Page 61 of Dropping the Ball

“Cold?” he asks, his voice low and lazy.

I give a single headshake, not trusting my voice. I keep my eyes on the screen, and he drops it. I’d rather die than get up, but it’s possible I’ll spontaneously combust if I don’t.

I stay.

Micah occasionally stops playing with my hair to draw me tighter and warn me another jump scare might be coming.

I think he makes up a few of them.

Somehow, by the time the credits scroll, I am both utterly boneless and nothing but pins and needles.

Neither of us reaches for the remote. The credits keep rolling.

It would be so simple to turn my head ever so slightly, and Micah’s mouth would berightthere by mine.

A quarter turn.

I want to do it. But I also want him to do it. I want him to initiate this so that if this goes wrong, it’s on him.Hetook us this direction.Hechose this.

It’s hard to think over my deafening pulse, but the truth is still louder.

I want this too.

Chapter Twenty

Kaitlyn

“I wasn’t lying, youknow.” Micah’s voice is mellow. Quiet.

“Lying about what?”

He doesn’t answer at first, instead combing several strands of my hair through his fingers at once, causing another shiver, sending more heat down my spine.

“This. Your hair. I always thought it was pretty.” He winds a lock of it around his finger.

“Thanks to two hours in a salon chair every eight weeks.” I try to sound dry. I sound breathless instead.

“It was pretty before. I had a lot of time in ninth grade to notice, since I sat behind you in Chinese the whole year. It was shiny. Like polished sugar pine.”

I make sure my voice is steadier this time. “That’s the nicest way anyone has ever said dishwater blonde.”

His arm tightens around me, like he’s putting me in check. “Who is the artist here? I know what I meant. I always thought it looked so soft.” He twirls a different strand around his finger. “It is.”

I take the compliment, relaxing even more against him, something I didn’t think possible when I was already boneless.

We fall quiet, and it’s a loaded silence. It’s the kind of silence before the tension bubble at the top of an overfull cup breaks. I could live in it forever. I will die if it doesn’t endnow.

I make the quarter turn.

Micah’s hand freezes, but he doesn’t loosen the curl. “Kaitlyn?”

I understand the question. “Yes.”

He understands the answer.

His lips brush mine, featherlight, and a sigh escapes me. As if that’s the final sign he needs, he kisses me again, his lips firm this time, his hand sliding from my hair as he moves it to my side and turns me so we are face-to-face.

If that first touch of our lips was another question, this kiss is an exploration with an edge of urgency, like this has been building since the day I bumped into him in his store.

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