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The first time you kiss him, you’re drunk and he is not. There are a lot of voices telling you it’s a good idea, but, as always, none of them are yours. You’re downing wine straight from the bottle, the way he never does, and it isn’t until you allow your loose limbs to slump onto the coffee table in front of him that you notice the look on his face. There’s reluctance, of course, but of more importance is the fact that this is the very first time that he doesn’t appear to be the predator, but the prey. However, he leans forward too, and it’s uncomfortable and somehow hilarious and good enough to pass, Emma supposes, and there’s relief in your chest when you glance back and a genuine laugh is escaping his lips as he wipes them on his sleeve.
The second kiss you share, neither one of you is drunk. There’s a movie playing on the large television, bathing the room in a harsh glow. Sarah is on the couch between the two of you, watching the action from between her fingers, when the leads come on screen together. You’ve been living beside her for weeks, have even become her friends, and she has yet to really see any display of affection pass between you. He’s watching her out of the corner of his eye, and you think maybe, just maybe, he kind of likes her too. You use that thought to steel yourself and lean over the top of her head, catching him by surprise by pressing your mouth to his, and as Sarah squeals from between your bodies, you think maybe it’s not so bad after all.
The third time, he kisses you. There is no one watching this time, no test to pass or show to put on, yet his mouth is still hot and insistent on yours for a fleeting second. He stares at you after, eyes filled with a kind of longing you’re not sure you want to see, and you recognize this weakness. You’ve seen it before, after all, in a cramped little attic filled with liars and murderers, only this time you’re not laughing. This is real, what goes on behind closed doors, and the college education your parents so dutifully paid for is busy calculating all the ways in which this is not right to do. But his moving away with that sadness on his face seems more wrong than anything, so you surge forward and catch his lips with yours, and his arms around you are strong and sure and frightening as hell, but you don’t want to stop.
There are a million more kisses shared after that, but the one you remember happens a few months before your call to arms. Sarah looks on from the couch as he slices the vegetables for the dinner he’s preparing for the three of you, and the sight of the blade in his capable hands does something to your stomach that you have to stifle somehow. Your arms are around him before he even has time to jump and his lips meet yours in a way that does nothing but fan the flames. When you finally break apart, he’s grinning, his smile enough to make most girls swoon and dogs growl as they smell the evil on him, and maybe this is real and maybe it’s not but the smile feels like it’s yours to keep.
You see him kiss Emma in the shower, months later, and the thought of it is overwhelming, because she is yours, and he is yours, and to stake that claim you kiss them both furiously as you all travel towards the large bed. Everything moves too fast that last night, far too fast to capture it in all the detail you wish, but you still have more than enough time in the morning to dwell on the strangeness of being in bed with two people you’ve always loved separately. When he comes into the kitchen, all puppy-like exuberance, it’s too much to take, and you snap. That look is there again, that vulnerability, but he’s stated his case and kissed your head and walked out again before you can think of what to do. Later, after the three of you track down Joey, you tag along with him back to the farmhouse until he crowds you against a tree. “This is wrong,” you tell him, because it really is, for so many reasons, but he just smiles, his teeth flashing white under the canopy blocked sunlight. “Isn’t everything?” he says, not really a question, and your lips find his once more.
The last time you kiss him, it isn’t on the lips at all. His forehead is cold and clammy under your mouth and there are a hundred million regrets on your tongue while his last words still echo in the room. The fire you started to keep him warm is slowly drowning them out, but it takes you a few moments to realize the roar is coming from inside your own head. There are tears streaming down your face, taking no time in finding their way from your chin to his no longer rising chest. There’s no time to bury him, no time to do anything before you have to leave, and your last memory of Paul is of him gripping your hand as he struggles to take his last breath, his love and support fading in the distance along with your parents’ house, his body still lying inside.
When you kiss Emma the very next night, you taste nothing there but lies. She attempts to reassure you, but she’s good at making every word in the English language sound the same. She touches you like she knows your body in a way you don’t feel she should, and all you can see is darker eyes watching you, sadness lined in every feature. The bathroom walls are too thin to muffle your scream, and you lock the door behind you and smash your hands against the sink. You imagine he’s here, arms around you once more, and you can nearly hear the words, uttered under breath, “Don’t worry. We belong to each other.” What can you say to that? You belong to no one, and no one belongs to you, not now that he’s gone. So, instead, you say, “I know.”