Page 56 of Best I Never Had

“Then why would I offer?”

“It’s fine, Hayden. Forget I brought it up.”

present

There was a time during our senior year, in the midst of the hurrah that was graduation and prom, where something shifted between me and Natalia. It was something that I buried deep, using an imaginary shovel to pat down everything that ever happened between us. And it stayed buried until recently, when she picked up that figurative shovel and encouraged me to begin digging. It was as if Natalia herself didn’t want to bring it up, to resurface those events without recounting something that neither one of us wanted to mention yet managed to pull from my mind andheart.

Until now.

It started to amble along the silent moments when she caught me staring at her a little longer than deemed normal. It lingered along the curves of my own lips and the pads of my fingers as everything from our past collided into our kiss.

And it becomes glaringly harder to ignore, even as I try to drown it all in a pool of alcohol and bad karaoke.

We settle into our seats, nestled in a small corner between an unoccupied pool table and a broken jukebox, creating our own little nook. The sounds of other karaoke patrons singing, sounding much better than my own, which sounded like a goat bleating along to music rather than actual singing, drifts over us in the crowded bar. We fill our time with stories that go as far back as middle school, even pulling an uncanny impression of our biology teacher, Mr. Khan, when he destroyed a set of cell samples by spilling his coffee on them, eliciting an awkward cry of distress that sounded like a duck and a beaver were tussling in an echoing cave. We laugh and talk and laugh some more as we push away everything that hangs in the air between us, stuffing them underneath the layers of our past.

“I’m getting some water,” Natalia announces, standing from her seat. “I need to hydrate, or this hangover is going to kick my ass in the morning.”

“I’ll get it,” I say, stopping her as I stand from my own seat. I watch as she sits back on her stool, a thoughtful smile peeking through her bottom lip pinched between her teeth. Just as I step away, I turn back around, needing to say the one thing that’s been nagging at my brain this whole time.

“Um…” I say hesitantly. My hand grips the table while my eyes trail my thumb tracing careful strokes along the curved edge. “I’m sorry about that kiss,” I finally say.

Her smile drops slightly as the flush already spread across her neck from the alcohol deepens into a dark cherry color. She has a cocktail straw in herhands, and she starts rolling it between her fingers as the plastic ends of the straw start to twirl frantically.

“Do you regret it?” She tilts her head to the side and her lips pucker outwards as she pulls the inside of her cheek between her teeth. She peers up at me through her thick lashes and her eyes stay wide, almost like a deer in the headlights. Like she’s scared.

Of all the responses I expect from her, this is the last.

“Do I regret kissing you?”

She silently nods, eyes still wide.

“No,” I say immediately. Her eyes flick to my mouth before looking back at me and she lets out a shaky sigh, almost as if she’s relieved.

“Then why are you apologizing?”

She knows why.At least, sheshouldknow why.

I clench my jaw, stopping myself from pointing out that the reason for my apology should be clear as day. And instead of saying why by reminding her that friends don’t kiss the way we did and clarifying the reason behind it, I take a slow, seductive step toward her. I pen her between myself and the wall behind her.

“I’m apologizing because…” My voice trails off. My voice sounds throaty. And thick. Like I have an entire collection of words stuck in my throat. Ones that matter, ones that I should keep to myself, and ones that want to be spoken but never will be. And I’m sifting through them, making sure to pick out those I should be saying and holding on to the ones I need to keep to myself, leaving them behind to fill that thickness in my throat.

I watch as her entire body tenses. The heat radiating off me wraps around her, causing an invisible force field to enclose us in our own bubble. Every nerve ending in my body buzzes as she leans back, her breath hitching through her parted lips as she peers up at me with her dark eyes. And they’re so dark. Like two hard rocks of cinder that liquefied, making my blood hot like lava as it runs through my heart in rapid beats.

“Because it wasinappropriate.” My voice becomes a low rumble as my breath brushes across her cheek now angled sideways. That vanilla scent thatscreamsNatalia Marquez fills the space between us, causing my heart to stutter. I fill the small remaining gap between us, inching even closer to her. This time, she doesn’t lean back.

“Um…did—I mean…” she stammers when our noses practically touch. Her chin tilts up and her eyelids flutter in front of me, making my breathing raspy and uneven. My eyes trail down her neck as she exposes it toward me, and I can practically see her pulse threading against her skin.

“I should have run it by you first,” I say hoarsely.

She looks up at me, our faces less than an inch away from each other. “Oh,” she finally whispers. “I–it’s fine. We didn’t really have time to…” Her warm breath brushes across my chin.

I step away, putting back that safe space between us. I nod, agreeing with her. “I guess…” I trail. “I thought that it would make your ex jealous. Or something like that…”

She nods. “I know,” she says, so low I can barely hear her over the light chatter surrounding us.

“I’ll get you that water,” I whisper, turning away from her before I walk away.

I watch Natalia from the bar, her eyes wandering over the rumbling crowd and music tracks playing in the background of enthused karaoke singers. I wait for the crowd to thin before I order two glasses of water. My own mouth suddenly feels too dry, and I roll a lodged knot down my throat as I tear through every memory I’ve all but forgotten about.

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