Asher tips his head back and laughs. “If anyone could lead that army, it’s you, Sid.” The lightness of his voice is enough to wash all the other thoughts from my head. Basement date or not—Lindsay or not—this is a pretty great night.
I knock on Asher’s bathroom door, but it pops open as I do. It’s not even closed, let alone locked. Next to his bed, Asher is pulling his T-shirt off, over his head. It’s theSWIMMERS DO IT BETTERshirt—the one I made him change out of the first time we went to Trevor’s house. The fact that he wore it tonight makes me smile. He picks a gray T-shirt off of his bed and pulls it over his head. I’m a little sad as it slides over his chest and obscures the view I had of him.
“Did you wear it that night just to annoy me?” I ask, suddenly curious.
Asher smiles. “I plead the fifth.”
“And what about that pink shirt? You worethatto annoy me, right?”
“I told you why I wore it.”
“Hm.”
He looks at me expectantly, and for a second I forget why I even came into his room.
“I had fun tonight.”
He smiles, and lifts the hem of his T-shirt to tie his pajama pants. “Me, too.”
I’ve seen Asher in his pajamas a million times, but never in his room. Alone. They’re just clothes. I’m in my regular clothes, because I couldn’t bring myself to walk in here in my threadbare T-shirt. It didn’t offer nearly enough barrier between us.
I tear my eyes away from Asher’s waist, and focus on why I came in here. Which was not to creep on Asher. Definitely not. “You know, you’ll have to use one eventually.” He looks at me blankly, and I smile. “A date. We said fourdates.”
He smiles, and it’s smug and cocky, the smile I saw on rare occasions after a prank—or when one was coming.
“I don’t like that look.”
He feigns innocence. “What?”
I tip my head to the side and don’t offer anything.
“I like that you’re begging me to take you on a date.”
My mouth opens and snaps shut. “I didn’t… I mean… I just…” I shake my head. “You aresoannoying.” This only makes him smile wider, more genuinely, like I’ve made him truly happy.
“AmI, though?” Mischief glints in his eye.
He steps toward me, his eyes burning into mine, and I take a step back, like we’re dancers, our limbs giving and taking from one another. We both take another step and my legs hit his bed. The soft impact with the place he sleeps—the place I laid just days ago—makes my breath catch in my throat. He leaves the space between us, and his hand reaches out, smoothing a piece of my hair between his finger and thumb, before pushing it behind my shoulder. Warm fingers rest on my shoulder, then trail to the back of my neck, but he isn’t moving any closer to me. Everything about the way Asher touches me is so confident, like it’s not just the first time he’s touched a girl like this, but that it isn’t the first time he’s touchedmelike this. Even though every single touch feels like it’s the first for me.
I should do something—speak, or blink, or breathe. He isn’t kissing me, but he wants to; I can feel it in the way his fingers softly cradle my neck, see it in the tenseness of his arm, as if it’s a snake, coiled and ready. It’s in his eyes, in the way they’re running over my face, as if searching for something. But I can’t find the words, so I make myself move. I take the smallest step forward. And again we are like dancers, like the most skilled of partners, as I rise up on my toes, and his mouth lowers to meet mine.
Our first kiss in the grass was all him.This oneis all mine. It’s clumsy to start, even though it’s now our third kiss—or maybe our fourth, even—and I wonder if it’s because the dynamic has changed. We’redatingnow. Our hands fidget, and our heads fight to find the right angle. When he tries to run his fingers through my hair and catches his finger on a spot that pulls, I laugh, and so does he. It’s awkward, but not uncomfortable. Maybe because we’ve been so ridiculous in front of each other. We have been weird, and childish, and frequently embarrassed. We’ve seen all the worst parts of each other, and nothing we do now can even come close to that.
As the minutes go by, we find our rhythm against each other’s lips again. Neither of us is a quitter, and both of us are perfectionists. I am wrapped in his arms, our bodies pressed together, our hands wrapped around each other’s waists. Our fingers explore exposed skin—I thread my fingers into his hair, and he traces the line where my tank top meets my shorts. Goose bumps rise up everywhere his skin meets mine.
We may never stop kissing. My toes are cramping up from the few inches I’m raising myself up, but I won’t be the first to pull away. I push up higher, and then all the way down, trying to stretch my stiffening toes. Asher’s lips follow as I dip and rise. I smile against his lips and he laughs, but his lips are back on mine before the sound has faded around us. He twines his arms tightly around my waist and pulls me up, like he’s giving me theworld’s tightest hug. I think he’s giving my toes a break, until he turns us and pulls me with him onto the bed.
We crash into the comforter clumsily, our bodies still pressed together, and a surge of panic rises up in me as his body settles on top of mine. A few weeks ago, Asher was the one person in the world I would have called my nemesis.And now he’s on top of me, on his bed.Beds and bodies and our parents down the hall. My breath hitches, but before I can let the full potential of our situation wash over me in a smothering wave, Asher rolls to his back and tilts his head to look at me.
“So a date, huh?” He smiles, and my eyes take in the current state of him. His kiss-reddened lips, the pink cheeks, little tufts of hair pulled this way and that from my fingers.
“A date.” I can barely get the words past my kiss-swollen lips.
He smiles back up at the ceiling. “Sidney, will you go out with me tomorrow night?”
“I’ll think about it,” I say, just as his elbow meets my side and I let out a squeak. I turn my face to meet his, and my voice is as serious as it is nervous. “I wouldn’t hate that.”
DAY 28
