When We Kiss

Coco’s brown eyes go wider. “Like with his gun?”

“Yes, Tabby,” Emberly joins her being bad. “Did Chad shoot his gun?”

“Okay, that’s enough.” Scooting to the side of the bed, I leave them both rolling around laughing as I stomp into the kitchen and pull out a packet of ginger tea.

“What the heck happened here?” Emberly’s with me as I fill the kettle, leaning down to study what’s slowly turning into a bruise on my thigh.

“Oh, that.” I switch on the gas and wait for it to ignite. “I guess Chad did shoot a gun last night.” She straightens, studying my face. “A paintball gun.”

“Did he take you to that place Jimmy’s always going on about? The way he talks, you’d think it was some kind of magical kingdom.”

“Like Disney World?” Coco is up on a stool at the bar, and I reach in the cabinet to get her an Oreo Pop Tart.

“It was pretty elaborate. I’d never seen any of those people before in my life. How is that possible?”

“They were probably all from Fireside and elsewhere. I can’t imagine too many of the senior citizens in Oceanside playing paint ball.”

Shrugging, I put the Pop Tarts up and take down a box of ginger snaps for me. “It was actually a lot of fun.”

“So you had a fun date with Chad?” Emberly crosses her arms, nodding like she won a bet or something.

“Saying I told you so is so unattractive.” I crunch into a ginger snap then grab a washcloth to wipe the dark brown crumbs off Coco’s face.

She hops off the stool and runs across to my small living room, where a flat screen is hung above a real wood fireplace.

“I’ve been telling you so for a year.”

Coco puts the TV on some kid show about a cat and a fish in school, and Emberly leans close over the bar so we can talk in private. “Did you sleep with him?”

“No.”

She frowns, pulling back. “You didn’t?”

My nose wrinkles, and I bite into another ginger snap. “I don’t like how that makes me sound slutty.”

“I’ve never called you that a day in your life.” She drops back onto the bar stool like she knows something. “So you didn’t sleep with him… Interesting.”

“What’s so interesting about that?”

“You’ll run out the door to hop on the back of Travis’s bike—”

“That was different. Did you see Travis? He was like… Jax Teller with black hair.”

Her lips twist, eyes cast to the side. “It’s true. He did have that Sons of Anarchy sex appeal.”

“He was a lying, cheating, sack of shit is what he was.” Inwardly, I cringe. “I can’t believe I trusted him for so long. I can’t believe I thought he was the one.”

“You never told me that.” My friend’s voice goes soft, gentle. It makes me uncomfortable.

“He was not the one.” I snap a gingersnap hard between my fingers. “I blame all the old ladies in this town constantly going on about missing your chance and shit. Bullshit.”

Maybe I do need some hair of the dog.

“If it’s meant to be, it’ll be.” Emberly nods, then her eyes narrow. “I bet if we saw Travis Walker now, he wouldn’t look like Charlie Hunnam at all.”

“He’d look like the south end of a northbound mule. One that can keep heading north.”

Emberly starts to laugh. Then we both laugh, holding each other’s hands until we’re out of that dark place.