Page 49 of Fake It Till You Break It
“I mean, have you two ever…” Straightening, Ben moved his two fingers in circles. “You two seem pretty close.”
It took me a moment to get his drift. “No, nothing like that.I told you that we grew up together and our moms really want us to date, but we never did.”
“Until now.”
“Now is just to get them off our backs. It’s not real.” Is it just me or did my voice sound sort of wistful?
Stepping around a puddle on the sidewalk, Ben laughed. “I was just asking. I mean, I don’t want to step on any toes if you guys are actually dating or anything.”
“No, there are no toes anywhere.” The meaning of his words sank in, and I looked up at him. “So, hypothetically speaking, if there were toes, you would actually be worried?”
“Realistically speaking, yeah.” With a slow grin that made my toes curl against my sandals, Ben carefully took my half-eaten ice cream cone from my hand and tossed it into the metal trash can at the corner of the sidewalk.
He leaned over and kissed me gently. Sweetly. He brushed a wisp of my hair behind my ear while his hand was pressed against the brick wall over my head, making me feel small and dainty. But he left enough space between us so I didn’t feel overwhelmed or crowded. My hand reached up to clasp the back of his neck and pull him closer.
Crazy as it was, the first thought that popped into my head as soon as our lips touched was that I wasn’t done with the ice cream. Seriously, such a waste.
I mean, don’t get me wrong. The kiss was… nice. Really nice. Probably an eight on a scale of one to ten. Definitely topfive of my favorite kisses. And this was dating back to my first kiss with Jake when we were eight and I kissed him as revenge for telling on me to my mom about my F on the earth-science project.
But I was stilldisappointed. I mean, I wasn’t expecting a fairy-tale kiss that would sweep me off my feet or something, but I thought I would feelsomethingmore from my dream guy. I felt more electricity when Jake accidentally touched my neck. And not to mention Jake’s kiss the other night. I mean, that went straight up to the top of my list. Now that was like a fairy-tale kiss. If fairy-tale kisses were rated PG-13.
Thinking about Jake while I was kissing Ben didn’t feel right. It almost felt as if I were cheating, but on who? Jake was my fake boyfriend while this was my first (and maybe only) date with Ben. Technically, I was barely dating anyone, so it was kind of hard to be cheating.
That still didn’t make me feel better.
Ben just smiled and took my hand to walk again. “Come on, I’ll take you home.”
Relieved that he wasn’t going to try to kiss me again, I nodded.
AN HOUR LATER, Iwas still wide awake. I paced around my room, but I just couldn’t sleep. There was a restless feeling in my arms and legs every time I tried to lie down. It justfelt like there was something beneath my skin wanting to break free. Like an alien on the Syfy channel. I stretched. Wrote an email to Finn. Showered. I even tried to meditate, but nothing worked.
After my fourth attempt to do a cartwheel ended up with me in a crumpled heap on the floor by the window, I noticed that Jake’s light was still on across the street. That was weird. It was almost two in the morning. What was he still doing up?
I grabbed my phone from my nightstand to text him.
ME:Are you sleeping?
J. ASS:Zzzzz
ME:I’ll take that as a no. Especially because I can still see the lamp on in your room.
His bedroom light immediately turned off and I snorted.
J. ASS:Perv.
ME:It’s only considered a perv if I’m leering at you & I can definitely assure you that I’m not. I’m just nosy.
J. ASS:At least you admit it now.
ME:And at least you admit that you’re not sleeping.
J. ASS:I never said that.
ME:Well, you’re still talking to me, aren’t you?
I could see that he was typing something, but he would keep erasing it and start over. Rolling over to my side, I propped my head up on my bent arm and waited for his response. It took a while, but finally he sent another text.
J. ASS:Do you mind if I come over?
