He makes it sound like this is a dentist appointment. “Evening, don’t you think?”

“Night does seem more romantic,” Nick agrees.

I’m not sure that romantic is what we’re going for, but I write down, Evening. “But Saturday night’s the awards dinner,” I remember. “Maybe Sunday night?”

Nick shakes his head. “My dad and I are leaving to go to Oahu Sunday afternoon.” He rubs his chin like he has a beard there instead of three ginger strands of peach fuzz. “What if we slipped away during the awards dinner? Then nobody would come barging in—”

“You think your dad might come barging into your room?” That’s an unpleasant thought.

“He’s normally good with giving me my privacy—although I’ve never tried to have sex before, so who knows—but sometimes he forgets and just walks in. We always have the keys to each other’s rooms. But he’ll be busy during the awards dinner. He’s getting an award this year.”

“My mom’s a presenter!” I clap my hand to my forehead. “That’s brilliant, actually. We could go and come back, and they’d never even notice. It’s the perfect alibi!”

Nick’s eyebrows furrow. “Okay, two things I want to say here. First: I really hope you don’t think having sex with me constitutes a crime.”

“Of course not. We’re consenting . . . pre-adults.”

“Great. So on to the second thing: How long do you think this is going to take, that you imagine us sneaking out of the awards dinner and then popping back in without anyone noticing we’re gone?”

I stare at him. My own ears are undoubtedly pink at this point. “I mean, it probably won’t take too long. What, do you want to cuddle after?”

“I don’t know,” he says in a kind of choked-up voice. “Do you not want to cuddle?”

“I thought boys didn’t like cuddling.”

“I didn’t get the memo about what boys like. Maybe I’ll want to cuddle. I guess that depends on how the other stuff goes.”

“The other stuff,” I murmur. I am still finding it hard to imagine the other stuff. “Right.”

His eyebrows push together. “Are you sure you’re okay with this? You can back out, you know.”

“I’m not backing out.”

“I won’t think you’re a coward or anything.”

“I’m not scared. It’s just, when I asked you last night, it was kind of theoretical sex. And now it’s starting to feel real.” More real than it ever felt with Leo, in a strange way.

“If you want to call it off, at any point, I’m good with that.”

“I appreciate you being so flexible.”

“You feel like a cup of tea now,” Nick says, “but later you might not want a cup of tea.”

I blink. “I have no clue what you’re talking about.”