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It’sme.
My palms are sweaty, so I wipe them on my jeans as I walk around and meet her where she stands up. I reach my hand out for hers and she grabs it.
We walk toward the infamous closet and close ourselves inside.
“Your seven minutes starts now!” someone yells from outside and I can see Hollis’s face is painted with nervousness.
In all the time I’ve known her, I’ve never once heard her talk about a crush or even boys—or girls—for that matter. But I know that will all change when she enters her freshman year. I know it did for me. Though, in all honesty, none of the girls I ever hung out with compared to her.
To Hollis.
Yes, she’s been my best friend since I can remember. But dating other girls never crossed my mind even when all of my other friends all had girlfriends because none of them were better than the girl I taught how to ride a fucking bike.
And now that I’ll be an adult tomorrow—with society shitting on age gap relationships—I don’t know how it would have ever worked out anyways had I told her about my true feelings.
Plus, the plan was always for me to leave for college, and that’s not fair to her.
“Jax.” Her sweet, soft voice pulls me from my overthinker-status, and I’m drawn to her deep brown eyes.
“Five minutes!” the person outside yells.
She bites her lip and looks down at her own hands, twisting her thumbs in circles over each other.
“So,” I say, not sure how to fill this time.
Ithinkabout kissing her, I really do. But again, that would be selfish. And what if she doesn’t feel the same way.
My feelings for Hollis started developing as more than friendship about a year ago. Maybe because we had started spending less time with each other seeing as we were in two different schools and had different friend groups. So, when I did get to see her or hang out with her as much, it was like coming back home, in a sense. Not really knowing what you have until it’s gone, type of thing.
But at my age, does one even know what it is they really want?
So it’s better that we leave this closet as friends and my secrets buried in the walls around us because there’s no point in bringing up something I don’t even really understand just for it to confuse her and for me to leave.
“What are you going to tell people when we get out of here?” she asks, now holding herself around the waist, her arms wrapped around herself as if she’s trying to protect herself.
“I'll tell them whatever you want me to tell them, Holli.” That gives her a little bit of ease and a small smile curls over her lips.
Her eyes bat at me and all I can think about is pulling her into me and giving her a small kiss. Has she ever been kissed? I know my first kiss was when I was her age, and it was at a party almost exactly like this one.
“Jaxon, I-” She goes to speak up but someone pounds on the door and yells that we have three minutes left, which causes her to jump.
I laugh.
“Not funny.” She reaches out and playfully slaps her hand across my arm, but I grab it before it makes contact. And then I pull her in.
Her breath hitches and it makes me nervous. I've never done anything like that before, been anything but playful and friendly.
“Have you ever been kissed before, Hollis?” I don’t know why I ask and her brow arches at me and her eyes widen. Almost like she’s embarrassed. I let go of her hand and she lets it fall to her side.
“It’s okay if you haven’t. And it’s none of my business, really.” I curse myself for possibly sending her mixed signals and for nearly crossing a line that shouldn't be crossed.
“No, I haven’t. But Jax, what if there's something I want to tell you but I don’t know how to say it?” Her tone sounds shy, like her nervousness is tightening around her words.
“Then you can wait until you do know how to say it.” I assure her.
I watch the way she turns over her thoughts, her eyes looking anywhere but me for a beat, and her front teeth sawing on her bottom lip.
I wonder what she could be thinking about, because all I’m thinking about is how shitty it’s going to be for me to leave Texas tomorrow having never known what it would be like to get the girl. How I’ll never be able to getmytime with Hollis and that I have to leave keeping her as just my friend, when I know I want more.
