My hands curled around his shoulders without asking my permission, as if they were magnetized. A soft sigh escaped him as I gave a careful squeeze, letting go after barely a heartbeat. My hands felt strange as they moved away from him, itching to touch again. How long since I’d touched anyone like that? Anyone who wasn’t Mom, Dad, or Benji?
Since I’d moved here. Eight months.
Too long.
“Thank you,” Felix said. I might’ve been imagining the roughness of his voice. I had to be, didn’t I?
“Welcome,” I replied as he turned, wrapping the shirt around himself.
After another heartbeat, we went back to walking in the direction of his apartment. It was different now, though. There was a charge in the air, the same prickle at the back of my neckas before a lightning strike. The hairs on my arms were standing on end, and it wasn’t because I wasn’t wearing my shirt.
It was more because Felixwaswearing it. It was at least a couple of sizes too big for him—not trailing after him like my shirts did on Benji, but hanging off his narrower frame. Obviously not his.
Mine.
It wasn’t until he looked at me again that I realized I’d been staring at him. I looked away, heat rising to my ears again. My hand went to the back of my neck, rubbing nervously. I was soawareof him. Every one of my nerve endings seemed to be on high alert.
“This is me,” Felix said, stopping in front of the dark, empty storefront.
I stood facing him, still rubbing the back of my neck.
The night was over.
I didn’t want it to be. I didn’t knowwhatI wanted, but I knew that what Ididn’twant was to walk away from Felix right now. What could I say to keep him here?
“I know,” I said, which probably wasn’t it. “Small town.”
“Small town,” Felix repeated, lips quirking as he tilted his head just a little to look up at me.
I stared at them, wetting my own.Say something. Anything.
“I hope, uh, you had a good night?” I asked. It was weak, but it was conversation. It was another moment of connection.
That was the thing. I felt connected to Felix in a way I couldn’t have explained. I wanted…
More. More of him. The thought was so clear, once I’d had it, that it felt like a burst of fireworks going off in my brain and lighting up the whole dark sky.
Felix’s smile widened. When his face was still, it was perfect—every line, every feature was exactly as it should have been, in ideal proportion. He was beautiful, in the way paintings in museums were beautiful, in the way glaciers and snow-capped mountains were beautiful.
When hesmiled, though, smiled up at me the way he was smiling now, the breath caught in my lungs. He was more than beautiful then. I needed a different word for it, a better word, but if there was one, I didn’t know it. When he smiled at me, my heart soared.
“I did, actually,” he said. It sounded distant over the rush of blood in my ears, but I nodded.
“Good. Good, that’s?—”
“Coop,” he interrupted, taking my hand. His fingers were cooler than mine, and a whole lot softer and more delicate.
I remembered the time we’d met—properly—when I couldn’t bring myself to touch him because I was afraid I’d ruin his pristine dance outfit.
But now he was standing in front of me, wearing my worn plaid shirt over his clean, neat dress one. Holding my hand.
“Coop,” Felix repeated.
I looked up from his hand to his face just in time to see his unimpressed brows soften.
Anticipation buzzed in the air between us, tying my stomach into knots like it was trying to make a macramé plant hanger out of it.
“Come upstairs,” Felix said, brushing his thumb over the back of my hand.
