Page 101 of Crash & Burn

She pulls back, too soon, and my gaze drops to her chest, reddening by the second.

“You wear your emotions on your chest. That’s not fair.”

She looks down before rolling her eyes at me and turning around to head to the couch. “Life’s not fair, raindrop. Plus, I love seeing you blush.”

My eyesareon her assas shewalksaway from me, peeking out the bottom of those silk pajama shorts.She’s as distracting as ever.

Of course she likes when I blush, she’s usually the reasonfor it. She gets the advantage seeing the reaction she pulls from me. She gets to hide hers with a T-shirt or hoodie.

Instead of sitting down on the couch, she sits down in front of it. The lights of her living room turned off, candles lit, and blankets and pillows on the floor. I was so focused on her when I walked in, I hadn’t even noticed.

She turns to me, tapping the space next to her.

“What movie are we watching?”

“Well, I figured we could decide together,” she says, grabbing the remote to turn on the TV.

“You’re going to let me have a say?” I feign surprise. “That’s a first.”

“As long as it is one of theTwilightmovies,” she adds.

“Never seen any,” I admit.

Mia looks at me as if I just admitted to committing murder.

“What?” I say. How did I already fuck something up with her?

“You’ve never seenanyof theTwilightmovies? Don’t you have sisters?” My sisters liked the movies, and I remember driving them to the midnight premieres when they were in middle school, but I always just dropped them off and picked them up after.

“Yeah, but I still have never seen them. I’ve heard you and Drew talk about them though.” Drew and Mia immediately bonded over their love for theTwilightmovies early on in their friendship. One of the nights I was bartending last summer, the girls were there catching each other up on their weeks, and I had to listen to Mia, Drew, and Annie argue which of the five movies is the best. Drew said the last one; Annie said the first one; Mia said the third one.

“That is about to change. What time is it?” She taps her phone sitting on the ground next to her. “Okay, the run time of all of them is probably just under ten hours, and it is 10 p.m. now, which means we won’t have time to do all of them in one night, so we will do the first two, maybe three tonight, and then you’ll come over tomorrow night and we will watch the last two.”

I try to suppress my smile, but I don’t do a very good job.

“What?”

“Nothing,” I reply. “I didn’t know you took your movie-watching so seriously.”

“I don’t. I takeyouwatching my favorite book-to-movie franchise seriously.” This time, I don’t try to hide the grin on my face because this makes me happy.

And I don’t know why.

Maybe it is because it means she wants to let me know her more, and that is all I want. What Mia doesn’t know is that I takeeverythingseriously when it comes to her.

“We better get started then.”

Mia smiles, turning on the movie, and pulling the blankets on top of us. We spend the next six hours watching the first three movies, one after another, and I can’t say these films are ones I would pick as my favorites, but then again, I would watch her favorite movies with herover and over againas long as it made her happy.

I’m lean back against the couch and Mia isleaningon my chest. If I look down, I can see her, watching so intently, and I find myself focusing more on her than the TV.

What I learn about Mia through watching these movies is she likes to talk about what other work the actors in the movies have done, and she likes to share what is different compared to the book and the movie.

Watching movies with her may be my new favorite pastime because shefeelseverything. She laughs out loud at the funny parts and cries at the sad ones. Her brow furrows,she bites her lip along with the characters when they’re stressed or confused, and, even though she has seen the movies dozens of times, she watches as if it is her first time.

There is something about it that is refreshing, seeing her sointhe moment rather than soinher head. It is similar to when she is taking photos.

Her mind isn’t racing. She isn’t trying to catch up to her thoughts.

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