Little Do We Know(2)

Luke flipped me around, pressed my back against the glass, and lifted my hands above my head. I laughed even harder. “You’re going full soap opera,” I said.

“Hey, you started it.”

I hitched one leg over his hip and pulled him closer.

“She’s totally watching,” he said. “Keep going.”

But I didn’t want to keep going. I wanted to kiss Luke for real, not for show, and certainly not for Hannah.

“I think she’s seen enough.” I looked over my shoulder, blew a kiss in her direction, and pulled down hard on the shade.

“Are you ever going to tell me what happened with you two?” Luke asked.

“Nope.” I didn’t see the point. Hannah and I hadn’t said a word to each other in over three months. She didn’t go to school with us, and between my play rehearsals and her church choir practices, our paths rarely crossed.

It wasn’t the way I wanted it, but it was the way it was.

I led him over to my bed, and when he sat on the edge and parted his legs, I stepped in between them. I let my fingers get lost in his dark brown curls and tried not to think about Hannah.

“Well, when you two start talking again, remind me to thank her.”

“For what?”

“I’m going to fall asleep tonight thinking about that kiss.”

That made me smile. Two seventy-three, I thought to myself. Only I didn’t think it to myself. I said it out loud. Luke pulled back and looked at me.

“What did you just say?”

“Nothing.”

I felt the flush heat my cheeks. I hoped it was dark enough in the room to keep Luke from noticing.

“Why did you say ‘two seventy-three’?”

“I didn’t, I said…” I tried to think of something that rhymed with seventy-three, but I was coming up blank.

Luke wasn’t about to let it drop. He brought his hands to my hips and pulled me toward him. “Come on. Tell me.”

“I can’t. It’s embarrassing.”

“It’s me,” he said as he undid the first button on my blouse. “What is it? You have two hundred and seventy-three freckles?” He kissed my chest.

“Maybe.” I giggled. “You want to count them?”

“I can’t.” He kissed another spot. “It’s too dark in here. Tell me.”

“I can’t tell you. You’ll think it’s weird.”

“Of course I will. You’re weird. In a good way.” And then, without taking his eyes off mine, he popped another button open.

“Ooh, I like that one even better.” I reached into the back pocket of my jeans for my phone, opened my Notes app, scrolled down to Day 273, and typed:

“You’re weird. In a good way.”

“Okay, fine. Here.” I handed him my phone.

Luke ran his fingertip over the glass, scrolling down slowly, scanning the entries. “Wait, who said the stuff in the quotes?”

“You did.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. I started on the night we met. You said this thing that made me laugh.”

“What did I say?”

I reached over his shoulder and scrolled to the top so he could read the first entry.

Day 1: “I think I’m in big trouble, Emory Kern.”

He laughed quietly. “I was right. I knew you were fun.”

“Sure.” I grinned. “But after all those boring girls you’d been dating, it wasn’t like it was a high bar or anything.”

Luke pointed at the last entry, Day 437. “Why does it end here?”

I shrugged like it was no big deal. “That’s August twentieth.” The day Luke was leaving for University of Denver, moving into the dorms, and I was hopefully doing the same at UCLA.

“Oh,” he said. And then it got quiet. And awkward.

I cracked a joke to lighten the mood. “So, no pressure, but that last one better be damn good. You should probably start thinking about what you’re going to say right now.”

Luke returned his attention to my collection of quotes.

“What? No way!” Luke started laughing so hard, I had to cover his mouth to muffle the sound.

“Shh…You’re going to wake my mom up.”

He pulled my hand away. “How did you not laugh in my face when I said, and I quote, ‘These songs make me feel like you’re in my arms.’ I did not say that.”

“You did. You made me a playlist, remember? Because you’re adorable.” I kissed his nose.

“I thought you meant this was embarrassing for you, not for me.” He looked up at me from under his long eyelashes, a mischievous smile playing on his lips. And then he swiped left. The little red delete button appeared on the side of the screen next to 273 days of carefully collected Luke-isms.

“Luke!” I panicked and tried to grab my phone from his hands, but he was too quick. He held it in the air, out of my reach, threatening to wipe the whole thing out with a single tap.

“Kidding. I wouldn’t do that.” He swiped right and the red button disappeared. Then he dropped the phone on my comforter and kissed me.

It was the kind of kiss I’d wanted when we were back at the window: long and slow, patient and teasing, soft and eager, all at the same time. God, I loved kissing him. I loved doing everything with him, but I might have loved kissing him most.