Page 77 of Landon & Shay: Part One

Oh, Landon.

Just those words alone made my heart ache.

“I think that’s for me to decide, not you,” I said. At first, he hesitated. He wasn’t sure if he was willing to show me his dark sides, to open up in a way I was certain he’d never opened up before. But there I was, holding out an olive branch, giving him a chance to be real for the first time in forever.

“Come on, Landon,” I whispered, giving him a small smile. “What’s the worst that can happen?”

His brow knitted, but then he gave me a small smirk. It was so tiny that I almost missed it, but luckily, I was studying him from all angles.

“I’m not good at talking about my feelings, really. I kind of close up,” he confessed.

“Okay.” I walked over to my backpack and pulled out a spare notebook and a pen. “If you can’t talk about them, then write them down in here and let me read your thoughts.”

“Do you always have spare notebooks lying around?”

I laughed. “Doesn’t everyone?” I took the pen and wrote a question on the first page for Landon to answer. “Here. Just reply to the question whenever you feel like it and leave it in my locker. You can write a question, too, and you can ask me anything. We don’t even have to discuss whatever we write out loud. We can just read each other’s truths and go from there. Deal?” I held my hand out for him to confirm our agreement.

He shook my hand. “Deal.”

As we touched, a spark raced through my system, and I probably held on to his hand a second too long…or he held on to mine too long. Either way, we were holding each other, and we didn’t let go too fast.

I liked the way it felt when his skin touched my skin.

When the feeling became too big, I dropped his hand. “I should probably be getting home actually. It’s pretty late.”

“Wow, a hit-it-and-quit-it kind of thing. I feel used, Chick.”

“Well maybe someday I’ll let you use me back,” I shot back, and a part of me was shocked that the words even left my mouth. “Walk me to my car?”

“Of course.”

We walked out and he opened my car door for me like the gentleman I’d never thought him to be, and I thanked him. “Oh wait, one last question,” I said.

“What is it?”

I pushed my tongue in my cheek and wiggled my nose. “Was there any leftover tissue in her butt from wiping, and if so, did you accidentally swallow it?”

He shook his head, laughing. “I hate you so much.”

“I hate you, too.”

“Yeah, well, I hate you the most,” he promised before he leaned in and kissed my forehead.

It felt so much more intimate than anything we’d done before. Forehead kisses had officially become my favorite thing he had given to me.

“Drive safe, Chick,” he said before stepping away. As I drove home, the butterflies in my stomach remained, and every time I thought about my hand wrapped around his hardness, every time I envisioned his face as I brought him to completion, my whole body would heat up all over again.

* * *

When I arrived home,I felt as if I were floating on air. My heart was soaring from my interaction with Landon, but all of that came to a crashing halt when the reality of my life at home slammed back into me.

It was quiet, calm as a river moving downstream. I couldn’t think of the last time it felt that tranquil at my house, but it wasn’t a peaceful calmness. It was terrifying.

“What’s going on?” I asked as I walked into the living room.

Mima stood there with her coat on and three suitcases at her side. There were also a few boxes stacked up beside the suitcases.

Mom looked up from the dining room table and stood up. She walked toward me, and I noticed the puffiness of her eyes right away. “Shay…we’d thought you’d be back a little bit later, but—”

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