12. He almost threw up the first time he kissed Aelita.
"Have you actually ever kissed anyone before?" Odd asks.
They're holed up in Ulrich and Odd's dorm room, playing the newest Zombee Hoard game. And yeah, at first Jeremie had been dismissive of the whole premise because zombie bees was just a weird concept, but the games have proven to be pretty fun, if scientifically implausible. He doesn't realize Odd is actually speaking to him and not asking the room at large until he catches Odd's pointed stare and Ulrich's eyeroll.
"What?" he asks.
"You know, kissing?" Odd replies. "A mating habit of the human teenager?"
"Please don't refer to it as mating," Ulrich mutters.
Odd cheerfully ignores him, turning his attention back to Jeremie. "I'm just saying, you and Aelita are going out and certain things may be expected, you know?" Ulrich snorts and Odd responds by sending a swarm of zombees after him on screen.
"Mature," Ulrich mutters.
Jeremie frowns at Odd's head, ignoring his character for the moment. "I don't understand why this is any of your business."
"You're my friend, Einstein," Odd replies. "You're head over heels for Princess, everyone can see that, don't protest. Yes, victory!" He does a fist pump and shimmy on the ground in celebration. "Anyway, you're my friend. I want to make sure you're prepared for your official date and all."
"Going to demonstrate it for him?" Ulrich asks, leaning out of the way of Odd's flailing fist. "Look, he's turning red now. You've embarrassed him."
"You're both idiots," Jeremie mutters. He turns his attention back to the game as it restarts. "I have kissed girls before," he adds. His voice is a bit more petulant than he'd like it to be and he can feel the warmth in his cheeks from Odd's comments.
"Really, who?" Odd asks while Ulrich replies with a slightly disbelieving, "of course you have."
Jeremie bristles and turns his attention to annihilating his so-called teammates and friends.
/
"Is it so unbelievable that I've kissed a girl?" Jeremie questions.
Yumi pauses in the middle of highlighting a passage and looks up at him, eyebrows raised. "You and Aelita have kissed?"
"Not Aelita," Jeremie replies. He folds his arms over his history book and rests his chin on them.
"You've kissed someone else?" Yumi frowns at him before returning her attention to her highlighter and the large ink spot she's left on the page. "I thought you and Aelita were dating."
Jeremie blows out an exasperated breath. "We are. This doesn't answer my question."
Yumi shrugs and looks up at him again. "I never really thought about it," she says after a moment. "What's brought this on?"
"Odd," Jeremie groans, "and Ulrich."
"Why do they care about who you've kissed?"
"I don't know," he grumbles. He sits up and rubs his temples. He's had a headache since their impromptu game night on Wednesday. He pulls his glasses off and cleans them on with the end of his sweater. "I told them Aelita and I are going for coffee Saturday."
"Ah," Yumi replies. Jeremie squints at her suspiciously. "Well, I guess they're just trying to be helpful. You do have a habit of getting tongue tied around Aelita."
"That was a year ago!"
"Mm," Yumi agrees. Jeremie slides his glasses back on and, just as he suspected, she does have an amused smile on. She turns back to her highlighting. "It's okay to be nervous going out together alone, but you're both into each other. It'll be fine. And if you get nervous, that's okay too."
"I'm not nervous!"
He can't help it that his voice comes out higher than he intended, but he does offer a weak smile when the librarian shoots them a glare. Yumi gives him another amused look, this one tinged with a hint of sympathy, and Jeremie returns to his history notes, disgruntled.
/
Jeremie imagines that, years from now, when he looks back on his first real one-on-one "date" with Aelita he'll regret the fact that he had sushi the night before. He's never been particularly fond of fish, and the night before a meeting with Aelita sounds like a disaster. He's honestly not sure why he didn't think this through properly. He blames Odd, that's usually a safe bet, and his insistence that Jeremie couldn't eat the platter of sushi rolls he ordered by himself.
Jeremie isn't sure that bragging rights are worth this kind of discomfort, even if victory had tasted sweet the night before.
Aelita gives him a concerned look on their walk into town, her silver-striped hat pulled low over her head against the last trace of winter. The cold air actually feels good on his overheated skin, and he can't help turning his face into the wind, even if the cold stings at his eyes.
"Are you sure you're alright?" Aelita asks.
"I'm fine," he laughs. She gives him a doubtful look and he reaches for the café door, holding it open for her. "I may be a bit queasy from all the sushi."
"You did eat a lot. You should leave the competitive eating to Odd," Aelita admonishes. They slide into a booth near the window where they can people watch from the warmth of the café. "You should have chamomile tea," she adds. "That's supposed to be good for stomachs."
Jeremie pulls a face, sticking his tongue out and wrinkling his nose. "I don't like herbal tea."
"You should've thought of that before ingesting a platter of raw fish," she singsongs, waving at Nicolette as she comes over to take their orders. Jeremie simply sighs as Aelita orders the teas and pastries.
/
They take the long way back from the café, through the woodlands and park. Normally, Jeremie would appreciate being able to spend more time alone with Aelita, but Nicolette's had been hot and the tea had done little to settle his stomach. The smell reminded him of post-chemo days when his mother would sit in bed and sip pot after pot of chamomile tea.
Aelita links her fingers with his as they wander down the footpath back to Kadic. It's too cold for the families and the playground is deserted of the usual cluster of small, screaming children. Jeremie feels slightly better now that they're out in the fresh air again. His head feels clearer, but his stomach is still unhappy.
"How're you feeling?" Aelita asks. "Did the tea help?"
He squeezes her mittened fingers with his gloved ones. "Yes, thank you."
She gives him one of her dazzling smiles and he can't help but smile back at her. "I'm glad." She gives him another smile before turning her face up to the thin sun rays coming through the clouds. "It feels like there should be snow today. The wind is so cold, but the rays coming through the clouds look like those paintings we studied last term, remember? The religious ones."
"Chiaroscuro," he replies after a moment.
"Yes! Caravaggio and Rubens and van Honthorst! Odd preferred de Coster, but I think his paintings are kind of creepy, you know?" Jeremie nods, though he doesn't really remember de Coster's paintings. Art history was never his forte. Aelita lifts her hand, uses her teeth to pull off the mitten so that she can run her fingers through a sunbeam. "It's amazing to think of the worlds people created with just a bit of paint and canvas."
He watches as Aelita twists her hand back and forth, the sun glinting off the sparkly pink polish decorating her fingernails. The glitter makes his head throb and his stomach gives another unpleasant flip. He swallows. "I guess people have always been searching for something more," he says after a moment.
She gives him a wry smile. "And sometimes they stumble upon it by accident."
He isn't sure if it's the way the sun highlights her eyes or catches on the flush of her cheeks. If it's the way her mouth is twisted a little, one side slightly higher than the other as she smiles at him. He isn't sure if it's his headache. But he leans in then, kisses her in the middle of a bitterly cold day while the sun shines and the deserted swings creak in the breeze behind them.
She smells of lavender and her lips taste of strawberry chapstick and he feels legitimately sick and elated and panicked all at once.
Aelita blinks at him when he pulls back, but her smile is wider and her eyes are brighter and she kisses him again. Standing in the center of the footpath he can't think of anything he'd rather be doing, anywhere he'd rather be. Her fingers are cold when they brush his neck, they send an electric thrill down his spine and he reminds himself not to throw up on her shoes.