Julian

I shouldn’t have done it. I’d told myself I wouldn’t kiss her again, but of course I did. Who did I think I was fooling thinking I could resist her forever?

I prided myself on having good self-control, but it wasn’t like I was some saint. I watched Tina’s gaze return to normal, that dreamy, dazed expression fading.

I didn’t want to see it go—I loved when she looked at me like that.

Like she felt it too.

But I had to stop this before it got out of control. I gripped the steering wheel and took a deep steadying breath. It had to stop this before it got any more out of control, because let’s face it, I was already off the rails here.

After that first kiss, I’d come to my senses…eventually. I’d realized the next day that what had happened couldn’t happen again. At least, not anytime soon. My head was in no place for a new relationship and I couldn’t do anything less. I wasn’t one of those guys who could just hook up and walk away. And even if I could, it would have been impossible with this girl.

Tina was in my system. She’d gotten into my blood.

Cheesy? Perhaps. But true. Maybe it was just the timing of it all—the way we’d found each other when we needed someone who understood. Maybe this connection between us would fade along with our heartaches.

Maybe.

But I didn’t think so. Mutual heartbreaks might have been what brought us together, but over the past couple weeks, Tina had become my friend. Maybe more than my friend.

I shook my head quickly to rid myself of that thought. I wasn’t going there, remember?

For now, at least, we were friends. I didn’t want to ruin that because my body had a thing for her body. I glanced over and saw her licking her lips and taking deep breaths.

Yeah, that was so not helping my situation. I focused on my hands that still gripped the steering wheel. Eventually I couldn’t take the silence any longer. I had no idea what she was thinking. I had a pretty good idea what she was feeling physically, because I felt it too. But what she was thinking was a mystery. Then again, the way her mind worked was pretty much always a mystery to me. That was part of the fun. She never ceased to surprise me.

I cleared my throat. “So,” I said slowly.

“So,” she repeated just as slowly.

“That happened,” I finished.

She let out a short laugh and the sound was such a relief in that awkward silence that I started to laugh too.

We’d kissed twice and both times ended with laughter. Was that weird? Maybe. But it felt good to be laughing. Almost as good as it felt to be kissing.

The fact was, being around Tina felt good.

That fact was still amusing and startling and just a little insane. I mean, this was Tina. This was Briarwood’s resident mean girl, its psycho sweetheart, its crazyface, its drama queen.

But she wasn’t. She wasn’t any of those things. If she ever had been, she wasn’t anymore. When I looked over again, she still wore a small smile, a remnant from her laughter.

“You are beautiful.” The words just sort of slipped out and when she turned to face me I saw her surprise.

I cleared my throat, reaching out to brush back a lock of light brown hair. “I meant to tell you that earlier.” I was striving for normal but my voice just sounded strained. “I like your hair.”

Her answering smile was enigmatic. A hint of the cocky, impish grin I’d come to love but mixed with a shyness that was new and heart wrenching.

Which was the real Tina?

Both. That was the beauty of it. The beauty of her. She wasn’t a mean girl and she wasn’t a sweetheart. She wasn’t cocky and she wasn’t humble. She was everything in-between.

I mean, I guess we all were. No one was so black and white as we’d like to believe. But with Tina the dichotomy was fascinating and every time I caught a glimpse of a new facet of her character it made me want to dig deeper, to know her better.

I wanted to know all of her, inside and out.

She tugged at a strand of her hair and peered at it as though she’d never seen her hair before. “I still don’t know what came over me.”

“What do you mean?”

She looked up at me and I saw the confusion written all over her face. “I mean…” She threw her hands up. “I mean, I don’t recognize myself these days. I’m all over the place.”

I nodded. “Welcome to the club.”

She shot me a quick look. “It’s not the same. You’re reeling from your first heartbreak. Of course you’re feeling out of sorts.”

Out of sorts? More like insane. I just kissed Tina Withers. For the third time. My world was no longer right-side up. My life was barely recognizable some days, and my heart? Well I had no idea what the status was there.

But sure, out of sorts worked too.

“You’re getting over a heartbreak too,” I pointed out. I loved to state the obvious.

