It had come in around 3 AM, and before I read it, I knew that was even better. It meant I was on his mind in the middle of the night. I fumbled my phone to the floor trying to swipe open the message, then squinted and read it three times.
SAWYER: So. I’m not sorry I kissed you. I’m sorry I kissed you that way.
Okay.
Okay, this wasn’t…bad?
Or good.
It was…
I didn’t know what it was. If I asked him to explain, would I sound stupid for not getting it?
Maybe. But I’d feel dumber if I tried to play it off and got it wrong.
After agonizing for half an hour and trying to squeeze every ounce of meaning out of every single word, I gave up.
TABITHA:Explain…?
English majors, eat your hearts out.
SAWYER:I wanted to do that all summer. Ben knew. He thought he was helping. I shouldn’t have done it on a dare. Kissing is better when both people are into it.
Oh. My. Gosh.
Ohmygosh.
OHMYGOSHOHMYGOSHOHMYGOSH.
Natalie was right: he was into me.
I needed to say something quick after a confession like that.
TABITHA:My bad. I thought both people WERE into it.
I read over the message, considered deleting it for reasons of total dumbness, then doubled down instead and sent a winky emoji.
A WINKY EMOJI.
I dropped my phone and pulled my covers over my head with a groan.
My phone buzzed almost immediately, and I couldn’t have resisted checking it any more than peanut butter could resist jelly.
SAWYER:Damn. I definitely should have done it sooner.
Swooooooon.
That was the beginning of our DMs. At first, it was a few times a week, catching up on school as we each got back to campus, or talking about a movie we’d both seen.
Then it became every day.
It never grew to phone calls. Neither of us suggested it, and I wondered if Sawyer’s reasons were the same as mine. He’d already become a high point of each day. Keeping it to messages made it manageable, like he was inside an efficient boundary, a section that belonged to a different part of my life.
Even so, I dated less my sophomore year than I had my freshman year. The boys I met…it was different. They weren’t as funny as Sawyer. Or as cute. Or if they were cute, they were also too cocky. And mostly boring.
The next summer, I made Grace drive me all the way into Camp Oak Crest. She complained bitterly until I gave her twenty bucks to shut up. But I couldn’t meet the Rust Bucket at the airport. I couldn’t. I was a hot mess and trying not to look like it because I didn’t know what to do when I saw Sawyer.
In a normal year, I couldn’t wait to run and fling myself at Natalie and BenandSawyer, giving back huge hugs, all of us talking at once as we caught up.
