Kissing Kate Read Online Free

left again, and before I knew it I was parked down the street from Kate’s house, staring at her window from the front seat. I knew she wasn’t there—her Jeep wasn’t in the driveway—but I didn’t care. I’d been thinking about her all day; at least this way I had something to focus on.
    What I’d been turning over in my head was the fact that just because the two of us kissed, it didn’t have to mean anything. Friends did that kind of stuff sometimes. Not to the extent that we did, maybe, but girls at school walked around with their arms slung over each other’s shoulders, and I’d seen guys on the football team slap each other on the butt more times than I wanted to count. Plus, Kate was a very physical person to begin with—that’s just the way she was. She used to clutch my arm in the theater when we watched scary movies, and if my shirt tag was ever sticking out or my collar was messed up, she’d reach over and fix it without giving it a second thought.
    It actually took me a while to get used to how touch-y she was, back when we first started hanging out. Jerry wasn’t much of a hugger, even when he first moved in, and by the time I was in junior high, he’d pretty much stopped touching me altogether. So the first time Kate hugged me—it was after she got an A- on a science test that I’d helped her study for—I stiffened without meaning to.
    “What?” Kate said, pulling away. “You act like I’m your Great-Aunt Lucy or something.”
    “I don’t have a Great-Aunt Lucy,” I said.
    “You know what I mean. Do I have peanut-butter breath? Is that it?” She cupped her hand around her mouth and exhaled.
    “No, it’s just . . .” I shrugged. “I guess it’s been a long time since someone’s touched me.” I realized how weird that sounded, and I blushed.
    “Oh. Does it bother you? I mean, should I not hug you?”
    “No, it’s okay.”
    “Good,” Kate said. “Touching is good.”
    I wondered if she remembered saying that. I wondered, if I brought it up, if she’d deny it. But that’s what I wanted to tell her, that one person touching another person was perfectly normal. It’s just that we’d been drinking that night at Rob’s—she’d been drinking, anyway—and so things went further than they should have.
    I thought of her hand on my skin, under my shirt. The surprise of it, my sharp intake of breath. My pulse quickened now in the truck, and I shoved the memory away. For several minutes I held myself still—eyes closed, head back against the seat. Then a car drove by, and I jerked to attention.
    A blue Saturn. Not Kate.
    Of course not Kate. She was probably at the movies, because she always went to the movies on Saturday afternoons. We used to go together, and sometimes after one show, we’d sneak past the usher into another. Only today she’d be with Ben. She’d have her popcorn and her pink and blue heart candies from the Candy Jar, which she ate together to mix salty with sweet, and Ben would have his arm around her shoulder. Or maybe he’d rub her neck like he did that night at Rob’s party, after they found us at the gazebo. Slow, lazy circles, while Kate relaxed and leaned closer.
    I twisted the key in the ignition. It was stupid, lurking outside Kate’s house like this. I never should have come.
     
     
     
    At the Old Corner Bookstore, the clerks pretty much let you fend for yourself, which I liked. I knew I didn’t want to go home and truly be alone—which was different, somehow, than being alone in a crowded store—and so I’d driven here with the vague notion of finding some way to get Kate out of my head. I stood inside the front entrance for a moment, then frowned and headed for the section labeled “Self-help.” I didn’t know what I was looking for, but I figured that was as good a place to start as any.
    The first book I picked up was a book on candles called Light Your Inner Fire. I riffled through the first couple of chapters, then flipped to the