“Already paid for,” the woman helping Colin said with a smile. “Your cute boyfriend did it.”
Colin and I both started to stutter in response to the phrase, causing the woman who’d helped me to swat her on the arm. “Don’t embarrass them! It’s their first date.”
I supposed the way we were behaving was very ‘first date’ like. I looked at Colin and he grinned at me and I couldn’t help but smile back. Whether because we didn’t feel like explaining our story to total strangers, or because somewhere inside us we liked to think their assumption was true, we decided not to correct them. Colin grabbed the bag with my kimono, we walked over and collected our tea and ramen, and found a spot to sit and eat.
The afternoon bled into the evening as we crawled the rest of the booths. We got sweets from Germany, including enough to bring back for my parents, took pictures at the fake Taj Mahal in India, and played with an adorable baby dingo that was promoting an animal rescue in Australia. Everything we did reminded us of some story from our childhood. He would start a story and then I would take it over and then he would take it over, and it would end with us laughing out loud about the tons of good times we’d had. The day ended better than I could have ever hoped for.
By the time we were pulling back into the driveway, the sun had already set. We walked inside, noticing that my parents were both passed out on the couch, and just decided to head upstairs. We got to our doors and came to a stop, facing each other, standing in the middle.
Colin smiled at me and handed the bag with the kimono over. “Thank you.” His eyes were full of something spectacular. Something I’d seen before, but not for years. Something I’d once believed meant he loved me too. “This has been an amazing day.”
“It really has. Thanks for coming with me.”
I smiled up at Colin and I was reminded of the way we looked at each other that day he kissed me. I couldn’t deny that I hoped this day would have the same outcome. Colin lifted his hand to my face and I took a breath in and held it. He brushed his thumb across my cheek, but just when I thought he may lean in, he rubbed his fingers and pulled his hand away.
“Still had a piece of glitter hanging out from that one stand.” It was a lie, but I didn’t push it. “Well. Goodnight.”
“Yeah. You too.”
Colin turned around and went into his room and I finally let out my breath and fled to mine. I held my chest, trying to calm it’s clamor. Even all this time later, Colin was still the only one who could make me feel so calm and so crazy all at once.
14
Colin
I smiled watching Tatiana flip through her phone, showing her mom the pictures we’d taken on Saturday. I was chewing away at the breakfast burritos her dad made us, and for the first time since I’d lost my parents, I felt at peace. I wasn’t quite sure what Saturday meant for Tatiana and I, but there was something I saw very plainly that day.
Tatiana had feelings for me too.
I saw it in the way she looked at me, in the way she held her breath when we were standing outside our bedroom doors. It was the exact same look she’d given me that day at the mall. She was waiting for me to kiss her, and god knows I wanted to. After the day we’d had and the way she was staring at me like I could have asked her anything and gotten a positive response, I wanted to kiss her and I wanted to do more than that. I’d done a lot of growing up in five years, and whereas the Colin of five years ago was more than happy to kiss Tatiana alone, the current version of me wasn’t sure I could control myself. She’d looked so fantastic in that kimono, and though I respected her greatly, there was a huge part of me that could only imagine peeling it off of her.
“Colin!”
I jumped to attention. “Huh?”
Tatiana tilted her head. “Jeez, where were you? I called your name like four times.”
“Sorry. Just lost in thought I guess. What’s up?”
Tatiana sat down next to me and picked up her breakfast burrito. “I was telling my mom about the tea. It was really good, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, yeah!” I took the last bite of my food. “I mean, lavender tea was always Tati’s favorite, but it was good.”
Kya smiled at me. “I’m glad you two had such a good time.”
It was already Monday, time to head back to school. It felt like the weekend had flown by having spent the day with Tatiana on Saturday, and then most of Sunday in my room doing homework and generally trying to turn down the fire raging inside me. The more I thought of Tatiana, the more I wanted her. I hadn’t anticipated that little hiccup. Obviously rekindling an old flame from middle school would come with some new hat tricks. I’d lost my virginity the year prior to Harlie, and I knew that Tatiana was sleeping with Mr. Kepler. Neither of us was ‘pure’ so to speak, but we hadn’t ever been together, and once I realized that, I couldn’t drag my mind off of it.
“Tati, you talked for too long. Wrap it to go,” Cristiano instructed.
Tatiana nodded and hopped off of the barstool and walked over to the other side of the island. I tried to keep my gaze safe, but as Tatiana stretched to try and get the tin foil down from on top of the fridge, her ass was right at eye length, and the base of her long-sleeved shirt separated dangerously from the top of her leggings, revealing just a glimpse of her silky stomach. I could feel all of my consciousness traveling south. I hadn’t really helped myself out in the sexual department since Harlie and I broke up, and it was obvious that was going to have to change if I was going to continue being around this renewed Tatiana.
To my left, a loud clang jolted me. I looked up and Cristiano had his hand on his coffee mug, which was still rattling on the island countertop. His knuckles were white around the handle and he was leering down at me like he was going to bite my head off.
I’d been caught.
“Cris, everything okay?” Kya asked.
In a flash, the threatening stare was gone, and Cristiano’s calm, friendly smile was back. “Yeah, just dropped my mug a little too hard.”
I stared down at my plate. Message received, Mr. Marquette. I’d definitely need to be more careful. The Marquettes had been so good to me, and Tatiana and I were finally getting back to an okay place. The last thing I needed to do was risk it all because I was unable to keep my eyes in their sockets.
Tatiana and I were relatively chatty on the short car ride to school. It only took about three minutes by car to get there, but the entire time Tatiana and I exchanged playful jabs about our school work, Tatiana had gotten hers done in a couple of hours in the morning while I had to spend most of my Sunday getting mine done. It wasn’t until Cristiano innocently made a comment about Tatiana still needing help in science. It brought the situating careening back at me like whiplash. Spending a nice Saturday with Tatiana had completely erased it from my brain; she was sleeping with a teacher. Maybe, now that we were doing pretty good again, I could talk to her about it. I didn’t want to run in assuming she was blindly being taken advantage of, she certainly didn’t seem forced when I saw her at the game, but any adult sleeping with a teenager was taking advantage of their naivety, that was a given.
When we pulled to a stop in front of the school, Cristiano smiled at us. “I’m glad you two are doing better. Have a good day at school.”