Page 34 of What We Break
"No, but you need to date some of them. Otherwise, what's the point?"
The point of what?Living somewhere? Building a life? Having a job and friends and a fiddle leaf fig that depends on me?
I take a sip of my beer and swallow the response I actually want to give. "I don't know. I'm just taking things slow."
Bethany raises an eyebrow. "Slow? You? The woman who once hooked up with that doctor in Nashville after knowing him for three hours?"
"That was different."
"How?"
Because I knew I'd be gone in a month, so it didn't matter. Because nothing I did there would follow me to the next place. Because temporary people get temporary treatment, and I was the most temporary person in every room I walked into.
"I don't know. It just was."
Bethany studies me like I'm something furry under a microscope. I don't love that look. "You really are different here."
"Good different or bad different?"
"I honestly don't know yet."
Before I can figure out how to respond, Bethany's attention shifts over my shoulder.
"Oh my god, don't look, but there's this incredibly hot guy at the bar who's been checking you out for the past five minutes."
I immediately turn around. Of course I do. There's a guy leaning against the bar — dark hair, nice smile, button-down that actually fits him properly. He catches me looking and raises his beer in a little salute.
"I told you not to look!" Bethany hisses, grinning.
"You knew I was going to look."
"True. He's cute, right? You should go talk to him."
I shrug. Yeah he's attractive, but I'm not in the mood. And the idea of someone coming back to my apartment — myhome— feels wrong. When I was in temporary apartments or long-stay hotels, it didn't matter who passed through. But my apartment isn't temporary. I bought a couch. I have a fig.
Your standards for who enters your home are: must be more committed than a houseplant. The bar is literally on the floor and you're still not interested.
When I get up for the bathroom, cute bar guy intercepts me.
"Hey," he says. Up close he's even better looking. "I'm Matt."
"Laine."
"Can I buy you a drink, Laine?"
Nice voice. Friendly eyes. Expensive cologne. The kind of guy who probably works in finance and has strong opinions about craft beer.
"Sure," I say. "But I'm here with my friend."
"Bring her over. I've got friends too."
So that's how I end up spending the next two hours at a table with Matt and his buddies — Tyler and something that starts with J that I immediately forget. They're nice enough, attractive enough, successful enough. The kind of guys I used to be happy to spend time with. Happy to flirt with.
Matt's charming in that practiced way that means he's done this before. Lots of eye contact, lots of questions about me, lots of casual touches on my arm when he laughs. He buys our drinks and tellsfunny stories about his job in marketing and asks about nursing like it's the most fascinating career in the world.
And I'm bored out of my mind.
"That must be so rewarding," he says when I mention working in the ER. "Helping people, saving lives."
