“What?” I take my hands off my face and find that the Chameleon potion I tested has kicked in. They’re not actually invisible, but the skin shifts to match whatever background it’s against. “Oh my god, kill me.”

I hear a little snort of laughter, and before I can confirm that Ana is actually laughing at me in what might be the most embarrassing moment of my life, I feel her lips on mine. Her mouth is so soft that I lose all brain function for a second. She bites my bottom lip lightly, and I let out a little gasp. I can feel her smile against my lips.

Even though we’re literally kissing right now, I have to keep checking in to make sure I’m not hallucinating. Yes? She’s still there? Beautiful, and gay, and kissing me? She wraps her arms around my waist, pulling me closer. I respond by pushing one of my hands into her hair, because, oh my god, I love her curls.

By the time we break apart, I’m wrecked. My brain has flown into a million scattered pieces, and I have no hope of reassembling it anytime soon. I stare at Ana, barely breathing. Her lips are slightly parted, and I can see the bottom edges of her front teeth.

“We should probably get out of the closet,” she says.

She smiles at me—a full, devastatingly dazzling Ana Álvarez smile—and slips out the door, leaving me with the realization that I just had my first kiss in a potion supply closet.

Chapter 31

GABRIELA:

Sueños

I wake up to dream each day

Reaching for a future that I hope will find its way to me

Sueños

People say that I am quiet

But my dreams echo loudly in the spaces in my mind

—Lyrics to “Sueños” from Bronxtown Brooms

“So what now?” Ana asks when I join her at her lab table. She’s gone back to brewing her potion like nothing happened. She even snagged the wormwood we went into the closet for. When she did that, I have no idea.

I, on the other hand, am staring at the other club members and wondering if they know that I’m a big old lesbian who just made out with a mind-bogglingly incredible witch in an actual closet. There’s a coming-out joke to be made there, but I’m too mentally zonked to put it together.

“Do you want to date me?” I say tentatively.

There is an uncomfortable amount of silence after I suggest this. She meticulously places seven crystals in a perfect circle around her cauldron and starts folding their magic into her potion. I wonder if I’m about to live through a nightmare I didn’t know I had until this moment—getting rejected while someone brews a potion. What if she likes me enough to kiss me, but not enough to date me?