“Yes but it’s not the same thing,” she said.

I assumed she meant because she’d broken up with Alex so often, but she surprised me when she continued. “I wasn’t in love with Alex.” She shrugged and I saw a hint of pink in her cheeks. “Not anymore, at least.”

Something in me eased, a twisted knot I didn’t know I’d had inside me uncoiled. Holy crap, I’d been jealous. And not in the same way I’d been with Leila. I wasn’t even sure I could call that dark emotion jealousy. It had been something far more complicated. It had been less old-fashioned jealousy and more deep-seated anxiety. It had been a noxious, overwhelming sensation of being duped or the butt of a joke.

Which I supposed I had been. Neat.

But this? The tension in my gut that I hadn’t even acknowledged, the one that had been growing since our first conversation in the stockroom?

It was jealousy. Envy. The old green-eyed monster. I’d been jealous of Alex, and it had nothing to do with his good looks or his charm. I’d been envious because he’d had Tina’s heart.

What the hell?

I found myself staring at her with my jaw hanging open but luckily she wasn’t looking my way.

“You were right,” she said as she twisted that same lock of now-brown hair around her pointer finger, back to examining it with avid interest.

“I was right?” I could only repeat her words because I was in something of a daze.

She nodded. “You were right that I’d been with him because it was familiar. It wasn’t exactly easy, but it was easier than being without him.” She wrinkled up her nose as she looked at me. “Does that even make sense?”

I nodded. “Yeah, it definitely does. The devil you know, right?”

“Yeah, I guess.” But she didn’t look convinced. “There was more to it though,” she said slowly. “I think…”

I watched her swallow. Then I watched her tongue flick out to lick her lips, the dead giveaway that she was uncomfortable.

“It’s so hard to walk away from someone who makes you feel wanted and pretty and understood and…” Her voice kind of faltered at the end.

“Loved?”

She let out a long breath. “Yeah.”

We didn’t look at each other. She wasn’t crying and she wasn’t moaning about it, but I could feel her loss as surely as if it was my own. “I’m sorry,” I said. It was a lame thing to say but my chest was aching on her behalf.

She lifted her head and turned her head to face me. “I’m not,” she said with a decisive shake of her head. “I’m not sorry it’s over.”

She held my gaze for so long I wondered if she was going to speak or if I was going to kiss her again. The latter was a tempting option.

One side of her mouth lifted up in a half smile. “It wasn’t real on his part either,” she said. “He doesn’t love me anymore, and I know that. So if I continued I’d just be settling, right? I’d be settling for some half-assed version of love.”

Before I could reply, she continued. “And I’m too good for that, right? I mean, I don’t settle for knockoff brands so why would I settle for a boyfriend who doesn’t really love me?”

I kept silent because she wasn’t really expecting a response. It was clear she was working through all this in her own head and I was here to listen. And I was fine with that because I was still trying to figure out what was going on with me.

I mean, I’d started this day thinking I could be friends with Tina. I’d thought maybe this bond between us was just a side effect of our similar circumstances. But now I had to face the fact that maybe this was more. At least, for me.

I’d been telling myself since that first kiss that we needed to go slow because she still had feelings for Alex and I still had feelings for Leila. But she didn’t love Alex, not anymore.

And me?

I cleared my throat and gripped the steering wheel again, clenching and unclenching my hands on the wheel. “I’m not in love with Leila anymore either.”

I felt Tina’s eyes on me. “You’re not?”

I shook my head. “I think I fell out of love with her a while ago, if it ever was love.” I turned to face her, my own crazy thoughts pouring out of me before I could stop them. “Can it be love if it’s so one-sided?” I didn’t wait for an answer. “I don’t think so. I think that’s infatuation. And even that…” I shook my head as I tried to put my feelings for the last few months into words. “Even that feeling turned into something dark toward the end.”

“How so?” I heard her shift so she was facing me, the interest in her voice unmistakable. But was she just curious as a friend or did she have the same vested interest that I had in her emotional state.

I gripped the steering wheel again, focusing on the feel of its solid weight in my hands. “It stopped being fun,” I said. “It stopped being about good conversations or flirting or even making out.”

