When he handed Ryan his paper, Daniel paused. “This might be the best essay I’ve ever read, Ryan. Keep it up.” Ryan grinned and thanked Daniel.
The bell rang and everyone hurried out of the class. I didn’t understand why they were so quick to leave. This was my favorite class to slowly retreat from. Before standing from my desk, I noticed an extra piece of paper attached to my essay. Flipping it over, I read the words Daniel had written to me.
Brilliant. Simply brilliant.
You’re going to be an amazing author.
I’ll read whatever you write.
I miss you so much it’s hard to breathe.
When I looked up, I saw his eyes on me. He looked as if a weight had been lifted off his shoulders as our eyes connected. I felt the weight remove from my body, too. He was still there. Daniel wasn’t merely Mr. Daniels—he was still himself. And I was still on his mind, the same way he lived in mine.
Maybe there weren’t two different Daniels. Maybe Mr. Daniels was just another part of him. So it wasn’t surprising that I had fallen for both sides of the coin. I was crazy about all of him—the good, the bad, and the broken pieces.
I think I liked the broken pieces the most.
I didn’t even know what it meant for us—his note, my looking up to him. Yet I didn’t care. It was enough for now. I thought the best thing to call it was hope. I really loved the hope in his eyes.
His lips turned up in a half smirk and my lips followed, giving him the other half. We made each other smile without even saying a word.
Those were my favorite smiles.
I stood up from my chair and placed everything inside my backpack except for my current read. I hugged it tight as always, and when I passed Daniel’s desk, I heard him say my name. I didn’t turn back to him, yet I stood still.
“Were you thinking about what I think you were thinking about during class?” he whispered. My cheeks deepened in color. I heard his light laugh. “I think about it, too.”
My head turned to him to find his blues. I smiled. “Really?”
“Really, really.”
I turned away, and when I was out of his viewpoint, I smiled even bigger.
I smiled so wide my cheeks started to hurt.
Hey hey, don’t you forget
The way I moan your name or
The taste of my lips.
~ Romeo’s Quest
After school, I headed straight to the library and stayed there until late into the evening reading. I found a table that no one ever traveled by in the back corner of the library. It was slowly becoming my personal safe haven.
I didn’t always read though. Most of the time, I wrote out reasons why Daniel and I could somehow make it work. Why, if we started as friends, by the time school let out, we could transition into more than friends. There were only about one hundred and twenty-some days left in the school year.
One hundred and twenty-four to be exact.
Not that I was counting.
So mainly I wrote out my dreams. Fantasies I wished would someday come true. I was stuck with only my creative daydreams and hopes of something more.
After picking up a few new books, I headed home. I should’ve worn a sweater over my teal sundress. I was freezing. It was clear that autumn’s warmth of Wisconsin was slowly being taken over by a chilled winter. The streetlights were shining bright, and the sky was slumbering.
While walking past the cemetery on May Street, I paused when I looked through the gated area. First I saw his car parked all alone in the parking lot. Then I saw him. My heart skipped a beat, yet it felt as if it were beating faster, too. Daniel made my once fixed heart do crazy things.
He was standing there alone, staring down at two gravestones.
Still a new kind of hurt.
“Oh…” I whispered to myself, placing my hands on my chest.
He looked like he had just gone for a workout in his shorts, plain black shirt, and running shoes. Was he a runner? I wished I knew. I wished I knew so much more about him.
He bent his knees, lowering himself closer to the stones. His lips were moving, and he brushed a finger across his upper lip before he chuckled. He laughed, yet it looked like he was frowning, too.
Those were the most painful—the sad laughs.
I glanced down the streets to see if anyone else was watching him. They weren’t. Of course they weren’t. Why would anyone watch someone standing in a cemetery? My hands twitched and I started rubbing them against my new book.
I should’ve kept walking. I should’ve pretended I hadn’t seen him.
But I had seen him.
No one should have to stand in a cemetery alone.
Especially Daniel.
Within a few seconds, I was standing by his side. I wasn’t quite sure how I’d even arrived next to him. It felt like floating, my feet gliding me his way. He made me soar.
“Hey,” I whispered, making him turn toward me.
“Ashlyn,” he said, surprise in his tone as he looked up to me. I almost forgot how much I loved how he looked at me.
I blinked and shook my head. “I’m sorry to bother you. I just saw you standing here and thought…” Thought what? “Thought nothing,” I muttered.
“Nobody ever really joins me out here.”
“I’m nobody,” I whispered.
He studied my face for a few seconds before he lowered himself down to the ground and the tiniest smile found his lips. “You look like somebody to me.”
I looked back and forth, noticing the darkness surrounding us. I wasn’t sure if I should stay or go. But my feet were telling me that they had no plans to backtrack.
“Why do they call you watermelons?” Daniel asked.
I smirked when he looked up at me. I took it as an invitation to stay. Lowering myself down, I sat next to him. I glanced down at my chest and laughed. “Is that a serious question?”
