Page 104 of What I'm Looking For

It’s just a play,you idiot.Will is acting.

But I can’t talk myself out of this loss.

It’s real.

“Kate. Are you okay?”

When I look up, I scream. Will stands over me, covered in blood.

My heart stops. And then it’s a freight train. Hurling myself at him, I scale his body. I need to touch his skin, feel that it’s warm.

“I’m sorry,” my voice scrapes out.

Strong hands grip my upper arms. “Are you okay? Did someone attack you or something?”

I choke out a strangled laugh. It is actually kind of funny. Here he is, covered in blood having justdied, and he’s making sure I’m all right. “No, no… I… uh… was riding by.” Panting, I point back toward the path where my abandoned bike sprawls. “And I saw you die. And I got… upset?”

He looks at me like I’m an escapee from McLean Mental Hospital. “You saw the scene where Mercutio died, and you thoughtIwas dead?”

“Well, obviously, I knew it wasn’t real. But”—I fling a hand toward the stage where the other actors play on—“some part of me believed it.”

His wicked smile morphs into a full-out howl of laughter.

I smack him on the chest. “Don’t laugh at me!”

“I can’t help it.” His grin is unapologetic. “That’s the biggest compliment I’ve ever received.”

My heart flips.

And then it melts.

WILL

Still holding Kate upright, I watch expression after expression flit across her beautiful face. I don’t ever want to let her go. Still I wait, my chest tight, for her to make a decision. When she steps back into my embrace, I heave out a sigh of relief.

“I’ve missed you,” I whisper into her hair.

“I missed you, too,” she croaks.

She pulls back just enough to tilt her face up. My lips meet hers, tentatively at first, but before I know it, my hands are in her hair and I can’t tell where I end and she begins.

Abruptly, she breaks the kiss. And licks me. Twice. “Whoa. This stuff is sweet.” She sniffs my chin. “Is that chocolate?”

Right. I’m covered in fake blood. “Yeah, we use chocolate syrup and a few other things to make stage blood?—”

She licks me again. “Yum.”

“Including dishwashing liquid,” I finish. She sticks out her tongue and coughs like Frankie trying to rid himself of a hairball. I pull her shirt away from her body so she can see that it’s stained as well. “Good thing this stuff washes out.”

Large splotches of the bloody stuff dampen the front of her shirt. She giggles. Within moments, she’s laughing hysterically—so hard I have to take her elbow to steady her again. Finally, she lets out a big sigh. Her gaze is sheepish, her cheeks rosy pink.

A shiver runs through me. “I love you.”

Another giggle escapes. “I know.”

“And that’s funny?”

She grasps my upper arms and drops her forehead on my chest. She rolls her head back and forth, oblivious of the blood.

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