She was quiet on her side of the car, patiently waiting.

“Toward the end it was just such a struggle,” I finally said. “I was always worried that I’d messed up, or worried what she was doing when she wasn’t with me. When we were together she always seemed distracted or like she wanted to be somewhere else, or maybe just with someone else.”

The only sound in the car was our breathing and I focused on the sound of it, on the way she smelled, on the way I could feel her in the car with me, my body attuned to hers so that it was constantly aware of her every movement.

Having said all that aloud, I felt better. Relieved. Like a weight had been lifted.

“I’m glad you’re over her.” Her voice was soft and uncharacteristically vulnerable. “She didn’t deserve you.”

I nodded, uncertain what to say to that. No one deserved to get hurt like that. But it was still nice to hear.

After another long silence she spoke again and this time her voice was a little louder and sounded far more normal. “So…this still doesn’t resolve my prom issue.”

“No, I guess it doesn’t.” Laughing, I turned to see her giving me that impish grin.

God, she was beautiful. Her eyes were lit up with laughter. She looked less cynical than I’d ever seen her. The urge to lean forward and kiss her senseless was nearly overwhelming.

I swear she saw it in my eyes because she tilted her head to the side. “Are we ever going to talk about that kiss?” She pursed her lips for a second before adding. “Or should I say those kisses, plural?”

I lowered my brows and pretended to think it over. “We never did talk about that first kiss, huh?”

She shook her head, silent laughter making her shoulders shake. “We never did.”

I let out a weary sigh. “And now we have a whole new kiss to address?”

She laughed out loud at that. “It’s too much, right?”

“Way too much,” I said. “We don’t have to figure all this out today, do we?”

“Definitely not,” she said. “I mean, I just definitively ended things with my long-term boyfriend. One thing at a time.”

“Exactly,” I added. “Everybody just slow their roll.”

“Yes!” She was outright laughing now even as she feigned disgust. “God, what’s the rush, people?”

“Seriously.” I let out a dramatic huff of indignation that had us both laughing like morons. An invisible weight in the atmosphere had lightened and it seemed like we were both giddy with the lack of oxygen.

Maybe we were both laughing with relief that we’d given ourselves a pardon. We’d let ourselves off the hook.

And thank God. I seriously had no idea what was going on between us. Well, I had some idea, but I definitely wasn’t ready to face it. I couldn’t even admit it to myself while she was smiling at me like that, let alone tell her to her face that I had a suspicion I might be falling hard and fast for my new BFF.

“We have too much going on right now,” she said. “Let’s not read too much into a stupid kiss.”

“Or two,” I added quickly, mainly because I wasn’t loving this new turn in the conversation. Stupid kiss? I might not have been ready to talk about what it meant, but those kisses—and more than that, these conversations—they meant something.

Right?

“We should avoid any more complications,” she said.

“Definitely.” Because we absolutely should. That much was obvious, but…

“So we’re friends then,” she said.

The relief in her voice made me stiffen. I mean, we were friends, but also…

“Great,” she said before I could come up with a good response. “Friends.” She said it in a tone that brooked no arguments.

We were friends, but somehow agreeing would have made me feel like a liar. A liar by omission, maybe, but still a liar. So I sat there and stewed, my gut churning in discomfort as I realized that I’d just agreed by default to stay in the friend zone with a girl I might very well have a crush on.

No, there was no ‘might’ about it. I liked her. I liked Tina Withers.

She shifted so she was a little closer to me, her knees brushing up against mine. “Do you know what friends do?”

I cast her a sidelong glance, wary at her wheedling, teasing tone. “They braid each other’s hair?”

She ignored me. “They help one another out.”

“Uh huh.” I narrowed my eyes in her direction. I had a suspicion where this was going and it made me distinctly uneasy. “Like, for example, sitting in a tiny car for nearly an hour to listen to their friend’s breakup woes?”

She ignored me again. “Like, for example, going to a very important dance with said friend after she’s broken up with her jerk of a boyfriend?”

I blinked in shock as the meaning of her words hit home.

