This is it. This is my moment. That heart in my chest that was squeezing painfully now starts to pound, an uncomfortablethump-thump, thump-thump, thump-thump.
I can hear my heartbeat whooshing in my ears, and my smile is wavering out of pure nerves. The mistletoe has wilted a bit, I notice when Aiden holds it up, but I’m not taking that as a bad omen.
Although the look on his face as he stares at the little plant…well,thatmight be a bad omen. Only one way to find out.
So I go up, up, up on my tiptoes, place my hands on his broad shoulders to steady myself, and then kiss him straight on the lips.
Or I try to, anyway.
I’m maybe one centimeter away from the most perfect lips in all of existence when Aiden grabs me by the shoulders and pushes me away, gentle but absolutely firm. I stumble back, wrenching out of his grasp and letting out an unladylike yelp of surprise when I trip and then fall, right onto my bum.
“Are you insane?” Aiden says. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I—”
“You’re a student!” he cuts me off.
I look stubbornly up at him. All hope is not lost yet, though admittedly my dignity has left the premises. “I’m old enough?—”
“I don’t care. I don’t even care if you’re sixty with a beer gut,” he says firmly. “You. Are. A. Student.” His mouth snaps shut, and in the illumination of the porch light I can see his jaw muscles flexing, his nostrils flared as he breathes, his head turning this way and that as though to check if anyone has seen us.
“I just—” I begin, my voice small. “I just—I wanted?—”
“Youthought?Youwanted? It’s not just about you, Juniper,” he says, exasperated. “I could get expelled if someone saw this. They could kick me out of the university. Heck, I could go to jail. You aren’t even legal, are you?”
He doesn’t even know how old I am? My vision goes blurry as hot tears fill my eyes; I swipe them away furiously, just in time to see Aiden squeezing his eyes shut and taking a deep, steadying breath.
“I’m not angry at you, okay? I’m not mad.” He pauses. “I’m proud of you for that English grade. You worked hard, and it shows. But I don’t ever want to see you at this apartment again,” he says finally, “and you are never to pull another stunt like this. Got it?”
I nod, scrambling to my feet. I have to go; I have to get out of here before he sees me cry. I stumble away, away, away, finally turning on my heel and running.
I think he calls after me as I flee, but I don’t turn back.
* I couldn’t tell you why, but I teared up writing this. My precious Juniper, trying her best.
4
IN WHICH JUNIPER DECIDES MURDER MIGHT BE THE BEST OPTION
Aiden Milano.
Aiden.
Milano.
The man who taught me to love literature and then broke my little teenage heart, and he’s standing here in front of me.
My new roommate.
He’s not twenty-three anymore—he must be about thirty-five, I think. He’s giving off major sexy professor vibes, wearing a tweed blazer over a dark-red sweater, khaki pants, and some sort of brown dress shoes. He even has the leather messenger bag. His brown hair is longer than it was when I knew him, shorter on the sides than on top.
The writer in me wants to come up with all sorts of evocative descriptions for the masterpiece that is his face—the sharp angle of his jaw, the penetrating eyes, the slightly crooked nose—but the red-blooded woman part of my brain can only manage a wordless, slack-jawed stare.
Yep. He’s still my type, and he’s still a heartbreaker.
To be fair, he was absolutely right to break my heart. I wasseventeen—he was correct, that’s not even legal in the state of Idaho—and he was my twenty-three-year-old college tutor. I was headstrong and a little bit broken, and I latched onto someone older and more mature. I’m just grateful he was the kind of guy who never would have taken advantage of my feelings.
I never saw him again after that Christmas Eve, either, which allowed me to lick my wounds in peace. His pedagogy class ended, and I finished out my senior year fairly well, despite a brief but sudden move to a foster home part way through January. I got accepted to an in-state college, and it was thanks to Aiden’s English tutoring that I decided to become a writer after graduating.
