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T
wo days later I was at Stella’s house again and she was giving our presentation for an audience of one. Me.

I was trying to keep my mind on what she was saying, but it was hard to focus on that because of the way her mouth moved when she talked. The tone of her voice. The way she stood. It was all . . .  sexy. So sexy.

Just a crush. A weird, out of the blue crush on a girl. Everyone had had one of those in their life, right? It didn’t mean I was . . .  I mean, I still liked guys. I totally liked guys. I totally . . . 

Was staring at her boobs.

I was just jealous of them. Mine weren’t shaped that nice. That was it. And her shirt was cute. I was not staring at her boobs, imagining what they would look like without the shirt.

Nope. Not even a little bit.

I dragged my eyes back up to her face and found her staring at me expectantly.

“Well? How was it? And keep the editorial comments to a minimum.” Oh. She’d finished the presentation and I hadn’t even noticed. Because I’d been staring at her boobs.

This was starting to be a serious problem. Thank God our presentation was on Monday and then we wouldn’t have time alone together anymore. I couldn’t handle it.

“Uhhh, good. Really good,” I said, stumbling to come up with something, anything, to say. She sighed and threw up her hands, notecards scattering to the floor.

“You weren’t even listening. I can’t believe this. You may not care about this class, but I do.” Now that made me mad.

“I do care about this class, seeing as how I’ve been in it since the beginning of the year. Where the hell were you?” I got to my feet and then we were standing about a foot apart, both equally pissed.

“That’s irrelevant. I’m in this class now and I don’t want to get a shitty grade because I’m stuck working with you.”

I took a step forward and we were almost chest-to-chest.

“Oh, I’m so sorry that it’s been so
awful
to work with me, you should have just gone to Mr. Hurley asked him to do the whole thing yourself. Oh wait, you pretty much did that anyway!”

Our eyes are locked and I could feel that this was one of those intense moments where the world just stops.

We’re both breathing a little too hard for what happened and then Stella did something that shocked me more than if she would have pulled out a gun and shot me.

She kissed me.

I
had no idea what made me do it. Maybe I was hormonal, or hadn’t kissed anyone in a long time, or maybe I had been poisoned during lunch and this was some side effect, but one minute she was standing in front of me yelling and the next I had pressed my mouth to hers.

The contact lasted all of a half a second, because she pulled away so fast. I teetered on my toes and nearly lost my balance. I’d been leaning so far into her that I had to grab the back of a chair so I didn’t crash to the floor.

“What the fuck, Stella?!” she said, putting her hands up and backing away. “Seriously, what the
fuck
?”

“I’m sorry,” I said automatically. “I’m sorry.” I had no idea why I was apologizing. I mean, yeah, it probably wasn’t the best idea to kiss her, but I’d thought . . .

No, that was impossible.

“I’m sorry,” I said again, my voice sounding robotic. She spun around in a circle while ripping the elastic viciously out of her hair. The brown semi-waves tumbled down to her shoulders and she was so cute. So, so cute.

Cute and pissed, but that was a good look for her.

“You just . . .  You just kissed me,” she said, spinning around. “You just fucking kissed me. What the fuck?” She certainly liked to swear a lot when she was taken off-guard. But I thought her reaction was a little extreme for the situation. I mean, was me kissing her the worst thing that had ever happened to her?

“I don’t know,” I said. That was the truth. I didn’t know. Well, I did. I knew that I thought she was adorable as hell and that I had wanted to kiss her for a while and that it had finally become too much and my body had sort of taken over, but other than that, I had no idea why I specifically liked
her.

Sure, there was the cute factor and she was smart and sexy and she could be funny when she wanted to, but she wasn’t . . .  I mean she wasn’t, say, Natalie Dormer, who was hot as fuck. She was just Kyle.

I licked my lips and tried to tell myself that I couldn’t taste her.

“I have to go. I seriously have to go,” she said, grabbing her things and stumbling, dropping her copy of
Jane Eyre
in her haste to get out. Her limp slowed her down a little and I grabbed her arm, reaching down to get the book.

“You don’t have to go. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have done it. I don’t know what happened.” Oh, what a lie.

“This is just . . .  so, so fucked up. You’re seriously fucked up, Stella.” My insides clenched when she said my name. She wrenched her arm away from me.

