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“For you,” she said, smiling a little, and he realized she was holding a box wrapped in sparkly silver paper.

His chest swelled. He couldn’t remember the last time anyone other than his mom had gotten him a gift. It was almost all too much: her closeness; her eyes; the gift; the sheer joy of him being here, with her, in this room, at this time.

He couldn’t think of anything else to do but kiss her.

5

As Leo kissed her, Shira kept her eyes wide open. Partially from surprise. Partially because she was so busy thinking about her lips that her eyes were way down on the priority list, and no matter what she’d blustered about dating before, she hadn’t been kissed enough recently to make the movement muscle memory.

But mostly it was because she couldn’t relax. Yes, she could register that it felt good: the movement of his lips against hers, the familiar smell that made her feel comfortable no matter the situation, the feeling of heat that spread down her throat and pooled into a throb in her belly. She could register herself leaning into him, her lips moving back, into the warmth and comfort and spark that she knew would grow into a flame if she let it. It was that she couldn’t turn off her brain. He’s a college dropout, he lives with his dad, he has no career goals, what would all my friends think?

The thoughts made her rigid. It must have felt like kissing a statue, which had to be why he broke away first after maybe two or three seconds that felt drawn out into eight years. She really hoped he didn’t see the wince she wiped off her face. “Sorry, sorry,” he said, and before he could beat himself up, she was saying, “No, no, it’s okay,” and then he was turning beet red and his eyes were falling away, and she shoved the box at him, mostly to give him something to do with his hands.

He grabbed clumsily at the box, almost dropping it, and they both apologized to each other at the same time, and then there was an awkward laugh, and then he was desperately tearing at the paper, his fingers unable to close on much more of it than a scrap at a time, so he was littering her bedroom carpet with sparkly silver snow.

She could pinpoint the moment when his heart broke. If this weren’t Leo, someone she cared deeply about, this might have been a dramatic moment when she recounted the tale to her friends later. But it was Leo, and she did care so deeply about him, and she wouldn’t tell anyone this story, because her heart broke a little, too.

“Oh,” he said, his face entirely blank as he stared at the present in his hands. “This is a pity gift.”

After enlisting her parents’ help with the food, Shira had ventured out to the local Barnes & Noble, which said online that it had a whole big section of books meant to help people with their careers. Leo apparently only played video games now? She could work with that. And so could How to Turn Your Love of Gaming into a Career. Big black blocky font on a neon-yellow cover, crowning a young man sitting before his outdated computer with an exaggerated scrunched-up, confused expression.

In the store it had seemed so thoughtful. But here, after the kiss, after that blank face, she couldn’t help but cringe at it. “No, no, it’s totally not,” she said hastily but not in time. He was already flipping it over, eyebrows raising.

“For people who need a little help pointing themselves in the right direction,” he read aloud. Scoffed a little. “Well, that’s me. You nailed it. Congratulations. No, mazel tov.”

She couldn’t help but be stung a little by his sarcasm. She’d meant well, after all. Surely he could give her a little credit for that? “I was trying to help.”

“Right,” he said. “Because even though you haven’t seen me in eight years, somehow you know exactly what would fix my life. A how-to book. So thoughtful. If I read this book, what, then you’d kiss me back?”

At first she felt like she might shrivel up, and then a spark of anger flared into something more. Like, seriously, how dare he. He was the one who’d left. He’d come back to his dad’s house now; he could’ve come back occasionally to see her if she’d really mattered to him. He was the one who was clearly unhappy where he was at, treading water in the house of a man he hated, at a job he hated, no matter what he claimed. It wasn’t like she was a lifeguard jumping in after him and hauling him to dry land; she was tossing him a life raft he could choose to grab or not.

But none of that was what came bursting out of her mouth. “ ‘Then you’d kiss me back’? Like you’re entitled to my body?”

She felt embarrassed as soon as the anger pushed it out, but it was too late. It caught in his eyes and flared there, too. “Seriously, Shira? Of course not. I thought you knew me.” There wasn’t only anger there; she could also see hurt. “I just thought we were vibing. I thought it was mutual. It’s okay if it’s not. It’s okay if you’re not into me. But…” His jaw worked, tightening up so hard she was afraid he might break a tooth. “Did you not kiss me back because, what, you’d be embarrassed to be seen with me?”

“Of course not,” she said. “I’ve been seen with you literally the entire night. We’ve spent the whole party together.”

She opened her mouth to continue her argument, but the words died on her tongue. She couldn’t really argue with him—that was entirely the reason she hadn’t kept kissing him back. Not because she hadn’t wanted to. Because she knew that, with Leo, one kiss would lead to another kiss, would lead to something more, would lead to her introducing him to her friends and coworkers and boss as…well. The guy who lived at home. The guy with a dead-end job and no degree and currently no hope of anything more.

Her stomach squirmed uncomfortably. Of course Leo was more than that. They had years of history, of inside jokes, and he was funny, smart, kind, all the good things. But she lived across the country in a big city. She was ready to take on the world. How was she supposed to build something with someone on the opposite side of the country, who was content without plans for his future, fine living with his dad? He couldn’t afford his own place, and he couldn’t exactly share her tiny studio.

“I thought so,” said Leo, voice tight. “You were always like this, you know. I thought you might have grown up a little. I guess not.”

“Really? Because it seems like, between the two of us, I’m the only one who’s grown up.”

She could tell immediately that she’d hit him right in the gut. “I meant emotionally,” he said. “I don’t care what anyone else thinks of me, but that’s all you care about. Do you even care that your whole life is basically a performance for other people?”

“That’s not true!” she exploded. “Not even a little!” She wrapped her arms around herself like that would protect her, even though she had absolutely zero need of protection. He was hurt, and he was lashing out. That was all that was happening. “Maybe you should care a little more about what people think of you, if that means you’ll do something with your life.”

“Yeah. Sure. Fine.” His face twisted, and his mouth opened, and she braced herself for something really ugly to come out—years of history meant they knew where all the bodies were buried, metaphorically but also physically, in the case of all their deceased pets—but then they both stopped at the sound of singing. The crowd. They were singing the blessings for the Hanukkah candles. Or, really, the Levinsons and Joe and the few other Jews in the crowd were singing while the rest of the neighbors were attempting enthusiastic but mangled interpretations from the transliterated Hebrew words on their phones, but that was close enough.

The familiar tune sent calm washing through her; her anger drained right out, leaving her limp and sad. “I can’t believe they’re lighting the menorah without me,” she said. “I threw this whole freaking party.”

The tension had left him, too. “We can still make the second blessing. We should go out there.”

But neither one of them moved. She huffed out a breath. “Look, I really didn’t mean to—”

“It’s fine. Don’t worry about it.” He turned to study one of the photos on the wall: one from college where she, Danica, and some of their other college friends were getting ready for a party. Shira remembered that night well—it was right before winter break, and they were getting ready to part ways, and they were both pouting that Danica’s birthday fell between Christmas and New Year’s, so they wouldn’t get to celebrate it properly together. But then someone had told them to smile for the camera, and while Danica’s face was still a little pouty, Shira had automatically fixed her grin on bright and shiny.