"Kate! Please!" Nick called out to me, begging for me to turn around.
He was begging. He was fucking begging. I couldn't help but scoff and kept walking with my head held high. I missed the turn to go down my street, not like going home right now would help with him practically on my heels. I could possibly lose him in town square though.
"Kate, wait up." He called out again. For some reason, I had to close my eyes and shake my head. No, I'm pissed at him. I'm so mad at him, but now it just sounds like I'm just trying to convince myself that I am.
I didn't know what I wanted. Of course, I want to talk to him and just forget everything that happened to go back to what it was like last week, but that wasn't possible. I had my life threatened by someone who was in the same room of the event that killed many of my friends and almost myself. I watched the person who saved me get a bullet returned six years later. It's been a fucking rollercoaster of a day and I had no clue how I was even keeping my mind straight at that point.
"Freckles, please-" Nick choked on his words when I whipped around and started to walk back to where he was.
"No!" I yelled at him. My voice sounded tight and rough. I pointed my finger directly at his face, well more technically his nose, as I shook my head at him. "You don't get to do that!"
My throat was constricting as it took everything in me to not start crying on the spot. His eyes fell on my finger before moving past to look at my face. He furrowed his eyebrows together in confusion.
"Do what?"
Oh, my god. He's so stupid.
I let out a noise that was something in between annoyance and frustration as I gripped at the roots of my hair before focusing back on Nick. "You can't say that nickname that only you call me and expect me to immediately forgive you!"
He pressed his lips together to form a line as the corners of his mouth tilted up into one of the smallest smiles ever, "But you are talking to me." He tried to lighten the mood, but that response resulted in the exact opposite reaction in me.
A scoffed full of disbelief escaped my mouth as his face dropped, realizing that his attempt to make a joke fell flat in the mud. I ran my hands down my face and left them on my neck as I tried to pick my next words.
Shaking my head again at him, I spoke with my eyes closed tight, "You don't get to ignore me for a week and just let it be water under the bridge."
Nick swallowed as his gaze fell to the ground between our feet, "I wasn't ignoring you."
I took a deep breath and threw my head back, annoyed with his vague and redundant answers. "Then what do you call you not talking to me since that night?"
He pulled his lip in between his teeth as he slowly lifted his head back up. The brim of his hat just barely allowing me to see his face. "I was... avoiding you?" He cringed at his own response, and I simply laughed at him.
"Fuck this," I threw my arms up and turned back around but I barely made it one step away from him when his hand shot out to quickly grab my hand.
Just as fast as he touched me, he pulled away and let go. "No, Kate, please let's talk about this."
"Let's talk this through? Talk about what!" I whipped back around and raised my voice. His shoulder slumped and bowed his head again, looking like a puppy who was just whacked on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper. "You should have come to me days ago! What happened with all that 'you're my best friend' shit and that you were afraid to lose me?" I couldn't help the tears flowing down my face anymore as I took a couple steps forward to slight duck so he could see what his actions caused. "You have no clue how much I wanted to just talk to you, I missed you so much."
His face screamed guilt and his eyes were getting glassy. He honestly looked like he wanted to cry and vomit at the same time.
"All the times people knocked on my door, trying to get me to come out and talk to them. Every time someone knocked, I wished and hoped that it was you, but you never came around. And now, you're just standing here, wanting to talk about it but you're giving me bullshit answers that are pretty much repeats of what I'm asking," I took in a shaky breath as he looked back at me. His hand twitched at his side like he was going to raise it, but it stayed by his side.
"I... I'm..." he started to meekly say but went quiet and wiped his eyes while ducking his head as a horse pulling a cart full of lumber trotted past us.
My head followed the cart as I started to see people filling the square a couple yards away. I didn't want anyone to witnesses this. They would get in the way and Nick would hide and cower even more than he already has.
I grabbed his sleeve and pulled him into the direction of the range which was only a couple feet away from where we were standing, "I'm not going to have this fucking fight in the middle of the street."
