Page 53 of For the Record

Because suddenly I wasn’t worried about ruining our friendship over one kiss. I wasn’t worried that she was dissipating from my fingers. I could relax in this kiss because we weren’t going to be just friends anymore. Never again did I want to be just friends with Rachel Clarke.

Currently playing: Magic Carpet Ride by Steppenwolf

I’m going to get a motorcycle.

Rachel: That’s a shame. All your beautiful Greek God skin is about to go to waste.

Come with me.

Rachel: Tempting, but I like to keep my body parts intact.

I would never let anything happen to you.

Rachel: For some reason, I actually believe that. You can pick me up, but only because I want to talk you out of this as much as I can.

Unfortunately, Adam wasn’t kidding about his poor decisions. He really was going to get a motorcycle.

I spent the entire ride to the dealership pulling up statistics on my phone and reading them aloud. Only with each pie chart and graph, he would shrug and say something like “I’m not as reckless as those guys.”

My hands waved around. “It doesn’t matter how great a driver—or rider, I guess—you are. It’s other people I don’t trust.”

We fought back and forth before he parked, letting out a deep exhale and looking over at me from the driver’s seat. “I’m buying one. I’d love for you to get on board with it.”

I held my eyes to his for a moment, checking for any signs there that said he would consider driving out of this parking lot without a life-taking fun wheel, but there were none. His gaze held mine, and my heart picked up speed until I broke the contact to look around the lot.

We hadn’t spoken about the kiss from last week. Not really, anyway. After I went back outside, Layla came rushing to me.

“Are you okay?” she’d said. “Crew said you were sick up there. Oh my gosh, you look flushed. Have you not been drinking enough water?” She gripped both sides of my face and pulled me to her.

It was her wedding day, an evening where she should be whisked away by her husband in a night of bliss and love, and yet she’d found me and fussed over me while, two minutes prior, I’d been upstairs kissing her new brother-in-law. The wave of guilt over me had gnawed at my heart like a dog with a bone, and I swore to keep all eyes focused on her for the rest of the evening, never once leaving her to have to get up to refill her drink or stock up on Crew’s fish tacos.

After a while, I noticed people filtering out. Adam was long gone, leaving only me with the couple. And Liam, of course, considering it was his house.

Liam and I had stuck around in silence, picking up the empty cups and scattered trash, collecting folding chairs and tables and essentially putting his back yard back to its normal state. He’d stewed the entire time. Something told me he was hung up on his ex-wife. Meanwhile I stayed quiet, only thinking of Adam.

The next day he’d texted me.

Adam: We’re okay, right?

Of course. You’re my best friend.

Adam: Mine too.

So no more kissing?

Adam: Probably for the best.

Probably.

So we went back to normal after that. Or an augmented version of normal. I’d kissed him before, of course. But that had been over a year and a half ago, and since then, we’d gotten so close that if things didn’t go back to normal, I wasn’t sure what I would do. Adam was the only stable thing in my life at the moment, and ruining that by kissing him was something I wasn’t prepared to take on.

I hadn’t seen him since the wedding, so when he randomly messaged about the bike, I was happy to go to see him.

“So,” I dragged the word out, looking around the lot surrounding us full of motorcycles. “Where should we start?”

The young bike salesmen in their khakis and black polos stood near the dealership’s door, circling like sharks, with their eyes on us. Adam reached into his back pocket, unfolding a piece of paper with information for the exact model he wanted.

“Yamaha R6. Preferably blacked out.” He looked down at the creases in this paper before folding it back up and sticking it in his pocket.