“Good morning,” I greeted as I walked into the kitchen. I wanted to kiss Colin on sight, but that would have to wait.
Colin watched me as I walked over and sat down in the barstool next to him. “Good morning.”
I stared into Colin’s green eyes until I could feel my parents gaze on us. I looked over at my mom and her eyebrows were so high I thought they were going to fall off her face. “What?” I asked.
She crossed her arms. “You look nice.”
I looked down at my outfit. I’d dug out one of my teal, thin hoodies from the back of my closet and a pair of light blue, acid wash jeans. I suppose it probably was the brightest thing I’d worn in a long time. “Thanks.”
She reached across the kitchen island and lifted the half a football locket with a finger. “Where’d you get this?”
I side-glanced Colin and he shrugged. I looked back at my mom. “Colin gave it to me.”
Colin held up a hand. “Correction. I just gave it back to her.”
My mom examined it a little closer in the wake of Colin’s clarification. “This is the football necklace you bought forever ago, right?”
I nodded. “Yeah.”
My dad tilted his head. “Huh. I guess it didn’t even occur to me that we never saw it again after that first day you wore it. How’d you end up with it, Colin?”
“She dropped it and I picked it up,” he replied, telling a half-truth. “I didn’t really have a good opportunity to give it back to her until recently.”
My mom chuckled. “You’re the one whose birthday is coming up. You should be getting presents, not giving them.”
I was reminded that I never did decide what I was going to get Colin for his birthday. My mom was right, what he’d given me was so special, that it elevated what I wanted to give him in return. He deserved something really wonderful, but we were still getting to know the people we’d grown into. I didn’t really know what he would like.
“You two walking to school again?” My dad asked.
“Yeah.” Colin finished off his cereal and my mom scooped up the bowl before he could stand to try and put it in the dishwasher himself. “If that’s okay?”
My dad beamed. “Of course. It’ll probably be too cold soon to do it anyway. Enjoy it while you can.”
I ate a quick breakfast of a banana and toast and then Colin and I left for school. We had barely cleared the threshold of my front door and Colin had interlocked his hand with mine. If I knew my parents, and I was pretty sure I did, they had their noses pressed to the glass of the front living room window, watching as we walked away. It didn’t bother me. They loved Colin just as much as I did. If anything, they were relieved.
We walked slowly on purpose. There was no need to rush and neither of us wanted to. Until I had ended things with Val, my relationship with Colin was pretty much pigeonholed to our walks to and from school.
“Hey.” I don’t know why it felt weird breaking our blissful silence. “What do you want for your birthday?”
A loud laugh flew out of him. “Because last night wasn’t enough?”
“No. You can have that whenever. That’s not a present.” The words ran out of me before I realized the magnitude of what I said. A quick glance at Colin proved that the concept had not been lost on him. “What?”
“Really? I can?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Obviously.”
We were skating around what we hadn’t done before; made our relationship official. “I mean, I don’t want to do anything else while I’m still with Val. Not so much for him, but for you, I…” I swallowed hard. “I want you to be the only one.” Not that I had any plans to sleep with Val ever again, Colin pretty much was the only one already.
“That’s what I want.” Colin stopped and turned to face me. “For my birthday. I want to be the only one.”
“That’s the plan,” I murmured and Colin shook his head.
“No, I don’t want it to be ‘The plan,’ anymore.” He was looking at me with a brand new expression I’d never seen before. It lingered somewhere between longing and needing. “I want to be together. Right now. For real. I don’t want to wait anymore.”
I had already planned on ending things with Val on Sunday, but I didn’t tell Colin that. I knew if he knew my plans he’d try to interfere. I wanted to handle things myself. “I don’t either.”
“Well then what are you waiting for?” he asked.
I thought of how much it freaked me out when I tried to break up with Val the day before. He was growing increasingly more possessive and aggressive when it came to me. My idea to try again in the full view of the public eye was fool-proof I hoped. Colin must have picked up on my fear, because he lifted my hand to his lips and dropped a quick kiss on each of my knuckles. “If you’re afraid, I’ll help you. If he’s still threatening you, we could tell Coach Nash or Mr. Devine.”
“No!” I barked and Colin recoiled a bit. I dropped my head. “I’m sorry, I just… Those rumors were bad enough. I don’t want anyone else to know.” I looked back up at him. “He’s been weird lately, but I don’t think he’ll hurt me. I promise, I’ll end things. Soon, just give me a little more time.”
Colin sighed. “I’ve waited this long.”
I went up on my toes to kiss his lips. “I love you. I want to be with you too. More than anything.” My words seemed to help.
We shared one final kiss before putting a more natural distance between us to walk into school. It didn’t stop people from staring at us as we moved, but I was much less concerned about them, and much more concerned with Val. I waved goodbye to Colin as he left for the senior wing, and then I went and found Billy. He was already standing near my locker and when he noticed me walking, an expression of impressed shock lit up over his face.
“Wow. A primary color? Are we about to be smited?” he asked.
“Shut up,” I hissed. “And it’s not a primary color.”
“It’s blue.”
“It’s teal.”
Billy fake gagged. “It’s blue.”
I put my backpack and jacket away, grabbed my books for my first class, and then linked my arm in Billy’s and pulled him towards a set of tables and chairs that each of the wings had for studying and general lounging before, between, and after classes. We went to the one furthest back and sat down.
“Colin and I had sex last night.”
Billy’s jaw dropped. “YES!”
“Shhhhhh!” I laughed at him. “Jesus, do you have another volume.”
“What happened?” Billy asked, leaning in.
“Sex,” I replied, confused.
“No.” Billy waved his hand through the air. “What happened?”
“Oh. I got home after school yesterday and he was there instead of going to his away game and he said he skipped because he wanted to see me. We kissed, made out, yada yada, and then my parents came home.”
Billy shook his head. “Cock blockers.”
“Tell me about it.” I snickered at the very obscure and uncomfortable description of my parents. “Anyway. Colin said he didn’t want to wait anymore, and I didn’t either, so that night we snuck down to the basement. It was so beautiful, he went out and got rose petals and tea lights and scattered them everywhere, and he’d made this playlist just for us.”