Where There's Light | ✔

32. Kiss Cam

"You've been extra quiet." Mom sat across from me at the kitchen table, Taylor hanging off her boob. "After coming in late from studying."

"I was back before curfew." Though missing it to stay snuggled up with Nolan would've been worth it. "And you can stop smirking. It wasn't a date."

She didn't believe me. Even Taylor paused her breakfast to give side eye me. Was I really so easy to read that a baby could do it?

"Mrs. Coleman said she saw you with him before. Exactly how many group projects do you have together?"

I kept my mouth shut and focused on my pancakes. Because for the rest of Thanksgiving break we had to work late to finish this project. When school started back up and I had to go back to working at the market, Nolan and I worked on our project on the weekends.

After that first night we didn't need alcohol to loosen us up. It was just us with some junk food in the trunk of the minivan looking out over the dried up creek. Most nights we kept to the plan. We shared facts and stories. Stuff we thought we should know about each other.

Gia was being tight lipped about the questions, so we didn't have anything to go off of. We worked on getting our stories straight about how we met, who asked who out, our first date. Our stories didn't stray too far from the truth. We had to make sure they were believable.

One night we didn't talk. He didn't want to. Instead we sat in a comfortable silence on the rickety old swing set. After a while he told me his mom got really sick and needed to be taken to the hospital. She was fine to go home, but he seemed really shaken up about it.

That wasn't going to be on any pop quiz, yet he told me about it. I didn't know how to respond, so I held his hand as we stared out over creek.

Something shifted that night. Our talks weren't all about showing off scars and ranking ice cream flavors anymore. They become more personal. More about fears and dreams and goals.

That's when we learned just how much we had in common. He wanted to travel Europe because it was his mom's dream since she was his age. I wanted to go to UCLA because it's where my mom studied before my dad talked her into dropping out.

That was another thing we shared. We both felt like our dads failed our moms. My dad practically forced my mom to become reliant on him and him alone. Nolan thought his dad could've fought his mom harder about treatments when she was first diagnosed.

He knew things about me that Bee didn't even know. Like the real story behind the paint stain on my rug. I didn't just drop it, I threw it. My dad's lucky the bottle missed him. He's lucky I didn't try again after he tried to talk me into abandoning my mom to live with him in Ohio.

And I could tell it had been a while since Nolan was that open with another person. His hands were constantly in his hair as he told things from the deepest part of him. I was filled with a special kind of warmth knowing he trusted me enough to tell me those things.

Our talks brought us closer, made us friends at the very least. That was something our fake relationship was missing and adding that element didn't go unnoticed by our peers. We were stopped in the hall more than once by people asking if we signed up to run for king and queen, promising us their vote. Maybe this wouldn't be a lost cause.

* * *

Nolan's minivan came in handy on Friday. The basketball team had an away game and we carpooled with Bee, Gia, Hannah, Candi and her boyfriend Justin. Thankfully Justin was a forgiving person, otherwise the ride would've been a long one.

As much as I enjoyed a mini road trip with my friends, I hated that we all had to be in Nolan's car. The van was like our secret spot. Just for us. They were trespassing. Hannah was wrapped in one of the blankets that was still spread out in the trunk, Gia and Bee played with the deck of cards that Nolan brought to prove he knew card tricks (which still hasn't been proven.), Candi and Justin were cuddled together in a way I've imagined being with Nolan more than once.