Several drinks later, an auburn-haired girl and a brown-haired boy stood side-by-side, leaning against the balcony railing. Directly below them were scattered green beer cans all over Jonah’s freshly mowed lawn—the result of a failed attempt to balance each can on the railing.
“And… what? Don’t tell me your parents told you to dump him,” Drew laughed, taking a swig of beer.
She swiveled her head at him and arched an eyebrow. “What if I did?”
The can came down and he wheeled his head to face her, studying her face and searching her eyes, finding nothing but sad amusement and solemnness. He choked down a cynical laugh and rubbed the bottom of his lip with his thumb, choosing not to comment.
“I didn’t break up with him because my parents told me to,” she elucidated. “I did it because… he would have started feeling inferior to me. And no one would be happy that way.”
Drew nodded slowly as his mind processed this. Even though she had opened up to him much earlier, he still was slightly in awe at the fact that the school bitch had such kind motives behind all the bitchy things she ever did. Never judge a book by its cover, he supposed.
“You’re actually…” he began, voicing the general concept he deduced after analyzing all the facts he gleaned from her explanations. “You’re actually a really good person, aren’t you?”
Her eyebrows knitted together in skepticism. She stayed silent for a moment before giggling. “What kind of bullshit is that?”
“You’re pretending to detest him in order to get him to hate you, and that way, he can move on from you without being hurt,” Drew theorized to the cool night air. “I’m right, aren’t I?”
He was. She pressed her lips together. Was she that transparent? Damn. And she thought she was a good actor. “You can see through everyone. Am I right?” she asked, mocking him playfully.
Drew grinned. “I’m just the same kind of idiot as you are.”
A wry smile painted itself across her lips. “What does that mean?”
“It means I’d do the exact same thing.”
Now, it was Estella’s turn to fall silent and let his words wrap around her brain as they hung in the air. She reached for another beer in the cooler and cracked it open, bringing it to her lips the second it started fizzing.
“Shit,” Estella mumbled as she squinted at the blur of beer cans showered on the lawn. “Are those things dancing?”
“Looks like it to me,” Drew replied awfully cheerily. “Can’t tell what dance it is, though.”
“Maybe it’s the Wobble,” Estella proffered thoughtfully.
He snorted. “I don’t think so.”
“Then what is it?”
His eyes drifted away from the pile of cans lying on the grass and found themselves wandering the night sky. “The Macarena.”
“Liar,” Estella accused, but a grin adorned her face as she rubbed her teeth against her bottom lip, her line of vision tracing back to Drew. “You’re not even looking.”
“That’s ’cause I’m looking for a shooting star.”
Estella raised an eyebrow, looking at the sky and then back towards him. “A shooting star?”
“Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because I wish I could freeze time, right here and right now.”
As soon as he said it, he broke his gaze with the stars and locked eyes with Estella. She would have been startled if she was sober, but merely peered into his eyes with a slightly empty look. She found a convincing look of passion and desire within his green orbs of eyes, rings overlapping vortex lines until they reached the gaping black hole of nothingness.
She cracked a smile.
“Do you ever stop being an idiot?” she asked, tearing away from his glance easily, facing Jonah’s neighborhood and everything beyond.
“What’s that mean?” Drew grumbled, clearly unhappy that his cheesy movie line hadn’t done its magic on Estella.
“You’re a player when you’re sober and drunk.”
“I’m not a player.”
“And I’m poor,” Estella replied sarcastically, shooting him a facetious grin.
Drew, whose gaze hadn’t wavered from her, gave her an unimpressed frown. “At least I’m not one of those obnoxious guys who only talk about themselves.”
“When they’re drunk?” Estella questioned.
“When they’re drunk and sober,” Drew clarified.
Estella shrugged in agreement. Point taken. “I guess. At least you’re not stumbling over yourself and… er, interrupting everything I say by yelling.” She blinked a few times. She could hold her alcohol well, but she had drunk more than five or six beers, and that wasn’t giving her an easy job.
He nodded. “At least I’m not trying to attack you.”
She glanced at him, amused. “At least you’re not ugly.”
“At least I get good grades.”
“At least you…” Estella trailed off due to lack of things to say. She didn’t know Drew that well. They practically spoke for the first time in the ice cream parlor the other day.
“… have a good personality,” Drew finished.
She broke the pattern by lighting up with a smile. “Hey, let’s not get too cocky now—”
“At least I’m good-looking.”
At that point, Estella was conscious of the fact that she was taking a step back. And if she was taking a step back, that meant Drew was taking a step forward. And if he was taking a step forward…
“At least I’m good at kissing,” he continued softly.
Oh, God. She saw where this was going. And even though she was drunk and craving for attention, she just broke up with Stephen. Wasn’t this a little too impulsive? In hopes to ruin the mood before things could carry on in the wrong direction, Estella spread open her lips and hastily added, “At least you’re…”
And then he kissed her.
It was gentle, light, and quick. His mouth was softer than she thought it would be. His lips left hers quicker than she anticipated, leaving her mortified at the fact that she was disappointed. Her eyes flickered up at him, and her heart buckled when she found his eyes centimeters away from her. Not only his eyes, but his nose, his cheekbones, his jaw, his stubble, his lips…
He was inching closer to her, and Estella knew she was in deep shit when she found herself not wanting to push him away. When she could feel his breath on her, she impetuously concluded that she was drunk, so, to hell with everything—she kept her eyes fixated on his and let his hand wander to cup her cheek. When his lips touched hers for the second time, she let her eyelids fall.
His kiss deepened into her mouth, parting slowly. This time, before he could pull away, Estella responded by capturing his lips with hers. Slowly, torturously, their mouths parted and closed, moving in sync.
Losing track of time, the world transformed before Estella. Instead of the back of her eyelids, she saw gold. She saw the most brilliant, most inner part of a firework, a spark.
She snaked her arm around his neck as his tongue surreptitiously slipped between their parted lips and Estella followed suit, each other’s mouths becoming their own, both bodies pulsing with lust and surging with desire.
Estella tried to recall—did kissing Stephen ever feel like this? She didn’t think so. Maybe it was because Drew was an amazing kisser, or maybe it was because of the alcohol. But there was one thing that was clear as day, painted on all angles of her mind: she did not want to let him go.
Her heart and her lips throbbed as one as the slow, tender, but agonizing kiss had somehow become faster and wild. He took a step forward, leading her out of the balcony. Someone—one of them—grabbed the glass screen door and slammed it open, waltzing right across the room and dropping onto the bed, lips locked all the while.
His hand left her cheek and their kiss broke momentarily to rip off his shirt. Estella’s eyes fluttered open to find nicely toned abs and pecs in front of her. The slightest of cocky crossed his face as he watched her caress every ripple on his abdomen with her eyes. Her lips lifted upward in the smallest smile, and she tugged off her shirt, deciding right then and there that this was what she wanted. For now, anyway.
Instead of her lips, his mouth found her jawline, planting small and feathery kisses along it, leaving her tingling. His hands wandered her upper body, feeling and building a picture for what his eyes weren’t seeing. He never pulled away from her, gently grazing her skin with his lips. A low moan escaped her lips when he bit her neck, and she reached down and slipped off his belt with agile fingers. Drew tangled his fingers in Estella’s hair as she wrapped her legs around his waist, closing her eyes as he went down.
Well, there was no going back now.