Playing Hard to Get(2)

“Yeah, he does need to watch it. You’re so right.” I meet his gaze once again to find him studying me with interest in his eyes. I think I impressed him with the knee talk. I only know this info because of all the chatter I overhear at the store. At the student center. At the lounge in my apartment building that’s on campus.

I cannot escape the football players, especially Knox Maguire.

“You like football?” the guy asks, pulling me from my thoughts.

“Sort of.” I shrug. Smile. Then hit a button on the register. “That’ll be one-hundred-fifty-two dollars and thirty-six cents.”

He whistles, pulling his credit card from his battered wallet. “Probably will barely crack the book open all semester.”

“Don’t forget we buy back textbooks,” I remind him, on autopilot.

Working at the student bookstore, I say that a lot.

“I shouldn’t even buy it. What’s the point? I’ll just beg some hot girl to share her notes with me.” He taps his card, the reader making a noise, indicating it’s going through. “What’s your name?”

I don’t want to tell him. I don’t like this guy. Not really. But I don’t want to be a complete bitch either. “Joanna.”

“I’m Mark.” He smiles.

“Hey Mark.” I point at the credit card reader screen. “Mind signing that for me?”

He scribbles his finger across the screen and I stash the receipt in his bag before handing it over. “Maybe I’ll see you around,” he says, voice purposely casual.

“Maybe,” I echo, knowing I probably won’t. He doesn’t seem like the type to hang out here or in the library, which is my other favorite haunt. “Thank you. Have a nice day.”

“You too.” He grins just before he takes his bag and leaves the counter. I watch him go, letting out a small sigh of disappointment as I slowly shake my head.

Men. They’re pitiful.

“He was flirting with you.”

A startled yelp escapes me and I whirl around to find my coworker, my friend, one of my favorite people in the entire world, Leon, watching me with narrowed eyes.

“You scared me!” I rest my hand against my chest, trying to ease my overly active heart. “And he was not.”

“He was,” Leon says firmly. “And you were clueless, as usual.”

I wasn’t that clueless. “What am I supposed to do, offer up my number? Ask him to meet me for coffee sometime?”

“Yes and yes.” Leon stands next to me at the counter, nudging his shoulder into mine. I grip the counter, so I don’t go toppling. Leon is stronger than he looks. “You need to get back out there. You’re moping, and I’m over it.”

“I am not moping.” I sound defensive.

Guess what? I am defensive.

My boyfriend and I broke up at the beginning of the summer and I was absolutely…devastated. Bryan and I had been together since midway through our senior year in high school, and when we got into different universities, I worried we would end things before they even really started. We were a total high school cliché. After lots of crushing on each other and wasting time, we were finally a couple, only to go our separate ways after graduation.

But Bryan said that it didn’t matter where we were. He was in love with me and wanted to keep seeing me, even if we were at different colleges. In different states—he’s in Arizona and I’m in Colorado because I wanted to stay closer to home. I, of course, agreed to a long-distance relationship because I felt the same way. I was in love with that boy and fully prepared to go the distance. As time went on, as we made it through one year, and then the next, I felt secure. We were going to make it. Hell, we even talked about getting married and having children, for the love of all that is holy, and then what does he go and do?

Breaks up with me in May—during finals week, the bastard—for a girl named Clara.

She goes to his college. They share the same major. They share a lot of the same classes. Fairly certain he cheated on me with his new girlfriend, though he will deny it until the day he dies.

Whatever. I’m over it.

Mostly.

“You are moping. And it’s bringing me down,” Leon says, reaching over to pat my hand. I snatch it off the counter, turning my back to him and grabbing a pile of books that need to be put back on the shelves. “Avoiding me isn’t going to change things. You’re still miserable!”

He calls out the last sentence to me as I walk away, and as discreetly as possible, I give him the finger.

All Leon does is laugh in response. The jerk.

But he’s not really a jerk. He’s just concerned about me, and I love him for it. Mostly because, deep down, I know he’s speaking the truth. I’ve been especially cranky lately and I need to do something about it. I need to get out of this funk.

How though? I’m not ready to date. Not yet. I’m probably too independent. That’s what happens when you’re in a long-distance relationship for over two years. You don’t spend a lot of time with your significant other, and you learn how to be on your own.

I’m so on my own now, I can’t imagine tying myself to someone else. Just…

No, thank you.

I take my sweet time putting away the books, forcing Leon to take over ringing-up duties. With school starting, we’ve been so busy the last couple of weeks, but it’s finally begun to slow down, thank goodness. Despite my occasional grumbling, I really do love my job. I’ve been here for the last year, and I like being amongst the books and the school merchandise—we are the number-one seller of campus-themed merch, of course. Everyone comes here to purchase their Golden Eagle team gear to wear to football games.