Page 127 of We Shouldn't Be Together
He laughs, breaking away from our kiss. “Sorry,” he mumbles, fishing his hands out of my blazer. “I didn’t mean to go that far up.”
I clear my throat. “Yeah. You kinda took me off guard.”
He laughs, fanning out his open collar. “Sorry, I got curious. Besides, it felt kinda lacey.”
I gasp, turning redder. He’s right; it does have a lace overlay. “So?”
He sniggers. “So, nothing. It felt nice.”
I whack his arm. “Well, don’t feel it again.”
“I won’t. It was an honest mistake.”
“Mm-hmm.”
He laughs to himself, lifting his spoon and digging it into the rest of his vanilla ice-cream. It’s only a moment of reprieve, because soon he sets it back down and is playing with my curls.
“So, we’ve kissed,” I murmur, playing with his tie. “What happens next?”
He twists one of my curls around his index finger. “Anything.”
I tug on his tie, and my shoulders lift with a thrill of excitement. “Like we can do this again?”
“I just thought you said I couldn’t—“
“Not that!” Boys. Are their minds always in the gutter? “I wanna hang out with you again.”
“You wanna go to the arcade and have ice-cream again?”
“No, silly. I want to do anything. As long as it’s just the two of us.”
He grins, swiping his thumb along my jawline. “Sure. We can do that. Tomorrow morning I have my soccer game, but we can hang out after that. Oh, shoot. I forgot my grandparents get to town tomorrow. But if they arrive before my game, I can skip out.”
“But they’ve traveled to see you.”
“They’re coming for my birthday. My birthday is on Sunday. We have time.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah. Besides, I’m usually with my friends whenever they visit.”
“You want to see me at the same time you’re seeing your friends?”
“You’d prefer it being just the two of us?”
“Won’t they be judging why I’m suddenly around?”
“I told you, I wanna tell my friends about you.” His thumb brushes against my bottom lip. “About us.”
A fresh coat of goosebumps lines my arms. “Maybe I just don’t have your level of confidence. I have no idea how they’ll react.”
“Not as harsh as your friends. I guarantee it.”
I smirk. “That’s a given.”
“Well, we can ease into you hanging out with my friends. I’ll make up an excuse to ditch them.”
“I don’t want to be that girl.” My shoulders bunch high as I pull away. “I don’t want to be the reason you see less of your friends.”
