Tied Up in You

by Erin Fletcher

  Normally, Malina would find something to correct me about. That galaxies aren’t named after people or the universe can’t actually be changed or something else that she geeked out about and I’d never understand. But she just frowned.

  Okay, so she didn’t want to talk about it. That could be a conversation for another day. Today was for catching up and talking about things that wouldn’t make Malina sad. “Hey, did you watch the last episode of The Haunting?”

  Her face lit up at the mention of our favorite series. I’d missed that—her enthusiasm over every little thing, including TV.

  “Yes! Oh my gosh, I loved—”

  “The new character? Donovan?”

  “Yes!”

  Even though I’d been watching from my nine thousandth hotel room of the year, hundreds of miles from home, I’d been thinking about Malina the whole time, knowing she’d love every second of it. “I knew you would. What about the part where Malachi busted into that abandoned cemetery? Be honest. You had to cover your eyes, didn’t you?”

  She scoffed at me. “No.”

  I raised my eyebrows. The chances of her becoming that brave during the time we’d been apart were about the same as my chances of switching from hockey to baseball and getting drafted straight to the major leagues.

  She sighed. “Fine. Yes. I covered my face with a pillow for that scene, okay?”

  Normally, I’d rib her over something like that, but I couldn’t. Not this time. “It scared the shit out of me, too. I jumped and knocked over a can of pop. Spilled all over the hotel carpet.”

  “Oops.”

  “Yeah, oops. Hey, do you remember that time we went on the haunted hayride freshman year?”

  She gasped. “When Cory Hammond screamed like a girl and peed his pants? Yeah, I remember.”

  I smiled. Telling stories from my past to my teammates or whatever girl I was seeing was fine, but it wasn’t the same as being with the person who’d lived those memories, too. “Poor guy never did quite rebound from that. But it was a fun night.”

  “Hey, the only reason I didn’t cry and pee my pants was because I hid behind you the whole time.”

  I remembered that—the feeling of her tucked against my back, between my shoulder blades. I’d been dating someone else at the time, holding someone else’s hand, but that hadn’t mattered. Protecting was what best friends did.

  “Can we watch that Haunting episode again?” I asked. “I think I need to see it one more time to prepare for the next episode.”

  She hesitated.

  “I won’t even complain if you cover your eyes for the cemetery scene,” I said.

  “It’s not that. I just haven’t finished my homework yet.”

  “Oh, come on. It’s probably homework that isn’t even due tomorrow, right?”

  She sighed. “Do you have to know everything all the time?”

  “As a matter of fact, I do.” I got up to turn off the lights, leaving us in the near pitch black, except for dim light coming from the kitchen down the hall. Within seconds, I’d pulled up Netflix on her TV and burrowed into the couch. Before joining the NTDP team, I’d spent more time in that exact spot than I could count. That couch, right there with Malina, no worries about hockey or girls or anything else…it was perfect. How had I forgotten how much I had missed this? How did I always forget?

  Next to me, Malina sighed as she tucked her legs up under her. “I am totally Team Donovan.”

  “See? Watching this again is better than doing homework, right?”

  “Maybe,” she said, but her eyes were glued to the screen.

  “Say it.”

  “Say what?”

  “Say, ‘You were right, Luke.’”

  When she looked at me, there was a sparkle in her dark eyes from the glow of the TV. “Not in a million years, Luke.”

  I reached for her side. There was a ticklish spot right above her left hip that I’d discovered sometime during our freshman year. Not many people knew about it, but a few quick tickles in that spot and she’d be a giggling mess of putty in my hands, guaranteeing she’d admit I was right.

  “Don’t!” she squealed when my hand was still inches away. “Okay, okay! You’re right! You’re right! This is absolutely better than doing homework.”

  At the last second, I let my hand drop back to the couch.

  “Mean,” she said.

  “What? I didn’t actually tickle you.”

  “No, but you—” She cut herself off when there was a scream from one of the characters. “Oh, cemetery scene!” she said, turning and burying her head in my shoulder.

