“Good?” Anna demands. “A first kiss better be more than good. It should knock your legs out from under you. Right?”
We all nod, if only to pry the details out of Keely. She sighs, resigning herself to being outnumbered. “On the boat, we were laughing. And when I leaned in, he was leaning in too. Like we’d done it a thousand times before. So. More than good.”
None of us speak for a few moments. But you can almost hear our shared longing, like an ache between ribs. If??only. I hope. This is a way I’d like to be kissed, immediately familiar but still exciting.
“So, Lucy,” Mohan says. “What was your first kiss with the ex-BF like?”
“Oh, come on. I’m not going to talk about that.” I’m sure they think I’m a prude, but really, I just don’t want to talk about kissing another guy in front of Henry. Not when I think about kissing him every time I near his orbit. He’s sitting on the log, and I’m on the blanket in front of him. I’m glad he can’t see my face.
“I bet it was on her front porch after a formal first date,” Mohan announces, as if I am not present. “Like, literally dinner and a movie.”
It was actually dinner and putt-putt, thank you very much. And he kissed me in the car at a red light. Like he couldn’t wait, like he might lose his nerve. Or maybe he was nervous that my dad would open the front door and find us on the porch, who knows?
Keely smiles over her drink. “And I bet it was the third date at least.”
Later. We went out for a while, held hands plenty before we kissed. So what? But I make my face blank, shrugging with a kind of smugness. I’ll never tell.
“Well, if that’s true, it’s very 1950s and romantic,” Anna, my real friend, says.
“People liked tongue in the fifties too,” Keely notes, and the other traitors snicker into their hands.
“Guess all you want,” I say, sipping my drink. “But you perverts wouldn’t know romance if it handed you a dozen roses.”
Mohan cackles with glee, while Keely brushes her hair back, dignified. “I prefer wildflowers, personally. Or handcuffs.”
“She only says these things to shock you,” Henry says, taking pity on me. But Keely waggles her eyebrows at me, and I really do wonder. “She was singing a different tune when Mr. Yadriel Soto was wooing her last year. She loved it.”
“How dare you bring that up!” Keely swats at his knee, and I lean away to avoid the fray. “Ugh, he was so hot. Do you remember how hot he was?”
“Mmmm,” Anna says, and Mohan raises one hand like he is praising Jesus for this guy’s hotness.
“Sometimes I get online just to look at pictures of him in his army uniform.” Keely sighs dreamily. “He’s stationed in North Carolina now.”
The conversation shifts to former flames, and I stretch, unfolding my crossed legs.
“You can lean back if you want,” Henry says.
“Oh. Thanks.” I might think this was weird, except that these four are always in contact with one another—Anna tucked into the crook of Mohan’s shoulder, Jones carrying Keely on his back.
When I relax against his legs, my blood speeds up, rushing to inform the rest of my body: We’re touching! We’re touching!
I did not use to be such an embarrassing person.
If you’re in a quiet enough room, you realize some lightbulbs make little sounds every once in a while. A zap of energy, an electric hum. When Henry leans forward to whisper something about Mohan’s ex-girlfriend, I swear something in my heart buzzes like a filament.
It’s the eye contact across crowded rooms, like I’m always the first person he looks for. Our evening routine in the rec room with easy conversation. I collect these moments like gold coins, adding them up in my mind. In the span of ten seconds, I can think both: This is happening! and Am I making it up?
It’s exhausting.
It’s exhilarating.
And suddenly, I need to flee. I’m nearly squirming from the way my heart flutters, and I just need to not drink any Christmas alcohol or talk about kissing.
“I’m actually gonna head back,” I announce.
Mohan swivels to me. “Say what?”
“I’m wiped from this week.”
“We understand, Boo.” Anna pats my leg, eyes already dreamy from the red-hots whiskey. T minus ten minutes till they’re talking about life in other galaxies.
Henry gets up behind me. “I’ll walk you back.”
“Oh. You don’t have to.” But I want you to. I think I might as well have said it, googly-eyed as my stupid face has got to be.
“Yes, he does,” Keely says. “Otherwise we’ll worry. And take a lantern.”
Henry points up at the full moon, high in the cloudless sky. “We’re good, I think. And I can use the light on my cell.”
Well, I guess this is happening. “Okay. Thanks. Night, guys.”
“Sleep tight!” Anna calls. And then the three of them exchange totally conspicuous glances. Am I making it up?
As we begin down the path, I hear Keely start in about how wild things really do happen during full moons. It’s documented.
“There they go,” I tell Henry. “Nerds.”
I don’t have to look over to know he’s grinning. “No doubt. But I like ’em.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
We’re halfway there when Henry pulls out his cell phone.
“The light is much dimmer than I thought,” he says, laughing. “Maybe we should have taken a lantern. I just didn’t want them bumbling around back there. At one point last year, Anna—”
Before he can finish the sentence, I step into some sort of divot. It only barely disrupts my gait, but Henry is ready to catch me, hand light on my back.
“Whoa. Okay. Do I need to carry you?”
“Nah.” I steady myself. “Imagine how jealous Neveah would be.”
“Ha.” His hand drops away, and he goes right back to his rambling walk and his story. Am I making this up?
Once we’re out of the woods, he keeps walking with me. Now that there are no trees overhead, I can see him clearly in the dove-gray moonlight.
“So, hey. I wanted to apologize on behalf of our idiot friends. They shouldn’t have grilled you like that about . . . your ex.”
“Oh, it’s fine,” I say. His expression is skeptical, perhaps even worried. “Really! It didn’t bother me.”
“Okay. Good. I just thought they might have offended you. Like, maybe you were doing that thing where you don’t kiss anyone till you get married. I mean it’s cool if—”
“What? No!” I laugh a little under my breath, to let him know that’s a silly thought. I know a few people who are doing that, but it’s not for me. “Why? Because my dad’s a pastor?”
He shrugs, with a guilty little grimace. That’s a yes.
I shake my head. “I was, in fact, kissing a real live boyfriend until last month.”
“Well, I didn’t think you made up a boyfriend. I mean, Luke and Lucy. It’s terrible.”
“Lukas. He doesn’t like being called Luke.”
“That’s worse somehow,” he says, laughing again. “You’d invent a better name than that if he was fake.”