pulled onto her street. I turned off my AC and stuck my hand out the window, hoping the rushing air would clean the nervous sweat off my palm.
And there was her house, quietly beautiful, with the expansive front porch and the wind chimes tinkling beneath the lights. She was sitting in one of the rocking chairs, legs crossed, waiting for me. When I got out of the car, she stood up and lingered at the top of the steps.
“Hey,” I said shakily, crossing the yard, the crickets buzzing all around me.
She was fidgeting as I walked toward her. “Hey.”
“How was your trip back?”
She watched me carefully. In the glow of the porch lights, her flyaway hairs danced like gold. “Is that really what you were dying to talk to me about?”
I reached her and looked up into her nervous face. “No,” I said softly. “Can we sit?”
We sat side by side on the front steps, her hands wrapped around her legs, my hands fumbling with my car keys.
“Are you feeling better?” she asked after a minute. “Natalie said you canceled on the Fourth because you were sick.”
“I wasn’t sick,” I said, looking straight at her. “I said that because I was afraid to see you.”
Her eyes moved between mine. “I know. Why?”
I cleared my throat and stared ahead of me, at the dark road and window-lit houses.
“That night on the swings…” I began. “I didn’t … I mean, I wasn’t sure how to…”
I could sense her body language; she was so careful, so taut.
“I thought … maybe … that you were going to kiss me.”
I took a deep breath and looked at her. She looked back with scared, searching eyes.
“Were you going to kiss me?” I asked.
She swallowed. “Did you want me to?”
My heart was pounding. I couldn’t look away from her clear, vulnerable eyes.
“Yes,” I whispered. “It’s just … um … I’ve never kissed anyone before.”
It was one of the hardest things I’d ever said, yanked straight from the shame pit inside me. I checked her expression, but she didn’t flinch or widen her eyes the way I’d worried she would. I steadied myself and kept going.
“I’ve never done anything with anyone,” I said, trying to make her understand. “And you’d been asking me about dating, and … and I panicked. I’m sorry.”
Lydia’s entire body relaxed. She exhaled and wiped a hand down her face. “Shit,” she said, laughing with relief. “I thought you were going to say something bad.”
I blinked at her, surprised. I thought my lack of experience was something bad.
“I thought you were going to be like, ‘I don’t like you like that,’” Lydia went on. “I thought that’s why you pulled away and why you haven’t talked to me since. I worried I was reading you wrong this whole time.”
“No,” I said, eager to make myself clear. “No, you were reading me right. I’m just—I don’t know. Scared.”
Lydia looked steadily at me. “Does it scare you to know that I like you?”
“Um, yeah,” I said, blushing. “But it also makes me really happy.”
“And you like me, too?”
My whole face was on fire, but I breathed past it and kept looking at her. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.”
She smiled at me in a calm, anchoring way, like she understood exactly where I was coming from. “I’m scared, too, Codi. It’s like I told you that day in the tree house … sometimes I feel scared of everything. But I like being around you. I like knowing you. I would love to spend the rest of the summer just hanging out with you.”
I let that settle into me. The way we were sitting, the way we were talking, it seemed like we had all the time in the world. Like I could try something new and there would be enough room to breathe in it.
Slowly, carefully, I scooted closer to her on the steps. I laid my hand over her knee, the way she’d done on the swings. “I wanna hang out with you, too. And not just as your friend.”
She stared at my hand for a moment. Then she raised her own hand and laid it over mine, touching my fingers gently.
“You said you’ve never kissed anyone?”
“Yeah,” I said.
“Does that bother you?”
“Yes,” I said, laughing self-consciously.
“Okay…” She nodded, searching me again. “Does it bother you that I have?”
“No,” I said, surprised to find it was the truth.
“Okay … so then…” She breathed and settled her eyes on me. “Would it be okay if I was your first