| Chapter Twenty-five |
| Justin was the first to pull away. Not that Grace ever had even considered it; she was perfectly happy to go on kissing him for the rest of her life. Could anyone really blame her? "Sorry," he said in a hushed tone. The expression on his face was one of embarrassment. Grace touched her fingers to her lips; she didn't know how to respond. Her mind was going a mile a minute, but she was speechless. "It just happened. I'm sorry." His eyes met hers, silently asking for her to respond. "I can't believe you…you kissed me." So wrapped up in her own awe, Grace didn't realize that he needed some kind of reassurance that she wasn't offended or angry. It wasn't everyday he grabbed his friends and kissed them. But in her inexperience with men, Grace might not have picked up on it anyways. "Yeah." "I've never been kissed like that before. Not like that." It was a embarrassing confession, but somehow she felt that he should know he was the first. At the look of astonishment on his face, she quickly added, "That's a good thing." "I didn't know." "How could you? It's not like a scarlet letter or anything." She laughed a very fake laugh, but her attempt at humor was completely lost. "If I had known…," he trailed off. "You wouldn't have kissed me?" Justin nodded. She'd expected him to be flattered or at least pleased that he was her first kiss. Maybe that was asking for too much, but she'd never though that he'd feel guilty. Like he'd stolen something. Something that he didn't want. She thought of Liv Tyler in That Thing You Do. Towards the end, Liv had mistakenly thought that she and her longtime boyfriend (Jerky McJerkyson) were engaged. When he starts being a jerk about it (hence the name), she pleads with him, "This is a beautiful moment, and you're ruining it." Of course, afterwards, she gives him an awesome breakup speech whereas Grace could only mutter, "I'm glad you did. I've wanted you to for a long time." "I know." Considering she'd asked (read: begged) him to kiss her on two occasions, his response wasn't as arrogant as it sounded. However, it did bring up the unasked question that Grace wasn't quite sure she wanted to know the answer to, but she couldn't help herself. "Then why?" "I don't know. I really don't. You looked so unhappy, and I just felt this need to…" He didn't finish, but she refused to let him stop there, "To what?" "Protect you. I wanted to make everything better. I couldn't stand it that you were upset." She would have jumped into his arms and hugged him until the day the restraining order arrived except he ruined his perfectly wonderful statement with a very annoying, "You're my friend." So, instead of telling him that he was the greatest man that ever lived, she continued with her interrogation, "But that doesn't explain why you would kiss me." Whether he said it was because he felt sorry for her or just really need to kiss a girl at the moment, she had to know. And it looked like she might finally get an answer, but Grace was never a very lucky person, so it shouldn't have surprised her when she heard someone's voice calling Justin's name. It was very faint, but unfortunately, not faint enough to go completely unnoticed. Like he'd been hypnotized, Justin snapped out of his trance. "It's Trace." She couldn't be sure, but it sounded almost as if he was relieved. He moved towards the door and poked his head out, "The library!" "Where the hell is that?" came the faint reply. "Walk towards the laundry room!" Trace's loud footsteps quickly approached, and when he finally saw Justin leaning out of the doorway, he shouted, "Who the hell knew you had a library in this place? What the hell are you doing here?" Justin motioned him inside, "Dude, get in here and stop yelling." Trace followed suit, but drew to a halt when he saw Grace. "Hey." He looked around the room, probably looking for Lynn. Why else would Lynn's assistant be here? Justin made a quick introduction. "Trace this is Grace. Grace this is Trace." She'd never realized their names rhymed, and if she didn't feel like jumping through a window, she'd laugh about it. Instead she just waved. Justin, however, didn't seem to realize that anything was awkward about the situation. They hadn't finished talking about what had just happened, in fact, they had just reached the good stuff. "So, what are you doing here?" Again, Trace looked over at Grace like she was an interloper, but didn't make any direct comment about it. "Uh…I tried calling your cell, but you had it off. Ron's having a thing at his beach house. Thought you'd want to go." "Yeah, sounds cool." Being addicted to US Weekly magazine like she was, Grace immediately imagined a party full of debauchery and Paris Hilton. She'd probably read about Ron's big bash in next week's issue along with photos of Justin and some unidentified girl. "I called Sadie and Olivia." "Sounds fine." "Okay. I'll be back here around 10." Trace absentmindedly waved goodbye to Grace and left the room. "Sorry about Trace. He's a bit of a troll, but you have to love him." She wasn't sure if he was apologizing for his friend's personality or lack of height. "Yeah." "He's always going on about some party somewhere." "Yeah." When were they going to get back to the "why did you kiss me" portion of this conversation? "So, do you wanna go?" "Huh? Where?" If her lack of eloquence wasn't enough, she stressed her dimwittedness by looking around the room as if a tiny door would appear and lead to the secret garden. "To the party. Ron's big bash." "I don't know Ron." Honestly, Grace had no idea why she was avoiding the question; she really did want to go with him (duh!), but for some unknown reason, she was having a hard time saying so. He shrugged, "Neither do I, and I seriously doubt that Trace does either." "Ah." "So, how about it? Feel like painting the town red?" He smiled his extraordinary smile, and she found that the words slipped out easily, "Yes, I'd like that." Oh dear god, they were going on a date. "Good. Do you want us to pick you up?" "Yeah, that's fine." She'd completely forgotten about Trace. Did it count as a date when his best friend came along? "I'll be there around 10:30. After Trace and I pick up Sadie and Olivia." Something told her that dates didn't usually include two extra girls. 2 guys and 3 girls. The odds didn't to seem to be in her favor. "Wow, look at the time," he frowned down at his watch, "I have some things to do before tonight." She felt like yelling 'but I want to know why!'; however, she didn't think that would get her anywhere. "I'll see you later." "Yeah, later." Later they were going to finish this conversation even if she had to lock him in a room. Hmm…that didn't sound like such a bad idea. |