“Oh my god, no!” Leo says in disgust. “How could you think that?”

I gesture impatiently toward the locker rooms, where the other girl is still standing there with an increasingly hurt expression.

“No,” Leo protests. “I don’t care that you didn’t want to have sex with me. I mean, I was hoping you would, but it’s fine. You weren’t ready. I was okay with that.”

“So you just—I don’t know—found a girl who was ready?”

“I’m not assuming that she’s going to have sex with me. I thought I’d see what happens, go with it, you know.”

“Oh, I know,” I say. “But she—”

“I actually think you’d really like Kayla,” he continues, the most nonsensical thing he’s said so far. “Did you see her swim today? She’s got the best form of any girl on the team. And she’s really funny. She—”

“Please stop talking about Kayla,” I say.

“Okay.” He nods. Clears his throat. “I just think if you got to know her—”

“You said you loved me,” I say, again too loudly, and someone passing by catches the words and hoots at us. We both redden. I cross my arms over my chest. “That was yesterday, that you said that. Less than twenty-four hours ago.”

“I know. I didn’t mean—”

“So you meant it like the way a person says they love peanut butter cups.”

His eyebrows squeeze together in confusion. “I don’t like peanut butter.”

I close my eyes for a few seconds. “Fine. So maybe the way a person says they love a good cheeseburger.” My stomach turns at the thought. The chlorine smell of the pool is so strong it makes me feel dizzy. I lean against the wall and take a deep breath.

Leo scratches at the back of his neck. “Yeah, I guess I meant it that way. I do like you, Ada. Really. You have to believe me. I meant it, what I said.”

“So I’m the cheeseburger in this scenario. And she—” I gesture again toward the locker rooms.

“Kayla,” he fills in.

“Thank you. Kayla. She’s the shrimp cocktail.”

“Actually, I’m allergic to shrimp,” he says.

“Goodbye, Leo,” I say. I push off from the wall and run for the door.

This time he doesn’t run after me.

I’m halfway through the parking lot when I think of more I want to say. About how if you kiss someone regularly, if you go on (I do the calculations in my head) twenty or possibly twenty-one dates with a boy, over the course of five fucking months, it should be safe to assume that he’s your boyfriend. And about honesty. And about communicating your expectations.