“Uh…” I said in response to those wide pleading eyes.

She couldn’t be serious. I turned to face her directly as if a change of perspective might help me see that her request was in jest.

She was totally serious.

“Tina,” I said slowly.

“Come on,” she pleaded before I could go any further.

Probably for the best since I wasn’t sure what I’d been about to say. Tina, I don’t want to go with you? That would have been a lie. I had little interest in the prom, but I very much liked the idea of having Tina in my arms—on the dancefloor or anywhere else. The thought of it made me want to pull her back toward me and kiss her senseless all over again. So yeah, I wanted to be her date.

More than that, I wanted to make sure she was happy. In that particular moment, my highest mission in life was ensuring that this girl graced the world with that stunning smile on a regular basis.

And I really wanted to make sure she was happy with me and not some other guy. Even if it wasn’t Alex. I didn’t want her going on a date with anyone but me.

That jealous feeling? It wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.

All this was to say that in asking me to be her friend-date to the prom, one thing became apparently clear.

I wanted to date Tina. And yeah, if a date meant the prom, then I was actually tempted to take her.

But...

There was a giant but surrounding this topic. The but being—I liked her. And she’d just spelled out that she wanted to be my friend. Even if she hadn’t I didn’t know if I was ready to try again. Love had kicked my butt and I wasn’t sure I’d survive another thrashing if this thing with Tina took a nosedive before it even got off the ground.

And yet…

She was looking at me with those big blue eyes. Mercilessly pleading with me with her gaze. How could I refuse after all she’d done for me…after the way she’d been there for me?

I couldn’t.

Also, I didn’t want to. Selfishly I wanted to be her date. I wanted to be the guy who danced with her all night long. I wanted to be the one who made a once in a lifetime memory with her.

Oh hell, I didn’t just have a crush. I had it bad for this girl, that much was becoming incredibly clear.

She clasped her hands together in front of her chest. “Pretty please?”

This was a mistake. This was a mistake. This was a mistake.

I ignored the voice of reason as I turned to her with a rueful smile. “Tina Withers, will you go to the prom with me?”

* * *

“Let me get this straight,” Alice said from where she was perched on the edge of her bed. “You, Julian Morris, are taking Tina Withers to the prom.”

I couldn’t see Alice’s expression. I was too busy determinedly staring at her ceiling as I lay strewn across her bed. That was where I’d fallen after I’d made my confession.

Alice was not a priest but in this instance she was the closest thing to it. I’d come over to help her study for her bio exam the day after the car conversation with Tina but instead I’d spilled everything—the whole story, leaving nothing out.

I wasn’t normally such a talker but I was still reeling from it all—the kiss, the conversation, the growing intensity in my relationship with Tina. And yeah, I was just as weirded out as Alice that I’d not only opted to attend the prom, but that I was now escorting Briarwood’s prom queen-to-be. A princess in waiting? I didn’t know, whatever they called the girls who made up the female portion of the court in the antiquated insanity that was prom.

I could hear the confusion in Alice’s voice as she continued with her questions. “So, you’re just going as friends?”

I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.”

“But you like her as more than a friend.”

I rolled my head to the side so I could see her reaction. Her look confirmed that my newfound feelings for Tina were just as crazy as I’d thought.

“Are you sure your infatuation isn’t just a rebound thing?” she suggested, looking remarkably hopeful. “I mean, I know you guys have gotten close lately, but maybe you’re confused or something.”

I just continued to stare at her. I was pretty sure I’d made it very clear that I had no explanation for these new feelings. Maybe this was just a rebound thing…but I didn’t think so. It felt deeper than anything I felt for Leila. But then again, I’d thought that was the real deal so who was I to say? Clearly I was an idiot when it came to relationships.

“Right, let’s regroup,” Alice said, her tone brisk and efficient. It was her stage manager voice, the one she used when she was being blunt and take charge, which that was exactly what I needed right now. I was sick of emotions and trying to decipher my feelings and Tina’s. What I needed was a plan of action. I needed objectivity and perspective, which was why I’d spilled my story in the first place.

Scrubbing a hand over my face, I struggled upright into a sitting position. “Yes, let’s.”

