Late that night, Alex texts to let me know Steve was open to the idea of having me practice with them over the summer. I will need to get permission from the school, since I'm no longer a student at Wilderness High. He suggested I join under the premise of volunteering to help out the team.

I wonder how Alex managed to broach the topic and whether Steve found it suspicious that we had communicated, but of course I can't ask about this part. Besides, Alex is such a natural communicator; however he handled it, I trust that it was seamless.

After the exchange, Alex and I don't text again. There are only a couple weeks left in the semester, and I review my expectations for this summer on the daily. The best case scenario is that something... happens with Alex when we see each other again, but I understand this is unlikely. The probable scenario is that nothing happens, and I will still be able to enjoy his proximity and sustain my crush a while longer.

The worst case would be if Alex is available, and I risk being honest about my feelings, and he turns me down. I think I can handle this, though. It has happened multiple times this school year, and I have easily bounced back from every experience. It seems like after putting myself out there with Alex, Joshua, Ethan and Josué, my confidence would have been knocked to the ground; on the contrary, for whatever reason, I have become more self-assured with each rejection.

I feel more amused than I probably should over the my string of failed romantic experiences; it's not as though I am looking to fall in love at the age of nineteen, anyway.

We have toned down the partying significantly in recent months. Isla and I go hiking often with various groups of friends, and sometimes I play ping pong or foosball with Joshua. Our interactions are still flirty, though we haven't experienced any more of our supercharged moments such as the one in his dorm room when he tried to kiss me. I think he is afraid to take it there again.

As finals approach, I buckle down on my studies. I've been completely enraptured by this semester's course, especially my creative writing class. We are crafting a final short story in lieu of an exam, and in one night I crank out a personal narrative of my first kiss. It's raw and sentimental, and I sort of love it, but at the last second I decide it's too intimate to share with my classmates and professor.

Instead, I invent a bizarre science fiction style romance about a girl who, unaware she is part robot, is implanted with a device that causes her to give birth. I have no idea from where the plot line manifests (I don't even like science fiction), but I vomit it all onto the page in a few hours' time.

My classmates love it; my favorite peer comment, scrawled in the margin with zealous handwriting, reads: "I envy you like I envy the French their bread!!!" This makes me giggle out loud. The same student calls out my favorite line of the story as cliché, which also amuses me. As I glance across the room at the classmate who critiqued my story, a sweet blond boy with a light dusting of freckles, it occurs to me that he bares a slight resemblance to my friend James from high school. James. By golly, I think that kid had a crush on me.

As I read through the rest of the peer feedback, peppered with superlatives and exclamation marks, a sharp, boiling hot kernel of hope pops around inside me. It's hope... and desire. At first I think it has something to do with James, or Alex, but then I realize it's about me. Putting a certain combination of words on paper. Causing others to feel something.

Even though, perhaps, I didn't have the courage to share the right story.

My professor's comment at the end is a heavy aluminum lid that puts an end to the feverish popping: "This was a very, very... strange story." That's all it says.

Yep, I definitely should have shared the first kiss tale instead.

Still, he awarded an A to my work. I'm not quite sure what to make of his comment, but I avoid eye contact leaving class as the crinkled paper in my clutches absorbs the bucket of sweat outpouring from my palms.

* * *

On the last day of the semester, our Spanish professor plays a music video from his home country after everyone turns in their final exam that scars us all for life. It's called "Opa, yo viaze un corra," which we understand to translate as, "Hey, I'm going to make a corral!" It features a cowboy with a straw of hay hanging from the side of his mouth, bleating in awful slang phrases as he herds animals around his farm.

The rest of the students chuckle and raise their eyebrows in mild consternation, but Isla and I dissolve into uncontrolled hysterics. Our classmates stare at us, as our reaction has now become more absurd than the video itself. I don't even care that I have become the center of attention, because I'm with Isla, and I'm drowning in dopamine.

Back in the dorms, we locate the video on YouTube and blast it on full volume. Ethan and Elia drop by to discover us dancing around like kangaroos, belting out the chorus: "¡Opa, yo viaze un corra!" I make eye contact with Ethan and marvel at the fact that I fell so hard for him, then fell away again so quickly. Will I always be so resilient?

After we come down off our end-of-finals high, my friends take off to ready themselves for their various evening festivities. Isla, Elia and I have yet to decide how we want to celebrate, but we declined an invitation from Ethan to party with him and his friends. They are too intense for us these days, and we want to keep it low key.

I play the piano for about an hour, then wander by Joshua's room.

"All finished with finals?" I call to him in greeting from the open doorway.

"All done!" he confirms, and we high five. Joshua turns the high five into a brief hug, which I wasn't expecting. These types of moves are always saturated in awkwardness, especially as compared to the natural way Alex used to invent excuses to touch me, but I don't mind it. Sometimes I wish I were more physically attracted to him.

As we joke around, I notice Joshua has a large white gob resembling mushy tortilla lodged between two of his bottom teeth. I find myself contemplating a future moment, when he will see his reflection in the mirror, soggy white blob shining back at him. Will he be mortified, or will he not care? I hope the embarrassment lasts no longer than a single, evaporating instant.

"What are you up to tonight?" Joshua asks.

"I'm not sure yet. I'll hang out with Isla, but we haven't decided our plans yet."

"A few of us are going to dinner downtown, if you want to join. Trenton is driving."

I do; I want to join. I want it all.

"That sounds fun. I'll check with Isla."

The other side of the room is completely empty, I now realize.

"Where's Josué? Did he go home early?" I inquire.

