Sunkissed Serendipity

Chapter 37

Julian

Isla is laughing when I tell her to go to sleep. Her laughter is the only sound evident in my room other than the soft hum of the air conditioner. Once she simmers down, she kicks her leg under the blanket we are sharing, and I freeze. Her bare leg is smooth as it softly touches my own. I've never felt myself ignite this much over a touch before. A touch that was meant to be causal because after Isla is done, I notice she is still laughing.

She gives a one-last huff before she says, "No, Julian. I'm being serious. Have you never had a girlfriend before?"

I don't know how I feel about partaking in this question and answer because it was too intimate. I was lying in bed with her right next to me. Her head was lying on my arm, and I had my arm around her shoulder. Well, lightly, but still. This was just the both of us here, in the dark of my room, from where Isla turned off the lamp earlier.

"I..." I say aloud, my voice carrying a soft whisper of the quiet of my room. I clear my throat and say, "I've had experience with girls before. I kissed two of them."

"Two?"

"Yeah," I answer, daring to finally glance at her again. She was watching me with her doe eyes turned down and her face relaxed. I nod. "Yeah, um, my first kiss was in the summer before high school. And the next kiss was only this past year."

"Hm," she replies, and I turn my face toward her. Giving me a smile, she says, "Oh wow. And here, I thought I would count on your list."

"You do," I add quickly, before she can take it harshly. I then explain, "But your kiss was different."

"Yeah, cause I bet girls just don't go around kissing guys they don't know," she says with a soft laugh.

I nod, feeling my leg lightly graze her own under the blankets. I don't mean for it to happen, but it does, and I take a deep breath in. "yeah. Your kiss was different."

"Kisses," she says with a raise of her eyebrow.

I nod, remembering the embarrassing moment in the airport all too well. The one where I thought the kiss could have meant more than just a goodbye. "Right," I say, swallowing the memento away. "My first kiss turned into nothing because she was a tourist and left before giving me any of her contacts. The second girl, well—"

Isla's eyes light up, and she hits me with her elbow. "Was she your girlfriend?"

"Yeah," I say, looking at the ceiling and not at her face. For some reason, it was unsettling to find out how excited she seemed when learning about my ex-girlfriend. It felt like she was excited for me and wanted to know my story like a friend would. But that thought is a slap in the face of the reality that we were just friends. I shake my head as I say, "Yup. I kissed Jayden at homecoming this past school year. After that night, we started to date. We dated for around a few months, but that was it."

"You dated for a few months, and yet you didn't bring her home?" Isla asks, and I look at her once more. She was curious about wanting to know what happened, and I guess I couldn't blame her. "No," I say. "I, of course, wanted to. I mean, my entire life is surrounded by my family. My brother and parents, but Jayden, never really wanted to hang out in that sense. I talked to Jack about her a few times, so he knew of her, but my parents were kept in the dark."

"Why didn't she want to come over to your house?"

"She wasn't ready," I say quickly. "I didn't bring it up after the first time, but after two months passed, I slowly started to bring it up. But she kept saying no, and after all of her rejections of my offer, I stopped asking. I guess—she wasn't the type of girl you bring around to your family anyway."