“You look nice,” Tyler told me, flashing his incredible smile at me when he got in.
“Thanks. Just letting my mom dress me up, like a Barbie doll.” I grinned slyly. “It was this or the holiday-sparkle gown. It’s pretty fancy. I think you’da liked it.”
Laughing, he pulled his car away from the curb. “I think you made the right call. Not sure you’d fit in wearing a ball gown.” Tyler grinned. “But I like the new you.”
I wanted to laugh, too, but instead I smiled weakly. The new me. That was the thing. I was the same; it was everyone else who’d changed.
“Yeah? Where we going?” I asked. Surreptitiously, so he wouldn’t notice, I pulled my phone out and noted the time. It was 3:11.
“I figured I’d get you out of the house before the neighbors start to think you’re some kind of shut-in or something.” He tapped his thumbs on the steering wheel while he drove, and I wasn’t sure if it was a habit or if I made him nervous. I hoped it was that last thing, because I’d hate to think it only went one way.
“Shut-in? I’ve only been home for five days, and I’ve barely been there. Pretty sure I don’t qualify as a shut-in.”
He shrugged. “Then I guess I thought you might want to grab some coffee with me.” Cocking his head, he shot me a look. “Did they even have coffee in your day? ’Cause we could go someplace else. Maybe split a root beer float or something.”
I shoved him. “Okay, smart-ass. Coffee’s good.” I laughed, and wondered if he’d watched the clock half as much as I had today.
The coffee shop he took me to was cute, not a Starbucks or Seattle’s Best Coffee—the kinds of corporate places Cat and I had sworn off because Cat had convinced me they were “bastardizing” the coffee culture. Austin had gone along with our boycott because he liked making out with me, but I’m not sure why any of us thought getting our coffee from the Gas ’n’ Sip was any more humanitarian. It was a gas station, after all.
After ordering, Tyler dragged me to a spot in the back where we found a table away from all the noise. It was quieter and less crowded than near the counter, where people were coming and going, and the espresso machine hissed, and there was the constant banging as the baristas replaced old grounds with fresh ones. Tyler leaned forward, over the top of his double-shot mocha, and studied me pensively. “I’m sorry about the other day,” he blurted out. “About how I acted when Austin came by.”
My eyebrows squeezed together. My chest squeezed even tighter. I’d thought about it more times than I could count, but I guess I hadn’t really expected him to apologize. “It’s okay . . .” I started, and then realized the thing about Tyler was that I could talk to him. I’d nearly forgotten how good it felt just to be near him. How he didn’t act like my feelings didn’t count, and that I shouldn’t rock the boat. “It sucked, really. All this time I’ve been back, all I thought I wanted was to see him, and then when I did . . .” I shook my head. “It wasn’t at all what I thought it’d be. He was . . . he was a jerk. He didn’t really care about me or what I was going through; he just came over to . . . make himself feel better, I guess. He didn’t even ask how I’ve been . . . or where I was the whole time I was gone.” I looked across the table to Tyler, who was just sitting there, listening. To me. “And then you got home, and all I could think was how you would’ve asked me those things. But you looked so upset, and I felt like a jerk for not stopping you when you went inside.” He didn’t try to console me or interrupt me or tell me that I was wrong to have the feelings I had, the way Austin would have. He just let me unload on him, and it was so . . . freeing. I kept going. “And then today, I had such a shitty day, and instead of going home after school, you came right over.” I stopped talking when I realized I’d just confessed to spying on him. My cheeks felt like they might burst into flames, and I bit my lip before I said anything more incriminating.
His expression shifted from wistful concern to amusement in a blink. He grinned at me, obviously not about to let my slip pass that easily. “You were watching me?”
I made a face at him. “Whatever. I noticed you were home, that’s all. Not that strange, considering I live across the street, you know?”
“And you just happened to be looking out your window at the exact moment I got home. . . . That seems a little strange. C’mon, admit it. You were waiting for me.”
“Uh, no,” I insisted, perfectly fine with the fact that I was lying through my teeth. “I was looking out the window, and I happened to see you. The end. But it’s awesome you think I have nothing better to do all day than to sit around thinking about you.”
He leaned back in his chair, his smile so wide, and his dimple so deep, he looked positively full of himself. When had little Tyler grown into this guy who oozed such confidence? And how could I have ever thought of him as little? “Okay,” he allowed, but there was nothing in his tone to suggest that he believed a single word I’d said. “If you say so.”
I didn’t think it was possible, but my cheeks got even hotter. Lifting my plain-old ordinary drip coffee to my lips, I took a sip, hiding behind the cup for as long as possible.
“It was hard . . . seeing Austin again. Seeing how much he’s changed and knowing the things I know . . . about him and Cat.” And then I set down my cup again and confessed, “But it was worse today. I saw Cat.”
I didn’t know if this was too weird to share all this with him. Even though I felt something—whatever it was—for Tyler, I couldn’t ignore the history I’d had with Austin. Austin had walked away from our past years ago, but it didn’t stop the weight that had settled deep in the pit of my stomach, that felt heavier each and every time I thought of what we’d once had together.
Tyler was great and all, but he was just a distraction. A really adorable distraction.
At least that’s what I told myself.
“I know.” He set his phone on the table between us as if he was confessing something with it. “She called after she saw you, to see if I was out of school yet. She was crying, and I think she just wanted someone to talk to. She said almost the same things about seeing you.” He shrugged and leaned forward again. His voice was shades more thoughtful than it had been when he’d been teasing me about watching him.
It was what made me feel comfortable confiding in him—that serious way of his, that quiet maturity. “She said you hadn’t changed a bit. I guess that made it worse for some reason, because she said she wanted everything to be the same as before. She . . .” He paused and frowned, and I wondered if he was recalling his conversation, filtering parts of it and deciding what he should and shouldn’t tell me. Holding back. “She wishes her and Austin could undo what they did.”
My heart lurched. I wished for that too. So badly it was probably written all over my face.
I looked at Tyler, sitting across from me with his messy hair and concerned expression. He watched me without judging me, or asking anything from me I wasn’t capable of giving, or making me feel guilty for not acting a certain way or believing things I couldn’t believe. He was just here to help me figure out who I was and how I fit into this new world I’d been dropped into.
I hated that I found it harder and harder to hold on to my feelings for Austin, not to let them be eclipsed by these new and uninvited feelings Tyler had stirred in me.
“But they can’t, can they?” I admitted. Emptiness filled my chest.
He shook his head. “They’re not bad people, Kyra. It wasn’t an accident, them getting together, but it wasn’t malicious either. I was there. I was young, but I was around when it happened. Austin was a wreck after you vanished.”