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“—doing?” he asks, yanking away from where my lips had met his for the briefest moment, a whisper of an action. He sucks in his bottom lip and stares at me in horror.
“I’m—oh my god. I’m so sorry.” I shake my head, my cheeks so hot that they hurt. I place my cold fingers over them. “I don’t know—I’m drunk. I’m sorry.” I blink at least five times in the span of a second. “That was...”
“It’s okay.” He stands, avoiding looking at me. “I get it.”
I dig my nails into the skin under my eyes for a beat. I’m mortified. Fucking mortified. I have never once done something like this. Not with Holden. It’sHolden. And I’m not that drunk. I can’t believe I let something like that happen. WithHolden. He’s got to be so weirded out. He practically jumped away from me, and I can’t fight off the flashbacks of his birthday party when the bottle landed on me and his face looked likeEdvard Munch’sTheScream. I repulsed him. I still repulse him, present tense.
“I’m going to change the tire,” he says quietly to the ground. “Did you want to help?”
I swallow roughly, then force out in a light-hearted, that-was-totally-weird-in-a-hilarious-way-right? kind of way, “Not at all.”
He gets to work, the only sound between us theclick-click-clickof his hazard lights until he starts jacking the car up and taking off bolts.
I’ve totally, completely ruined the good thing that was forming between us.
Goose bumps pebble my legs, so I hug my knees to my chest and pull Holden’s jacket around me, zipping it up and slipping my hands into the pockets. My fingers brush against something smooth and stiff in his right pocket. I let my fingers get a feel for it before pulling out a black velvet jewelry box. I don’t dare to open it because I just know it’ll be beautiful and for someone else and it’ll make me want to cry more than I already do. It’s probably just all my mixed emotions, my adrenaline crashing, the beer leaving my system, I don’t know. Something dark and distant pangs in my gut because everyone’s moving on and I can’t fast-forward to catch up, and I can’t rewind to live in the place where everything was once okay—I’m not even sure how far back I’d have to go anymore.
When exactly did my life become such a disaster? Was it when I started working with Holden? Or before then, when Corrine and Holden started dating? Or was it way back inmiddle school the night of Holden’s birthday when I didn’t confront him, didn’t tell my best friend that he hurt my feelings, that Ihadfeelings for him to hurt?
I don’t know what I’m feeling toward him now. Things are complicated. If Holden and Corrine had never dated—had never held hands between classes, had never gone thrifting together, had never gotten detention for coordinating make-out sessions when their teachers thought they were using the restrooms—Holden probably wouldn’t even be in my life again. Or maybe he would—because, really, why was I holding such a stupid grudge before? It’s okay that he didn’t like me back—and we’d all be best friends. But that doesn’t feel right.
I wipe away an errant tear. I did not give it permission to leave my eye. I force the box back in his pocket and don’t touch it again. It’ll make some girl really happy and I shouldn’t have snooped through his pockets when he was nice enough to give me his jacket. When he was nice enough to tell me that it was okay that I mauled him, when he’s so obviously not interested.
The kiss was an unconscious action. I just reacted. I was basically on autopilot, so there’s no reason that I should be able to recall how soft his lips were. How they parted when he started asking me what I was doing. Shouldn’t remember how they filled my body with the heat I always seem to crave from him.
I reach for my own necklace that is still not around my neck because it’s somewhere at Corrine’s house, gathering dust.
