Missed By A Mile | ✓

10 | simple

I'm in the garden, humming the chorus of a song that I can't quite remember as I water the plants, when there's a hesitant knock on the gates, and I almost drop the sprinkling can on Juni's Kalanchoe flower bed out of surprise.

Then after my brain reminds me of who it might be, my heart starts beating faster inside my chest for entirely different reasons.

This is getting ridiculous, I think, but does it stop me from taking a quick look down at my clothes to make sure I don't have any dirt on me? Absolutely not. I tentatively put the can down and tighten the strings of my cardigan around my waist before making my way to the gates.

Don't think about the texts, I remind myself internally, and my subconscious echoes back the words at me until it sounds like a mantra inside my head even though it hadn't been that big of a deal in the first place. Don't think about the texts. Don't overthink. Don't think. Don't. Don't. Don't.

And then I pull the gates open and it all goes up in smoke when I actually see her.

The useless overthinking. The 'I'm making this sound like a crisis when it isn't'. The endless questions. The lack of answers. The panic. The voice inside my head that constantly tries to come up with a string of Reasons Why The Way I Feel For Kaia Lee Could Possibly Not Be Romantic. Or the very good (not) alternative where my subconscious snaps her fingers and tells me that I have no experience with 'crushes' whatsoever and should simply not be allowed to make decisions regarding the same.

Everything. Gone.

Because how could I think about anything else when she stands in front of me with a smile brighter than the neon orange shirt she's wearing? When her hair, clearly damp from a recent shower, haphazardly pushed to the back from the front, slightly clings to the skin behind and underneath her ears?

I try to tell myself that this is just another one of those moments where you see a person so attractive you're left speechless at how unfair it is that some people just go around and about living their lives looking like that. I really do try.

But when she murmurs a soft greeting and my own gets stuck in my throat, I know I'm going to end up at Sean's door later today with the words, Hey, Sean, how did you know you were gay? Asking for a friend.

Through the haze of my Kaia-bound thoughts, I see her mouth forming more words but her hand reaches in my direction just as I blink and I all but freeze on the spot as soon as I catch a slight whiff of the softest smelling perfume from her wrist. Too stunned to move or ask what she's doing, I stand there looking up at her like the utter fool I am; eyes blown wide, mouth parted to form a question that's never going to see the light of the day.

And then I feel it, the barest of touches against the side of my neck that lasts a fraction of a second but enough to leave my skin scattered with goosebumps before she... flicks at something?