Page 8 of Mixed Signals
“I guess you should,” I say with a laugh.
He hums, the sound rich and low between us. I watch the streetlights paint his face in shadow. Golds and silvers and warm, warm red. The smile slips from his mouth and his gaze trips into something hesitant. His eyes dart to me and then back to the road.
“Why did you go to dinner with a guy like that?”
I fidget in my seat.
“A guy like what?”
He mumbles something I don’t catch beneath his breath. “A guy that leaves you with the check and steals the silverware on his way out,” he says louder, clearer.
I sigh and press two fingers to my forehead. “You noticed that too, huh?”
“I heard you talking to Stella in the bakeshop a couple of weeks ago,” Caleb hesitates. “About a guy who used a lint roller on you before you got in his car.”
Ah, yes. Peter. He also made me put those little disposable surgical booties on over my heels, but I keep that to myself. I glance out the window and tuck my hair behind my ears. I straightened it tonight, something sleek and shiny. I feel silly about the effort now.
“I’ve had some bad luck recently with dating,” I finally manage as an explanation. It’s an understatement, but how else could I possibly explain the dumpster fire that is my love life?
Peter and Bryce aren’t even the worst of it. I had one guy ask me if we could pick up his mom after lunch and take her to her dry cleaner. I had another guy bring his best friend and proceed to act like I wasn’t even there at all. They talked about fantasy football for forty-nine minutes and did seven pickleback shots.
Each.
“And that guy—what was his name—Justin?”
“Jacob,” I supply quietly.
He’s the one that hurts the most. All of the rest—I can play them off as amusing stories to entertain my friends. Forays into the wild and weird world of dating. But I had been with Jacob for months. I had given him so many pieces of myself in a desperate attempt for it to work. I wanted so badly for someone to just … stick … that I made excuses. Justified his crap behavior and told myself he would get better. His ambivalence. His indifference. I told myself that he just needed time to settle into a comfortable rhythm. He just needed some time tolikeme.
But the more time I spent with him, the more I felt like I was losing those bits of myself that I had given him so freely. He didn’t prioritize me or our relationship. He was more committed to his phone than he ever was to me.
I deserved better than that. Ideservebetter than that.
“Jacob sucked,” Caleb says. His jaw does that clenching thing again.
“He did.”
“What’s going on, then?” Caleb nudges the turn signal with his wrist and we merge off the highway, closer to home. “These guys all seem like—”
“Douchebags?” I offer. Assholes? Giant, humiliating wastes of my time?
He laughs, but it doesn’t sound very funny at all. It’s sharp at the edges. “Yeah,” he agrees. “They all sound like douchebags.”
I don’t say anything in response. I don’t need the reminder that my romantic life is a disaster. That the one thing I’ve always secretly, quietly hoped for is as much a mystery to me as dark matter and extraterrestrial life. It doesn’t matter how many dates I go on, I’m as far away from it now as I’ve ever been.
I don’t understand how something so easy for everyone else can be so difficult for me.
“Layla.” Caleb presses out my name with a sigh. When he says my name like that, it feels like two hands curled around my shoulders, a gentle shake. “Why are you giving these guys your time? Why are you settling for crumbs when you deserve the whole damn cake?”
My chest pulls tight. An ache, right in the middle of me. “That’s a really lovely thought, but sometimes crumbs are all you’ve got.”
I can tell he doesn’t like my response, so I turn and stare out the window, watching the land slowly change as we move away from the coast. Everything here is rich and vibrant, late summer settling in earnest. Lightning bugs dance outside my window, quick flashes of gold as we speed past.
I wait for him to try and talk me out of my sad little conviction. When he doesn’t, when he just patiently waits for me to go on, something unlatches, and my words tumble out.
“I don’t know. I guess—I guess I’m just looking in all of the wrong places. I want someone to be mine. And not everyone is perfect right off the bat, you know? Sometimes people need a little time before they shine. Everyone deserves a chance.” I shrug again, feeling naive in the worst of ways. I mean, Peter stepped out of his car with a lint roller. Not so sure he deserved any of my attention after that. “And with Stella and Luka together, and Beckett and Evie, I’m kind of surrounded by it. I guess I’ve been thinking that crumbs are better than nothing.” I rest my forehead against the cool glass of the window. “Maybe that’s my problem. Maybe I should swear off cake altogether for a little bit, crumbs and all.”
Caleb is silent, the rumble of his Jeep beneath us the only sound. Wind at the windows and the low hum of voices on the radio.
