“So where are we going?” I ask.

He takes his hand from the steering wheel and puts it next to mine on my seat. His pinky touches my pinky, and the enormous thrill of it, from this smallest of touches, surprises me. My insides tremble. What happens when he touches me for real? I don’t know if I’ll survive it.

“It’s a surprise.”

“Give me a hint,” I say.

“Nope.”

“Do you know how hard it was to get dressed not knowing where we’re going?”

“I think you did just fine,” Levi says, and his fingers move to the hole in my jeans, right at the thigh. He draws a circle, and I swear, for a second, I leave my body. I’m a puddle on the floor. I’ve never had a real boyfriend before, never had anyone casually reach out for me like that, like my thigh is also his thigh for the taking. The entire ripped jeans trend now makes sense to me.

I’ve kissed a few guys, but always at parties, always not-quite-sober kisses, the kind that happen on a dance floor in front of other people and lead nowhere, certainly not upstairs to the empty rooms at Xander’s house, where the doors lock and the sheets are changed by a daily maid service.

For five whole years I’ve fantasized about kissing Levi. I’ve thought about doing all the things my classmates seem to get to do to each other in those rooms, or in their own bedrooms, or in their cars, and the thought that some limited version of that might happen tonight, will likely happen, is hard for me to wrap my mind around. What if I’m a bad kisser? What if being that close to my face, where Levi can see my pores, where he can see my distinct tangy human-ness up close, turns him off? Or even worse, what if we don’t even make it to the kissing? What if we go to a restaurant and sit across from each other at a table and he discovers that I have nothing interesting to say?

We’re merging onto the freeway, heading west, and he takes back his hands to concentrate on the road. I like that he’s careful and cautious. In lab, he always wears his goggles and gloves, and moves slowly with the pipettes. In seventh grade, our math teacher gave us one of those trick quizzes where he buried in the instructions to not answer a single question, a lesson in reading the fine print. Levi was the only kid in the whole class who passed.

“So tell me, how do you feel about sand generally?” Levi asks.

“I’m pro-sand. Especially in large quantities spread out across the coastline.”

“Cool. I’m pro-sand too. I can’t remember: Do you surf?”