I was seeing stars. And not the pretty kind either. The kind that flashed and burned like they were dying. My backside throbbed, and beer soaked through the back of my jeans. Noise filled my head in waves, but I caught snippets of people's words.

"Hey, are-"

"...down..."

"just stop-"

One voice cut through all the sound, like a blade of ice that sent chills dancing across my skin. In the dark of the bar I couldn't make out his face, just his figure hovering over me and the stench of motor oil coming off his jacket.

"Come on, let's go."

His hand gently closed around my wrist, still wet and cold from holding his drink. When he pulled me up I felt like I had been placed on a cloud, floating above and away from all the noise and all the smoke and all the darkness that filled my head.

A blast of cold hit me, and finally I tasted fresh air. I blinked and looked up, the sun still hanging low and burning bright behind reams of clouds. I used to hate midnight sun in the summer, although recently I was thankful it kept me awake, and away from the nightmares that coming back home brought me.

"So...you good?"

The biting of the wind that blew down from the mountains brought me back to my senses. I whipped around and came face to face with Grey, his arms crossed in his dirty jean jacket and a typical, disdained look on his face. He chewed on a toothpick while he waited for my response.

"Just peachy, thanks," I muttered as I pulled my jacket tighter over my torso.

An awkward silence ballooned in the air around us. Grey frowned and furrowed his brows the way he always did when he was thinking, but for once it was directed at me. My nerves bundled into a knot in my stomach.

"What are you looking at?" I hissed through my teeth.

"You're bleeding." Grey pointed at my forehead. He chomped down on the toothpick again, and hearing his teeth grind made me shudder. He took a step towards me, and as soon as he did I stepped back.

"Don't," I said sharply. "I'm fine."

He stepped forward again, but slower and more docile, like the way he had guided me out of the bar. I felt warm liquid trickle down my head and stop at my temple.

"Seriously Grey." I couldn't hide the cracking in my voice. "Don't you dare."

I didn't know what would happen if his skin touched mine again while I was fully cognizant, but I really didn't want to know.

He rolled his eyes at me. "Or what?"

"Or..." I swallowed hard and tried to slow my breathing. "Or I'll kick your teeth in."

"Really?" He sounded bored. "And risk getting blood on your boots? You wouldn't."

My blood boiled, and I was sure my face was as red as the sun-stained clouds overhead. Without another word I huffed and turned on my heel, making my way down the street and back towards the coffee shop. I had the keys - if I had to hide out there until Delilah or my mother picked me up, I would. Anything to avoid seeing him, hearing him, smelling him in the air around me.

"I'm not gonna chase you Kenny," I heard him call after me, his voice carrying on the wind through the empty street. "I spent the better part of my teenage life chasing after you. I'm not doing it anymore. I'm fucking tired of it."

My breath caught in my throat, and tears stung the corners of my eyes. Those dying stars flashed in my head again, and with it came echoes of his voice and every pained word he spoke.

Sickness rolled through me, and without warning my legs buckled and sent me toppling to the sidewalk. My knees stung from the impact, and my chest heaved and begged for air.

I heard Grey's footsteps behind me. He muttered something like god damn it before kneeling down next to me and putting my arm around his shoulders. I didn't bother fighting him, even though the feeling of his skin against mine burned and tingled in ways I wish I didn't already know.

He put me into the passenger seat of his car - the same black Jeep Wrangler he had been driving since high school, still smelling of cigarettes and the minty air freshener that hung from his rear view mirror.

I couldn't bring myself to look at him. I pressed my forehead against the window and just concentrated on the sun darting in and out of tree branches in bursts and flashes of light. The reflection of the clock on the car dashboard said 10:18 PM.

"Are you okay?" He asked.

I squeezed my eyes shut and ignored him.

I sat on the edge of Marcela Cane's front steps, drawing lines in the dirt with a stick I picked up in the driveway. Fat tears rolled off my cheeks and splattered to the concrete. I heard the screen door squeak open behind me, and I pressed the sleeves of my sweater to my cheeks to soak up the streaks of runny mascara.

Grey lowered himself on the step next to me with a can of Natty Ice in his hands. He elbowed my arm playfully.

