Page 77 of Do You Ship It

We’re halfway home when Anissa waves her phone at me. ‘Jake went back to the party. He’s going to get a lift home with some of the others.’

Right. Of course. They’ve been chatting on Discord. She’s someone he likes chatting to about the books.

Mum tries to give us a bit more of the third-degree when we get home, and I offer up a few half-heartedresponses. Anissa fills in for me with a bit more enthusiasm, and a huge yawn that has Mum sending us both off to bed to get some sleep.

Anissa and I change quickly and in silence, and I don’t think this is how sleepovers are really supposed to go. I’m not being a good host.

Then again, we’re not twelve, and my life has just imploded because of a kiss.

I roll over to face Anissa down on the airbed.

‘I didn’t mean to hurt him,’ I whisper into the dark. I don’t think she’s asleep yet. ‘I didn’t even really mean to kiss Max, it just … happened.’

‘I thought you and Runic … I mean –’

‘Yeah,’ I say. ‘I thought so, too. I don’t know. It’s all a mess, and … God, the look on hisface… I’ve never seen Jake like that. He was devastated. The things I said to him … I really didn’t mean …’

Anissa props herself up on one elbow, the airbed making a plastic-y rustle. ‘He said some pretty harsh things, too, Cerys.’

‘It’s nothing I didn’t deserve. He’s right, I do … tag along, I’m –’

‘He was out of order,’ she reiterates, so sternly that I let myself believe her. At least for the moment. ‘And anyway, he’d really been putting those Kopparbergs away, plus a few vodka jelly shots … Give him acouple of days to get his head straight, he’ll see things differently. You can both apologize and go back to normal. It won’t all seem so horrible then.’

‘Do you think?’

She nods; I see her silhouetted head bobbing as my eyes adjust to the dark.

Weirdly, I trust her judgement. If she’s been chatting to Jake for a while – and she knows him a bit from school and spent all night at the party with him … At the very least, I trust her judgementfarmore than mine right now.

Can I blame Jake, for being so hurt? He caught me kissing his best friend. He wouldn’t have reacted like that if he didn’t feel the way about me as I do about him. Isn’t that a good thing? Isn’t this what I wanted?

So why is itMaxthat my mind keeps circling back to – putting his arm around me, keeping me warm from the chill, coming after me when I got upset, thennot looking at me after the kiss?Why is that the part that seems to hurt so much more right now?

Is this how Jake felt when he saw me kissing another boy? This overwhelming ache in the pit of my chest that feels like it’ll drag me down, drowning me?

A couple of minutes pass in silence, though neither of us falls asleep. Instead of processing anything, my brain just feels full of raging, white noise I can’tdecipher. My lips are still tingling from the aftermath of the kiss, and I touch a finger to them.

I really don’t know what I was thinking. I don’t even know how we got to a point where we were kissing! I thought Max hated me. I thoughtIhatedhim. That can’t all change in the span of one conversation on opposite sides of a bathroom door, can it?

Is this what the whole fuss is with the enemies-to-lovers trope? I kind of understand it, if that’s the kind of kiss it leads to.

One very quiet, but very clear thought swims to the surface:I wish we hadn’t been interrupted.

I risk saying out loud, ‘It was a really good kiss, though.’

Anissa giggles. ‘I’ll say! We only caught the tail end but you two lookedverysteamy.’

‘And his hair’s really soft.’

‘Mm-hmm.’ She makes the sound through closed lips, like she’s trying not to laugh. I throw a spare pillow down, smacking her square in the face, and the giggle bursts out of her.

And because she’s proving to be a good listener – a good friend – I say, ‘For a minute when I saw you and Jake together, I thought …’

Anissa snorts. ‘Asif.’

‘Oh. Well … okay.’Good. Bad? I don’t knowanymore. ‘Thanks for, um, coming with me tonight. And for coming home early with me. I know you were having a good time …’

‘Of course!’ she says. ‘I did have fun. It’s sad we didn’t get to hang out a bit more, though. You totally vanished after we got there. I thought …’ She gives a small laugh. ‘Well, after I saw you and Max all over each other, I thought maybe that was why you’d invited me. So you could both ditch Jake without it being weird. Fourth-wheel me a bit. It’s okay if you were,’ she adds in a rush. ‘I just –’

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