Never Been Kissed: A Never Been Novel (2 page)

“Nice shirt.”

I’d been scrolling through my ‘Suck it
Up’ playlist, waiting for the elevator to come down, looking for something particularly happy. I glance up at the source of the voice.

“Huh?” Shit. Double shit. It’s
him
. The sex god from next door.

I’ve managed to avoid him all week, knowing that most people start work later than my own seven to three shift, thus missing him both going in to work and coming back home. Now he’s here, in front of me, s
aying something about my shirt.

Since it’s the weekend, I get to wear whatever I want. Namely, a pair of loose Adidas shorts that aren’t so loose around my ginormous bon-bon, and a nerdy shirt. I have an extensive collection and I’m really proud of them. Synapses firing as they are, my brain is simultaneously dealing with his question, trying to
remember which one I’ve worn, while the sound of a pterodactyl shrieking in alarm echoes in my head. I’m not sure I can speak.

“Your shirt. I like it. Most people would say thank you.” Hunter’s
grinning
at me. The kind of grin a hot guy gives a girl, knowing exactly what kind of effect it has on her. Oh, I
hate
him. Somebody should tell him jackpot genetics don’t really make us who we are.

Snapping my mouth closed, and making sure I don’t have a look on my face like I just found out Tom Hiddleston knows my name, I don my armour against him – my ability to be
snarky.

Which is hard to do when the guy in front of you is as hot as Hunter is, and the plain black tee with that same hoodie and dark jeans look indecent on him instead of casual street-wear. His skull-trim makes him look even more dangerous, total badass, and I’m ashamed that my body is reacting to his good looks. In another dimension and I
if didn’t look like I do, I would give him a seductive smile, invite him back to my place for some sweaty hours of sexercise.But my ass is big enough to be seen alone on the
Marauder’s Map
, and Hunter would never want me. So I’m going to treat him like a friend, and a creeper.

My hands are fists at my sides, and my jaw hurts where I’ve grinded my teeth. I don’t know why I’m so mad. “Okay,” I say, trying to stare through him, enjoying the blurriness of his features without my glasses on. “Do you even know what
my shirt’s about?”

“Babe.” So much badass and att
itude injected in that one word, it’s a wonder my panties haven’t floated down to my ankles. The guy could be even more badass than Jax Teller and Dean Winchester
combined.

He’s not for you.
He’s just like my buddies, just like Josh, Tommy, Eli and Alex.
“Don’t call me babe,” I say, trying to be cool and badass like Jo Harvelle. Jo Harvelle who wasn’t flustered or anything when she almost-kissed Dean, and knows her way around a knife and rifle.

Hunter smirks. “Do you like apples?” he asks, mimicking a perfect Southie accent. The man has seen
Good Will Hunting
. I will not swoon, I will
not swoon
. Be professional, be a badass. Yeah, right. Rocky’s doing victory laps in my head, ghost-jabbing the air because Hunter likes one of my shirts. I’m pathetic.

But he knows
Good Will Hunting
.

I grin, hold my hand out for a shake. “I’m Sera. Nice to meet you.” I wiggle my fingers when he takes too long. “Most people shake the other person’s h
and when it’s offered to them.”

He looks down from my face to my hand and back up again. Just when I start to feel dumb about the whole thing, he puts us palm to palm and pumps up and down.

“Hunter,” he says, letting me go.

I just held his hand. Fine, for like three point four seconds, but I did it! And I’m not even blushing! Score
!

“HUNTER!” A female’s voice
rings out from behind us. I don’t cringe, instead, keep my smile on my face. I’m smart; I’m intelligent. He commented on the awesomeness of my shirt. That’s all, he just made my day. But this is reality.

“See you later,” I say, stepping into the elevator once the doors open. I turn my attention back to my iPod, rep
laying 1D.

Glancing up before the doors close, I look at him, rubbing the back of his neck, staring at his feet. In my head, Hunter would look at me longingly, and maybe even tell me he likes more than just my nerdy shirts. He’d tell me I’m stunning or one of those words that aren’t so overused like beautiful.
He’d tell me I’m funny and awesome, and badass and he wants me in his life based on this short encounter.

It doesn’t necessarily hurt when he does none of these things. It doesn’t hurt when he turns and walks towards the voice. Probably the same girl he was with last week who wants breakfast in bed.

It doesn’t hurt, but it sure is disappointing. Books have ruined me for life.

***

“Broski!” I yell at Katie as she comes into my spankin’ new apartment. I try to see it like a stranger would, but Katie’s my best friend so that POV doesn’t work so well.My walls are slate gray, but the pictures make the room, not the ornate glass dining room table that I spent a fortune on, or the badass leather couches, or not even the beige zebra-striped carpet in my living room.

Nope, the pictures tell people who I am. I found a black and white series of super heroes that are simple, elegant and so amazing I just had to have them. Over my leather couch, I’ve got portraits of Batman, Superman and Loki keeping watch over my apartment.

Katie sets her groceries for the night on my counter, insisting she’ll make me dinner. I love to bake, but dinner? No. It doesn’t happen. I’ve been surviving on peanut butter and banana sandwiches for the past week. Something about using the stove to cook a full-blown meal scares me.I tried to learn from my Mom, a Greek displaced to Montreal, trying to keep track of recipes in a notebook. I hated it when she used to eye-ball spices and proportions. Or how she just
knew
what spices go with what, and just started adding a bit more vinegar to a salad, some oregano and a splash of oil to a salad. What if it doesn’t come out right the first time? Wouldn’t you just keep adding oil then vinegar then more spices in a vicious never-ending cycle?

