“So, anyway…you gonna tell me what this list is you were mumbling on about last night in the bathroom?”
Her head snaps up and her eyes lock on me. They look so much greener without her glasses. She looks totally different. Kinda like when Clark Kent takes his glasses off and suddenly he’s no longer a geek. It’s like I knew she was hot before but fuck me, now she’s beautiful.
“I told you about the list?”
“No, not really, you just kept mumbling something about having to cross off the list.” My interest is suddenly magnified a billion percent at the panicked look on her face right now.
“So, you gonna tell me what it is?”
“It’s personal, I’d rather not. It’s kind of…um, it’s just...”
Truthfully, I’m a little hurt that after what’s just unfolded between us, she can’t tell me about a stupid list. The hurt must be evident on my face. She replaces her glasses and looks back at me.
“Look, okay. Emily, my best friend, died a few months back and she’d written me this letter with a list attached, kind of like a bucket list. She’d written down things that she wanted to do before she died. There were still things that she hadn’t crossed off. She wants me to finish it for her. I haven’t told anyone about it, I don’t think she would have wanted me to. I know it sounds crazy but it’s the last thing she’s ever asked of me, so I feel like I need to do it for her.”
“It doesn’t sound crazy at all.” I say crossing the room and sitting beside her.
“Yeah well, one of the items on her list was to get wasted.”
“Wait, so you’re telling me that she’d never been drunk?” I say, disbelief clear in my voice.
“Neither of us had.” She shrugs her shoulders and carries on.
“She was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia when we were fifteen. She started chemotherapy the day after she found out. She was on so many drugs to try control the cancer, she couldn’t have gotten drunk even if she’d wanted to—it would have screwed with her treatment. She was my best friend; we did everything together. I wasn’t about to leave her at home and start partying without her… I mean what kind of friend would do that, right? Obviously, it must have bothered her more than I realized because she put it on her bucket list.”
Wow, now I feel like a complete dick for not believing she’d never been drunk.
“So, at least you got to tick off one of her things then, huh?” I say. “I’m pretty sure she’d have been impressed with your efforts.”
“Yeah well, I actually managed to cross off two with the whole singing in front of half the senior class.”
She’s smiling but shaking her head at the same time, like she can’t believe what she did.
“Em wanted to be a singer, she had an amazing voice, too. I can hold a note, but seriously she was like Adele or something, her voice was that good. Thing is, she was super confident about everything except singing in front of people—she just couldn’t do it. Too nervous, I suppose. Performing to a crowed was on her list too. Do you think last night classifies as a crowd?”
“Definitely,” I offer, “and you nailed that too.”
She blushes again and it takes every ounce of strength in me not to lean over and kiss her. I want to pin her down and completely posses her. Kiss every part of her. Taste every part of her. Bite down on that plump bottom lip, and run my hands over her soft creamy skin. But I can’t let myself go there, not yet. When I do finally kiss her, and I definitely will, I want her to remember it forever, without it being tainted by the memory of how this morning started out.
I can’t resist her, though, so I give in a little to the temptation and lean forward, placing a feather-light kiss to her forehead. I think I must have shocked the hell out of her because she’s sitting like a statue not moving, I can’t even hear her breathe. I’m officially starting to panic when she seems to shake off whatever the hell that was and smiles. I relax and smile back.
“Come on, Princess, I think it’s time I get you home.”
I’VE MADE A promise that I don’t think I can keep. He asked me not to tell anyone about his situation and I agreed I wouldn’t. I regret it already. I have to tell someone. It’s not right what’s happening to him. I snatch the keys from my purse and follow him out of the pool house to my car.
“Keys.” He holds his hand out expectantly.
“Huh?”
“Keys,” he repeats. “You can’t drive after the amount you drank last night. You’ll probably still be over the limit.”
“Oh, right… yeah, okay,” I say, tossing my keys to him. I throw like a girl and he has to lunge forward to catch them.
“I’ll drive you home and walk back.”
“You can’t do that,” I say, feeling guilty that I probably wrecked his night and now I’m dominating his morning, too.