The corner of his lips turned up. “No, I get it. I do.” His fingers ran through the blades of grass surrounding us and he picked up a few strands. “Your body is beautiful. That’s not a secret. But how are they compelled to pick up on that small detail of you and not talk about those damn eyes? Or that fucking incredible brain of yours?”
I looked down at his hands, which were rolling the grass through his fingertips, and I didn’t reply.
He continued. “I get so pissed off whenever someone looks at you wrong. Or says the wrong thing to you. Or posts pictures all over your locker. Or if they smile at you. Or call you beautiful. Or…anything!” He released a breath and took a deep inhale. “Anything they do to hurt you or make you smile makes me want to attack.” He exhaled. “And that doesn’t really make for great ethics.”
My teeth ran across my bottom lip. I was uncertain of what to say to him.
He noticed the look in my eyes and ran his hands across his face. “I’m sorry, Ashlyn. I shouldn’t verbally say the crap that runs through my mind.”
“I’m working on my friendships,” I said, turning so I was facing him straight on. I reached into the inside of one of my books and pulled out a piece of paper. Placing it in his hand, I smiled. “I did a little research on Wikipedia.”
He unfolded the paper and read it out loud. “Four important foundations to making a friend.” He stopped reading. “You’re such a nerd.”
He wasn’t wrong. “I’m a nerd-stud. What can I say? Keep reading.”
“Number one. Proximity, which means being near enough to see each other or do things together.”
I puckered my lips up and rubbed underneath my chin. “Well, seeing how I sit in your second row during third hour, that’s kind of being in the same proximity, right?”
He narrowed his eyes on me and moved on to step number two “Repeatedly encountering the person informally and without making special plans to see each other.”
“Holy crap. That’s like, I don’t know—running into you behind the bar. Or running into you at school. Or…running into you in a cemetery. It wasn?
??t planned at all. I have to admit the last one is kind of a downer.”
The way his smile stretched made me think I was somewhat charismatic, even though I just felt silly. “Number three, opportunities to share ideas and personal feelings with each other.”
“Hmph. Well, to be honest, I think we’re still working on that one. What’s the last one?”
“Ashlyn,” he groaned, reading the final step. “Wikipedia said this?” He raised an eyebrow and I nodded. “Promise, promise?”
My smirk reappeared as I bit my bottom lip. “I’ll promise, but no double promises. Come on, just read it.”
Clearing his throat, he sat up straight. “Last but not least, number four. Be named Daniel Daniels and Ashlyn Jennings.” He folded the paper and placed it back inside my book.
“What?! It says that?! Well, crapballs. That’s three out of four steps we have. I think that’s pretty good.”
“But it’s not perfect,” he argued. His fingers ran through his hair, making it a bit messy. He didn’t look like Mr. Daniels anymore. Just Daniel. Just handsome, talented Daniel.
“Humans weren’t made to be perfect, Daniel. We were made to screw up, fuck up, and learn new things. We were made perfectly imperfect.”
He narrowed his eyes and moved in closer to me. His fingers brushed my hair behind my ear. The small touch awakened anything that might have been sleeping within me.
“Why did you have to be my student?”
A smile crept on my face. “Because God has a sick sense of humor.” My eyes moved to the flowers Daniel must have bought for his mom. They were a bouquet of daisies. My favorite flower. “I love those ones, too,” I said, gesturing toward the flowers.
“Mom would have liked you a lot. I just know it. Dad would have thought you were too smart for me.”
I grinned. “He sounded like a wise man.”
I shivered a bit from the chilled breeze and he frowned. “You’re cold.”
“I’m okay.”
He took my hands into his and started rubbing them, warming me up. I wondered if he knew how much his touch meant to me. How much I missed that touch.
“Can I tell you a secret without this getting weird?” I whispered as I watched his chest rise and fall with each breath he took.
“Yes,” he muttered.
His face softened, and when he turned to look at me, I felt my heart set on fire. Those undeniable strong feelings of desire, those evident urges I had… All I wanted to do was kiss him. I wanted to kiss him so much that if it never led to anything else, I would be fine with that. His lips alone had the power to make me live forever. How could I never be more than your friend?
“I like holding your hand,” I said. “I really like holding your hand. It makes me feel…important.”
“You are important.” His words were so raw that it made me almost shatter into a million pieces.
His thumb started circling the inside of my palm and my brain went into shutdown mode. I felt his hands travel under my legs, and he lifted me, placing me in his lap. My legs wrapped around his waist.
I fit perfectly against him. So perfectly that I was almost certain that we both had been created for one another. He was my missing puzzle piece. Our faces remained so close that I couldn’t tell if our lips were connected as one or not. His words made love to the air as he repeated himself.
“You are so fucking important.”
I wondered if he knew how he controlled my heartbeats.
A breath released from my lips. I placed my hands on his chest and laid my head against his shoulder, where I lightly kissed his neck. I felt his hands around my back pull me even closer. He rested his chin on the top of my head. His heart beats increased against me. I loved the idea that I made his heart race.
“Tell me about them, friend.”
A deep inhale was felt against him. “Mom was a music teacher. Dad was an English professor.”
“You’re a mix of both.”
“I’m a mix of both.”
