We dance ’til the music cuts out. No fading, just gone — like it knew we’d had what we needed from it. I didn’t move right away. Neither did Cal. We just stood there, arms barely looped around each other, breathin’ the same quiet air.
“Still got dinner,” he said eventually.
I blinked at him. “You cooked?”
He gave a half-grin. “No, ma’am. I reheated.”
He led me to the table, pulled out the chair like we were in some fancy restaurant downtown and not sittin’ twenty feet from a rusted-out ice cooler.
There were paper napkins. Real plates. Forks, too. And from the insulated carrier behind the pump, Cal pulled out a big ol’ thermos and two clamshell containers. Steppin
The metal of the hood was still warm beneath us. My fingers rested just shy of his. We weren’t talkin’. We weren’t touchin’. Not exactly. But the space between us was so full, I didn’t dare breathe too deep or I’d spill it. Cal shifted a little, his hand fallin’ closer to mine. Still not touchin’. Just... close. Close like we’d always been.
“You remember the first time we talked?” I asked.
He chuckled. “’Course I do. You called my answer in sophomore Biology ‘interestin’.’ Like you were tryna be polite ‘bout how dumb it sounded.”
“I wasn’t bein’ polite,” I said. “I really thought it was cute. You got nervous and said a mitochondria was like a vending machine.”
He laughed, low and soft. “Still stand by it.”
“You were blushin’ so bad,” I said.
“I was blushin’ ‘cause you were lookin’ at me.”
I turned my head toward him. He was already lookin’ back.
A breeze caught the edge of one of the string lights above. It swayed a little, tossin’ a soft yellow glow across Cal’s face.
His smile didn’t change. It didn’t grow or tremble or shift. It just... settled. Like it had always been there. Like it had been waitin’ on me to catch up.
“I know,” he said. Responding to the question left unspoken in my mind.
I looked up again. The sky was stretchin’ forever. Stars were spillin’ out like they didn’t care if we watched.
“You wanna know when it happened?”
“When what happened?” I could stare into the sky forever, as long as he was there.
“When I knew,” he says, as if it’s obvious. “About you. About me.”
I blink. “Cal, if this ends with ‘when you tackled the quarterback,’ I’ll never talk to you again!”
He chuckles. “No. It was before that.”
“It was Mrs. Duran’s class. Sophomore year. Third row, second seat. You were sitting in front of me.”
I blink. “...Spanish?”
“Yup.”
“I was terrible at Spanish.”
“I know.”
“You were worse.”
He smiles. “Exactly.”
I furrow my brow, waiting for the punchline.
“You were doodling,” he says, voice softer now. “In the margin of your quiz. Duran was going over some grammar thing and everyone was half-asleep. I was pretending to take notes, but I wasn’t.”
He pauses.
“You laughed.”
I sit up and look at Cal like he might be ready for the men in the white coats.
“At your own drawing,” he explains. “Just this little snort, like you were trying not to, but couldn’t help it. You had no idea anyone saw.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“You wouldn’t. It was nothing. Just... a moment.”
He shrugs, then sits forward.
“But you looked happy. Like, really happy. Not performy, not fake. Just... light. I hadn’t seen you like that before. Not once. And something about that—”
He taps the hood twice, like punctuation.
“I just knew.”
I swallow.
Because now my hands are shaking again, but for a whole different reason.
“You fell for me because I laughed at my own dumb drawing?”
“No,” he says, eyes locked on mine. As he reaches up to touch my jaw, he continues — “I fell for you because you forgot to hide who you are for five seconds.”
And I realize I’ve never felt more seen.
The fluorescent lights were buzzin’ overhead. Spanish class smelled like dry-erase markers and desperation. The kind of hour that felt like a pause button on real life — like everyone was just playin’ their roles: overachievers answerin’ too fast, slackers pretendin’ they didn’t care, me in the back pretendin’ I wasn’t half-asleep.
I was slouched in my desk, chin in hand, hoodie sleeve half-tucked between my fingers. My notes were blank. My brain? Mush.
And Jesse was two seats in front of me.
Shoulder-length brown hair. Always a little messy. Hoodie string constantly in motion — chewed, twisted, tugged, retied. Never still.
I remember thinkin’: how does someone like that disappear so well in a room like this?
Then — He drew somethin’.
I didn’t know what at first. Just saw the pencil movin’, rapid and light, like it wasn’t bein’ guided by thought so much as instinct.
And then — He laughed.
It wasn’t loud. Not obnoxious. Just a quick, breathy snort — the kind of laugh that slips out before you can fake a quieter version. It even surprised him. He pressed the back of his hand to his mouth, like he could shove it back in.
But it was already there. Real. Unguarded.
I blinked. And for the first time since I walked into that room, I felt somethin’.
Not just the sound — the look on his face. That flash of amusement, of freedom, like for one second, he wasn’t calculatin’ how he looked or who might be watchin’ or how tight the walls felt around his ribs.
Just joy. Plain and dangerous.
I didn’t know what Jesse had drawn. Didn’t need to. All I knew was that I wanted to make him laugh like that again.
And again.
And again.
I’m still staring at him like he just punched the air out of my lungs with a compliment.
He leans back against the windshield, tearing the corner off a napkin he pulled out of his pocket, folding and unfolding it between his fingers like the silence is giving him too much room to think.
I look down at the boutonnière pinned to my lapel. It’s a little crooked. I don’t fix it. I slide off the hood, and turn to face him.
“Why’d you do all this?” I ask, not sure where the question lands in my chest.
He doesn’t answer right away. Just breathes. Softly. Like he’s asking himself if he really wants to say it out loud.
“Because I didn’t want the first time someone saw you like this... to be someone who didn’t deserve you.”
I stop. Because how do you reply to something like that?
He slides down to the ground with me. He looks at me and I can’t look away. He shrugs, barely. “Some teacher. Some date you don’t like that much. Some girl your parents think is safe. I didn’t want it to be them.”
I see a change come over his face. It started at his forehead and just melted down his face like some ice cream on a hot day. He was relaxing, he was vulnerable. But his eyes are steady. No nerves now. Just truth.
“I wanted it to be me,” he says. “Just once. I wanted to be the one who got to look at you in a tux and say, ‘Yeah. That’s mine.’”
My throat burns. I try to find something to say, but the words all shrink inside me like they’re scared of what’ll happen if I let them out.
So I just stare at him. And he stares back.
And for once, neither of us moves to fill the silence.
