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twenty-one

I liked to think I was the kind of girl strong enough not to cry over some stupid date, but by the time that Sebastian pulled up in his black sports car, my head was bent over my knees and tears were streaming down my face faster than I could stop them.

“Nellie?” Sebastian came running around from his side of the car to crouch in front of me. “Nellie, what’s wrong?”

Where did I even begin? With the fight with my parents, the horrendous start to the date, the fact that I was just one of the many girls Thomas brought traipsing through this restaurant, or how Tiffany had thrown my glass of Coke all over me?

I settled for none of them and managed to stammer out, “Take me away from here. Please.”

Sebastian didn’t ask why and I was grateful for it, because I didn’t think I could get the words out.

He pulled off the varsity jacket he was wearing and draped it over my shoulders, rubbing his hands up and down over my upper arms to warm me up.

I was embarrassed by how much better it made me feel to have it on.

I slid my arms into the sleeves, instead of leaving it on my shoulders like how he’d draped it.

Just like his black sweater—which I still hadn’t given back and was pretty sure I never would—the sleeves were too long for me, covering up my hands completely.

I turned my hands over and back, noting the small stains and marks on the blue and white fabric that showed that Sebastian wore this frequently.

“Come on,” he said softly. He slipped his hands into mine, and even though I knew it was only to help me up, all I could think about was how well my hands fit into his.

It was the opposite of how I’d imagined Thomas’s hands feeling.

Sebastian walked to the car, keeping one hand in mine and his other on my lower back, and waited until I was on the leather seat to close the door behind me.

He looked at me carefully as he got in his own side, like he thought I was going to break down again and he didn’t want to be driving if it happened. “Where are we going?”

I blinked in surprise, not expecting the question.

I guess I’d gotten so used to Sebastian just driving me home that it didn’t occur to me that we could go anywhere else.

It was on the tip of my tongue to just say to take me home, but then I thought of what would be waiting for me there.

Best case scenario, my parents would still be hiding away, giving me the silent treatment after the fight we had.

It was Friday night and as far as I knew, we had no plans all weekend, so there was every chance we wouldn’t speak all weekend.

Then on Monday morning, Mom would act like everything was back to normal, keeping that distance between us by talking only about school and the weather, while avoiding the elephant in the room.

But we’d never had a fight like this. I’d never screamed at them the way I had in the car.

I wasn’t sure how that was going to go over and I was worried that if I went home now in the fragile state I was in, we would get into another argument that I couldn’t handle.

Maybe it was better if I stayed away for a bit.

Sebastian pulled up to the edge of the parking lot, where we would be forced to either make a left, heading for home, or a right, heading for the outskirts of town. Part of me hated that the choice was up to me. The other part of me was grateful that he even thought to ask.

“Anywhere but home,” I said finally. He nodded and turned right, and I almost sighed in relief as he began racing down the street.

I never thought I would be grateful to be back with Sebastian’s insane driving, but after being in Thomas’s car I knew I never wanted to be anywhere but here with this boy.

I thought of Tiffany again—her disdain of having me around Sebastian when they were still together but turning around and cheating on him with Thomas.

Then I thought of Sebastian and how he had run back to her right after our kiss at the party last week.

Suddenly, all the feelings that had been piling up in me for days.

I hadn’t wanted to embarrass myself by asking him what happened after the kiss and making him see that I care more than him, but now I desperately wanted to know.

I wanted him to acknowledge that the kiss had meant something and I wanted some sort of explanation for why he went back to her.

Was he really just caught in the loop of breaking up and getting back together with her?

He said the time before it was supposed to be the last time—so what changed?

“Why did you go back to Tiffany?” I asked, the words sounding more tearful than I would have liked.

Sebastian glanced at me for a millisecond before turning his eyes back to the road. “What are you talking about?”

“You kissed me, and then you got back with her. Was my kiss really so horrible that you had to do that?”

