She stretched her legs on the backseat, leaned her head against the door. Now her head felt heavy, and under the night sky, the dim light of the streetlamp, her blurry eyesight can make out the perfect silhouette of TJ Shanley on the driver’s seat. The roof of the car was down, she could see the subtle draft gently blowing Theo’s hair.
He turned to check on her. Sharp nose. Perfect shape lips. A jawline to die for. Dreamy green eyes. Not that she can see it, but she had it embedded in her mind. She could feel herself grinning like an idiot, then she pulled her face back trying to be normal.
“You okay there Mickey?”
She could see a faint smile on his face, a wonderful gorgeous-looking smile on his ultra-beautiful face.
“I’m okay … I think …” she laughed lightly, she didn’t know what was going on, being drunk for the first time was hilarious.
“Okay … we’re going out on a stroll now, a good night’s air can help keep you up a bit … don’t fall asleep, okay? Or you’ll be spending the night in my car … here, have some water, drink up,” he handed her his water bottle.
Drinking from his bottle would make her lips touch his indirectly, right? She heard it in her brain, so lame. She sat up too quickly, “Whoa … everything’s turning.”
He started driving, “It seemed you had a pretty wild night there, Mickey … getting drunk, kissing a girl … more than I can say for myself,” he chuckled.
“Oh … man … please don’t say anything to Max … we were just fooling around, it was so stupid,” she rested her elbows on either side of the front seat and gulped on the water bottle.
He glanced at her through the rearview mirror, “It’ll be our little secret … but really, what was that all about? Are you and Jan …?” he didn’t want to assume anything.
“What? God … no … she was showing me how to kiss a guy … I told her it was a bad idea … oh, please, that was so embarrassing,” she put her hand on her face, the moment was suddenly vivid in her mind again.
Theo laughed, “How to kiss a guy?” he shook his head, “Do girls do that? You kiss each other just to see how it feels like to kiss a guy?”
She laughed out loud, “I don’t think so … but I did apparently … I can’t believe you saw that, and I can’t believe I’m telling you this right now, I’m going to regret this tomorrow, aren’t I? … by the way, what were you doing there anyway? Why aren’t you with Peyton?”
He was smiling in amusement, if anything, he thought it was really cute. He paused before answering her question, then tilted his shoulder, “She’s out with her girlfriends, … I thought it would be good if she goes out with her friends once in a while.”
She furrowed her brows, “Really? I thought when you’re dating someone, you’d want to be with each other all the time … not that I know anything about dating,” she scoffed.
He didn’t reply to that.
She was right though, but somehow that wasn’t the case with Peyton. They were always together at school, she was with him after school, at practice, and then they were on the phone the rest of the day. He needed some space.
“I thought since you’re going to leave for college, you’d be spending more time together?” she continued.
He glanced at her in the rearview mirror, “She’s going to UOG too.”
There was a surprise in her expression, that turned into a slight of sadness, “Oh …”
He spotted it, it reminded him of that letter he wanted to ask her about, but the timing didn’t feel right. “You know who I should spend more time with?”
She looked at him through the mirror.
“You.”
She was taken aback by that, it rendered her speechless.
“Because you’re the only one who I won’t be seeing as much … Max will be just a few minutes away,” he said.
She hid a smile, it was flattering that he was thinking about her in that way. “Well … we’re spending time right now,” she raised both her hands.
“Right, and we should spend more time after tonight too … if you’re not busy with Lee,” his tone was mocking her. “You haven’t been around the field lately ’cause you’re always with him now … is he the reason why you’re practicing that kiss?”
She blushed, “No … ” she laughed nervously. “I told you it was just Jan’s stupid idea.”
“’cause I know a thing or two about kissing,” Theo cut her off.
Her eyes widened. Was he saying what she thought he was saying?
He pulled over and stopped the car. Her pulse raised. He turned around to look at her.
“Do you like him, Mickey? I mean … are you in love with him?”
Their face was so close it made her nervous all of the sudden.
She raised her brows, she burst out into a laugh, “Where did that come from? … I don’t know … why do you want to know?”
He tilted his head to one side, “Because … when you’re in love with someone … a kiss will come naturally … you don’t really have to practice anything, that’s what I’m trying to say.”
Their eyes met, he was being serious.
“If he’s in love with you, he will make the move, he won’t be able to stop himself because it will be the only thing he wanted to do when he looks at you.”
Kind of like how she felt at that moment. He had a different look in his eyes, something she never saw before. But she was drunk, she must’ve imagined it. She’d been in love with him for so long, every word he said was true. She really wanted him to kiss her.
She held her breath as he was moving closer, she didn’t have time to figure out what was happening when his lips touched hers. She could feel his breath on her face, he was soft and tender on her lips but it was different from Jan. All the hairs on her body stood up, it was weird and wonderful at the same time, and then he broke away.
He had a faint smile on his face, his eyes were hazy, “Kind of like that.”
She was dumbfounded. Didn’t know what the hell just happened. “What was that?” she blurted out.
“You said you wanted to know how it feels like to kiss a guy,” he said casually. “Now you know.”
He acted like it was nothing. It was probably nothing for him, just a silly little girl’s curiosity about kissing a guy for the first time. He started to drive again and left her completely in shock.