“This is a good thing,” Alice said, her voice too bright. At my nonplussed stare she hurried on. “No, I mean it. It’s a good sign that you’re getting over Leila, at least. Right?”

I nodded. “I’ve barely thought about Leila lately.”

She beamed. “See? That’s great news.”

I grudgingly agreed with a shrug. “So I’ve gone from one romantic disaster to another. Explain again why that’s so awesome?”

She pursed her lips and I suspected I’d stumped her. I definitely knew I did when she abruptly changed the topic. “Do you think she feels the same way about you?”

I let out a long sigh. “That’s the question of the day, isn’t it?”

“So you don’t know.”

I thought of the way Tina responded to my kiss, to the way she was so different around me. “I think she does,” I said. “But maybe she’s not ready to admit it.” I turned to face Alice. “Maybe I’m not ready.”

She nodded slowly. “Maybe not. But if you have feelings for her, you’ve got to tell her.”

I knew she’d say that. I think that was half the reason I told her, to be honest. I knew she’d kick my butt, metaphorically speaking.

She looked apologetic as she continued. “It’s not fair to her or to yourself to pretend that you just want to be friends if you don’t. That’s kind of lying.”

I let out another long exhale. That’s exactly what my gut had been telling me when I’d gone along with this whole “we’re just friends” thing in the first place.

I liked her. As a friend, yes, but as so much more.

The way I felt around her was so not friendly. It was anything but friendly. The girl challenged me, she made me laugh, she antagonized me, she understood me, and sometimes she drove me nuts.

And I loved every second of it.

Alice’s voice changed considerably, taking on a high whiny tone. “What about prom, Blane?”

I turned my head slowly to face her. “Al, this is so not the time to be quoting Pretty in Pink.”

She smirked, and to be fair her Andie impersonation had been spot on. “It’s always time to be quoting Pretty in Pink. John Hughes was wise in the ways of high school.”

“It might be apt for you,” I said. “You’re the big nerd dating the preppy jock, remember?”

She reached out to smack my arm and I pretended that it hurt. “Fine, but if you go with Tina as her friend when you’re secretly harboring a crush, you are falling dangerously close to Duckie territory.”

I stared at her for a moment as her twisted 80s era logic hit home. No one wanted to be John Cryer’s quirky character with his pathetic one-sided infatuation.

Damn, was that me? “Ouch, Alice. That hurts.”

She rolled her eyes. “I’m not saying you are Duckie, I just don’t want to see you getting stuck in the friend zone if you honestly care about this girl.”

“‘This girl’ is Tina. Tina Withers,” I reminded her, as if she might have forgotten who we were discussing.

She stared at me.

“Don’t you think that’s a little insane?” I added.

She scrunched her nose up. “Kind of. But also…no, not insane at all.”

I arched my brows in surprise. If there was anyone who shared my former opinions of Tina, it was Alice. But she looked thoughtful as she toyed with a stuffed bunny that was lying on her bed. “I saw the way she was around you at the pizza place, remember? She was different. Real, genuine…” She shrugged. “I actually kind of liked that Tina.”

“I liked her too,” I said with an admittedly pathetic sigh.

Alice let out a snort of laughter. “Yeah, that much is exceedingly clear.”

“Am I that obvious around her?”

She was clearly struggling not to laugh. “Let’s put it this way. No matter what was going on with you and Leila, you never once threw yourself onto my bed to mope like a lovelorn junior high girl.”

I narrowed my eyes at her. “You are not funny.”

“I kind of am,” she said as she finally gave way to her laughter at my expense. “I’m sorry but this whole situation is just a little funny. You and Tina Withers?” Her laughter eventually faded. “Not obvious to the casual observer, I’ll admit, but I see it. I really do. You guys had something.”

I looked away, suddenly weirdly uncomfortable about discussing this “something” with anyone other than Tina. But, in my defense, I didn’t even know what I wanted to say to her.

“Is it too soon?” I asked. “She’s getting over a breakup and so am I. Maybe I’m rushing things.”

Alice shrugged. “But on the other hand, school is almost over. Graduation is nearly here. If not now, when?”

