His hand brushes my face, and holds onto my cheek. His airy brown eyes stare into mine. My heart nervously flutters.
"I don't know if I can do this." I say, staring back.
"You're not the only one. But we'll manage." He says, his lips inches from mine.
"I'm…scared." I say. He comes back from me to stare.
"That's crazy. I should be the scared one." He smiles at me. He never would kiss me. Right?
But I'm proved wrong. He leans back in and kisses me lightly. The sensation of kissing someone is weird. I can taste his love, or something. It tastes like a warm hot chocolate, and I never want to stop tasting it. It's an odd sensation, but I like it. I run my fingers through his blonde hair, and we kiss more surely.
He pulls away from me. "Well, that went better than I had expected." I whisper airily. His look suddenly turns.
"I hated it!" He screams in my face.
"What?" I ask. His angry look stays plastered to his face.
"I hate you!" His eyes turn hateful as he accuses me of something I don't understand.
"AHHHHHHHHH!" I sit up and shiver. I look around, and we're in an odd little cave. It was a figment of my imagination. It means nothing. I was dreaming. I breathe in and out heavily.
"Hannah, what happened?" Chris crawls over to me and stares into my soul, and I sit there, confused.
"I… you…. don't…. know." I stare at him blankly. I can't tell him. He can't know. They can't know anything.
"Come on, tell me before Tino over there wakes up and you have to tell him." His concerned eyes go swimming in my soul again, and I feel like I have to tell him something, have some sort of excuse.
"I… it... I… I kissed someone in my dream, and then they yelled at me. A lot. And I'm kinda freaked out now." I stutter, afraid that I'll reveal what I'm really hiding. I can't possibly hide that.
"Was it Holden?" He sighs.
"Yeah. Yeah it was Holden." I lie completely to him to hide my secret. I don't have to tell the truth all the time. But lying feels wrong with him.
"I'm sorry. I know you two will… be fine. He's back at school, he'll be fine. He'll still love you and all that stuff when you come back. It'll be fine." He sighs again and I can almost see a bit of sadness in his eyes.
"Thank you." I say, wanting to hug something. I hold out my arms and look to him, and he shrugs his shoulders.
"As long as you don't tell Mr. Hand-licker over there." He gestures to Tino, and I smile. He grabs my arms gently and pulls me in close.
"Thank you." I whisper. He squeezes a little, and I squeeze back. We have a mini squeezing war until we hear, "What's the haps in here…. OHHHH!" Bob, the talking snowman, walks in and sees us. This is not going to end well.
"So, some of us are getting comfy in this cold weather, huh?" Bob giggles again and draws a heart in the air around him. A mix of confusion and horror crosses Chris' and my face.
"Shhh, you'll wake Tino. We are just friends." I whisper defensively and put a finger to my lips. It's the truth, the defensive truth.
"Friends who hug passionately and flirt with each other?" Bob wiggles an eyebrow. Chris is shoved past his breaking point, and I can see it in his eyes.
"Can you give up on this dream you have that we love each other? We are going on a forced date after this purely for Tino's enjoyment, and I don't even want to. We are good friends, and just because we are different genders does not mean that we are romantically involved or inclined. So you can shut the Hell up." Chris' eyebrows angrily knit together as he stands up and goes back to his sleeping bag.
Bob turns to me and apologizes, as Chris is already asleep. Or he's just too afraid to talk to Chris. Not that I'd blame him. He acted appropriately. Like I did.
But did I?
Chapter 24
"Hannah! Chris! Wake up! Time to go!" I hear a voice yell from outside the cave. I curl up tighter in a ball so I can't see the sun and the voice can't get to me.
"Hannah. Come on. We've gotta go so you can find your sister and I can get back to work." I hear a soft voice just above me, but its shadow shields the sun.
"Mmmmmm, noooo." I mumble and curl up tighter.
"Hey, you're the one blackmailing me, and I want a new snow mobile. So get up." I get shaken and open my eyes. Chris' messy hair falls in whatever way it wants, but he still looks normal. I wonder how my hair looks.
I stumble up from the ground with Chris' help and shove my snow boots on, I already have everything else on because I slept that way. Chris smiles at me after I get my boots on and releases my arm from his grip once we get out of the cave. I can barely steady myself, I'm so tired.
"Good morning Tino, good morning Tino, good morning Hannah." Bob says brightly, like the sun shining in my face.
"Excuse me? Why are there two… Oh yeah!" Valentino, the real one, laughs a little to himself, but doesn't correct Bob.
"Let's get going for the day, we can't waste any time." Chris says, and we begin to hike upwards. Towards Emmy. Towards my sister.