I wasn’t sure if it actually had something to do with me.

I thought for a while that I’d been trying to convince myself for days that it hadn’t.

It was the cycle they were in and I knew it, but still it hurt.

It hurt to think that there was something about me that was so lacking that he went back to her.

Something about me that wasn’t good enough.

He hadn’t even given me the chance to talk about it.

He had just walked off with no words said.

“I didn’t— I mean that didn’t—” Sebastian let out a shaky breath, and then he suddenly veered off the highway onto the shoulder.

We were in a deserted area of the road and beside me, there was a long cliff leading down to the town, yellow lights from the houses standing out in the darkness.

I focused on them instead of looking at Sebastian, already regretting asking the question, even if I desperately needed the answer.

“I didn’t go back to her because you weren’t good enough.

Don’t tell me that’s what you’ve been thinking all this time. ”

“What else could it be?” Tears were streaming down my face again and I wished I could hold them back, but I couldn’t—not now, not with him. “Why else would you do it? ”

“Because I—” He cut himself off and I finally looked at him again. He was holding the steering wheel in tight hands even though we weren’t driving anymore. “Nora…”

I hated to hear him say my real name. After years of wishing he would just get it right, all I wanted was for him to call me Nellie.

My heart cracked as I stared at him, waiting for his next words.

This was where he told me the kiss meant nothing to him.

That he didn’t go back to Tiffany because of me, but irregardless of me.

I’d simply been a blip on his radar, another notch on his belt, and he’d forgotten about me entirely once he walked away.

I knew that to be true and still I’d pushed him.

But I had to ask anyway. Maybe because I just needed to hear the answer.

I needed him to say it for me to able to move on from him.

I thought I’d gotten over him once, but it was obvious the feelings never went away completely. Maybe this time, they would.

“It wasn’t because you weren’t good enough,” Sebastian said.

He was still holding on tight to the steering wheel and practically speaking to it instead of me.

I might have been offended, except that I thought I preferred it if he wasn’t looking at me as he said the words.

It would hurt less in the long run. I was sure this was a night that was going to replay in my mind for years to come.

The moment that my crush on Sebastian Novak was crushed completely.

The moment he really rejected me. Maybe it would be one of those memories I thought of so much that I would change how it went.

Maybe in ten years time, I would remember it happening outside the restaurant instead of in the car or I would remember him looking me in the eye as he told me I was nothing but his best friend’s little sister.

“It was because you were too good,” Sebastian said. “Too perfect.”

I was almost too caught up in my own thoughts to hear him say it, and even when I did register the words, I was sure I heard him wrong.

Too good. That made no sense, for about a million and one reasons, the least of which being that nobody ran back to their ex-girlfriend because of an amazing kiss with another girl.

“Don’t lie to me, Sebastian,” I mumbled. I wiped away a stray tear that ran down my face, distantly remembering how Ainsley told me the mascara she put on me was waterproof. I wondered if she anticipated me crying on this date or if that was all she had.

“Who says I’m lying?” He still wasn’t looking at me, which lessened his argument about truthfulness.

If he wasn’t lying, why would he need to avoid eye contact?

He probably didn’t want me to see the guilt or pity all over his face.

And maybe I should be thankful for that anyway.

It was pathetic enough that he thought he needed to spare my feelings like this.

“Because you’re not making any sense.”

“Nellie...” Sebastian sighed. “Do you have any idea how perfect that kiss was? Any idea how badly I wanted you?”

It was the opposite of the words I’d been expecting, and I was sure I was missing a not in the sentence somewhere. Or a ha, gotcha! at the end. Because the words as I was understanding them did not function together.

“I never really looked at you like that before,” Sebastian continued, oblivious to my thoughts.

“I mean, I looked at you. I thought you were beautiful. But you were Dean’s sister.

You were out of reach, so I couldn’t…” He trailed off, looking like he was lost in memory.

“But then, I saw you at that party. Wearing that skirt.”