Page 43 of Without You

I want to whisper her name but that would mean removing my mouth from hers.

I want to hear her whisper my name, too. But, same reasoning applies.

Mostly, I just never want to stop kissing her.

We stand in the office of my new shop making out until my phone pings with a text alert. The sound startles us both, but I don’t let her out of my hold.

“Holy shit,” she whispers and I smile. She rarely cusses, I’m learning, and it’s endearing and adorable. But to earn a curse word from her means I’m doing something right.

“Glad you’re feeling what I’m feeling, Katie.”

“This might be bold of me to say, but… have you ever had a kiss that great before?”

“Never,” I reply.

The last thing I see before I see the top of her head because her face is now buried in my chest is the twinkle in her eyes and her sexy (now smudged because of me) red lips break out into a brilliant smile.

Her forehead is pressed to my chest and her arms slip down from around my neck, over my shoulders, and find their place at my waist.

I rest my cheek on the top of her head and feel her sigh.

“Do you realize how long I’ve wanted to kiss you?” she says so quietly that if I wasn’t only paying attention to her in this moment I might have missed it.

“Probably as long as I’ve wanted to kiss you.”

I feel her head move side to side and her shoulders move up and down on a heavy sigh before she looks up at me.

“You didn’t know, no one did because I never told anyone, but when I was sixteen years old, I sat in the third row, third seat back in Mr. Pike’s Biology class and you sat in the second row, third seat back, and it was that first day of school. I looked over at you and you looked right at me with a smile that I’ll never forget in my life because it was so real and said, ‘Hey, you’re new, huh? I’m Brody Redding. Welcome to Benton High.’ and in those eleven words I developed a crush that never quit.”

“What?”

She takes a step away and then another and I miss her warmth but want to hear this story so if she needs her space to tell it, I’m willing to give it.

“Yeah. That first day of seventh period Biology? I’d gone an entire day without a single person acknowledging me. Not one. Even the teachers just called out my name for attendance and didn’t even recognize that I was new. I was scared out of my mind that day and when you looked at me during the second to last period of the day and smiled, it made me feel like it would be alright. Like maybe not everyone at Benton High were stuck-up. Starting a new school as a junior was so hard and that first day confirmed all my fears. But then you came along and… do you remember what happened after class?”

“No,” I admit. I don’t even remember that first day. At least not the way she tells it. I do remember seeing her for the first time because I thought she was really damn pretty.

“Johnny and Chad were by the lockers and I was just going to walk straight to my class but you tugged on my backpack, introduced me to your friends, told me about a bonfire kegger that was happening that weekend, and invited me to join if it was my thing.”

“I did?”

“You did.”

“Did you come? I don’t remember this at all,” I grumble. I really wish I would remember.

She nods. “I came, felt a little out of place because I only knew you three and I didn’t really know you, so I didn’t stay.”

“Why didn’t you come find me?”

She shrugs a shoulder and looks away. “Because I was a sixteen-year-old girl who’d been moved to a different town, a new school, and I was too nervous. I showed up, you were surrounded by a bunch of people and I wasn’t going to interrupt that. A few girls noticed me and I couldn’t tell if they were annoyed that I was there or if they were going to be friendly. I panicked and left.”

“Wish you would have found me and stayed,” I tell her, even though I don’t remember that night. Makes me feel bad that I don’t. It was significant to her and to me, it was just another Saturday night.

“That night doesn’t matter, Brody. You were one of the big men on campus and so intimidating, not because you were unapproachable, but because you were this kid who seemed bigger than life. At the same time, you were without a doubt the nicest guy in school. At least to me, you were.” Her words are a bit contradicting but yet, I understand what she means. And, even though I doubt I was the nicest guy in school, it’s still good to hear I wasn’t a complete asshole.

“You do realize that you were intimidating, too, right?”

She shakes her head and a giggle bursts out, followed by a snort, and another giggle. “Yeah, right.”

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