"Well, Leah's fucking wasted, so she doesn't want to go home to Mom and Dad," he said. "She's staying here with Marcela and a bunch of other drunk cheerleaders."

I chuckled and shook my head as I tried to fight back more tears. "What a bunch of assholes."

Grey shrugged. "Hey, she's your best friend."

"And she's your sister." I shoved his arm. "Probably explains where she got the asshole thing from."

Grey took another swig of his beer, and I couldn't help but notice the way his Adam's apple bobbed when he swallowed, and the bit of stubble that started to collect on his jaw and down his neck. He barely resembled the gangly, dorky kid I met in the 6th grade. It was like I blinked and suddenly he was all grown up, in this unruly, tight t-shirt wearing, messy hair kind of way. It made my stomach clench, and I wasn't sure if I liked it or not.

"Speaking of assholes..." Grey wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "What did Jayden do this time?"

"Nothing." I shook my head and tried to fight off more tears that stung my eyes. "Really, it's nothing. Just Jayden being Jayden."

Grey scoffed and clenched the beer can in his hand. "One day I'm going to kick that guy's ass." He looked down at me and gave me a faint, crooked smile. "Do you want me to take you home?"

I nodded and swallowed back more tears. Grey hoisted me to my feet and kept his hand on my arm as he walked me to his Jeep.

The car ride back to my house was silent, with nothing but Grey's old Rolling Stones CD crooning along in the background.

"Are you okay?" Grey asked when we rolled to a stop in front of my house. He put his car in park and lowered the music until it was nothing but faint static.

"Yeah," I replied with a sniffle. "He'll get over it tomorrow. He just...didn't like the way I was dressed."

"What an ass." Grey rolled his eyes and let out a heavy breath. "Well...for the record, you look great. I mean...you always do."

I chuckled dryly and continued to blot away tears from my cheeks. "Thanks Grey. I don't know how, but you always manage to know the right thing to say."

When I turned to look at him, he was closer than I remembered him being before. His elbow was pressed into the center console of his Jeep, his eyes darting back and forth between my eyes and my lips.

I didn't know what possessed me to do it, but I leaned closer and pressed my lips to his. He tasted like beer and cigarettes and spearmint gum, but his lips were soft and gentle, and I immediately knew how right it felt. He put his hand to the side of my cheek, and my arms found their way around his shoulders, pulling him even closer to me. For a moment everything faded into the background, like the world could have ended and we'd still be tangled together, but then reality set in as he pulled away.

"Wait," he said breathlessly. "You can't. We can't."

I exhaled sharply. "Why not?"

"Well, you're still with Jayden." The hurt in his voice was too apparent. "It's not right."

I sighed as I felt some weird combination of frustration and dejection well up inside of me.

"I've seen the way you look at me." Tears started to roll down my cheeks again and trickle onto my jeans. "You look at me like..."

I couldn't find the words. All I knew was he looked at me the way I wanted to be looked at, and it had taken me far too long to realize it.

"...Like you should be with me and not him," he finally said in a low voice. He kept his eyes on me, but I felt his fingers slide between mine. He was so close - closer than he had ever been - and the heat that came off his body made fireworks go off in my chest.

"Kiss me again." His voice was barely a whisper, his breath soft and feathery against my cheek.

And I did.

"Kenny..." Grey's voice pulled me back to reality. "I said, are you okay?"

I looked back up at Grey and watched the little veins in his neck pulse in the silence. There were so many things I wished I could have taken back, and maybe if I hadn't kissed him that night, a lot would have been different. I hadn't thought about that in so long, but sitting in the same spot, in the same car, with Grey's hazy eyes on me in the same way, it all came flooding back.

"I'm fine," I muttered as I pushed the car door open. "Thanks for the ride, Grey. Now do me a favor and stay the hell away from me."

I slammed the door shut before he could answer and trudged up my driveway. Grey's Jeep rumbled away behind me, and I waited until he was down the street before stopping and staring down at the cracks in my driveway. Wind whipped across my face, stinging and biting and burning my skin, and when it was finally quiet, I cried.