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“You’ve just given me way too much power,” I tell her as I place a kiss on her shoulder and wrap my arms around her waist.

She faces me and bows her head, her way of asking for a kiss that she can’t reach. I waste no time pressing my lips against her much softer, much plumper ones. And then I do it again.

And again.

And before I know it, we’re making out right on my front porch where anyone could walk by, look up, and see.

The thought of it makes me pull away slightly, enough to giggle. When I collect myself and go back for more, she’s smiling.

“What?” she asks.

“For two people who hate PDA, we’re really going for it.”

She laughs at that, in between more kissing.

“I can’t help myself. This may become a problem.”

“Doesn’t sound like that much of a problem, if I’m honest.”

Except that the sound of nearby tires on pavement makes us both spring into action. She quickly removes herself from my lap, I quickly wipe away the Chapstick that ended up around my lips instead of on them.

The car does nothing but drive by, being as harmless as ever. It wasn’t someone we know, it wasn’t someone gawking.

I don’t know why I haven’t told my friends about this. It just hasn’t felt like there was anything to really talk about, but everyday feels a little more intense.

I haven’t told Caleb, obviously, because that slimy snake decided to lie to me about his own girlfriend being around my daughter. At least what I’m doing is unavoidable, I can’t keep Dahlia locked inside and away from potentially bumping into the girl next door.

Kara goes back inside for a minute, and comes back out with a folder full of papers. Homework.

She sits across from me, scrawling the occasional words on a page. I keep reading my book. It’s nice.

I look up every minute or so to see how much progress she’s made, and her pace is good. I don’t want to interrupt and ask what exactly she’s working on, but I’m impressed either way.

“You hum when you read,” she says after a few minutes. “Do you realize you do that?”

“What are you talking about?” I wasn’t humming. I’m too focused on the words on the page to be doing anything else.

“Exactly what I said. You hum.”

“No, I don’t,” I say.

She puts a hand out in question.

“Okay, you’re right. I lied. I haven’t been sitting here for the past ten minutes listening to you or anything.”

I look at her like I’m waiting for her to say she’s kidding, but she’s being serious. How have I never noticed that before?

I almost start to apologize, but I get the feeling I don’t need to. She doesn’t seem irritated or overstimulated. In fact, she looks like she could sit there and listen to me hum all day.

Kara grabs the book I was reading, snapping me out of my thoughts. It’s facing down, so she starts by scanning the back.

“IfI read this kind of thing, it might sound interesting.”

“It is,” I say. “You should try it out, you might realize you’ve been a closeted romance book lover this entire time.”

She rolls her eyes and flips it over to the cover.

Then she freezes, and the energy between us shifts.