Page 42 of The Summer Plans

Why don’t I believe you?

I know he’s an idiot, but he’s a good guy. Unless he was a dick.

He wasn’t a dick. I could handle it if he was a dick.

What do you mean? Your reasoning makes no logical sense. You don’t like him, yet you ask about him. You want breakfast in bed, but not from him. And every time someone mentions his name you go on full alert. I know I dared you to kiss him, and it was terrible, but this seems like overkill.

She’s not wrong. And she’s way too smart for me to continue this charade. I can’t tell her the whole truth when I can’t even admit it to myself, but I wrack my brain, trying to think of any logic possible to make Raven understand this.

Imagine if someone dared you to kiss one of your best friends in front of everyone. And it was your first kiss, and you’d spent your whole life watching movies and reading books about the perfect first kiss. You’re nervous. He’s one of your best friends so it won’t be all bad, right? You’ll be able to laugh about it later, you think. But instead of it being some quick peck with a little tongue, your braces get stuck together. And it’s in front of everyone from your class because you live in a small town. You’re humiliated. He’s humiliated. Everyone’s laughing, and while it’s funny now, it was mortifying back then. I didn’t kiss anyone again until college because no one wanted to kiss me after that. And RJ stopped being my friend.

Fuck. I’m so sorry. I didn’t know you felt that way. Why didn’t you ever say anything?

It wasn’t your fault. It was just a messed-up situation.

How isn’t it my fault? I dared you to kiss. That never would’ve happened if I hadn’t done that.

No, but you didn’t make us kiss. And you didn’t kiss so hard the rubber bands on your braces got stuck together. I accept your apology, but it’s not your fault. I’m probably being hyperbolic, it’s not like it ruined my life or anything.

No, but you’re right about RJ. He broke off from our little trio after that. I just figured since he was dating Jessica, he was all into her. Boys of that age can have a one-track mind. Do you think it was because of that kiss?

No. I mean, I hope not. But then Todd did cheat on me, so maybe I’m just a bad kisser?

FUCK TODD!!!!!!!!

That’s a lot of exclamation points.

One for each time I want to punch him in the face.

I love you.

And you’re not a bad kisser.

LOL

That’s a weird thing to say to your BFF.

And how would you know, you’ve never even kissed me.

Kissing is subjective. Everyone likes different things. And there are so many factors. Lips, tongues, teeth, saliva, biting, sucking, how much force you use, etc. What is good to one could be too much tongue to someone else. And sometimes people’s natural kissing styles just click, but other times people learn what their partner likes and adjust.

That’s some pretty sound logic. I’ve never really thought about all that.

So you’re not a bad kisser. You just haven’t found someone that clicks with your style or has taken the time to learn what you like.

Oh.

But I still feel like an ass about my brother.

It’s fine. It just sucks. I’m stuck in a house with him, and we’ve never talked about everything from back then. It’s awkward. If he was being mean, it’d be easy to brush him off. I don’t know if I want to be friends with him again. Things will never be like it was when the three of us used to hang out. We’ve all changed, grown into different versions of ourselves. And if I learned anything from my divorce, it’s that men can’t be trusted.

RJ is nothing like Todd. He would never do to anyone what that asshole did to you. I raised him better.

You’re like 2 years older than him.

I still helped raise him. We didn’t get a lot of parenting growing up. We only had each other. And I had to keep him in line so we didn’t become wards of the state. So I did raise him. Though if you asked him, he’d say I just bossed him around a lot. You should talk to him, tell him how you feel about what happened back then. He’s a good guy. And if he acts like a dick, let me know and I’ll sit on him.

I stuff the last of the pancakes in my mouth as I read through her last message. This is why Raven is my best friend. When I spiral, she steps in to calm me down, diffusing my emotional bomb with her reasoning. It makes me feel like shit that I’m not being fully honest with her. I should tell her how deep my feelings run for her brother, but I think part of me is scared that she’ll talk me out of it, talk me out of liking him with logic. Maybe that’s what I need, though, to help me get over this stupid lifelong crush? Or maybe it’d make Raven think less of me for liking her idiot brother.