“I’m loving this place, Sera. Really proud of you for buying it.” I get a full Katie-smile, the kind with all white teeth that have been perfected with years and years of dental assistance.
She looks around again, taking in all the furniture, the artwork.

My throat gets thick, and I just end up nodding fast. I stare down at my hands, willing my eyes to stop being so bright.

“Took some ovaries to get out your house and do what you’re doing. Even with all the shit that went down, you’re making a life here. And for all that...” There’s a plastic ruffling as she searches through her bags. “I brought wine. Please tell me you have a bottle opener. I forgot to bring one from home.”

“Hell yeah, I have a bottle opener. I’ve been waiting for this night all week.” Turning from her, I move to the drawer that holds my target. Coming back to the counter, I find Katie standing on my side, and not the side of the living
room’s. Her right ear gets closer to her shoulder, as she tilts her head at me. Her eyes are warm and just as bright as mine were a second ago.

Katie moves in and hugs me. Katie gives the best hugs. I think it’s ‘
cause she’s not really a touchy-feely kinda person. You have to earn one of her hugs by being important to her. She’s just...good. It’s all I can say about her, but it’s the only word that fits. She brightens up a room by laughing at even the corniest of jokes, and never lets anything really bother her. I wish I was more like her. Enjoying reality instead of escaping to the make-believe that fictional characters provide me. I’m weaker than Katie is, but even if she knows it, she’ll never disrespect me by saying it to my face.

So I lose it.

I sob into her shoulder, dropping the bottle-opener, clawing my hands into her shirt and squeezing so hard around her ribcage, I might cause damage to her lungs. I give her the kind of hug a dying person gives a living one, hoping to absorb some life into their decaying body. I’m trying to absorb some of her happiness into myself, her bravery, her strength.

What’s even better? Katie squeezes her arms around me just as hard. And I sob harder, breaking in front of her and trusting her to help me pick up the pieces later.

***

“How do you do this? It’s like magic.” I’m eating chicken
marsala. I don’t know what marsala is, but this brown sauce on my chicken is the shit. Katie even made a potato salad using fingerling potatoes. They’re like really small, and there’s even a purple one! Say what? The dressing is oil, vinegar and green onions. All the flavours cause an orgasm in my mouth.

“Buddy, y
ou saw everything I did. It’s not hard. You just have to be calm about it is all,” Katie says, taking a delicate sip from her wine glass.

“I’m Dirty Harry calm, and I know I can’t make a fine meal like this.” I shove potatoes in my mouth and take a slurp of some wine. The fifty-eighth food-induced mouth orgasm of the night.
Bloody hell, this is awesome.

“Are we gonna talk about before?”
she asks.

I swallow the wine-soaked potatoes and cut up some more chicken, drenching the meat in the brown sauce of amazingness. “If you mean to imply that we should talk about my little show of hysteria, then we are most definitely not. I’ve got all the
Rookie Blue
and
Flashpoint
episodes of the week PVR’d for you, and
Jeopardy
is going to be on in fifteen minutes.Hysteria takes a backseat to TV. You know this.”

“Please tell me. How can I help you if you won’t tell me
what’s wrong?” I stare through the glass of my living room table, checking out my Green Lantern socks.

“There’s nothing really to talk about. It’s been a hard couple of weeks.
Hey, I got a promotion! Take a swig of wine to that!” I toss back the last bit in my glass, and bang it on the table, so a glass-on-glass chime fills the room. We both stare at each other and shriek “ANOTHER!” and snort-chuckle-laugh while I try not to choke around the piece of chicken I’m still chewing.

“Oh, yeah? What’s your position now?”

I grimace
. “I’m the supervisor’s assistant. Paygrade goes up ten percent and the benefits are outstanding. Pretty pleased.”
Not really.

Katie taps her lips
with her glass. “So, the tears before were tears of joy?”

“E
xactly! See? Nothing to talk about. I was overwhelmed by my pride and it just so happened it brimmed over into tears.”

She gives me a glare with the intensity of a laser beam
.“It’ll help if you talk it out, I swear.”

I smirk. “All it does is make me sound like I’m complaining all the time. I
hate that. Being whiny. What am I? A snotty rich kid that hasn’t got the latest designer jeans? Bloody hell.”

“I really wish you’d stop s
peaking British. And you do it to annoy your parents. You’re Greek.” she says, gathering up her fork, knife and plate. I follow with my own.

“I only do it so I don’t swear as much. There’s just somethin
g about cussing that soothes me. Also, it makes me feel closer to Tom Hiddleston.”

Katie snorts. “Riiiiiiiiiiig
ht.” She opens my dishwasher and starts putting her plate into it. My dishwasher is so awesome, I don’t have to rinse squat. “Speaking of the demons, what happened now?”

“I-I don’t want to talk about it. Not tonight. Tonight is me and my best bud doing our own thing. I got last night’s fight taped, too, if you wanna watch that fi
rst.”

“Fine. But we
will talk about it. I don’t give a fuck what your next excuse is gonna be, but you’re going to answer me. Got it?” Katie says, getting up in my face. Her index finger taps the tip of my nose and I end up rubbing it, taking a step back.

“You know y
ou’d sure give a lot of dudes shit-your-pants syndrome when you’d use your dominatrix voice. You don’t even need a whip.”