I decided to break the silence and send him a message.

Hey Hunter, you wanna talk about what happened yesterday? Maybe later?

Before I could hit send, I received a message from Hunter. Hey Lorrie, just wondering what you’re up to.

I deleted my original message and typed out a reply. Just sitting on a bench outside Wheatley. It’s cold. Brrr.

I hit ‘send’ and waited for a reply. It came seconds later.

I’m at the Engineering building now. Sit tight, I’ll see ya in a bit!

I waited a few minutes but didn’t receive a reply. Shrugging, I put my phone back in my pocket and turned my attention back to my sketchpad.

“Hello,” a voice called from directly behind me.

I jumped in my seat and crumpled up the sketch. “Hunter, stop sneaking up on me while I’m drawing!”

He came around the bench and took a seat next to me. “Why’d you crumple up your sketch? You’re gonna ruin it that way. Can I see it?”

I shook my head. “It’s not ready.”

“Okay. Well, you know I like seeing the drawings you do. I think you have a lot of talent.”

I turned to him and saw he had a rose in one hand and a box of chocolates in the other. My heart skipped a beat.

“What are those for?” I asked.

“Brought you some gifts,” he said brightly. “I messed up, Lorrie. I wasn’t sure how you felt about me so I didn’t get you anything for Valentine’s Day. I thought about it, but then I figured you might get pissed off or feel awkward if I got you something.”

A bit confused, I tried to put a smile on my face as I took the gifts from him. “Hunter, this is really sweet, but you didn’t have to do this.”

“Of course I did.” He sucked in a deep breath, his large chest expanding. “Lorrie, you mean a lot to me. I know you’re afraid that I’m gonna hurt you but I hope you know by now that I’d never do that. After that kiss, I was thinking that we should give dating a shot.”

My eyebrows raised. “Wait, what? Who said anything about dating?”

He smiled and laughed. “We kissed yesterday. It meant a lot to me, and I know it meant a lot to you too.”

Suddenly feeling uncomfortable with the whole situation, I offered the rose and chocolates back to him. Knowing Hunter’s casual relations with other girls, I hadn’t anticipated him interpreting the kiss as seriously as he did. “Hunter,” I said soberly. “I really appreciate all of this. But a kiss is just a kiss. It doesn’t mean I’m ready to date you.”

He furrowed his brows, ignoring my attempt to give him back his gifts. “Why are you trying to give me back your presents? Are you saying it didn’t mean anything to you?”

I brought the rose and chocolates back to my lap. “No, that’s not it at all. I’m just saying I’m not ready to move beyond friendship. I don’t want that kiss to change anything between us.” I took a calm breath, expecting him to be as understanding as he had been when I got angry about sleeping over at his place. As sweet as Hunter was, and as much as I enjoyed hanging out with him, being ‘just friends’ had enough stressful moments—gossip, drama, being distracted from school work. Dating would only multiply that.

He paused for a moment. “I can’t accept that. Not after what happened yesterday.”

My eyes widened. “What? Why?”

“I felt the way you kissed me back. I was fine being just friends if you didn’t have romantic feelings for me. But now I know you do, and you already know I have feelings for you.”

Was he really going to argue with me about how I felt? I fished for an appropriate response. “My feelings for you are purely platonic,” I said evenly. “I think of you as an older brother, not as a romantic partner. One kiss doesn’t change that.”

“Platonic?” he asked, his eyebrows high. “Do you even know what platonic means? The way your hips moved against mine was anything but platonic. Dammit Lorrie, I even tried to pull away. I wasn’t sure you wanted it, but you pulled me right back in.”

Blood rushed to my face as I remembered the sensation of his leg against my crotch and his hair between my fingers. I looked around to make sure no one was listening. “So I let myself get caught up in the heat of the moment and now we can’t be friends?” I asked, my voice rising. “You of all people shouldn’t be making assumptions off of one kiss.”

He narrowed his eyes. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Did I really have to spell it out for him? “Those girls gave you a blowjob and you didn’t think anything of it.”

“That’s different,” he said, his own voice rising. “Those girls don’t mean anything to me. You do.”

“You mean something to me too,” I said sternly. “As a friend.”

“I don’t see how you can’t tell the difference between kissing someone purely for pleasure and kissing someone who really means something to you. Kissing for us is something special.”

My jaw clenched. He was treating me like an idiot. “Trust me, I do see the difference. That kiss is looking like it might cost me a close friend, and that’s very disappointing.” I paused to let that sink in. “Like I said, I don’t want anything to change between us. But it seems like you won’t let that happen.”

He kicked a small rock on the ground, sending it tumbling in the distance. “I don’t get it. What’s the matter with you? I’m spilling my guts here and you’re turning to stone.”

“You might say ‘those girls’ mean nothing to you, but at least you respect ‘those girls’ enough to be upfront about the arrangement,” I snapped. “Frankly, the longer this conversation goes on, the more I feel like you’ve just been biding your time waiting for things to become romantic between us. Did you ever even want to be friends?”

“Lorrie, come on,” he said with a sigh. “I was totally cool with being friends. But I like you. You’re different. I know you like hanging out with me, and last night shows you’re definitely more than just attracted to me. So now I can’t understand why you’re denying your feelings. Especially when I’m being upfront with mine.”

“Here are my feelings,” I said, my fists balled up in frustration. “I don’t want to be in a romantic relationship with you, and I wish you would respect that. Maybe I got confused because we spend too much time together, and it was Valentine’s Day, and I was caught off guard. I don’t know, but it won’t happen again.”

“Lorrie—”

“Hunter, stop. I’m sorry, but we can’t. I told you before and I’m telling you again: I’m not ready. Maybe we shouldn’t be spending so much time together. It seems like things are getting confused.”

“We need to spend more time together.”

I looked into his gray eyes. “You’re willing to jeopardize our friendship for a chance at a relationship?”

His eyes became big and round. “We can be friends and in a relationship, Lorrie. We can have it all.”

“No,” I said, pursing my lips, my heart thumping in my chest. “I can’t do that. I really think we should have some distance.”