Page 107 of And They Were Roommates

“How could I not be?!” His voice hits a high note I’ve never heard from him.

I readjust my glasses. “You’re panicking.”

“I am not. I’m always composed.”

“Jasper.”

“It all began when I brought that dreadful bookcase in our room. Why ever did I engrave our names like that? Have you noticed it looks like a wedding invitation?”

“Wait. Then? That was before you even knew who I was.”

“That’s why I was having a CRISIS,” Jasper shouts, breaching into hissing basilisk territory, and his eyes blow wide. “I thought I was falling for the love of my life’s BROTHER. I was about to set myself on FIRE.”

“Jasper.”

“And I have been trying so hard to be very, very normal since, but I cannot. Why, Saint Valentine, did I put us in a bedroom together?” He slams himself against my bedpost, sinking toward the floor like a dead body.

Before he falls too far, I walk over, tug him up by the collar, and press my lips to his.

I just want him to shut up, tolistento me. His lips are warm despite the rest of his body always being freezing, and it’s so strangely intoxicating that I almost let him keep kissing me.

Except he’s not kissing me.I’mkissinghim.

Like two years ago.

Abruptly, I pull back. Do Ieverlearn from my mistakes? “Sorry. I’m—I should’ve asked. But. Do you at least know what you’re thinking now?”

Jasper doesn’t look horrified, even though I expect him to run away, slamming through the wall so forcefully that only the outline of his body remains. Instead, he peruses up and down my body in a way that makes my heart simultaneously plummet and explode.

Then my own shirt collar is tugged, and I’m being lightly shoved against the bedpost. Jasper cups my jaw and kisses me with the passion of someone starved for weeks. For two years. Every second thought I’ve had about Jasper melts out of my head, his touch lancing electricity through my core. This is nothing like our first kiss years ago. It’s more. It’s too much.

A muffled sound leaves me as I place my hands on his chest. “Jasper—”

His hand travels from my jaw to my hips, shoving our bodies closer. He’s barely unruffled, only a few hairs escaped from his stubby ponytail, yet my lips are already swollen and my uniform is a wreck. “Please, Charlie, can you stop arguing with me just this once?”

My body screams at me to finally listen to him.

I try to regain my balance on the bedpost, but my legs are too close to giving out. “Somewhere else.”

Jasper is merciful enough to oblige, but I barely catch my breath before his arm is wrapped around my waist and he’s pushing me into our bookshelf, pinning an arm over my head. Fluttering pages fall to the carpet. Shakespeare, Jasper’s poetry—that’s all I catch before his lips are on mine again.

“This isn’t much better,” I manage on a gasp.

“Never liked poetry much,” he says. “Poets are snobs.”

“Youare a poet.”

He pulls back with a soft, low laugh. His blue eyes search my face, the same way they do when I read my writing aloud. The look that constantly floods my head with so much heat, I can’t think straight.

“What are you doing?” I cover myself with a palm, but he gently brings it down.

“Why do you always hide your face?” Jasper says. “I like your face.”

“Wh-what?”

“I said, I like your face. It’s my favorite part about you.”

I thrust my hand overhismouth instead. “Iheardyou.”

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