I sat there in silence as I thought about that very valid point.

When Alice spoke again her voice was gentle. “If you’re not sure about your feelings then—”

“I’m sure.” I surprised even myself with my vehemence. But I was sure. I could talk until I was blue in the face about the bad timing of it all but this ache in my chest when she was near, the way I missed her when she wasn’t around, the way I wanted to be around her constantly and be able to kiss her and touch her whenever I wanted…this was no figment of my imagination. It wasn’t some rebound infatuation or a fleeting crush. Of that I was one hundred percent certain.

Alice leaned forward and did her stupid Molly Ringwald impersonation again. “What about prom, Blane?” I rolled my eyes and she laughed. “I’m serious, Julian. What about prom? Are you seriously going to go with her?”

“You’re going,” I pointed out, my tone beyond childish.

“Yeah, yeah, but I have to go,” she said. “I promised Brian. In return he’s taking me to see a Broadway musical for my birthday.”

I shook my head. “Devious.” I would never fully understand the weirdness that was their relationship. But then again, I definitely was not in a position to judge.

Alice lowered her chin and gave me a meaningful look. “Are you sure you’re ready for what you’d be getting yourself into?”

I wanted to say “what do you mean?” but I knew what she was getting at. She spelled it out anyways.

“You’ll be in the middle of it all. You’ll be at the heart of their drama.” She arched her brows meaningfully. “Alex will not take it lying down so you’ll basically be poking the horny jock’s nest.”

I cast her sidelong glare at the stupid wordplay. “Clever.”

She grinned. “I thought so.” Her smile faded fast. Despite her joking, she was clearly worried about me. And maybe she had a right to be. “Are you sure you want to take her to the prom?”

I met her gaze. “I told her I’d take her and I’ll take her.”

Alice’s stare said it all, but she said it aloud anyway. “I’m worried.”

“I know.”

She looked down at the stuffed animal she was now clutching in her lap and picked at some fuzz. “Are you sure…”

I had a fairly good guess at what she was thinking. “Am I sure…what?” I prompted.

She looked up and her concerned gaze met mine. “Are you sure she’s not using you to make Alex jealous?”

I wanted to say no right off the bat. But common sense and years’ worth of watching Tina and Alex play their little reindeer games made me pause. They were renowned for trying to one up one another in the jealousy department, and everyone knew that whoever got caught in the middle was a human sacrifice.

Alice shifted on the bed. “I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

“I don’t want to get hurt,” I said with a rueful smile.

I stared at a point over her shoulder and she was quiet as my mind waded through everything that had happened these last few weeks, starting from that first, life-changing moment in the high school’s stockroom.

Yes, the Tina we’d long watched in her drama with Alex would hurt me. But that wasn’t her. Not anymore. At least, I’d never seen that girl. The Tina I’d been hanging out with was tougher than tough and put on a good front for the entire school. I’d seen a girl who’d been hurt over and over but who always survived. A girl who’d gone out of her way to protect me and to be a good friend.

She might have been self-centered in the past, but if so, she’d changed. She was changing. And so was I. Like it or not, I’d changed after Leila’s betrayal. I wasn’t as naïve as I’d once been and I wasn’t as trusting.

But I trusted Tina. So finally, after too long of a silence I answered her original question. “I’m taking her to the prom, Andie.”

She grinned at the fact that I was playing along with her weird John Hughes fantasies but her smile faded fast. “You could get hurt.”

I nodded slowly. “Maybe. But Tina isn’t trying to hurt me. She would never knowingly hurt me.”

Alice blinked a couple of times. “Wow.”

I gave a short laugh. I’d sounded pretty darn sure of myself, and one hundred percent confident in Tina’s deep down kindness. But I’d meant what I’d said.

Alice gave her head a little shake. “If you honestly believe what you said then that says a lot.”

I nodded slowly. “I do, and it does.” I met her gaze. “I like her, Al. A lot.”

She leaned forward so she could clap a hand on my shoulder. “Then it looks like you’re going to the prom, my friend.”

I smiled even as I groaned. “What the hell have I gotten myself into?”