I’m sitting on the hospital bed, him in the chair beside it. I breathe in through my nose, out through my mouth. I look down and pick at my chewed-off fingernails, shredding a painful hangnail down my thumb until I’m pretty sure it will go on forever and turn me into a skinned human being- muscles and fat exposed. I forcefully pinch down on the stem of it with my grimy teeth. 

Somebody get me a toothbrush.

Once I claimed that I remembered the kiss, Ash turned bologna-pink; all the way from his perfect nose to his small ears. 

“Oh. Um, you do? I’m sorry. I swear to you it will never happen again. I don’t know what I was thinking and-” I had cut him off.

“Why are you sorry?” I said. This boy confuses me.

He seemed to be frozen with his mouth hanging open like a moron, so I asked him again. “Why are you sorry?”

“Well, I guess… I don’t know. I mean you’ve always made it clear that you have no interest in me and you were… Well, you were not yourself that night. I don’t know. I just shouldn’t have done it. I’m sorry.” He finally let himself stop rambling and he looked up from the floor, into my eyes. 

I had stopped. I had let all my insecurities drown into a muddle of silenced uncertainty and hesitation. 

And I kissed him.