Page 53 of One Little Problem
“Not sure I’m ready for things to change with my dad and with us. It seemed like there was a way to keep what we had. Except if I stayed here, I’d lose it anyway.”
“Yeah.” Wasn’t sure he was asking, but I wanted to be clear.
“That sucks.”
“Yeah,” I agreed with that too.
Ryan sent me a withering look. “Say something else.”
“Xylophone.” No idea where the heck that came from.
“That’s what you went with?” Ryan questioned. At least he didn’t seem sad, sounded almost amused now.
I held my head high. “I stand by it.”
“Really?”
I grinned. “Yeah.”
He did smile now. “You’re an idiot.”
“Aww, babe.” Oops. “I mean, uh—"
“I’ll let it slide,” Ryan decided.
“Thanks… friend.” Thought that would be better than babe, but it wasn’t really.
We both made a face. Calling him my friend was just weird since most of my feelings towards him weren’t friendly. Seemed like he felt the same way. We were broken up. My head knew that. My heart still said, hey, it’s Ryan! and wanted to be happy he was around. I told my brain to shut up and just sat out here with him for a while.
I didn’t say anything for a while and neither did he, like neither of us wanted to leave.
* * *
Ryan
Reality check officially checked. I had come back down to Earth and evaluated my priorities. I felt… Still scared. But less scared too. Especially as Luke and I sat outside together. Hard not to be optimistic during the spring and summer. Flowers were blooming, birds chirped merrily, and I sat here with a gorgeous guy.
I possibly maybe, totally and completely, threw myself into things. I went big or went home. Maybe people telling me not to get super invested in Luke wasn’t the right thing. It was well meaning and solid advice but that was just kinda who I was. I understood their point, agreed with it, and then I was still going to draw his name and little hearts in all my notebooks.
That was how I rolled. All or nothing. It was okay to get a little head over heels, since I had someone watching out for me, but maybe it was all a balancing act. I had to step back eventually and consider me so Luke could do the same with him. I had to remember that I was totally going to want nothing more than relationship for a while but then I also had to apply that… me-ness to the next thing too.
“I guess I just need to have some faith,” I told Luke. “I’m scared because I don’t know what’s coming but that doesn’t mean things will end bad.”
“Are you talking about us?”
“I’m talking about I’m really unsure about Dad dating, but I know I don’t want to be the reason he doesn’t. I think I wanna give him my blessing.” Actually, I hadn’t meant to talk about my dad at all, but I was using it as a segue. Conversationally. Not the scooter. Did they still make those?
“You really don’t have to—"
“I know. But as much as I might not like it, I want to. And if I start feeling worse, I’ll just have to tell him, but I really want to be okay with it, so I just have to trust that I will be.” Like Luke said, I wasn’t really one to let fear stop me. Just because it was there didn’t mean that what’s coming was bad. And anyway. It was a simple question of what was more important: my doubts or my dad. Dad. Duh. Similarly, though I was scared, my future was more important than fear. “I also have to trust we’ll be okay even if I’m gone for the summer.”
I was skipping a couple steps there since we weren’t even together anymore, but Luke didn’t seem to mind. “You’re going?” he asked, sounding excited and hopeful. Screw it, I’m gonna go full cliché and compare his smile to the sun just peeking out behind the clouds of a rainy day, hesitant at first before filling everything with light.
“I’m glad that’s the part you’re wondering about,” I said, smiling. His smile made me smile too.
“Why?”
“Technically we’re not even together anymore so how could we be okay—"
