Top Ten(4)

“Your head is always bothering you,” Gabby pointed out.

Ryan ignored that. First of all, it wasn’t true: a couple of hockey-related headaches were hardly a big deal, in the scheme of things. Second of all, even if it was true, it wasn’t worth dwelling on; after all, he was due at practice in Minneapolis in two months.

Two months.

The thought of it gave Ryan that same uneasy feeling from earlier, like everything was about to change whether he wanted it to or not and he couldn’t do one single thing to stop it. “Can I tell you something without you calling me a pussy?” he heard himself blurt.

Gabby made a face. “I would never use the word pussy, first of all.”

“Okay, sure, yes,” Ryan agreed, sitting back in the passenger seat. “Sorry. But without you calling me a wimp.”

“When have I ever called you a wimp?”

Ryan rolled his eyes. “Like a thousand times, actually, but—”

“Okay, okay,” Gabby conceded, “sorry, go. I promise I won’t denigrate your manhood.”

“That’s sweet of you, considering I’m trying to tell you a nice fucking thing here.” He blew a breath out, nervous all of a sudden. His friendship with Gabby was different from any other relationship in his life for a lot of reasons, but this was one of them: the careful reveal of information, the unspoken agreement they had about what they said to each other and what they didn’t. He wondered if even this was crossing the line. “It kind of scared the shit out of me, when your sister was talking about us being apart this afternoon.”

Promise or not, Ryan was expecting her to make fun of him a little, but Gabby just nodded. “Yeah,” she said quietly, glancing down and picking at her cuticles. “Me too.”

Ryan looked at her in surprise. Usually she met feelings talk of any kind with enthusiastic retching noises. “Really?”

“Of course I’m scared!” Gabby exclaimed. “Are you kidding me? I’m terrified. I have no idea what I’m going to do without you around every second. It’s entirely possible I’ll freak out and never leave my dorm and grow into my sheets like a science experiment.”

Ryan shook his head. “That won’t happen.”

“Oh no?” Gabby asked dubiously.

“Of course not,” he said, with more confidence than he actually felt about it. “You’re a graduate of the Ryan McCullough Party Project. We have a 100 percent success rate.”

Gabby huffed a laugh at that, banging her temple lightly against the headrest. “Is that so?”

“It is,” Ryan said. “And even if it wasn’t, I know you, and I know.”

“Yeah.” Gabby cleared her throat, looking down again; her wispy blond bangs fell into her eyes. “Well, you’re going to be the king of Minnesota,” she continued after a moment, more loudly. “They’ll probably name the student center after you your first year.”

“A bar, at least.”

“I’m serious,” Gabby said, reaching out to poke him in the shoulder. “I know you, too, you know.”

“Yeah,” Ryan said, grabbing her finger and holding it for a second. He wasn’t sure if he was imagining it, or if their faces were getting closer. His heart did a weird, trippy thing inside his chest. “I guess you do.”

They looked at each other for a moment. The air in the car seemed to change. He could smell her, her skin and the laundry detergent her mom used and the smell of her car, which was always a little like french fries when you first opened the door, but also like the Ocean Breeze air freshener hanging from the rearview. Ryan liked it. She smelled like home to him. She felt like home to him, too.

“Ryan,” Gabby said quietly. “What are you—?”

“Nothing,” Ryan said, and kissed her.

For one terrifying second Gabby didn’t do anything, her mouth still and slack against his, her body hunched like a question mark across the center console. Then she made this sound, like a gasp or a tiny whimper, and kissed him back. She was a good kisser, Ryan thought, surprised and then immediately feeling kind of like a dick about it. He just thought he’d probably kissed a lot more people than her. His hand was on her arm, then on her rib cage, then rucking the back of her shirt up to rub her warm, bumpy spine. Holy shit, this was actually happening. This was happening, after all this time.

“Okay,” she said finally, pulling away from him, tucking her hair behind her ears. She sounded breathless in a good way, which made him feel pleased with himself. “Are we, like.” She laughed a little bit. “Are we?”