“What? She told me not to come. She told me to stay here. I didn’t think that warranted a phone call the next day just so she could say it to me again. I can’t take it from her. I can’t hear her tell me she doesn’t want to see me.”
“She still thought you’d come,” Ryan said, shaking his head. But he was wrong. There was no way in hell Jess thought I’d show up.
“Not possible,” I argued.
Ryan sighed, then spoke slowly as if I were the stupidest guy in the world. “She’s a chick. They want the fairy tale. She might have told you not to come, but you planted one hell of a fucked-up seed in her head, and then you left it there to rot.”
“You only think that because you don’t know her,” I said, waving him off. “She told me to stay here, and I listened. I listen to the things she says she wants from me. That’s what you do when you love someone.”
It wasn’t entirely true. Jess had wanted to stay together and I told her no, but that had been different. She wasn’t thinking clearly when she asked me that. I knew it would be disastrous, us trying to date long-distance, and I couldn’t do that to her. Jess thought she wanted us to stay together, but I knew the best thing for her future was to be apart.
Ryan shook his head sadly, as if he was some expert on the subject, even though he hadn’t had a serious girlfriend in the last five years. “No, you idiot. You read between the lines when you love someone. You learn when to listen to them and when to call them on their bullshit. And you learn the difference between when to fight and when to walk away.”
“Says the serial dater,” I shot back.
“I’m a serial dater because I know right away that the woman isn’t right for me, and I don’t string them along. That doesn’t mean that I haven’t learned to read women. Hell, I’m probably better at reading women than the two of you combined.” He waved a finger between Frank and me.
Frank let out an annoyed huff. “I think you should call her. You owe her an apology. And as much as I hate to admit it, knucklehead over here is probably right. Even though she told you not to come, she was probably still hoping you would.”
Ryan whipped out his cell phone and pressed a button. “Shit, Frank. Can you say that again? Nice and slow for the camera.”
Frank shoved away from the bar stool and flipped off the camera as he headed into the back office.
“Great. You made him leave,” I said, and Ryan turned the camera on me.
“Wave hi to the camera, Nick,” Ryan said with a laugh, and I flipped him off before spinning around, turning my back to the camera.
“Neither of you are any fun,” he grumbled. “I need to finish cleaning up the bar. We good here?”
I spun back around to face him. “Yeah, we’re good.”
Ryan headed back behind the bar as I flipped and turned the poker chip in my pocket, his words and my thoughts warring in my head.
Had Jess really wanted me to show up, even though she’d told me not to? Was Ryan right? I liked to think that I knew Jess’s heart far better than my brother did. There was no way she hadn’t meant what she said to me last night. The tone of her voice was way too serious, not playing around at all. And it wasn’t like she had called me today either. She knew I wasn’t coming, and she didn’t want me to.
I should have never called. Jess probably never wanted to hear from me again, and I didn’t blame her.
I’d never want to hear from me again either.
Getting over Him
Jess
I’d half expected time to slow to a crawl, for it to feel like it was barely moving at all after Nick’s call that night. But it hadn’t. If anything, time felt like it moved at warp speed, the days and weeks passing by in quick succession until they became months. I became more involved at the television station at school, picking up shifts when people were sick, and volunteered to work at all the fundraisers.
I loved how busy and productive my life had become, leaving me little time to think of Nick, even though he still lurked somewhere in the back of my mind. I wasn’t sure if he’d ever not be a part of me, even if only a small part. I’d noticed that when I gave his memory an inch, it took a mile, but thankfully even that seemed to be fading.
I’d even agreed to go on a date with a guy from the TV station who I thought was cute, but when I found there was less than zero chemistry between us, I didn’t encourage him further. Honestly, I was grateful that it was the lack of chemistry and not the abundance of Nick Fisher on the brain that had stopped me from seeing him again. At this rate, Nick would be a thing of the past in no time.
My courses were a breeze. I wasn’t sure if it was because the subjects came naturally to me or because I was so intrigued and invested in them, but I was thankful I wasn’t on the dean’s shit list at this school the way I had been down at State. One less thing to worry about was a good thing in my book.
Rachel came up twice to visit, and both times, she insisted we go to frat parties. When she complained the entire time about how much they sucked, I wanted to yell at her for being rude, but couldn’t find the willpower. Comparing these parties to those Nick’s fraternity used to throw was a joke. There was no comparison. It was sad, really. I mean, how hard was it to throw a good party for a bunch of underage, sex-crazed college students?
Apparently, Rachel and I were “frat party elitists,” as Brooke had dubbed us tonight after we decided to call it quits well before midnight and left the party. She wasn’t wrong. Nick’s parties had ruined us for all others.