Page 27 of Sam & Justin (Gomillion High Reunion #4)

The DJ was playing some soft 1980s number, something slow and romantic that I didn’t recognize.

But then, I’d never been a big fan of 80s music.

I was a fan of the way Sam looked at me and the way his hand closed around mine when I agreed.

He led me onto the dance floor and put his hands on my hips, pulling me close to him.

“Great speech,” he whispered.

I felt my face flush again. I really wished I didn’t blush so easily. “Not too much?”

“Just right,” he assured me. “Didn’t know you thought about all that shit from high school so much.”

I wish I could have told him that I thought about it all the time, but I hadn’t.

When I wrote down my high school memories, I’d focused on the big things.

I focused on the moments that everyone thought about when they remembered high school: prom, school lunches, graduation, things like that.

I hadn’t been wrong in thinking that it had been a politician’s speech.

“I’ve thought about it more since yesterday,” I confessed instead.

“When we saw that picture on the wall, it all came rushing back to me.” I looked down at his shoes and smiled when I saw they were the same black boots he’d been wearing all weekend.

“I realized how I felt about you back then.”

“You think things would’ve been different if you knew it back then?”

I didn’t know. It was a question I was asking myself.

If I’d known that I liked him when we were younger, would I have been bold enough to make a move?

Probably not. He hung out with different girls all the time, girls who said they were going on dates or had made out at some party.

I wondered how much of that was true, how many of those girls had kissed him, if it had ever gone further.

Not that it mattered, not now, so I tried to shove those thoughts away.

But even without the girls he was seen with, would I have had the nerve to say anything about it?

That one I could answer fairly confidently.

No, I wouldn’t have. I wouldn’t have thought that I’d have stood a chance with him.

He was the epitome of the cool bad boy, and I’d never had that.

I still didn’t, even as we’d gotten older.

I just had more confidence now than I did back then.

“No,” I finally answered. “Even if I’d known, I wouldn’t have made a move. ”

“Probably wouldn’t have worked then,” he admitted.

I wished I could say that it would work now.

That I had some kind of certainty that the feelings between us could surpass the distance and the way he felt about Gomillion.

Unfortunately, I didn’t have faith that it could, and I didn’t want to spend our last hours together wishing for something that might not happen.

I didn’t want to spend it thinking about the next day.

I just wanted to enjoy the time I had with him, so I didn’t answer. I didn’t ask him if there was a chance that things would work between us now. I didn’t want the crushing reality of the answer I already knew. I let the topic die, and so did he.

We danced. Not just to the first song, but to many others. At one point, I noticed that he knew those songs, too. It reminded me of the trivia contest the night before. “You really like music, don’t you?” I questioned after he started mouthing the words to some song I’d never even heard before.

“Love it,” he answered with a nod. “Used to blast it back home, drown out my parents.”

I would have hated having that kind of childhood, but I didn’t say it. Sam didn’t strike me as the type that would have appreciated that comment, the way it could be perceived as something pitying.

“Besides, Axel fucking loves the 80s. Listens to this shit all the time, especially when he’s getting soppy about this chick he dated back in high school.

” I laughed, and he pulled me closer. His mouth neared mine.

“Gotta say, I get the appeal now.” His lips brushed against mine as he spoke, and he closed the last millimeters of distance between us.

The soft kiss changed this song from one I’d never heard before to one that would join the list of my favorites.

Assuming I ever learned the title, but that was neither here nor there.

For a few hours, all my worries melted away. I danced with Sam. When we weren’t dancing, we were talking to Gabe. At one point, Gabe forced both of us to dance with him to an upbeat song. We were laughing and having a great time, and I willfully ignored the specter of time hanging over us.

Unfortunately, time passed whether we acknowledged it or not.

The DJ announced the last dance, and couples crowded the dance floor.

Sam’s head rested on my shoulder as we moved to the music, and I was struck again by how much I didn’t want this to end.

Not this night, and not whatever was forming between us.

When the song ended and the lights came up, I kissed him again.

It wasn’t like the hard kiss in the hallway, the one that told him how much I wanted him.

This was a gentle kiss, infused with hope and sadness, because there was a chance that it would be our last.

When I pulled away, Sam caught the back of my neck and hauled me back in for another kiss. “Don’t want tonight to be over,” he admitted softly, echoing my thoughts back to me.

“Me either,” I admitted. I was supposed to stay and help clean up, but I didn’t want that. “Give me ten minutes, and then maybe we can go out? Get a bite to eat?” It had been hours since we’d had the formal dinner, and I’d do anything I could to steal a few more minutes with him.

“Sounds good. Fucking starving.” He grinned. “Meet back at the table?”

I agreed and went off to find Vanessa. I didn’t even have to ask.

She just knew. She gave me a smile and her blessing to disappear into the night.

I found my way back to Sam, and we left.

It wasn’t until I was back in the parking lot that I remembered that Soph had driven me to the prom.

Sam led me to his car and promised to drive me home after we ate.

I gave Sam directions to a small twenty-four-hour diner not far from my place.

The menus were sticky with syrup and the air smelled like burnt coffee, but Sam looked relaxed the moment we stepped into the building.

I wondered if it held memories for him, afternoons spent with his friends or late nights avoiding his parents or putting food on his stomach to soak up the alcohol he drank.