  “Wimp,” I said, but let her hide there. Her hair smelled familiar and sweet, like mangoes.

  “You said you wouldn’t make fun of me!” she protested, but didn’t turn her head.

  “Just kidding.”

  There was a loud bang and the crash of shattering glass, but it wasn’t on the TV. My heart jumped from my chest to my throat. The noise came from somewhere down the hall. The kitchen window? The back door? Was someone breaking into the house?

  Holy shit.

  Malina’s head whipped up and she clutched my arm hard enough that she probably would have drawn blood if I hadn’t been wearing long sleeves. “What was that?” she whispered.

  “I don’t know,” I said, prying her hand from my arm and giving it a squeeze that I hoped was more assuring than shaky. “Stay here.”

  Someone on the TV screamed and I nearly jumped out of my skin. Stupid show. I flicked the flashlight on my phone and focused on holding it steady as I walked toward the kitchen. Maybe I could sympathize with Cory Hammond and his bladder back on that haunted hayride after all.

  The single lightbulb over the sink wouldn’t be bright enough for me to see everything, but it was enough that I’d hopefully be able to grab a knife, or grab Malina and get the hell out of there.

  I peeked around the corner and into the kitchen, expecting to see the window in a million pieces, or someone wearing all black and looking for something to steal. Nothing seemed out of place, but it was still dark.

  I mentally counted to three and flicked on the rest of the overhead lights, my pulse as fast as it would be if I’d just done wind sprints on the ice.

  Nothing. No broken window. No thief.

  “Jackson?” Malina called from the couch.

  “Shh,” I insisted. Glass broke. We both heard it. So where was the bad guy? Skulking around the back of the house? I hesitated. Grabbing Malina and throwing her in my car was sounding better and better. Why hadn’t I brought a hockey stick in?

  I was about to sneak through the kitchen, toward the laundry room and the back door, when something caught my eye.

  Light, sparkling off something in the sink.

  Relief nearly melted me into a puddle on the floor. Oh thank God. There wasn’t an intruder, just the glass I’d used at dinner that had slipped off the drying rack and shattered in the sink. I opened the cupboard with the garbage can, carefully tossed the pieces inside, and then rinsed away any remaining shards. When I was sure Malina wouldn’t cut herself reaching for something in the sink, I flicked off the lights and returned to the living room.

  “What happened?” she asked.

  I sat back in my place on the couch. “Apparently, we’re not as good at dish-stacking Jenga as we thought we were.”

  She breathed a relieved sigh and let her head drop back onto my shoulder. “That’s all it was? A dish broke?”

  “The glass I used for water. It’s toast. Sorry.”

  “It’s fine. God, I really thought someone was breaking in or—” She cut herself off.

  I grinned. Knowing what Malina was going to say before she said it was one of my skills. It was pretty obvious what embarrassing place her brain was going. “Or what?”

  “Nothing. Never mind.”

  “Or the ghost from The Haunting made its way from the screen and into your kitchen?”

  “Come on, you were scared, too.”

&nbs
p; I laughed. “Yeah, I was for a second.”

  “Well, thank you for coming to my rescue. I like you even better than Donovan.”

  She curled back up against me. God, I’d missed this. I’d missed her.

  “Hey, Jackson?”

  I meant to say, “Yeah?” That would have been the normal, reasonable thing to do. Instead, I turned and suddenly my face was inches from hers. I didn’t move. I barely breathed. I missed her.

  Then, almost as if my brain wasn’t attached to my body, I tipped her chin up and pressed my lips to hers. Everything slipped away—the show in the background, the broken glass in the kitchen, the fact that I was kissing my best friend. My whole world narrowed to the feeling of her soft lips on mine, the jolts of pleasure it sent from my brain to my toes and everywhere in between, and the sweet taste of sugar and coconut. I reached for her face, her hair, wanting to pull her closer, needing more, and—

  “What the hell?” Malina gasped, jerking backward.

  My hand froze awkwardly in midair as reality slammed into me. Oh, shit. Shit. I kissed my best friend. “Sorry,” I said, jumping up and slamming my leg on the coffee table. “Ow,” I moaned as I turned on the lamp, then turned on the overhead light for good measure.

