“We are going out for dinner and ice cream; that part was true. Only it will be just you and me.”
“Just you and me,” I reiterate back to him, not sure why he feels the need to clarify, given that we’ve gone places just him and me before.
“Like a date.” He looks at the ground like he’s too nervous to meet my gaze.
My world turns on its axis.
“A date?” I blurt in surprise, having not expected that in the least.
I mean, there have been signs, little things that make me think maybe he feels it too, this shift between us. But normally, I chalk it up to my overactive mind seeing what it wants to see and not what’s actually there.
“Is that okay?” He shifts his weight from one foot to the other.
“Yes!” I answer way too enthusiastically. “Yes,” I repeat a second time, more calmly. “I would like that.”
The smile that spreads across his face is one that dreams are made of. A portrait that I wish I could capture for all eternity so that when I think back to this day, I can remember exactly what he looked like in this moment and how it made me feel.
“Cool.”
“Cool.” There I go again, repeating back to him what he already said to me.
“Well, since we’re officially going on a date.” He steps closer and my heart instantly begins to beat a new cavity in my chest, it’s pounding so hard. “I have one more question for you, LV, and it’s one I’ve wanted to ask you for a while now.”
“Okay.” I attempt to swallow past the lump that has formed in my throat, but the action feels impossible.
“Can I kiss you?”
I suck in an audible breath, my legs trembling so violently it’s a wonder they are able to still support my weight.
I open my mouth to say yes, but no words come out. I’m stunned speechless.
So I do the only thing a girl can do when her mouth seems to fail her—I nod.
It happens in slow motion.
Penn steps closer, his tall, lean body now pressed to mine in a way that feels more intimate than ever before. His hand slides across my cheek to the back of my head, angling my face up to him.
I’ve never kissed a boy before. Heck, I’ve never kissed anyone, at least not in this way.
He leans down, his face moving closer to mine. I hold my breath, praying that it will somehow mask how epically I am freaking out right now. Somehow, I think it only makes it more obvious.
I catch the small smile that turns up the corners of Penn’s mouth, like he knows exactly what I’m thinking, before there’s no more room between us.
His lips are softer than I imagined as he presses them to mine. One peck, a second, and then I feel his tongue slide across the seam of my mouth, asking for permission I more than willingly give. Even though I have no idea what I’m doing, instinct has me opening for him.
When his tongue slides across mine for the first time, I know right then and there that everything is about to change.
For a fourteen-year-old girl, I can’t imagine life gets any better than this.
“PLEASE TELL ME WHYI had to hear you were back in town from Cat Stewart of all people.”
I break out of my daydream, glancing up to see my oldest friend, Josie, slide into the booth across from me, not waiting to be invited to do so.
I came to Johnny’s in hopes of getting a little time to myself. Time to research some options and figure out my next move, because staying here isn’t it. I thought I could do it. Now I see just how delusional my desperation made me. Only I didn’t do any research. Hence why my laptop is still closed on the table in front of me.
“I’m sorry, Jos, I meant to call you,” I immediately say, taking in the sight of her for the first time in nearly a year.
Josie was the only person, outside of my family, that I stayed in touch with after I left. She even came to spend every New Year’s Eve with me in New York, which are some of my fondest memories of living there. Funny that it took a person from home to make me appreciate how lucky I was to be there, living the life I had always dreamed of.
