Chapter 17: Do You Like Her?
Do you like her?
The question just hung there in the air between us. My brain, which had been a chaotic mess of pain and apologies and drama all morning, went completely, utterly silent. It was like someone had hit the mute button on my internal monologue.
I just stared at Jake.
’Like her?’ I thought, the words echoing in the new-found quiet in my head. ’Like, like her?’
It was such a simple question, but it felt huge. I had never actually stopped to ask myself that. Everything had happened so fast. The accident, the goddess, the system, the hospital, the puking, the punch... It had all been about survival and managing the next crisis. There hadn’t been any room to think about something like that.
But now, with Jake staring at me, waiting for an answer, I had to.
Did I like Nina?
I mean, she was cute. That was obvious. The first time I saw her kneeling next to me on the floor, even with my jaw throbbing, that was my first thought. ’She’s beautiful.’ But being attractive and liking someone were two different things, right?
I thought about her in the hospital. The way she’d looked so exhausted, sleeping in that uncomfortable chair just because she was worried about me. The way her face lit up when I said her cooking was good. That wasn’t just guilt. That was... nice. She was a nice person, a genuinely kind person under all that popular-girl stuff.
Then I thought about today. Her crying, telling me she thought of me as a friend. That hit me hard. No one had ever said anything like that to me, not with that much honesty.
So, yeah. I liked her. I liked that she was nice. I liked that she was easy to talk to, when I wasn’t being a complete jerk. I liked that she could be so worried and vulnerable, but also laugh at my stupid jokes.