If I knock over the journal and nearly overturn my tea in my rush to get off the couch, well—nobody needs to know.
I throw open the door, belatedly remembering that I’m supposed to be annoyed with him for dodging my calls.
Rain drips from the awning behind Jesse. The porch light we’ve been meaning to fix flickers petulantly over his head. It glows over the length of the boy on my porch, his mouth pulled into a tired half-smile.
“Hey, Sour Patch.”
“I’m about to sour-punch you,” I tell Jesse, fiercely determined not tofind his smile charming or the wet hair plastered to his forehead endearing. “Where have you been?”
The half smile becomes a full grin. My heart performs a complicated flip in my chest. Jesse is always handsome, even in his brooding, solitary hours, but a smiling Jesse?
My grip on the door tightens. I avidly observe the awning behind his head.
“Sorry, honey bun. Did I miss the kids’ bedtimes?”
I try to slam the door in Jesse’s face, but he catches the frame with one hand and pushes it back with mortifying ease. “I love it when you get all huffy,” Jesse says, leaning over the threshold. “So un-cheerleader-like of you.”
“For the last time, I ama dancer.It is a different set of rules, a different coach, a different training regime, a whole other competition track—”
I stop myself midway through the sentence, recognizing the trap too late. Shaking my head, I throw out, “Jerk. What are you going to do when you get your soul back and half your personality disappears?”
Regret hits me as soon as I say it.
Jesse’s mouth drops open. So does mine. We stare at each other for a full thirty seconds.
Before I can profusely apologize, Jesse bursts into laughter. He doubles over, heaving like he’s about to hack out a lung. He laughs for so long, my remorse melts back into irritation, and I put my hands on my hips.
Another minute ticks by. “Let me know if you’re almost finished or if I should go grab a snack while I wait.”
Jesse straightens, wiping at his eyes. When he speaks, his voice rasps with poorly suppressed delight. “Imagine how well we would’ve gotten along if you’d just been yourself all these years.”
“Who else do you think I was?” I say tetchily.
Jesse sighs. Studies me. “Never mind. I take it back. We would’ve killed each other before sophomore year.”
He steps closer. The edges of his jacket brush my bare arms. “Or,” he murmurs right by my ear, “I might have fallen desperately, pathetically in love with you.”
I freeze. Another joke?
I search, but there is no malice in Jesse’s features. No indication he’s playing games with me.
“Big words for a guy who basically threw himself into oncoming traffic when I kissed him,” I say hoarsely. A little teasing to show him the kiss in the train doesn’t have to sit between us like an unpinned grenade.
Except there’s nothing joking about the way Jesse’s jaw tightens.
My mouth goes dry when his hands cup my face, his thumbs light as a feather on either side of my cheekbones.
“Yasmina Mansour, hear me well, because I’ll only say this once. Actually, that’s a lie—I’ll say it as many times as you want to hear it. As many times as it takes for you to believe it.” Jesse’s voice drops, his breath caressing my parted lips. “If you still want to kiss me after we break this curse, I am all yours.”
I stop breathing.
“I thought it was obvious, but I forgot who I was dealing with,” Jesse continues, a hint of frustration seeping into his tone. He catches one of my curls and wraps it around his knuckle. “When you’re not stuck with me anymore—when you have every option available to you again, including Mama’s Boy—I’ll know that when you kiss me, it’s not just because I’m the only one left.”
Frustration boils inside me. He genuinely thinks he’s some kind of placeholder for Alex. How am I supposed to convince him that I haven’t given Alex more than a passing thought in weeks?
The temptation to argue is overpowering. So what if Jesse’s the only one I can be around right now? I had wanted to kiss him because he washim, not because he was there.
The fact that it was the best kiss of my life, well … his ego doesn’t need the stroking.
