What A Kiss Is

Chapter Eleven

Eleven

“Wait. We’re going where?” I ask.

“To the San Juan’s. Canada?” Dad’s eyes are wide. “It’s the trip we’ve been planning since you got here. We’ve just been waiting for good weather.”

“Oh. Guess I’ve been a little distracted.” How will things be different? Guess they really won’t be. We’ll still be on the boat, just not on the dock.

“So, they’ll ride with us?” I ask.

“Yeah, Lynn and Amber always ride along on my boat cause it’s bigger.”

“Right.” I smile. That’s a lot of time with Amber. “Two weeks?”

“More or less.” He shrugs. “Really, we live here, so for however long we want.”

“Uh…okay.” Right. The house moves. Kind of white trash in my mind, but also convenient.

- - -

Amber comes down the steps with a large backpack, her legs depressingly covered.

“Morning,” I say, a little curious as to where we stand after last night and the whole movie thing with Captain America.

She quickly takes the last two steps, her pack slung over a shoulder. “Morning.”

Her eyes don’t directly meet mine, and her mouth twitches a few times. I have no idea what she’s thinking, and it’s making me crazy. She doesn’t look happy, or sad. Just…

“How was your night?” I ask. What did you do after I left? Did he touch you? Did you want him to? Why am I such a mess over this?

“You disappeared.” Her eyes narrow. Anger? I’m still not sure.

“Yeah, it was a little too cozy in there for me.” I lean back and fold my arms. And I don’t like games.

“Crap.” She sits in a slump. “Okay. I’m about to take my mom’s advice, and this really sucks, okay?”

I chuckle at her poutiness. “Okay.”

“It’ll be easier if I don’t look at you.” She rests fingers on either temple, blocking her peripheral.

“I don’t like Kent that way. I just don’t. It was stupid and not nice for me to invite him last night. And I think I like you that way, but you scare me because I’ve never…”

The pause is excruciating, and her face doesn’t move or twitch or give any indication of what she might be feeling.

“Well, I can’t talk about that. And you don’t strike me as the kind of guy who’s happy waiting around for a girl to make up her mind, and I don’t know that you’d even want me, which would make all of this moot, and I’m a little confused, and I know you’re probably going somewhere fancy for school, and there’s no point in starting anything, and I’m afraid to start anything, and I don’t know what I’m saying, and really, really wish I hadn’t taken my mom’s advice.”

She stops talking, breathing hard after her rant, and her eyes close.

She likes me. I hadn’t realized how much uncertainty I felt until she said it out loud, and now I’m feeling something like relief.

“I’m going to school at NYU.” That’s what I come up with?

Our eyes meet. “Probably me too.”

“What?” I ask. Amber in New York?

“It’s one of my final three,” she says.

“Oh.” What else did she talk about? “I think I only understood about half of what you said.”