One Last Wish

Chapter Twelve

TOBY HELD ONTO his breath. His eyes were still tracing my lips and my skin felt hot underneath his touch.

Kiss and make up.

Should we kiss?

He was waiting. He knew I didn't want to but I could tell a part of him was wondering if I would.

"River?" he whispered.

"Yeah?"

"Do you want me to..." his words trailed off.

My eyes searched his face. Did I want him to? Looking at us now, nobody would have thought we were just in an argument fifteen minutes ago.

But that's how it always goes with us. We both push what we had been fighting about down deep and just forget about it in the snap of a finger.

It's probably unhealthy.

I looked down at his lips. They were perfect, but then again, everything about Toby Miller was perfect.

We're best friends.

He knows I want my first kiss. He knows I want it ticked off my bucket list. But do I want it with him?

Toby shook his head, looking down at his shoes. He removed his hand from my hip and I became cold instantly.

"That was wrong. I shouldn't have-" he cut his words off as he turned to go sit back on the desk chair.

"Wait," I grabbed his hand. I wanted to feel that warmth of his skin near mine again.

Then without a thought in mind, I rushed in and kissed him. Well, it was more like a peck: short and sharp. I was a girl with no experience, remember?

"Holy cow-" Tiana gasped like she couldn't believe I had just done it.

I'd forgotten she was there.

When I pulled back just as fast as I had gone in, Toby was smiling. "Damn, Collins."

My cheeks grew warm. Did I really just kiss him? Should I regret this? I didn't know what to think, but I did want his hand back on me for one.

He glanced down at my lips then back up to my eyes. He's kissed a lot of girls before, Tiana and I even caught him with one in the school art supply closet.

So I for one, can not believe I just did that. With Toby, of all boys, who probably expects a whole show in an art supply closet.

"God I wish I got that on video!" Tiana exclaimed, rising up to her knees on my bed. "Your parents will never believe it now."

"What?!" My eyes widened at her. "No, no, there is no way that you are telling my parents about this."

"But-"

"Tiana," I glared.

"Oh come on!" She pleaded. "You're parents are the coolest out of the three of us-"

"Excuse me?" Toby gasped, clearly wounded by her statement.

Tiana waved him off. "If you had a kid, wouldn't you want to know if their lips were still virgin?"

A laugh escaped my mouth. "Virgin lips?" I repeated, looking over to Toby, wondering if he even heard what Tiana said.

Turns out he did. "So I took your lips virginity?" He shoots me a goofy grin.

I moved to grab a pillow from behind Tiana's back and throw it at him, he takes the impact. "Lips don't have a virginity," I stated.

"So you don't mind if I do it again? When you least expect it?"

He sat down and threaded his hands behind his head, relaxing into the back of the desk chair.

"Consider it a surprise attack, to keep you on your feet and heighten those senses of yours?"

I raised my eyebrows. He's joking, right? Was this an art supply room type of idea coming through? I couldn't tell. His face and posture said one thing but his eyes told an entirely different story.

"This was a one-time thing. I'm not kissing you again." To be honest, I wouldn't even classify what I had just done as a kiss.

He opened his mouth to speak but Tiana interrupts with a high pitched squeal. "Ahh! You got your first kiss!"

I couldn't help but smile. My first kiss, wow. All thoughts out of the way for a second, I took the moment to soak it in. Guess that is kind of exciting for me.

But I had gone too fast to even register what it's actually like to kiss a boy on the lips.

And sadly, it didn't go the way I used to fantasize about it. But I shook away the small sad ache suddenly growing in my chest, it's not like I'd even have time for it to be at the beach, moments away from sunset with the perfect boy of my dreams.

My mind randomly wandered to Derek, and I wondered if he had ever kissed anyone before. Then I recalled him reading my thrown away bucket list this afternoon and I felt the embarrassment I had felt earlier, begin to come back so I stopped thinking of him altogether.

Tiana crawled off the bed. "Let's celebrate!" She walked to the door, flinging her pink hair over her shoulder to look back at me. "You have ice cream right?"

I nodded and followed her out of my bedroom with Toby trailing behind me.

"You know, River," he leaned down. "I'm honoured to have been your first," he whispered.

I stopped in the hallway, just before the stairs and turned to him. I took a deep breath and searched his eyes, wondering how his mood can change so quickly lately.

"Are we good now?" I whispered back quietly, pondering back to our argument at tryouts this afternoon.

"Yeah." His eyes fluttered over my face, soaking in all my features. "We're good," He murmured.

A/N: shorter chapter but felt like should end it here, the vibe hit too different to smash it with a whole other scene.

So next chapter will be longer with more events, promise!