Page 49 of The Gingerbread Bakery
He grinned and cupped her face with his hands, kissing her gently on the lips.
His smile grew and Annie couldn’t believe that the cutest boy in school was kissing her. For a minute, standing in the dark hallway of their high school, she forgot that they weren’t students here anymore, that they were technically adults. All she felt was the giddy joy of her crush liking her back.
‘What d’you get?’ Mac asked, pulling away and gesturing to the candy she still had clutched in her fist.
‘Peanut M&Ms,’ she said, sliding down to the floor. Mac joined her, their backs pressed against the lockers.
He put out his hand and she poured some candy into his palm. He tossed them all into his mouth at once, crunching happily.
‘So,’ he said. ‘What have you been up to this week?’
Besides thinking about you?
Nope, don’t saythat. ‘I helped my mom decorate the house and I took Charlotte to her basketball practice and I did a lot of baking. I actually had a few people place orders for Christmas.’
‘That's awesome. You’re like a real business.’
Annie beamed. Shewaslike a real business.
‘What about you? What have you been up to?’
‘Mostly spent a lot of time thinking about wanting to kiss you some more,’ he said with a grin.
Giddiness raced through her. She felt like she might float away. Mac was thinking about her while she was thinking about him!
‘You can,’ she said. ‘I mean you can kiss me some more if you want.’
Mac leaned toward her and this time the kiss was less gentle. By the time they pulled apart again, Annie was breathless.
‘Pretty fun doing that here and not having teachers split us up,’ Mac said with a laugh, and Annie could not imagine any version of herself that would have done this during school hours.
‘Yeah, that never happened to me,’ she said.
Mac looked at her, studying her like he was trying to figure her out.
‘Never got detention, either, I guess.’
‘Nope.’
‘Skipped class?’
‘Never.’
‘Faked sick so you could stay home?’
Annie thought about that one for a minute. Had she? ‘No, not that either. I didn’t want to get behind.’
Mac tipped his head, considering her. ‘What would have happened if you did get a little bit behind? Like what’s the worst outcome?’
Annie shrugged. ‘I would have ruined my perfect GPA.’
‘Right. Failure.’
‘Exactly.’
He looked at her for another minute and nerves fluttered in her belly. Maybe now was when he remembered that they didn't really make sense together. There were reasons they had spent the first thirteen years of knowing each othernothanging out.
‘Just so you know…’ he said, and Annie braced herself for what came next.