Pulling Nick into the range and immediately letting go the minute he crossed the threshold of the door, I let him go as he kept walking forward to turn back and locked the door. I ran a hand through my hair as I let out a breath, "It's your turn to speak. So, go. Talk. I'm done. Say what you have to say or I'm unlocking that door and walking away." I spoke as I crossed my arms and walked over to the table that had all the ammunition spread out to lean against. "And this time, I'm not turning back around."
Nick stood in the middle of the range, wringing fingers and shifting back and forth on one leg. It was almost like the day back at the beginning of December when I sat here giving him pointers on his archery. He rubbed at his eyes as he let out a sigh, "I- Fuck- why is this so fucking hard?"
I stood there in silence like I told him I was going to, watching him as he was very visibly picking through his brain for what to say. He kept trying to start a sentence but ended up cutting himself off and doing something with his hands or head to show his frustration with himself.
Finally, he placed his hands on his hips and breathed out a harsh breath, "I'm an idiot."
I just rose an eyebrow at him.
"I- umm..." he picked his hat up off his head to run his fingers through his hair before tugging his hat back on, "I didn't have permission."
My eyes shifted to the side for a second before going back to him. Confusion and lost evident on my face.
He licked his lips and rose a hand to pitch the bridge of his nose. "You didn't give me permission," He tried again. "I felt like I was... I don't know." He rubbed at his jaw, the sound of his fingers running over his stubble filled the silence in the building. "I was scared that you didn't actually like me and just went along with it."
"I didn't give you permission?" I questioned with a tilt of my head. He's gotta stop talking like I'm supposed to immediately understand what he's talking about and can fill in the blanks on my own.
"Yes, you didn't give me permission to kiss you!" He let out in a rush as he started to pace back and forth, finally speaking something that had weight behind the words. "I just leaned down to kiss you because my mind was going in circles about this huge fucking crush I have on you and for once I had nothing telling me to stop!"
I blinked a couple times as I leaned back on the table with my hands, "I'm sorry, you didn't talk to me for a week because you didn't have permission to kiss me?"
"Yes!" He yelled out as he spun to face me with his arms out wide. "You didn't give me permission- wait. No. That's not the word. Fuck." He squeezed his eyes shut as he leaned back on his heels, his neck craned back to the ceiling. "What's the word? Fuck!" His jaw tightened as he folded his hands over his head and started to pace again. "Consent! That's the word! I didn't have your consent!"
I drew in my eyebrows and let out a small laugh, "I'm pretty sure me jumping into your lap and kissing you back was good enough consent."
He paused his stride, "No, it's not." His words were harsh and serious. "I needed to ask you if I could kiss you and you needed to answer me. With words, not actions."
"You needed to ask me if you could kiss me?"
If you let go the whole week he ran away and hid, the basis of his argument was sweet. The rigidness and frustration I had with him started to slowly drain from my stance as I loosened my shoulders and relaxed my face that was probably scowling this whole time.
"I needed to ask you if I could kiss you so I could know you were okay with it and hopefully returned some feelings so I could, like, officially know that I wasn't making up things in my mind about you liking me. Also, we weren't sober!" His eyes widened as he remembered that fact and placed his hand over his eyes. "Oh, god, I was so afraid that I took advantage because we were so fucking high... I was so scared that you only saw me as a friend and I didn't have the freaking courage just to come and talk to you and now, I'm even more of a dick because we're talking about this shit when you were pretty much experiencing your worst nightmare no more than a half hour ago."
His mind was running a mile a minute as he kept spitting out words and I couldn't help but wonder for a moment if that's what I look like when I'm overthinking and rambling. It was kind of cute, him trying so hard to find the right words and phrases to convey what he was thinking and feeling.
Yes, he did a shit thing by not talking it through with me for a week, and yeah, it's unfortunate that we're talking about it today. But I was childish and immature in ways too. I also hid in my room and avoided him, making myself believe that he had to come to me first. I could have been the bigger person and tried at least once to talk to him, but I didn't.
It was on both of us, and we needed to have a better, more calm discussion of it later, but right now, my mind was focused on him saying that he needed to ask for consent so he could know that I liked him back.
And yeah, I do like him back. I really like him. Even though, he's so dumb.
I bit my lip as I spoke up, "So, you need to ask if you can kiss me?"