“I know what happened to your father…but what happened to your mom?”
He lowered his shoulders and took a deep inhale. “She was murdered.”
I gasped. I looked up and ran my fingers through his hair, and then I stilled myself. “I’m so sorry.” I said, not knowing what else could be said.
He gave me a sad smile and shrugged. His blue eyes made love with mine and I placed my mouth against his full lips, giving him a gentle peck.
“I think you’re beautiful,” I whispered, echoing what he’d said to me in a text message many weeks back. “And I don’t mean your looks. I mean your smarts, your protectiveness, your brokenness. I think that’s beautiful.”
His hand wrapped around my neck and he pulled me closer, his taste covering my lips, his body heat warming every inch of my body. “I don’t want to be your friend,” he said. We breathed in together and exhaled in harmony. “I want to be yours, I want you to be mine, and I hate that we can’t be us. Because I think we were meant to be us.”
“How is it that we never get to spend time together, but I feel like you know me better than anyone? How is it that I keep falling for you?”
The look of wonder in his eyes was beautiful. It was as if he had been wondering the same thing about me. “I don’t know. Maybe because when hearts are set on fire, no complications can extinguish the flame.”
“It can be a secret,” I softly promised. “Our secret—one hundred percent ours.”
His lips pressed against mine, and everything in the world shut up. Everything in the universe stopped. He brought me to a place of pure emotion, lifting all sadness and replacing it with comfort.
His lips were softer than I remembered yet filled with more passion, more intensity. My hands ran across the hem of his shirt and I slid it up, feeling his tight physique under the cotton material. “Ash,” he muttered. His tongue parted my lips and began to become well acquainted with mine.
My mouth gaped opened as my breaths sped up. His mouth traveled to my neck, where he began sucking and running his tongue in a circular motion. I felt my nipples harden under my dress as a breeze brushed across our bodies and he laid his mouth against mine again. His fingers slid to my spaghetti strap and he lowered it off my shoulder, giving me gentle kisses all the way down. I felt his hands cup my breasts through the dress, and I moaned lightly, loving the way he held me, the way he touched me, the way he knew me.
“We shouldn’t,” he warned, but I wasn’t certain if he was warning himself or me.
I covered his lips before he could try to stop it from happening. I’d never been so sure about anything in my life. I couldn’t pinpoint why, but I’d never felt as safe as I did right there in the darkness with someone who was hurting just like me. Whenever I was near him, there was a profound sense of security and comfort. Daniel Daniels felt like home.
So she kissed me with her eyes
And then with those hips.
And good God, could her hips kiss.
~ Romeo’s Quest
The next few weeks were filled with secret excitements. Daniel and I spoke mainly through text messages. In the hallways, we would accidently bump into each other—which was never accidental. He would ask me to stay back after class sometimes to steal small kisses. I liked the secretive relationship. I felt as if I were a spy trying my best not to get caught.
When I walked into class one Friday, there were three daisies sitting on my desk. Ryan walked into the room and noticed the flowers. “Are the bullies now giving you gifts?”
I grinned and held the daisies up to my nose. Breathing them in, I smiled. “You know bullies—they’re complicated.”
He laughed and slid into his seat. “Aren’t we all? Anyway, Hailey told me about this bucket list of yours.” I wasn’t surprised. He continued. “And from what I found out from snooping through your bedroom while you were in the shower…this Gabrielle girl sounded like a real babe.”
I smirked at his comment.
“I me
an, if she were here, I would probably give up Tonys with a Y to have Tonis with an I.”
“You would date my sister,” I frowned jokingly, “but not me?”
“Uh, did you die and leave your twin sister letters for every occasion?”
“No.”
“Then of course I wouldn’t date you. There’s something so sexy about ghosts leaving notes for their loved ones.”
Giggling, I nodded in understanding. “So you only get turned on by ghost girls, not alive girls.”
“Ohhh, I love when you say that. Say it again…”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Say what? Ghost girls?” He shivered with delight, loving the sound of it. I lowered my voice and moved in closer to him. “Ghost girls, ghost girls, ghost girls!” I whispered over and over again.
He closed his eyes and ran his hand up and down his chest as if he were extremely turned on. “Mmm! That’s how I like it.”
“You’re an idiot,” I chuckled.
“You love this idiot.” I did. “But back to the important things. Theo is having another party soon and I…” He grinned widely and reached into his back pocket. A plastic card came out and his smile grew bigger. “Have a fake ID.”
I snatched it from his hands and smiled. “Where the heck did you get this?!”
His eyes shifted back to Avery. “I know people who know people.”
“Burt Summerstone?” I asked, reading his name off the card.
He took it back from me and slid it into his pocket. “It’s not about the name, baby girl. It’s about the date. I am officially a twenty-one-year-old high school student. And we are officially getting drunk and crossing that item off of your bucket list. Bow down, bitches.” He pulled out a fake ID for me and I grinned.
Summer Burtstone. How creative.
“But I hate Theo,” I frowned. He had been the biggest jerk to Hailey.
“Even more reason to show up and give him a big middle finger,” Ryan smirked. “I do it all the time.”