"He went home... early, you could say," Joshua responds with some hesitation. "He didn't take his finals. Last Friday he got back to the room late at night and told me he was taking off the next day."

"What?"

"Yeah. I'm not quite sure what happened. I know he's been struggling to keep his grades up and maintain his scholarship. He's a brilliant kid, but he's sort of been all over the place this semester."

"Remember, I told you he seemed off?" All at once, I feel tremendously guilty for not pressing harder the day I approached Josué after Marimba. I made the moment about me and my crush, rather than letting him know he could rely on me as a friend.

"Yeah, you mentioned that. Didn't he always seem a bit... off?" Joshua ventures.

"Well, he has always been quirky and eccentric. But that's his shield, don't you think? He must have been disguising depression or some other challenges with all that symphony of distraction—the questions and rambling and all of that."

I thought he was being himself—the raw, naked truth... but maybe he was covering himself up all along. Or maybe I don't know anything about him.

"He always seemed happy though, first semester," I mutter pensively. "Or did he just have me fooled?" His gleaming eyes, those deep dimples.

"Maybe bipolar or something like that?" Joshua offers.

"Could be. Do you have his number? You should reach out and make sure he's okay—let him know we care."

"Definitely. I will."

I text Isla about the dinner plans, and she teases me about wanting to hook up with Joshua one last time before agreeing that we should join. Rolling my eyes, I slip my phone back into my pocket.

"We'll come to dinner with you," I tell Joshua. Pushing down shyness, I keep my gaze steady on his face to appreciate the subtle moment of excitement that lights across it.

* * *

We are served a large glass of wine (well, a red plastic cup of wine) in Trenton's dorm room before dinner. I'm immediately anxious that he will be driving us around after drinking, but I overhear him make a comment about being the designated driver.

We are with a fun mix of students—some are Joshua's League of Legends, Humans and Zombies type friends; Elia and Isla are here, and there are a few other people from Forest I have become friendly with during second semester.

It's my first time tasting wine. The flavor is abhorrent, but the numb, tingly high shoots to my head upon the first sip, and it's quite a nice sensation. There are a bunch of us crammed into the room, and I soon find myself smooshed between Joshua and Isla on Trenton's bed. I'm uncomfortable, but my tipsy mind is also zipping around wondering if Joshua is enjoying the incidental proximity with me.

Sometime this summer, will I find myself in a similar proximity with Alex? It is bound to happen. He can't merely feel nothing for me, now, right?

For the first time, I panic over the idea of him liking a different girl on the volleyball team. I shove the sickening thought into a pitch-black box and throw it off a metaphorical cliff.

Once most of us have had a couple glasses of wine, except the drivers, we head off to dinner. Seated at the restaurant, which is an elegant Italian place, we snap a bunch of selfies and silly pictures of each other. Isla uses my phone instead of her own—she is always grabbing my stuff, and I love that—and by the time she is finished, there are about a dozen selfies of us with a variety of hideous expressions. Tongues out, eyebrows creased together, giant flashing teeth, shocked "O"-shaped mouths.

I post three of the nicer photos to Instagram, including a group shot, a sweet picture with Isla, and one of Joshua and me. He has his arm wrapped around my shoulder, I'm leaning into his chest and my cheeks are glowing in a smooth shade of bubble gum pink.

As I'm posting the pictures, I notice I have a new follower: Alex. My entire body now has a thumping heartbeat. I have of course searched for him on social media before, but nothing ever came up. I hover my shaky index finger over his profile picture, pressing it as I shut my eyes tight and witness a stampede of fantastical scenes gallop across the darkness of my eyelids.

He has basically nothing posted about his life except a couple shots of him in outdoorsy activities such as hiking and paddle boarding.

I throw my phone into my tiny purse hanging from the chair and refocus my energy on the present. This is my last night with my college friends for three-and-a-half months.

Under the table, I feel Joshua's leg rest against mine. At any point, I could choose to readjust my posture and move away, but I don't. Neither does he. We sit like that for the remainder of the meal.

Isla and I head to the restrooms as the evening winds down, and when we're both locked into our stalls, she calls out loudly: "How did you enjoy your dinner? Did Joshua grope you under the table?"

The buttery pasta and multiple slices of doughy bread have sopped up most of the wine I drank earlier, but Isla is a lightweight and is clearly still tipsy.

"Sh! Shut up!" I hush in mortification. One of Joshua's friends could be in here and overhear us.

"You sure there's not more going on between you two? You posted a picture online with him," she asks with a nudge of her elbow as we wash our hands.

"No. I mean, we still flirt, but that's all. It just seems like the thing to do," I shrug and giggle.

"Yeah, why not?" Isla assents, winking conspiratorially.

"How are things with you and Danny?"

She flashes me a devilish grin. "They have been... let's just say, heating up."

"Oh my! Are you officially together?"

"No, it's just casual for now. Especially with the break coming up. But next year, who knows?"

Hopefully by then she will have moved on to someone else, because Danny is a bit of an ass in my opinion, but I keep this to myself.

My phone pings. It's a notification from Instagram. A message, more specifically. From Alex.

I see he has liked the photos I posted tonight, as well as several others from recent weeks. Under the one of Isla and me, he wrote: You look so happy, with a starry eyed emoji.

Dissolving into my own vortex of reality, I click into his message. I have forgotten about Isla, and the swirled peach tile of the bathroom disappears from my awareness as I lock my eyes on Alex's message.

Hi Nati! I finally found you on social media, lol. You have some secret security settings that I need to learn about. JK. Cute pictures. Is that your boyfriend?