Eight
Tabitha
I t’s the final night of my romance lessons with Liam and I’m a nervous wreck.
I ditched the plan.
Maybe it would be better to say that I revised the plan. I’m ninety-nine percent sure that Liam feels the same vibe that I do between us, the one that feels like the best parts of Christmas. Anticipation. Joy. The conviction that magic does actually exist.
I realized earlier this morning that this is my last chance to push on it a little. See what might happen if I tell him that I’m not as excited about the possibility of meeting ShreddingPages as I was a week ago. That maybe I’ve been looking for love (and confidence) in the wrong place, not to be too cliché or anything.
Liam sees me. That’s what he’s been showing me all along.
Honestly, I like working at the bookstore, but falling in love with someone who understands who I am at my core eclipses every dream I’ve ever had. It prioritizes things in my head differently, like suddenly, telling my father no doesn’t feel like such a scary thing with someone—Liam maybe—holding my hand.
How great would it be for me to find the courage to make both of my dreams come true?
I spend way too much time on my hair, but it’s worth it. My stick-straight mess lays in soft ringlets and my artistic skills picked a good day to show up—my makeup appears professionally done for once. Because I don’t want to look like I’m trying too hard, I elect to wear jeans again, but pair them with a blue sweater the color of the sky that’s my favorite.
If wearing a cute sweater isn’t a confidence booster, I don’t know what is.
Then Liam knocks on the door and my nerves fire up again.
Can I really do this? Everything will change between us—for the better. Unless I misread him and all the sweet things he’s said to me are just words. Like, he just wants to make me feel not so pathetic.
Okay, not helping. I swing the door open and Liam stands on the porch with his hands in his back pockets, which ruins my plan to give him a hello hug. Is it weird that the hug from the other day is the highlight of my week? No mystery why I’d want a repeat, but that doesn’t seem to be in the cards, so I step back to let him in.
“How was your day?” I ask because I am nothing if not a good pupil.
Liam grins, catching on that I’m taking his lesson from yesterday to heart. “You got me out of Christmas Eve dinner with my parents, so it’s a win all the way around.”
“Oh, I didn’t even think about the fact that you might have had family plans. I’m sorry if I caused any problems.”
“What? I just told you that I’m glad I’m here.”
Except his hands are still loose in his back pockets. If you looked up casual elegance in the dictionary, there’d be a picture of Liam. But it also feels like he’s holding himself back.
“I’m glad you’re here too,” I say with absolute sincerity. “And I appreciate that you let me get dinner this time.”
Geez, I’ve eaten with Liam every night for almost a week. It’s practically like we’ve moved past casual dating into couplehood without a lot of fanfare. I like the sight of him at my table, which has held servings for one for far too long.
“Your parents didn’t expect you for a big family dinner?” he asks as he digs into the seared scallops and braised Brussels sprouts that I absolutely did not cook.
My Aunt Amelia runs a catering business, which comes in handy sometimes.
“Tomorrow,” I tell him. “My mom and my aunts cook way too much food and some of my cousins get up a football game.”
Why does everything between us feel stilted?
I can’t put my finger on it, but Liam definitely does not have the same open, easygoing set to his shoulders as normal. Though, I have to be honest with myself that I don’t know what normal looks like with Liam. The last week has not been anything close to that.
It was a favor.
That’s enough to make me second-guess my plan to tell him I’ve ditched the plan. Now I need a new plan. And to stop thinking about the plan so much, probably. That’s what ShreddingPages said—great things can happen when you don’t stick to the plan.
And now I’ve superimposed ShreddingPages onto my evening with Liam. To say I’m confused about how to act, what I want, how to get what I want, where to put my hands, and why Liam is looking at me like that—understatement.
“Are you okay?” he asks me quietly. “You seem a little out of sorts.”
“I’m nervous,” I blurt out, because why not add another layer of awkwardness to the mix. “I had this idea to ask you to kiss me.”
Oh. Boy. That did not help matters at all.
The room goes pin-drop quiet and Liam’s gaze zeroes in on mine. The snap, crackle, and pop I hear must be my brain short-circuiting. It would be great if that led to me keeling over so I don’t have to sit here baking underneath his scrutiny.
“Do you want me to kiss you?” he asks, a perfectly reasonable question under the circumstances, but also like he’s feeling out the idea.
As if he’s never envisioned kissing me before. Ever. My face burns. He hasn’t called me Tab once so far this evening, but I wish he would. I wish he’d hear the word kiss and immediately take matters into his own hands, sweeping me off my feet in a whirl of secret, shared moments.
But he doesn’t. Choking back my disappointment, I try to laugh it off and deflect. “Oh, not for real. For practice. So when I meet ShreddingPages, I know what to do.”
