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“He deserves it.”
“Why haven’t you ever kissed anyone?”
Parker sucks in a breath, glances at me quickly, then away. She shoves her phone into some hidden pocket in her leggings. I figured I’d ask this like ripping off a band-aid. But I immediately feel bad.
“Guess this is fair play after my question, huh?”
“You don’t have to answer. I shouldn’t—I mean, it’s not my business. And it’s fine. Like, no judgment. I just … I’m curious.” I sound lame. I feel lame. But I also really want to know.
Parker picks up the pace, and I match her speed, wondering if she even noticed. “It wasn’t on purpose,” she says. “At least, not at first.”
I stay quiet through her pause, afraid if I speak, she won’t finish.
“Basically, my teenage years were all figure skating, all the time. Practice, school, more practice, competitions, repeat. I didn’t have time for anything else. By the time I quit, it was like I was years behind everyone else. It was awkward.Iwas awkward.”
“I doubt that,” I say, nudging her with my elbow.
This earns me a grin. “Yeah, well. It’s true. The older I got, the more it became a thing—in my head anyway. I was terrified of looking dumb or doing it wrong or of someone finding out and making fun of me. It sounds silly now,” she says with a shake of her head. “But you know how high school was.”
“Dumb.”
She laughs. “Yep. I did have somealmostkisses. They were”—her lip curls— “very, very bad experiences. Laughably, horribly bad.”
“Like?”
“Nope. I’m still on your first question. Those are stories for another day. After that, I actually started dealing with some anxiety. About that, but other stuff too.”
I try to picture bright, sunshiny Parker struggling with anxiety. It’s hard to imagine. But then, I remember what she said about being competitive. And her dad was constantly pressuring her and Brandon. So, okay, yeah—I can see it.
“Anyway, it got to where in college, I didn’t date at all because I was too anxious about the whole thing. That ring I usually wear? It’s a fidget ring. A lot of people with ADHD use them, but it helped me too. Breathing exercises stress me out, and the therapist I saw for a bit recommended the ring or something like it.”
I’m sort of blown away by her honesty. But then, Parker was always braver than me. She spills secrets like they’re pennies cast into a fountain to make wishes on.
“I don’t have, like, full-blown anxiety or anything,” she says. “Not like some people do. Thankfully, mine is mild. But dealing with it still helped me kind of own the fact that I hadn’t kissed someone. Now, I don’t see it as an issue. I see it as a gift. Don’t laugh, Logan.”
I frown. She thinks I would laugh at her about this?
“I’m not. I wasn’t. I would never.”
Parker shoots me a sidelong glance, as though assessing the truth in my statement. She must see that I mean my words, because she goes on.
“I figure by this time, it’s a choice. My choice. I get to decide who to give this kiss to.” She laughs a little. “That sounds pretentious, like it’s some hot commodity every guy would want.”
She has no idea.
“I mean, I still won’t know what I’m doing. And if I think about it too hard, I start to freak out a little. Just, like, the mechanics of it.”
Now my brain is thinking about the mechanics of kissing Parker. Ofshowing herthe mechanics.
Waving a hand, she says, “Whatever. That’s enough kiss talk. But that’s why it’s off the table for … this. When I kiss someone, it will be for real. Now you know way more than you wanted to. I hope you’re happy.”
I don’t know what I am. I do know I feel lighter than I did at the start of the night. The anger with myself or the world has fizzled. And I’ve got the natural high that seems to occur only when I’m around Parker.
Without thinking it through, I speed up, then slice to a stop in front of her. She does a neat little spin and stops too, hands on her hips.
“What? You’ve got a look.”
“No look.”
