Betting on You(81)

“So… do you like Eli?” She looked toward the guys, then back at me. “He is so funny and cute—you’re lucky Charlie set you up with him.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I honestly haven’t really talked to him much so far.”

She nodded and glanced—yet again—at Eli and Charlie.

“So what do you think of Charlie?” I asked. “Cute, right?”

“Yeah,” she said, shrugging. “I mean, he’s cool, but I don’t really feel like there’s a spark.”

I looked over at Charlie and remembered his face when he’d been gazing at Becca at that party, the sad smile, and I didn’t want him to get rejected his first time back out there. Especially when his friends acted like he’d been a hermit since getting dumped.

“He’s so hilarious when you get to know him—give him a chance.”

“I don’t want to let him think there’s a chance when there isn’t.”

“No, I know.” I sighed, realizing that would be worse. “Sorry. He’s just my friend, and I wanted to find someone for him.”

“I think it’s cool how close you are,” Dana said. “I’d love to have a guy friend.”

I gave Charlie another glance, and as he smiled his smart-ass grin, looking cute in his jeans and long-sleeve tee, I wondered if he’d been right all along. Was it possible to just be friends? Because as I watched him, it was definitely more than friendship I was feeling.

Dammit.

We went back to the table, and the rest of the night pretty much went like bowling. Charlie and I tried showcasing each other, but our dates seemed to be equally disinterested in each of us.

I mentioned the Chicago Cubs, but when Eli said Are you a Cubs fan? and I said no, it dissolved into just another awkward attempt at lame small talk.

At the end of the night, as we put on our jackets and gave back the bowling shoes, Dana said to me, “I have to go pick up my car tonight from the shop on Blondo where it got new tires, and I totally don’t feel like it.”

“I live on Blondo,” Eli volunteered, his eyes lighting up like her freshly tired car was the greatest news he’d ever heard. “I can drop you on my way home, if you want.”

Dana’s face brightened. “Seriously?”

“But you said you’d go with me to Target after bowling,” I whined.

“I’m sure Charlie will,” Eli said, giving me the metaphorical boot. “Right, Charlie?”

Talk about feeling like an unattractive loser.

“Sure,” he said, his eyes on me like he was trying to figure out how I felt about the brush-off. “I want to go see my cat anyway; now I can bring him a toy.”

Dana and Eli looked beside themselves with joy as they said goodbye and headed for his car. Charlie and I, on the other hand, walked to his car in silence, each of us lost in our own thoughts. When we got to the vehicle, he said, “Did we seriously both get ditched by our dates?”

I stopped as he hit unlock. “Looks that way.”

Charlie said, “Did Dana tell you what she said when I asked her about college?”

“No.”

“I asked if she was going away or staying local. You know, just to show an interest in her life, right?”

I nodded. “Right…?”

He gave me a funny eye roll. “She said, and I quote, I’m not looking for a relationship right now.”

“Shut up!” I opened the passenger door and climbed inside the car. “That seems so arrogant, to assume that you are, with her.”

“And it didn’t even answer the question. I still have no idea if she’s going to MCC, Harvard, or Clown U, for fuck’s sake.”

I tried not to laugh.

“And,” he said, smiling just a little, “since it’s considered rude to shout WHO ASKED YOU TO in someone’s face, I had to keep it all inside my tiny heart.”

I did start laughing then. “Who asked you to—great line.”

“It was either that or Get the hell out of my bowling alley.”

I was cracking up as he started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. “I mean, at least she addressed you. I was pretty much invisible to Eli all night long.”

“I think she spelled him,” Charlie said.

“What?”

“Remember those Descendants movies? Where Mal spelled King Ben and made him fall in love with her?” He pulled his phone out of his pocket and said, “I bet Dana did that to Eli.”

“Because that’s the only logical explanation, right?”

“Exactly.” Charlie clicked into the Bluetooth to play his music and said, “By the way, since no one loves us and we have no prospects, do you want to go to our fall formals together?”

That made me snap my head toward him. “Are you serious right now?”

Was he serious? He wanted to go to both dances together? I’d been working so hard at knocking down my Charlie feelings; could I do the whole formal wear thing with him and not totally lose myself?

He nodded and said, “Sure. It’s senior year, so my mom will have a heart attack if I don’t go. I’m not into anyone, so at least if I go with you and vice versa, we know we’ll have fun, right?”