into him and settling against his shoulder. I don’t think I’m breathing. My neck feels stiff as I debate whether to rest my cheek against him. It feels like too much, but I’m in it now, and I can’t sit with my head cocked up for the rest of this movie, or TV show, or whatever it is we’re going to sit here and watch. Or can I? Maybe my neck muscles are stronger than I’m giving them credit for.
I let my head relax against him, and it’s done; there’s no going back now. I am snuggling with Asher Marin. And not in an undercover-agent-getting-close-to-her-mark kind of way. In a really sweet, comforting, normal kind of way. Like two people who haven’t spent eight weeks every summer tormenting each other. Like two people who like each other. Is that who we are now? Or is this just how Asher is with people he’s not being horrible to? I don’t know Asher outside of summer vacation and this little town we both inhabit for two months—it’s totally possible that he’s the kind of guy who snuggles with all of his female friends.
“Stop thinking about it,” he says softly, his voice teasing but sweet.
Asher rests his hand on my arm, and as we watch the movie and then the next, his fingers trace an idle, mindless path on my skin. I can’t breathe.
And I don’t hate it.
Asher
It’s almost 2 a.m. and Sidney is still lying on me. My hand is numb, but if I’m the first to move from this position there’s a definite possibility that it will be the last time we’re ever in it. We haven’t said anything all night, but there’s a tangible current of anxiety rolling off of Sidney. We need to talk, so we don’t have another day like today, where she avoids me.
“On a scale of one to ten, how much are you panicking right now?”
The shoulder pressed against my ribs rises and falls as she takes a deep breath. “Something like a twelve.” I smile at her voice, because it sounds nervous but it doesn’t sound anything like a twelve. And she hasn’t moved away from me yet.
“I think we should go somewhere.” I sit up, and Sidney’s head slides down my chest a few inches before she catches herself.
“Now?”
“Now or never,” I say, standing up and pulling her to her feet. I need to show Sidney that we could be so much better together than we are apart.
* * *
It’s hard to believe only forty-eight hours have passed since the last time we stood here. I know technically each day holds exactly twenty-four hours, but in reality some days just take up so much more space in our lives. Jumping off of that swing feels like a lifetime ago. And standing next to Sidney now in the darkness of the trees, Nadine’s yard just beyond us, the minutes that pass in silence feel just as long.
“We’re a good team.” My words aren’t much more than a whisper. Silence stretches out as we stand side by side marveling at the white disaster that is Nadine’s yard. It’s not the mountains of fluffy potatoes I’d imagined in my mind, but it’s pretty gross looking; a white sludgy mess. There are dark spots crisscrossing the yard showing everywhere Nadine has walked. “I get the panic. I swear I do,” I say.
“But?”
I bump my arm into hers. “See, you get me.”
She smiles, and it feels like my chance to turn this panic-fest into something else. Something that doesn’t set us back to what we’ve always been. Because I’m sure Sidney’s already decided that this is all going to end in ruin. She’s already convinced herself that the only way to avoid hurting each other is to avoid liking each other. I wonder if this is how Taylor and David and Evan all met their fates. Sidney, alone in the dark, with too much time to think. Too much time to panic. “Just give me three dates.”
She looks straight ahead as she says, “March seventh, June twelfth … and October twenty-third.”
“Smart ass.” I poke her playfully in the side and she jumps.
“Guilty,” she says, but she doesn’t sound it. She sounds proud of herself. And like she’s starting to loosen up again. She sounds like drive-in movie Sidney. Like chocolate-chip pancake Sidney, covered in flour that first morning and dripping with newfound optimism.
“Three dates,” I continue, and I wish we were still on that couch where I was touching