Though I can’t imagine kissing anyone other than Liam. Ugh , I don’t even know if I can actually go through with contacting ShreddingPages at this point. Not with everything going on inside me with Liam’s name all over it.
Except the kiss plan had been designed to ferret out how he feels. And it’s starting to seem like I’ve misinterpreted quite a lot.
His brow furrows. “Have you never been kissed before?”
Wow. Okay, straight for the jugular then. “Of course I have.”
A couple of times. In college. That’s not critical information here.
“Okay, just…never mind.” He rubs his eyes with a thumb and forefinger. “You threw me off balance, that’s all. Was kissing on the list? I don’t remember kissing being on the list.”
Liam is frazzled. I’m certain of it and the knowledge sits funny in my chest. What does he have to be frazzled about? That his sister’s friend won’t stop talking about kissing? “It’s not a big deal. You’ve kissed lots of women before.”
That gets his attention and not in a good way. He scowls. “Tabitha, I haven’t dated anyone in months. I’m not the dog you seem to think I am.”
I flinch at his tone. And my own disquiet. “What? You’re always dating someone. Lyra tells me everything.”
Except now I’m thinking back and I can’t recall the last time she mentioned Liam or anything about who he’s dating.
“Did it ever occur to you that she might not have told the truth?”
The fierceness in his gaze captures mine and won’t let go. “Why would she do that?”
He shrugs. “Ask her. But my money is on her not wanting her friend to date her brother.”
Lyra has warned me away from Liam on more than one occasion. It’s one of the many reasons I’ve never told anyone about my huge crush on him. “I get the point, though. What happens if we start dating and it doesn’t work out? That would be really awkward for Lyra.”
And me . It would be terrible if I didn’t get to see Liam ever again solely due to blowing my shot with him. That’s what Lyra is afraid of after all, that Liam will get tired of me. He’s not the commitment type and that’s my middle name.
Good grief, it’s like my brain made 447 connections at one time, all of which results in me getting way ahead of myself. Liam and I are not dating. Therefore we cannot ever have a bad breakup.
Nor will we, if I backpedal. Hard.
“It would be difficult,” Liam agrees, his expression unreadable. “You and Lyra have been friends for over twenty years and I would never want to be responsible for straining things between you. Besides, you’re supposed to meet the love of your life tomorrow. Who is not me. Problem solved.”
Right. That is a thing. I nod, despite not feeling the enthusiasm I should.
We’re back on track. Problem solved. “Definitely. I can’t wait.”
Liam pushes back from the table and strides to the fireplace, bracing his hands on the mantle and leaning into it as if answers to all of life’s mysteries can be found in the flames.
Misery rolls off of him in waves.
“What’s wrong?” I cross to him, instinctively reaching for him before thinking better of it, but my fingers have already found a warm spot on his shoulder and I quite like them there. “Liam, talk to me. We’re at a place where we can do that, right?”
He spins, his stormy gaze searching mine, and it fills me with restless energy, the kind that can’t be burned off easily. Except I can think of one thing that would work.
His gaze drops to my mouth as if his mind went to the same place. Heat sizzles and it’s not from the fireplace. If nothing else, it’s readily apparent that my crush has blown up into something a whole lot bigger. And harder to keep inside.
“I’m not going to kiss you,” he tells me, his voice thick and heavy. “If a man kisses you, it should be real. He should want you more than anything in the world. Should be willing to sacrifice anything to have you. Don’t compromise, Tab. Hold out for that.”
I nod a bunch of times because I have no idea what else to do in this situation. He’s not telling me anything I don’t know.
“The thing is—I thought…maybe—” I squeeze my eyes shut as his point settles in my heart.
He’s telling me that he’s not that guy. My voice freezes in my throat.
“You deserve to have your Christmas mistletoe kiss,” he murmurs. “I won’t ruin that for you. I refuse to.”
Liam slides a thumb along my jaw, carefully smoothing back a lock of my wavy, pretty hair. Hair I styled for him. Not ShreddingPages. Liam doesn’t understand that I would pick him every time over some guy I met online that I thought I connected with.
It’s only by spending this time with Liam that I understand what that even means, what a connection should feel like.
I lean into his hand, grazing his palm with my cheek. He freezes for the briefest second and we both fall into the moment, unable to look away, unable to speak.
This is it, my one chance to tell him all of the things he’s written on my heart. But when I open my mouth, he lays a finger over my lips.
“You don’t have to say anything,” he murmurs. “Let’s just leave it exactly like this.”
And then he walks out. I stand there completely dumbfounded to have misread all of the signals.
It’s only after he shuts the door behind him that I realize. He was saying goodbye.