The Summer Girlfriend (Heart Beach, #1)(43)
“Yeah, sorry.” Jeremiah scratched the back of his neck. “Work’s been crazy. I probably responded to you in my head but forgot to actually text back.”
That was half true. Jeremiah had seen Theo’s text, and he’d known that Theo would want to go out like they used to. After Pop died, Jeremiah took a hard look at himself and realized that he needed to change. He thought of Pop’s wishes for him to find his real purpose and to stop wasting his life around people who didn’t care about him. He could be more than just the guy people invited out for a good time. Further driving home Pop’s point, after he died, no one in that friend group bothered reaching out to Jeremiah to offer their condolences. It had been Jeremiah’s final wake-up call. After that summer, he fell back from that friend group, and he stopped going out altogether. What had surprised him was how quickly he realized that he didn’t miss any of it.
So when Jeremiah saw Theo’s text come through, he purposely hadn’t responded. There was no easy way to explain that he couldn’t chill with Theo anymore because the activities that they’d once bonded over were no longer part of his life, and without that, he and Theo didn’t have much foundation for a friendship.
“Right, Good Boy,” Theo said. “You’re killing it. My ex had a subscription for her mean-ass Chihuahua.” He sent a curious glance in Noelle’s direction.
“Theo, this is my girlfriend, Noelle.” To Noelle, Jeremiah explained, “Theo and I went to college together.”
“Hi,” Noelle said. She gave a small wave and a smile.
“Girlfriend?” Theo laughed in surprise. “Damn. In all the years I’ve known Jeremiah, he’s never had a serious girlfriend, although he definitely had friends, if you know what I mean. Never met someone brave enough to tame him until now, I guess…”
Theo trailed off, and an awkward silence permeated the air.
“Noelle is too special for me to not be serious about her,” Jeremiah said. He looked at Noelle with a genuine smile.
“Jeremiah swept me off my feet,” she said with soft adoration.
“Cool.” Theo nodded, clearly uninterested in their expressions of affection. “Listen, a few of us are meeting up tonight at the Sand Saloon. Y’all should come out. Have some fun.”
“We have plans tonight, actually,” Jeremiah said, nodding at Noelle. “We’re gonna have to pass.”
“Aww, nah, bro. Change your plans! Bring your lady!” Theo looked at Noelle. “If you’re with Jeremiah, I’m guessing you already know how to have a good time. Come on, convince him to bring you out with us instead.”
“Nah, we’re gonna chill,” Jeremiah said, more firmly.
Theo sucked his teeth and waved Jeremiah away. “You got into a relationship and turned boring. I hate to see it!” He laughed, but his laughter abruptly stopped once he saw the irritated look on Noelle’s face. “Sorry, I’m joking. I don’t have a great sense of humor.”
“Clearly,” Noelle mumbled under her breath.
“It was good to see you, Theo,” Jeremiah said, officially signaling that it was time for the conversation to end. “Enjoy the rest of the party.”
“Will do.” Theo saluted Jeremiah and smiled guiltily at Noelle. “See you around.”
Noelle nodded, frowning as she watched Theo retreat to the party.
“How good of a friend is he to you?” she asked Jeremiah.
“We’re not super close.”
“Oh,” she said. Then, “I don’t know if I like him very much.”
Jeremiah chuckled, exhausted. “Me neither, to be honest. We didn’t have much in common, other than partying. But I don’t really do that anymore now, so.”
She paused, tilted her head. “Can I ask you something? It’s personal.”
Jeremiah studied her for a beat. He was a little wary about what she might ask, but he found that he wanted to answer whatever question she had for him. He nodded.
“You said before that you don’t really have a lot of friends and that you changed your lifestyle. Why did you decide to make those changes?”
“I, uh, just wasn’t surrounding myself with the best people,” he said. “And I wasn’t really living up to my full potential. I mean, I’m still trying to figure out what my full potential is now, but I wasn’t trying at all then. Before my grandfather died, he said some things about how I was living that made me want to change.”
That was the most he’d ever admitted to anyone about his last conversation with Pop. He looked over at Noelle, wondering what he’d see in her face. Her brows drew together, and her lips parted like she was about to ask a follow-up question. But then she bit her lip and nodded.
It was easier for him when people didn’t poke around in his thoughts and ask for more. But for some reason, he’d hoped that Noelle might have pressed further. Maybe it was because she never seemed to judge him, and he appreciated that.
“About our breakup,” she said, changing the subject completely. “We haven’t discussed the reason behind it. Something that Mercy Webster said stuck with me, though. What if there’s tension between us because you’re moving soon, and the thought of being long distance has been stressing us out, and we realized we won’t be able to last, so we argue and break up.”