She nods. “Good to know.” She touches the tips of my fingers. “Okay, so no to girlfriend tattoos; yes to dragons. How about YOLO wrapped in barbed wire?”
“Oh, great idea for my next drunken mistake.”
She laughs. “Please don’t.”
“What do you care? You’re not the one who’s gonna have to look at it for the rest of your life.”
There’s an awkward pause. That came out kinda weird. Shit. Now I feel like I should say, “Unless, of course, it turns out youarethe one who’s gonna have to look at it for the rest of your life.” But then that would be an even weirder thing to say. Shit. I look out the car window, my mind racing. When it comes to Kat, I keep finding myself saying shit I shouldn’t say and having thoughts I never, ever have.
“So what’s the deal with the dragon on your arm?” she asks, thankfully filling the awkward silence.
I clear my throat. “Ah. That was my very first drunken tattoo, though certainly not my last. I’m kinda known for drunken tattoos, actually. It’s sort of a thing with me and my friends.”
She laughs. “Can’t wait to see your collection up close some time.”
“Oh, you will.”
My heart is pounding in my ears.
“So what’s the deal with the dragon?” she asks.
“Ah, the dragon. I’d love to tell you I got it for some profound and intellectual reason—dragons have all sorts of meaning and symbolism, especially in Asia—but since you and I have agreed to play the honesty-game, I’ll tell you the truth: I stumbled into a tattooparlor in Bangkok, drunk and high as a kite, and thought, ‘Dude. A dragon would be so rad.’”
She laughs.
“Reed got a tattoo that night, too—but not a dragon. His is way, way cooler than mine, actually—which isn’t surprising, since he’s way cooler than me.”
“Reed was in Bangkok with you?”
“Yeah. After my first year of college, I traveled the whole summer with Jonas, all over the place, and for a short bit of our trip, some of my buddies joined us.”
“You like to travel?” she asks.
“I love it. You?”
“I haven’t done a lot of it, but I’ve loved it when I’ve gotten the chance. My parents took the whole family to Mexico for their anniversary when I was a teenager. And then we went on a Caribbean cruise for Christmas a couple years later. That was super fun.”
I make a face.
“You don’t like the Caribbean?”
“I don’t like cruises—unless, you know, you’re talking about a private yacht. That’s the only way to travel by sea.”
She scoffs. “Oh, well. Who doesn’t demand a private yacht when traveling by sea? Duh.”
I cringe.
“It’s not like I have stock in a cruise line or anything,” she sniffs. “I was just saying I was happy to get to go somewhere out of the country, that’s all, like most normal people would be. And, by the way, my dad’s a pharmacist and my mom has her own little interior designer company, so it was a really big deal for them to take five kids on a week-long cruise.”
I feel my cheeks burning. “I’m sorry,” I say. “That was really snobby and out-of-touch of me to say. Sometimes my inner douchebag oozes out. Please forgive me.”
But she’s not done with me yet. “I guess you better get another tattoo to remind yourself to be humble, huh? Because the ‘Grace’ one doesn’t seem to be doing the trick.”
There’s a really long pause, during which I feel like my tongue is literally tied into knots along with my stomach. She looks out the window of the cab, apparently gathering herself, her cheeks burstingwith color, and I stare at her profile, marveling at her beauty. How is it possible she keeps getting more and more attractive to me? Usually, a beautiful woman like Kat becomes less and less physically attractive the more I get to know her. I mean, with someone like Kat, you’d think there’d be only one way to go from here, right? But, nope, I’m more and more drawn to her with each passing minute.
“I’m sorry,” I say earnestly. “I’m a total douchebag sometimes. I know this about myself. Please always call me on it. So few people in my life do.”
“Oh, I will.”
