Page 80 of Kissing is the Easy Part
“No.”
After inhaling and exhaling several times, he closes his eyes. “Then I was fucking wrong about everything. We broke up over nothing.”
His words land with the force of a slap across my face. A surge of anger engulfs me, and my heart dives into a Jacuzzi of hot sauce. “That’s why we broke up?That’swhy we broke up?”
Countless sleepless nights, tears, and confusion over such a stupid reason.
How could he be sostupid?
“Flora, I don’t know what to say. I’m so sorry. I thought I saw you kissing and I jumped to conclusions.”
The heat rises in my chest, a tide of frustration and hurt. Tears well up and tickle the edge of my eyes. I stand up, and he rises to his feet too. “You don’t trust me at all! And you thought I was a cheater! I may not be a saint like you, but I’ve never cheated in my life!”
“I wanted to trust you. But why did you have to lie to me?”
“Why didn’t you justaskme?”
Sean lets out a frustrated grunt. He tugs on my wrist, but I step back.
Does he know how many times I cried for him? How I replayed our broken relationship, picking it apart shred by shred, trying to figure out what I did wrong? I spent my days shifting blame, first onto myself, then onto him, then back onto me again.
I drifted through summer in an empty shell, wondering if I was nothing more than a mistake to him. And when he got injured, I wasn’t allowed to be near him. I was forced to fret in silence, when no one was watching.
The tears spill freely. Sean apologizes about eight billion times between my angry sobs and accusations, until it sounds like a mantra. “I’m so sorry,” he says again. “It’s all my fault. I made a mess of everything.”
“Itisall your fault!”
He tries putting his arms around me, and I let him, too exhausted to push him away. “I didn’t ask because . . .” He lowers his eyes, and his voice cracks. “. . . because it hurt too much to talk about it. I’d never fallen this hard for anyone, and I was terrified that I meant nothing to you. I couldn’t handle it. It freaked me out, being that vulnerable. I didn’t want the details. I wanted to walk away with whatever dignity I had left.”
A hot guy with a little bit of insecurity is so . . .hot.
“And when I finally decided to approach you,” he says, “you told me I bored you to tears and you wasted four months of your life on me. Then you tossed the key chain and started seeing Liam Turner. Two weeks after we broke up. That’s why I never brought it up. It seemed pointless.”
“I was . . . I dated Liam to get back at you,” I mumble. “I assumed you’d gotten tired of me, so I had to act like I didn’t care.”
“I went through hell trying to get over you.”
“Me too, Sean. Me too. I was so hurt, I even tried to get revenge on you.” I take a deep breath, and my speech comes out in a cascade of sentences as I share everything about my stupid plan. “. . . but halfway through, I aborted it because I like you too much. That’s why we kissed at the party, and why I ignored you after, because I realized I could never win with you. I needed to get over you, move on.”
He sighs, pressing his palms over his eyelids. “That’s why you were acting so strange. If this is about getting even, aboutwinning, then you already won. I was never any match for you,” he says, his voice tinged with sadness as he gestures at the air between us. “Are we—is this still part of your revenge?”
The little-boy look in his eyes softens me instantly. I can’t remember ever wanting to hurt him. “No. This is the real me. No schemes, no ulterior motives. I want to be with you. I always have. That’s never changed. Not since we were freshmen.”
We lapse into silence, each absorbing the newly gathered information. “Wait. So you were willing to get back together even though you believed I cheated on you?”
He nods. “I can’t stay away from you. When you say you like me, it’s the best feeling in the world. I’m sorry about everything.”
“I’m sorry too.”
He takes my hand with both of his. “And you were willing to forgive me even though you had no idea why we broke up?”
“What can I say? You’re a really good kisser.”
He chuckles, pulling me toward him, and I fall into the comforting warmth of him. “I really missed you,” I say against his shirt.
“I missed you too.All the time.” As his arms tighten, I think of snow melting, water carving its way through rocks, and mountains crumbling, their edges worn soft by years. I think of glaciers running into cool streams. It’s like getting over a long war and eventually returning home.
“You don’t know how happy I am right now,” he says.
