I scanned the dance floor for Oscar from a distance, nervous to jump back in—to everything—but I couldn’t find him.

Sam walked up, playing with her purple hair.

“Outside,” she shouted past my ear. It took me a second to realize she was talking to me. “You can probably catch him.”

I walked out slowly, wondering whether he’d thought better of this and ditched me. Maybe then my stomach would stop this aching swirl, my skin would settle to a normal level of sensitivity, and I could get on with figuring out the rest of my life. But he was waiting by the curb, staring out into the street—and hot relief flooded my veins.

I touched his elbow, carefully, reestablishing all the broken boundaries.

“Hey,” he said, turning to me. “Sorry about that.”

“About what?”

“It got a little much. That place. Do you . . . do you maybe want to head home? Or you can stay, I’ll—”

I tentatively reached for his cheek, cupping it in my palm, then stood on my toes and kissed him again before I had time to make a conscious decision about whether it was a good idea. He wrapped his arms around me, tilting his head to deepen it, and I closed my eyes and melted against him, my leg drifting around his to get closer—then he jerked back.

I opened my eyes to see his arm waving into the street, hailing a cab. It had its light on but kept going.

I laughed. “Didn’t want us making out in the back.”

Oscar pinched the end of my braid and said, “You try.”

I flagged the next one as he stepped back. It pulled up right away.

“See?” I grinned at Oscar and slid inside. “Seventy-first and Central Park West.”

As we rumbled uptown in bursts and jerky stops, I tried my best not to fall into that late-night club girl cliché. But Oscar’s mouth had found the curve of my neck and started exploring and there was not one cell in my body willing to stop him.

I managed to break out of this hot haze long enough to hear the driver murmur something about near corner or far corner, to answer, “Here’s fine,” to pay, exit, immediately start making out with Oscar again.

I stood on the corner, incapacitated by rapture, dimly noticing the crosswalk light flash and go solid. I kissed him and my feet didn’t know how to move anymore. My eyes didn’t know how to blink.

When the light changed again, Oscar pulled me across the street by my fingertips, gliding backward. When we got to the far sidewalk, I tucked myself under his arm and he kissed the top of my head like we’d been dating for three years and this was our routine.