He let out a sigh as he brought his head back down, "Yes, Kate. I needed to ask you if I could kiss you." His face scrunched up as he cringed for a moment, "Well, I really wanted to say something like 'Can I?' or 'This okay?' because asking 'Can kiss you?' to me is just kind of cringe and I wanted to be smooth with it." He groaned as he started to pace again from embarrassment.
I rolled my eyes at his rambles. He didn't have a smooth bone in his body, but nonetheless, I kept pushing to see if he would eventually catch on to my word play.
"'Can I kiss you'? That's what you need to say?"
He sighed as he stopped walking with his back to me, "Yes, can I kiss you?"
I smirked even though he couldn't see it, "Yes."
Nick turned his head over his shoulder, his eyebrows were pitched together but he wasn't looking at me just yet.
"Yes?" He asked.
My face broke out into a smile.
"Yes."
He blinked as he turned his body enough to look at me. The silence that rang through the air wasn't awkward or uncomfortable, but it broke some as Nick's feet sounded against the dirt of the range.
He caught on.
His hands fell on my neck once he reached me. His thumbs landing right in front of my ears as he tilted my head back and kissed me. I placed my hands on his waist as his lips slanted over mine, pushing my head back even more than possible and I welcomed every bit of it.
I felt like I was burning under my clothes, but I didn't- no, I couldn't pull away. It felt just like it did last week. Nick was like an addiction, a drug, and this week without him made me crave him. It was like going through a withdrawal.
My hands grazed up his sides so I could wrap my arms around his neck. This time he was the one who shivered as my fingers and palms ran over his body. He took his hands off my face to wrap his arms around my waist to tug me closer.
Air. I needed air, sadly enough. So, I pulled away an inch at most to take a breath, but I couldn't open my eyes. I was just basking in the fact that he was so close, and we were kissing and he wasn't running away.
"That's..." he breathed out in a whisper. "That's how it should have gone the first time."
My eyes fluttered open as he pressed his forehead against mine.
"Nah," I shook my head lightly, "the first one was good too. It was the after that was the problem."
His hands felt heavy on the small of my back, but it was a grounding weight. A weight that I always wanted there as his thumb started to stroke back and forth.
"Yeah... sorry about that. My mind was a gutter, and all fucked up from the weed and... I'm sorry." He closed his eyes and swallowed.
I pulled my forehead away from his to give him one more kiss before fully pulling away this time and leaning back into his arms, "I get where you're coming from. I'm sorry, too."
He tilted his head to the side, "Why are you sorry?"
"I could have come to you too or just did something, not wait and push away until you came to me." I couldn't help but laugh a little bit. "Why are we like this? So scared to talk to each other about things and immediately overthink?"
Nick rose his eyebrows and sputtered out a sigh as he shook his head, "I have no fucking clue but we gotta stop."
My nose scrunched up as I laughed at his words. I placed a hand on his cheek as my laugh died out, "I'm still a tiny bit mad at you."
He looked down and leaned his head into my hand but brought his eyes back to mine after a second, "That's fair."
"I fuckin' cried to Taylor Swift because of you."
This time he laughed out loud, but I smiled at him as his nose crinkled up as well. Just like it does when he's genuinely laughing. God, I missed him.
"Did you really?" He kept laughing.
"Fuck off." I slid my arms out from around his neck to push at his chest. "I was convinced that I screwed something up and you hated me. And I vented the same way a dramatic teenager would." My face curled up in disgust as I cringed back at the memory of me bawling my eyes out to stereotypical sad, heartbreak songs.
"Aww," he cooed at me with a laugh as he pulled me back into a hug. His head fell into the crook of my neck as I brought my arms back up to run my fingers through his hair poking out from the bottom of his hat. His laughter died and his tone fell back to normal. "It's okay, I was the dumbass."
"Yes, you were," I responded with a smile.
"Okay... I'll accept that willingly right now because I was an idiot," he leaned forward to press his forehead against the skin of my neck.
I twisted a piece of his hair round my finger as I chuckled, "And are."
He let out a deep breath. A shiver ran its way down my spine at the feeling of him breathing on my neck. "... sure."