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The music’s too loud and the vodka Jackie poured into Shauna’s soda is already hitting too hard. She didn’t even want to come tonight—some dumb afterparty for the boys’ basketball team, everyone packed into someone’s too-big house with furniture pushed to the walls. Jackie made it sound like a favor. Like keeping Shauna company was her job.
She’s standing alone in the hallway when she spots Mari in the kitchen, balancing half-drunk on a barstool, lip gloss smudged and eyeliner a little wrecked from laughing too hard. She’s wearing a sparkly purple mini dress that looks like it should be innocent, but nothing about the way she’s sitting is.
Mari sees her watching. Cocks her head. Smirks.
Shauna looks away.
“Shauna!” Mari’s voice is way too loud. “Come fix my face!”
Before she can protest, Mari’s already by her side, grabbing her hand, and pulling her down the hall. They duck into the bathroom and Mari shuts the door behind them.
Shauna sets her drink down on the sink. “You look fine.”
“Liar,” Mari says, grinning. “Come on Shaun you owe me one. Help me out.”
Shauna grabs some toilet paper and dabs at the corner of Mari’s eye, trying not to breathe too hard. Mari smells like strawberry lip gloss and that vanilla perfume half the girls at school use, only sweeter, like it actually belongs on her. They’re way too close in the mirror. Shauna’s hand starts to tremble, just a little, and Mari notices. Of course she does.
“You okay?” Mari asks, softer now. “You’re shaking.”
“I’m fine,” Shauna mutters.
Mari turns to face her, hip against the counter. “You’re really pretty when you’re mad, you know.”
Shauna huffs out a laugh, nervous and sharp. “I’m not mad.”
“You’re something,” Mari says, tilting her head. “Maybe just sick of pretending.”
Shauna opens her mouth to say What the hell does that mean? but then Mari’s kissing her, sudden and hot and a little messy, like she’s not even thinking about it. And Shauna—
Shauna kisses her back.
It’s immediate. Intense. The kind of kiss you don’t come back from. Like every sharp little feeling Shauna’s ever tried to swallow just tears its way out all at once. Her hands land on Mari’s waist before she can stop them. She kisses like she needs this. Like she’s been waiting forever and didn’t even know it.
Then she pulls away. Stumbling back. Breathing too hard.
“I—I can’t,” she says, already fumbling for the door.
Mari just stands there. Her lip gloss is smudged again. She looks beautiful and calm and totally unreadable.
Shauna bolts.
She finds Jackie and drags her out- not allowing her to protest. Shauna drives in silence back to her house.
After dropping off Jackie, she speeds to her own house to sleep off the kiss.
-------
The hallway’s too bright. Shauna’s head is pounding from whatever they were drinking last night, and the memory of the kiss clings to her like sweat. She can still feel Mari’s lip gloss on her mouth if she thinks too hard. So she doesn’t.
She dodges Jackie before first period. She ignores every buzzing thought in her brain through math. She tells herself it meant nothing, and if she says it enough, maybe it’ll stick.
It doesn’t.
Because Mari finds her right after lunch.
Shauna’s halfway to class when Mari grabs her wrist and pulls her into that half-lit corner by the broken vending machine, out of sight but not out of reach. Her grip is firm. Familiar. Too much.
“Jesus, what—”
“You’ve thought about it, haven’t you?” Mari says. Her voice is calm. Not accusing. Just certain.
Shauna yanks her arm back, taking a step away like distance might fix anything. “It didn’t mean anything. I was just drunk.”
Mari doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even blink. “You kissed me like you’ve been dying to.”
Shauna’s breath catches.
“That’s not—” she starts, but the words taste like lies. So she bites the rest back.
Mari steps closer. “You didn’t have to kiss me back.”
“I was drunk,” Shauna snaps, louder than she means to. Her eyes flick down the hall, checking for anyone who might’ve heard.
“Yeah,” Mari says, still too quiet, “but you weren’t stupid. You knew exactly what you were doing.”
Shauna looks down at her shoes. Her laces are untied. She wants to fix them. She wants to fix everything.
“Are you gonna tell Jackie?” she asks finally.
Mari laughs once, low and dry. “Why, so she can tell you it doesn’t mean anything too?”
Shauna looks up.
Mari’s eyes aren’t angry. They’re just… tired. A little sad.
“You kissed me like it mattered,” Mari says. “Even if you’re scared shitless now.”
Shauna doesn’t respond. She can’t. She’s too busy trying not to cry, not to feel, not to let this whole thing spiral into something real.
Mari lets the silence hang between them, then shakes her head like she’s the one letting go.
“Forget it,” she says. “You don’t have to want me back. But don’t pretend you didn’t want me at all.”
Then she walks away.
Shauna stays frozen, hand on her backpack strap, throat tight. She can still taste strawberry lip gloss and smell her vanilla perfume and every truth she’s not ready to hold.