  The look on Malina’s face was one I hadn’t seen before. Her eyes were wide with something—shock? Disgust? Embarrassment?

  My cheeks and ears burned. Was it possible for your nose to blush? I was pretty sure mine was. “Malina, I’m so sorry. I was just…” I ran a hand through my hair, struggling to come up with something, anything I could say to excuse what had happened. “I was just so relieved there wasn’t a serial killer or something in the kitchen, and I just…” Nope. There weren’t any more words. There were hundreds of thousands of words in the English language and not one of them was going to help me.

  For a long time, she didn’t say anything. A long time. The expression on her face didn’t change. Then she nodded slowly. “Right. Yeah. I was relieved, too.”

  She was going to accept my ridiculously lame excuse? Or at least pretend to accept it? “Right? Yeah. Okay. Sorry.”

  She frowned. “Just…don’t. Do that. Ever. Again.”

  “No,” I said quickly. Spastically quickly. Oh God, my cheeks were still on fire. I couldn’t look her in the eyes. “Sorry. I won’t. It won’t happen again. I should probably go.” Then I winced and said, “Ow,” when I took a step that jarred my bruised leg.

  Her frown changed from confusion to concern. “Are you okay?”

  “Yeah,” I said, too quickly again. “Fine. Just…bruised my leg. Banged it. I’ll be fine.”

  “Do you need some ice?”

  “No. No. I’m fine. Sorry again. Thanks for dinner. I’ll see you at school, right? Sorry.” Instead of coming out like individual sentences, the words kind of blurred together into one big blob of awkward.

  Malina got up and walked me to the door. “Yeah. I’ll see you at school.”

  I had one foot out the door when she stopped me.

  “Jackson?”

  As much as I wanted to keep going, I couldn’t ignore her. I stopped and turned and looked somewhere in the vicinity of her left shoulder. Not in her eyes. Not at her lips or her boobs. Shoulders were safe. “Yeah?”

  “I don’t really know what just happened, but it was an accident. We’re still friends. It’s fine.”

  I forced a nod and kept my eyes on her shoulder. “Okay. Thank you. Sorry. Good night.”

  When I got in my car, I leaned back against the headrest and tried to breathe. Despite what she said, it wasn’t okay. I’d kissed my best friend. I’d acted like an idiot who didn’t know how to human, not the confident hockey player who kissed girls all the time.

  But the worst part? Worse than the kiss or the embarrassment or awkwardness that followed?

  I liked kissing Malina.

  A lot.

  I was screwed.

  Chapter Three

  Malina

  It was fine? As soon as Jackson pulled away, I scrambled back inside and leaned against the front door, pretty certain the cold wood was the only thing keeping me on my feet. I’d said it was fine because it was the only thing I could think to say, or maybe because I wanted it to be true. I knew it wasn’t. What happened wasn’t fine. It was…I couldn’t even process what it was.

  I closed my eyes as swirling thoughts made my vision swirl, too. We’d just been sitting on the couch, watching TV like we had a thousand times before, and yeah, the “someone maybe trying to break in” thing was new, but that didn’t mean anything. Why had he kissed me? My hands started to go numb, like my heart was pumping too much blood to my brain in an effort to figure this out to bother with my fingers.

  “Malina?”

  When I looked up, my mom was standing in front of me with her coat in her hand, frowning. They must have just gotten home and come in through the garage. “Oh,” I said, but my voice cracked and I had to clear my throat before I could say anything else. “Hi.”

  “I thought you said Luke was going to be here.” When I didn’t respond right away, her frown deepened. “Are you okay?”

  Oh, God. Could she tell Jackson had kissed me? Was there some kind of visible evidence on my lips? Was there a “my best friend’s mouth was on mine” expression that I didn’t know about and therefore didn’t know how to hide?

  “He…” I fumbled for a white lie. “You just missed him. He had to do something for his family. But he said thank you for dinner.”

  “That boy ate all the laulau?” Tutu called.

