17
Hannah
There are certain questions that should not be asked on a Tuesday afternoon.
For example: *Do you think Professor Hale hates joy?* Acceptable. *Should I switch my major because I got a seventy-eight on a quiz?* Dramatic, but acceptable. *Do you think Nate Wilder would be willing to teach me how to not be weird about sex?*
Absolutely not acceptable.
And yet that question has been living inside my head for two days, pacing around with a clipboard and refusing to leave.
It is there while I brush my teeth. It is there while I sit through psychology lectures.
It is especially there every time my phone buzzes and I think, stupidly, that it might be him.
Which, currently, it is.
I’m sitting at a corner table in Briarwood Coffee Co., my anatomy notes spread out in a frantic attempt at productivity. Outside, rain slicks the windows, turning the campus into a blur of gray stone and wet brick.
**Nate Wilder:** *You studying or pretending to study?*
My stomach flips. I hate it. I hate that Nate Wilder appearing on my screen feels like someone opening a window in a room where I’m trying to keep my papers stacked neatly.
**Hannah:** *I’m actually studying. Some of us have academic integrity.*
**Nate:** *I have academic vibes.*
I snort into my latte. A girl at the next table glances over, and I immediately straighten, pretending the laugh was a very professional cough.
**Hannah:** *Academic vibes won’t pass anatomy.*
**Nate:** *That’s why I have you.*
My fingers pause. *That’s why I have you.* Obviously, he means as a tutor. A strategy partner. The girl with the color-coded notes. But my pulse does something unnecessary anyway.
**Nate:** *You at Briarwood? Need coffee. Don’t flee.*
My body immediately prepares to flee.
This is inconvenient. Because I asked myself this morning—very firmly—whether I was going to bring up the "lesson" thing. The impossible thought Ella planted and then watered with terrifying enthusiasm. The answer had been a hard no. A no with walls and a moat.
But then the bell over the door jingles, and my entire nervous system salutes.
Nate walks in wearing a black Northwood Hockey sweatshirt, dark jeans, and a backward cap that makes him look irresponsibly good for a Tuesday.
His hair curls out messily from beneath the brim, and there’s a faint, fading bruise along his jaw from the Briarwick game. He looks like trouble with a high GPA.
A few minutes later, he appears beside my table with a coffee in one hand and a blueberry muffin in the other. He drops into the chair across from me, spreading his long legs beneath the small table. One of his sneakers bumps mine.
I pull my feet back too quickly. Nate’s eyes flick to mine; he notices. He always notices the things I’d prefer to bury in a shallow grave.
“You good?” he asks, breaking the muffin in half and sliding the larger piece toward me.
“Fine.”
His mouth curves. “Favorite lie.”
“You’re very repetitive.”
“You’re very predictable.” He leans back, watching me pick at the muffin. “Something’s up. You’re glaring at your notebook like it owes you money.”
I last exactly eighteen seconds of his steady, expectant silence before I break.
“Can I ask you something weird?”
Nate sets his phone facedown. The teasing vanishes, packed away behind a gaze that is suddenly, intensely focused. “Serious face is on. Go for it.”
I pull in a breath, my heart drumming against my ribs. “I was talking to Ella about the party. And the kiss.”
Something flickers in his expression. Awareness. But he stays quiet, letting me find the words.
“I told her that I got carried away,” I say, the confession sounding rushed. “And it made me think. About the whole... experience thing.”
Nate’s jaw shifts. “What experience thing?”
“Sex.”
I said it. In public. Quietly, but still. Nate doesn't laugh. He doesn't make a joke.
“I feel behind,” I admit, my voice dropping. “I hate feeling like there’s this whole part of being wanted that everyone else understands, and I’m just standing here with flashcards. I don’t want to be awkward forever.”
“You won’t be.” His voice is low, anchored. “Awkward isn’t permanent, Hannah. It’s usually just newness wearing bad shoes.”
I let out a shaky laugh, which helps. A little.
“Ella said maybe you could help,” I finish, the words barely audible over the hiss of the espresso machine.
For a second, Nate doesn’t move. He studies me, his expression serious in a way I rarely see. There’s no trace of the playboy now. Just... Nate.
“Help,” he says carefully. “With...?”
“Please don’t make me say it again.”
“I’m not trying to embarrass you.” He leans forward, elbows on the table. “I just need to know what you’re asking.”
“I’m asking if you would ever... teach me. Show me. Not sex right away,” I add, mortified. “I’m not asking you to take my virginity over a blueberry muffin.”
Nate’s mouth twitches, but he keeps his gaze locked on mine. “I’m not saying no.”
My heart stops. Not poetically. It just forgets to do its job.
“But I’m not saying yes like it’s nothing, either,” he adds. “If we do this, we do it carefully. And not because you think you have to be different for Cross. If this is about feeling like you need to be 'ready' for some other guy, then no.”
I should feel embarrassed. Instead, I feel oddly safe. “It’s not just that. I want to stop being scared of wanting things. At the party... I wanted to keep going. I don't know how to be normal about that.”
“Then stop trying to be normal. Just be honest.”
I swallow hard. “I want to know what I like. I want to know how to be touched without feeling like I need an instruction manual.”
Nate’s expression changes. Something in his eyes darkens, but his voice stays soft. “Okay. But there are rules. One: you’re in charge. If you want to stop, we stop. No questions. Two: no apologizing for being nervous. Three: we start with less scary.”
“What’s less scary?”
His eyes flick briefly to my mouth. “Practice kissing. Not for the fake dating. Not for the crowd. Just for us.”
The room feels ten degrees warmer. *Practice kissing.* No audience. No Ethan. Just Nate.
“Okay,” I whisper.
He leans back, his mouth curving faintly. “We don’t have to decide everything today. We’re just talking.”
He checks the time and stands up, slinging my heavy backpack over his shoulder before I can protest. We walk out into the damp chill together, the rain now a light mist. He walks me all the way to Langford Hall, the silence between us heavy with the new, private weight of what we just discussed.
“Hannah.” He stops at the bottom of the steps. “You don’t have to be embarrassed next time we talk about this.”
“I probably will be.”
“I know.” His mouth softens. “But you don’t have to be.”
I watch him walk away, his cap backward, hands in his pockets. I walk into my anatomy lecture with my pulse too fast and my head spinning. I am still confused, and I still know our deal is fake.
But for the first time, I don’t feel like I’m standing outside a locked room. I feel like someone just handed me a key, and for some reason, I’m not scared to take it.