“Reminds me of a place back home,” he said when he noticed me studying him. “Dana’s Diner. Real dive of a place, but the best food you ever tasted.” He looked back down at his menu. “Think I’m gonna do the full breakfast.”

I found it on the menu and read the description. It came with eggs, meat, potatoes, and pancakes. Everything but the best thing the diner had on offer. “You need to get the biscuits and gravy,” I advised. “They’re the best ones I’ve ever tasted at a restaurant.”

His interest looked piqued, and then he went back to studying the menu. “What about this one?” he asked, angling the menu toward me to show me one of the meals. “No pancakes but comes with the biscuits and gravy.”

I looked it over and nodded. “That’s what I’m ordering.”

He put down his menu, and it seemed like it was a magical cue to summon the server.

Because only a moment after he put it down did an older woman with a tight, dyed blonde ponytail and laugh lines appear, holding a pen and a little order pad.

She introduced herself as Margo and made quick work of taking our orders.

She returned a few minutes later with coffee and polite small talk.

When she left, we were left sitting there with what was possibly the first awkward silence of the weekend.

It dawned on me that this was the first unstructured time we’d had together since we’d reunited.

Unless you counted the night before, but I hadn’t been thinking of conversation when I first got to his motel room and neither had he.

We’d managed to have good conversation in the afterglow of our hookup, but that was yesterday.

Now, I was struggling to come up with anything to say.

The silence spread over our table as he put sugar into his coffee.

The sound of his spoon scraping the bottom of the mug while he was stirring it sounded louder in the strained silence.

I hated it. I kept racking my brain for things to talk about, but I couldn’t.

I’d never been good at small talk, after all, a fact that I’d shared with him the night before.

He stopped stirring. “Are you relieved it’s over?

” I didn’t understand what he was talking about at first, and I tried to figure out how to ask for clarification.

Surely, he wasn’t asking about whatever was going on with us.

I raised a questioning eyebrow, trying to pull a page from his book of nonverbal communication.

“The reunion,” he clarified. “You did all the planning and shit. Must be a relief that it’s over, yeah? ”

“I’m glad it went well,” I answered tactfully.

It was his turn to quirk a questioning eyebrow, and I couldn’t stop the small smile from forming.

“I can’t say that I’m glad that it’s over.

” My voice was quiet, and I felt my face burn.

I looked down at my black coffee, trying to wait for the feeling to fade from my face.

Instead, it kept feeling warmer. I could feel his eyes on me, watching me.

I swallowed hard and forced myself to look back up at him. “I liked reconnecting with you.”

I thought I saw a little color in his cheeks at my words.

“Liked catching up with you too,” he admitted.

His voice was quieter than I’d heard it, and it gave his words an almost confessional tone.

He took a deep breath. “Can’t say I’m upset that the reunion bit’s over though.

Never did care much for this place, you know? ”

“I bet you’re happy to get back to King’s Bay then, huh?”

And there it was. The elephant that had been in the room with us all night, getting bigger and brighter and more obvious with each passing minute. I’d finally called our attention to what we were both stubbornly avoided, and I regretted it.

He didn’t get a chance to answer, because Margo chose that moment to return with a tray weighed down heavily with food.

He looked relieved, not having to answer.

That, in and of itself, was an answer. He dove in immediately, downing one of his eggs, before conversation resumed.

But it wasn’t an answer to my question. Instead, we started talking about the reunion, going over things that would be nothing more than memories tomorrow.

When the topic of my speech came up, he faltered again. I noticed he did that every time we started inching toward the more emotional aspects of our reunion. “Have you ever thought about running for office?”

The question took me by surprise. “What?”

“Running for office,” he repeated. “You were a real natural up there, giving your speech. Had everyone hanging off every word. And you’re organized and shit, you know? Smart, and you’ve got good ideas.”

“I’ve thought about it,” I admitted after a small pause. “Rachel thinks I should make a go for city council.”

“Why haven’t you done it yet?”

“No idea. Maybe I don’t like the idea of not getting it,” I answered. My stomach twisted at the thought. “I’ve never liked rejection, but who does?”

He took in my words before reaching out and covering my hand with his. “But maybe you’d get it in a landslide,” he suggested as he rubbed his thumb over my finger comfortingly. “People here like you, you know?”

“I think they’d like you too,” I told him, dragging my eyes up to his face. “With time, once they got to know the real you.”

He didn’t look convinced, and I could see why he might think that.

I’d seen the way our peers had treated him, but several had started to warm up to him during the weekend.

Gabe had been talking to him, even when I wasn’t there.

Robbie had seemed to get along with him.

When we’d been on the dance floor, a few other people had given him smiles.

I’d even caught him chatting with a former classmate at the bar when he’d gone to get us drinks.

If that much change had happened over a weekend, I could only imagine the way things would change over a longer period of time. It was just too bad that we didn’t have it.

Conversation continued as we finished our food and Margo brought the check. We were running out of excuses to stick around, especially once I paid the bill.

Our time was over.

We got into his car, and I gave him directions to my place. Once he parked, I looked at him and then back to my house. I didn’t want our time to be over. It didn’t have to be, not yet. He wasn’t leaving until the morning.

“Come inside?”

He didn’t verbalize an answer, just turned off the car.