  I used that distraction to escape my mom’s scrutiny. I pushed away from the door and forced my legs to cooperate as I walked toward the kitchen. Thoughts about Jackson—or really, staring into space not knowing what to think about Jackson—could wait. “I told you he would, didn’t I?”

  Mom followed me into the kitchen, where Tutu was slicing the remaining haupia. She put a square on the plate and handed it to my dad.

  “Mahalo,” Dad said. His Hawaiian pronunciation wasn’t as good as Tutu’s, but it was so much better than mine.

  “You’re welcome. Malina?”

  I shook my head at her offer of dessert. If there was one thing I was sure of, it was that I wasn’t hungry. “How was trivia?”

  “Good,” Mom said. “We lost, but it was fun. Lots of teams tonight.”

  The three adults took seats at the kitchen table while they ate. Instead of taking my own seat, I leaned against Tutu’s chair. She patted my arm a few times, her rich caramel skin warm against my own, giving me the reassurance I didn’t realize I needed.

  “Lots of good teams tonight,” Mom said. “We need to up our game.”

  “Or we need a ringer,” Dad said. “Speaking of game, how’s hockey going for Jackson? I saw the team’s doing better than they were earlier this season.”

  My stomach flipped. Obviously my family wasn’t going to make this any easier.

  “He seems fine,” I said, trying to keep my voice even. “They’re home for a few weeks.”

  “Oh, good,” Mom said. “I know you’ve missed seeing him at school.”

  School. In less than twelve hours. I was going to have to see Jackson at school in less than twelve hours. I had to go figure out what in the world I was going to do. “Speaking of school, I should get some homework done.”

  “Don’t work too hard, my mo’opuna,” Tutu said.

  “She has to work hard,” Dad said. “Gotta keep that GPA up so she can get into a school with a good business program, right?”

  Thoughts of Jackson drifted away as my heart sank. The rational part of my brain knew that path would lead to a solid future. But the rest of my brain—and my heart, apparently—were having a hard time letting go of the applications I hadn’t sent in to schools with astrophysics programs.

  Those schools seemed like a good idea back in middle school when I learned people could make a living studying stars and planets and everything space-related—things I did for fun
when I had free time. But I wasn’t a naive middle schooler anymore. Not everyone could grow up to be ballerinas or firemen or doctors, and while my dream was different from the rest of my classmates, it was still just that. A dream.

  “Right,” I said, and hoped my family wouldn’t pick up on my lack of enthusiasm. “Don’t worry. I’m working hard.”

  “We know you are,” Mom said.

  “Did you look over those interview questions I sent to you?” Dad asked. “The big day is only a couple weeks away.”

  “The big day” was the day of a scholarship interview with my dad’s company. Even if my dad didn’t work there, I still had a decent shot since I’d been an intern in the office the past two summers. My dad had been quick to point out that many scholarship recipients had gone on to have long and impressive careers within the car industry—his company, specifically. He’d also been quick to send some sample questions that he claimed he got from Google, but I wouldn’t have been shocked if he’d bribed them straight out of the scholarship interviewers themselves.

  “Not yet,” I said. “But I will.”

  “Good. You should have your answers memorized. You’ll have a better shot if you sound confident.”

  “What your dad means to say,” Mom said, getting up to clear empty plates from the table, “is that we know you’ll do great, and we’ll be proud of you no matter what happens.” She gave him a pointed look.

  He gave me a sheepish grin. “Right. What she said.”

  “Thanks,” I said, even though the words didn’t come anywhere close to making me feel better. “I’ll be upstairs if you need me.”

  I headed to the living room to pick up my books on the way to my bedroom. It wasn’t the room where I’d spent most of my childhood. That room currently belonged to Tutu. My new room was smaller and didn’t even have a closet. My bed took up most of the space, and I always stubbed my toe on the dresser that took up the rest, but it had a big window, and there was enough room on the walls for the space artwork I’d collected, so that was all that mattered. The only thing I wished there was room for was my STEM project, but having an unfinished project in my bedroom might stress me out too much to sleep.