His Saving Grace

Chapter Seven

In that moment, I forgot about everything—my trigonometry homework, my thesis papers, the call I owed Bianca, and the fact that I was, eww…sick. It was only Garrett and I, his lips against mine. As cliché as that sounded, it was true—turns out the romantic books I’ve read weren’t lying.

Then I did the stupidest thing ever.

I sighed.

Well, excuse me for literally being “never been kissed”.

But at least I didn’t cough, or sneeze, or burp, or something of that nature. Dear god that would be disgusting.

Garrett pulled away like he just got electrocuted and I almost stumbled head-first—I didn’t know I was leaning into him. My eyes snapped open. He was staring at me, eyes wide, and then he looked away. I felt my blood rise to my cheeks, and I stood up hastily, almost knocking my chair down. Garrett followed suit.

“Gnight,” he mumbled, and then ran out of the room.

Good job, Katie, I thought sarcastically. I packed my things up as fast as I could, trying to ignore the fact that the space beside me where Garrett sat still smelled a lot like him.

With a frustrated sigh, I flung myself to my bed. Questions were swimming in my mind.

Another sleepless night, here I come.

~~

“OHMYGOD KATIE WHY ARE YOU IN SCHOOL DEAR GOD GET YOUR ASS OUT OF HERE THE WHOLE SCHOOL WILL GET SICK!” Bianca said—rather, shouted, causing some heads to turn in our direction. It was 7:20 a.m. and I was walking down the hall when Bianca saw me.

Ah, yes. My best friend never fails to be conspicuous.

“I’m feeling better, Bianca,” I said, yanking my locker door open. I dumped my stuff in, grabbed a few random items, then shut it. After the kiss, I couldn’t concentrate on anything. I tried studying, but Garrett repeatedly entered my mind and here I was, on the first day of finals, not prepared.

“Oh!” Bianca said, placing her pink backpack into her locker. “That’s great!”

“Yeah,” I murmured in reply. It’s great that some random guy who seemed like he loathed me had kissed me  while helping me with my homework. It’s great that I wasn’t able to study because of him. It's great because I could barely get an hour's sleep because of him. “It’s so great,” I accidentally said aloud. I hadn’t realized I snarled.

“Don’t get sarcastic with me, young lady,” Bianca said, fixing me with a hard stare. “You are to tell me what happened. Does this have something to do with a guy? Are you dating one? Is he Garrett? Did you do it? If he did, maybe he forgot protection because you seemed so pissed—”

“BIANCA!” I said in horror.

“Okay, okay, I’ll shut up now,” she said, raising her hands in defeat.

After five minutes of practically spitting out everything that happened, Bianca stared at me. I stared back, feeling a bit jittery. 

“HOLY SHIT KATIE YOU’RE NOT A VIRGIN ANYMORE!” Bianca exclaimed. I seriously wanted to slap her right now. “I mean, your lips aren’t…” she added when people started staring.

 "So do I get a certificate for that? A medal? A trophy? Hmm?" I asked sarcastically, squeezing myself through the crowd of people that blocked the doorway.

Ah, shit. Finals. 

~~

It's been a month since the finals. Somehow I managed to scrape up A's in most of the subjects, which was a total miracle.