“Stay away from me.” I let her go because what else was I going to do? I couldn’t force her to stay and I wasn’t going to explain everything and I was still so messed up from the fact that I’d even done it that I just let her walk out the door.

“H
ow did studying go?” Dad asked an hour later when he came home. He’d been working a lot of extra hours at the college lately, but it made him happy, so I didn’t mind. Plus, it had been a blessing in disguise tonight. I didn’t know what I would have done if he’d walked in on me kissing Kyle.

I choked on a piece of popcorn and had to chug some water before I could breathe again.

“Fine. We, ah, practiced our presentation so I think we’re ready for Friday.” I knew my presentation was solid, but now I had this fear that I was going to mess it up due to what happened earlier.

I wanted to groan and bury my head in the couch cushions. I’d definitely messed up and the embarrassment was now taking the place of shock from earlier.

Oh. Hell.

What if she told someone? Fear prickled my skin and my chest started feeling tight. What if she told someone? What if that someone told someone and then tomorrow everyone would know that Stella Lewis, Queen Bitch, was a dyke?

I pulled out my phone and texted Kyle with shaking fingers.

Please don’t tell anyone about it. Please.

I knew it sounded desperate, but I was pretty desperate. This could undo everything I’d worked for in high school. I swore I would never be the girl that everyone mocked and teased and made fun of. Just thinking about it made my stomach heave and I had to run to the bathroom. All the popcorn came back up and I gasped, resting my forehead on my arm.

Dad knocked softly.

“You okay, Star?” He had enough courtesy not to bust through the door and ask if he could hold my hair or something.

“Yeah,” I said, getting to my feet and flushing the toilet. I grabbed my toothbrush and started scrubbing my teeth hard.

“Let me know if you need anything,” he said before I heard him walk away from the door.

My phone buzzed and I nearly swallowed my toothbrush.

Don’t worry. I won’t say anything.

I slumped against the sink and spit out the toothpaste before rinsing my mouth out.

Thank you.

I left it at that. I should probably just pretend that it didn’t happen. Yes. That was the best way to deal with this. Kyle wasn’t going to say anything and I was sure she wanted to forget about it.

There was only one problem.

I couldn’t forget about it.

L
ate that night, in the throes of sleep, my brain took hold of the kiss and let it go further. One kiss became two and then there were tongues and hands and clothes on the floor and before I knew it I was awake and panting with my hand between my legs and the sweet burn of desire flooding my veins.

I moaned and there was no way I could get back to sleep, so I slid my hand under the waistband of my panties and got to work. I was so close that it was only a few moments later that I came, shuddering and biting my hand so I didn’t moan too loudly.

Dad’s room was down the hall, but I didn’t want to take any chances that he’d hear me. Sometimes he stayed up late reading or doing work for his classes.

The shudders slowly stopped and I had to lay there for a second before I could even think about moving. I hadn’t come that hard in a long time. And I wasn’t done. The ache started up again a few seconds later and I was back at it, with the dream-kiss scenario fueling me.

Three orgasms later, I was finally done and ready to sleep. I went to the bathroom to wash my hand on semi-shaky legs.

That was when the guilt and the shame set in, but I refused to feel bad about it. I wouldn’t let myself go there. I’d had plenty of fantasies about girls before, they’d just never been very specific. So I’d used Kyle to get myself off a few times, so what? It didn’t mean anything. She was just there and she was cute and I’d kissed her.

Didn’t.

Mean.

Anything.

I
sat in my car for a few minutes after I’d rushed out of Stella’s house. Because what the fuck.

She . . . she definitely kissed me. There was no way around that. I mean, it wasn’t like she’d leaned in to pluck an eyelash off my cheek, or was checking me for cavities or something. Nope. That was definitely meant to be a kiss.

It . . . kind of was, before I realized what was happening and flipped out. Because why wouldn’t I flip out? Stella was . . .  the last person I thought would ever kiss me. I mean, the fact that we had been yelling at each other and the next second she thought “hey, I should kiss this girl right now” was fucking crazy.

Fucking crazy.

My hands shook on the steering wheel as I gripped it. I needed something to ground me or else I was going to float away in a haze of confusion.

I should probably go. Like, right now. Definitely before her dad came home and caught me loitering in the driveway. I wouldn’t even know how to explain that.