“If you can’t get the French, I’ll teach you something more basic,” Kitty says, and there is no mistaking the contempt in her voice.
Peter hears it too. “No, I’m gonna get it. Just give me a second. I’m gonna master it just like I mastered the other kind of French.” He winks at me.
Kitty and I both scream at him for that. “Don’t talk like that in front of my sister!” I yell, shoving him in the chest.
“I was kidding!”
“Also, you’re not that good at French kissing.” Even though, yeah, he is.
Peter gives me a Who are you kidding? look, and I shrug, because who am I kidding?
* * *
Later, I’m walking Peter to his car when he stops in front of the passenger-side door and asks, “Hey, how many guys have you kissed?”
“Just three. You, John Ambrose McClaren—” I say his name fast, like ripping off a Band-Aid, but Peter still has enough time to scowl. “And Allie Feldman’s cousin.”
“The kid with the lazy eye?”
“Yeah. His name was Ross. I thought he was cute. It happened at a sleepover at Allie’s; I kissed him on a dare. But I wanted to.”
He gives me a speculative look. “So me, John, and Allie’s cousin.”
“Uh-huh.”
“You’re forgetting one person, Covey.”
“Who?”
“Sanderson!”
I wave my hand. “Oh, that doesn’t really count.”
“Allie Feldman’s cousin Ross who you kissed on a dare counts, but not Josh, who you technically cheated on me with?” Peter wags his finger at me. “Nuh-uh. I don’t think so.”
I shove him. “We weren’t actually together then and you know it!”
“A technicality, but okay.” He gives me a sidelong look. “Your number’s higher than mine, you know. I’ve only ever kissed Gen, Jamila, and you.”
“What about the girl you met at Myrtle Beach with your cousins? Angelina?”
A funny look crosses over his face. “Oh yeah. How’d you know about that?”
“You bragged about it to everyone!” It was the summer before seventh grade. I remember it drove Genevieve crazy, that some other girl had kissed Peter before she did. We tried to find Angelina online, but we didn’t have much to go on. Just her name. “So that makes it four girls you’ve kissed, and you did a lot more with them than kiss, Peter.”
“Fine!”
I’m on a roll now. “You’re the only boy I’ve ever kissed kissed. And you were the first. First kiss, first boyfriend, first everything! You got so many of my firsts, and I didn’t get any from you.”
Sheepishly he says, “Actually that’s not entirely true.”
I narrow my eyes. “What do you mean?”
“There was never any girl at the beach. I made the whole thing up.”
“There was no Angelina with big boobs?”
“I never said she had big boobs!”
“Yes you did. You told Trevor that.”
“Okay, fine! Geez. You’re missing the whole point, by the way.”
“What’s the whole point, Peter?”
He clears his throat. “That day in McClaren’s basement. You were my first kiss too.”
Abruptly I stop laughing. “I was?”
“Yeah.”
I stare at him. “Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“I don’t know. I guess I forgot. Also it’s embarrassing that I made up a girl. Don’t tell anybody!”
I’m filled with a glowy kind of wonder. So I was Peter Kavinsky’s first kiss. How perfectly wonderful!
I throw my arms around him and lift my chin expectantly, waiting for my good-night kiss. He nuzzles his face against mine, and I feel gladness for the fact that he has smooth cheeks and barely even needs to shave. I close my eyes, breathe him in, wait for my kiss. And he plants a chaste peck on my forehead. “Good night, Covey.”
My eyes fly open. “That’s all I get?”
Smugly he says, “You said earlier that I’m not that good at kissing, remember?”
“I was kidding!”
He winks at me as he hops in his car. I watch him drive away. Even after a whole year of being together, it can still feel so new. To love a boy, to have him love you back. It feels miraculous.
I don’t go inside right away. Just in case he comes back. Hands on my hips, I wait a full twenty seconds before I turn toward the front steps, which is when his car comes peeling back down our street and stops right in front of our house. Peter sticks his head out the window. “All right then,” he calls out. “Let’s practice.”
I run back to his car, I pull him toward me by his shirt, and angle my face against his—and then I push him away and run backward, laughing, my hair whipping around my face.
“Covey!” he yells.
“That’s what you get!” I call back gleefully. “See you on the bus tomorrow!”
* * *
That night, when we’re in the bathroom brushing our teeth, I ask Kitty, “On a scale of one to ten, how much will you miss me when I go to college? Be honest.”
“It’s too early for this kind of talk,” she says, rinsing her toothbrush.
“Just answer.”
“A four.”
“A four! You said you missed Margot a six point five!”
Kitty shakes her head at me. “Lara Jean, why do you have to remember every little thing? It’s not healthy.”
“The least you can do is pretend you’ll miss me!” I burst out. “It’s the decent thing to do.”
“Margot was going all the way across the world. You’re only going fifteen minutes away, so I won’t even have a chance to miss you.”
“Still.”
She clasps her hands to her heart. “Okay. How’s this? I’m going to miss you so much I’ll cry every night!”
I smile. “That’s more like it.”
“I’ll miss you so much, I’ll want to slit my wrists!” She cackles wildly.
“Katherine. Don’t talk like that!”
“Then quit fishing for compliments,” she says, and she goes off to bed, while I stay behind and pack up my toiletries for the New York trip tomorrow. If I get into UVA, I’ll probably just keep a set of my makeup and creams and combs here at home, so I won’t have to pack every time. Margot had to be so careful about what she brought with her to Saint Andrews, because Scotland is so far away and she isn’t able to make the trip back home very often. I’ll probably only pack for fall and winter and leave all my summer things at home, and then just switch them out when the seasons change.
6
IN THE MORNING, DADDY DRIVES me to school to catch the charter bus. “Call me as soon as you’re settled in your room,” he says as we wait at the traffic light by school.
“I will.”
“Did you pack the emergency twenty?”
“Yes.” Last night, Daddy gave me a twenty-dollar bill to put in the secret pocket of my jacket, just in case. I have his credit card, too, for spending money. Ms. Rothschild loaned me her tiny umbrella and her portable cell phone charger.