I know he thinks it would be fine. He looks at this town and life in general with big bright eyes, but he doesn’t realize how bad it can be. How ugly it can get, and I know it’s not just limited to Kennedy. She learned that hatred from somewhere, from a place where it would be perfectly acceptable to taunt Kingston nonstop for fooling around with me. I can’t do it. Especially if I’m leaving him.

And that’s what it all comes down to. When I leave, I need to know he’ll be okay. That he’ll still have friends here and he won’t be alone or ostracized. So we have to keep our hands to ourselves.

I need to look and not touch. And not get caught looking.

We have two months left in school. That’s it. Then this summer, I’m going to work and save as much money for my mom as I can before I go off to KU. Before I can finally be free to be me out in the real world and leave this small town behind.

Everyone heads out to the practice field, but Kingston holds back, his confident smile plastered on his face. “You ready for our last season of baseball?”

I laugh because he doesn’t seem sad at all about it ending. He’s living in the moment, and it looks good on him. He’s happy, so I’m happy. We’ve been going on like nothing ever happened between us. “Yeah. I am. You?”

His eyes land on my lips, settling there for far too long and sending a warm, uncontrollable tingle throughout my body. Maybe one more kiss?

“Yeah,” he says, swallowing thickly, his eyes still on my lips. Is he thinking about kissing me?

“We should go,” I say because no. No more kisses. Jesus, fuck. We’re in the locker-room where one of our teammates could come in at any time. This is why we had to end this. The temptation to be stupid is always present with him.

He finally pulls his gaze from my mouth and back up to my eyes. “Oh, yeah. I’m . . . uh . . . I’m fine.” He doesn’t sound all that convincing, but it’s like he’s distracted more than being dishonest.

“You okay?” I have to ask. I mean, I know he’ll be fine. We still have everything we had before we started this. We still hang out every day. He still sleeps over in my bed—which is absolute torture, by the way. We eat lunch together in the school cafeteria. Nothing else has changed.

You’d think it’d be weird, but it isn’t. Not really. Everything with Kingston is still so effortless. Except for lusting after him, but honestly, that’s not really a change for me. Not at all. I’ve been doing it quietly for years.