Her hands are on my face within seconds, eyebrows pulled up, a frown taking over her face. “Oh my god, are you okay?! I don’t know what happened, it just flew into the air. I’m so sorry,” she pulls my lip down with both of her thumbs, “Oh my god, you’re bleeding.”
“I’m fine.”
“That's a technical foul for losing control of the mallet. They get a free goal shot,” the ref says matter of factly, “Lemonheads, line up your shot.”
The Lemonheads take their free shot on goal and sink the puck in, winning the game with a 6-7 score. Kennedy’s shoulders slump forward with defeat and she pushes out her bottom lip, “We woulda won if I didn’t foul against my own teammate.”
“Yeah, you’re probably right, but now we can go to part two of our date: lunch.”
“Wait we need a picture, I have to memorialize making it to the air hockey unsanctioned mixed duos semi finals.”
“Obviously,” I deadpan. “How could I forget?” I don’t love posing for pictures, especially when it's hockey related, but I like the idea of Kennedy and I having couple pictures together. I can’t help it, I like doing boyfriend shit. I like carrying purses, and cuddling, and snapping mirror selfies before letting my girlfriend put a face mask on me.
Kennedy finds someone relatively young to take our picture then stands in front of me, lips pursed, “How should we pose?”
“Don’t over think it, come here.” I wrap both arms around her shoulders, leaning forward to kiss her on the cheek. I hold the pose until the lady hands the phone back to Kennedy, resting my chin on her shoulder as she swipes through the pictures. She’s smiling so big in the photos her eyes are almost closed. She holds up four fingers on each hand for our fourth place win and my forearms look huge, I can’t lie. She texts me the pictures instantly, allowing me to flip through them on my own, zooming in on her face.
I want to post this picture on all my social medias, the college equivalent of shouting it from the rooftops, but I won’t. Until she’s my official girlfriend and we’ve told Miranda, I’ll have to be satisfied with making it my lock screen instead.
“For lunch, I was thinking we do something low-key. Either grab some food to go from Serendipity or head back to my apartment and order food there. What do you think?”
“Let’s order,” she answers instantly. She hasn’t been to my place since the night we kissed for the first time, over a month ago. I tend to be the one coming over to her place, it's been easier to keep everything a secret without a roommate involved.
Adrian isn’t home when we walk through my apartment door. We head into my room anyway. She kicks off her shoes and her work out sweater, revealing a tiny skin black tight tank top before flopping backwards onto my bed.
“You have such a boy room,” she says, eyes wandering around my space. I have no rebuttal because I do. Having a twin sister meant that growing up I did everything in my power to distance myself from Miranda’s (and Kennedy’s) pink themed everything. My comforter is navy with navy sheets and navy pillows. I have two hockey posters hanging up on my wall and one framed picture from my freshmen year when Bramwood won the frozen four.
I say the only thing that comes to mind: “You like it.”
“Yeah, I do.”
I take the rolly desk chair instead of the bed, very aware of the fact that usually when Kennedy and I are alone in a room together, our clothes come off, and I don’t want her to think I’m only asking her to be my girlfriend because of the sex.
I hand her my phone with the food delivery app already pulled up and let her pick out what food to get delivered. She picks the chinese place with the fastest delivery after my stomach grumbles loud enough for her to hear it.
She props her sock covered feet over my knees that are pushed up against the mattress while she looks through our photos from earlier again.
My heartbeat is pumping in my hands and my tongue is stuck to the roof of my mouth as I sit there, observing her, hyping myself up for the next part. She continues to be oblivious that I’m freaking out.
I clear my throat but she doesn’t hear me so I clear my throat again. “You need some water, old man?” She tosses out.
“I have something for you.” I place her feet back on the bed and stand up, wiping my hands on the back of my pantsbefore I head to my closet and pull out a small poorly wrapped package.
She takes the package from me, holds it in her hands, uncertainty on her face. She flips it over, unwrapping the paper carefully. When she gets to the back cover, she flushes deep, over her face and down her neck.Shit. Maybe this is not the cute moment I was imagining. She turns the book over, revealing a weathered copy ofFever, 1793with the name K. Brooks written in faded blue pen in the top corner of the front cover.
“You had it the whole time?” she says. She’s not reacting at all like I imagined she would. In fact, she’s not really reacting much at all.
I swallow. “Yeah, I did.” The words come out scratchy and low. I’ve never felt more laid out raw than I do right now. Like she can see right through my skin and bones and straight into my chest cavity.
The three of us, Miranda, Kennedy, and I read this book for school in seventh grade. Even back then her notes were crazy. She’s always been an annotator, marking up books and papers and notes with her multi-colored sloppy handwriting and doodles in the margins.
I don’t think I could explain why I took it back then, but she and Miranda were in the living room and I had just gotten back from hockey practice. Her back pack was right there, open, on the kitchen island, her book just sitting there, ready to be taken.
That night, I locked myself in my room and flipped through every page hunting for all of her markings. I remember feeling like I was looking at something naughty the way my chest felt every time I came across another one of her doodles. When I got to page 97 she underlined the line where the main character kisses a boy on the cheek. She scattered hearts all over that page in pink pen and sharp mechanical pencil. And right there in thebottom corner of the page, almost swallowed up by the crease of the book, I found a heart, faded from trying to be erased with K+W on the inside.
“Open it.”
The book naturally falls open to the right page. I’ve spent an embarrassing number of times since I was 12 opening the book to page 97 and just looking at the poorly erased heart, convincing myself that I didn’t like Kennedy. A folded piece of paper falls into her lap that reads:can I be your boyfriend? Circle yes or no.
