I had a crush on my best friend's cousin the moment I saw him. I sent her a message, half-joking: "Your cousin is so hot. Does he have a girlfriend? What do you think about me becoming your sister-in-law?" For the first time ever, she replied with just a single question mark. Followed by: "You want to be my cousin's girlfriend? Then what does that make me?" I thought she was just being possessive and jealous, so I typed back without a second thought: "You're my number one best friend in the whole world! My dearest, closest bestie!" Her reply stunned me: "Aren't we dating?" Me: "Who told you we were dating?!" Her: "If we're not dating, then why are you always kissing and hugging me?!" Isn't that just... normal stuff best friends do??? 1. Staring at the messages from Audrey, I sat bolt upright in bed, my mind a complete blank. My brain kicked into overdrive, trying to figure out if she was joking or being serious. Before I could formulate a careful, probing question, my phone rang. It was her. The ringtone was the special one I’d set just for her. I jolted, and my thumb reacted on pure instinct, declining the call. The screen now showed "Call Ended." A cold dread washed over me. Whether this was a joke or not, the fact was, I had hung up on her. If this was all a misunderstanding, I was so, so screwed. The last time I hung up on her was back in high school. Some girl in our class had claimed to be her best friend, and Audrey, convinced the girl was trying to invade our friendship, went into a jealous rage and started a fight. I got mad at her for being so reckless and gave her the cold shoulder. That night, she sent me a text. I didn't reply. She called. I didn't answer. At midnight, my doorbell rang. There she was, standing on my doorstep with a thunderous expression, asking if I really wanted to end our friendship. She looked like a ghost, her hair all wild and unkempt. Honestly, she scared the crap out of me. Of course, with my mom's help, we made up and walked to school together the next day. I never hung up on her again. It always felt like if I did, she would swim across the Pacific Ocean just to materialize in front of me a second later. My phone buzzed with a new message. Babe: You dare hang up on me? I scrambled to reply. "It was an accident! I hit the wrong button! Were you calling to tell me it was all a joke?" I threw in a cute emoji to soften the awkwardness. Babe: No. Tears welled in my eyes. I tried one last time. "Audrey, stop scaring me. If you keep joking like this, I'm going to get mad." Babe: Not joking. I'm coming over. Me: Don't you dare!!! The words flew out before I could stop them. Today's conversation had completely shattered my understanding of reality. I had never, ever had feelings for Audrey that were more than friendship. I had no idea when she started seeing me differently. I buried my face in my hands, a desperate thought occurring to me. Maybe she'd been misled by something she saw online, misinterpreting her own feelings for me. Neither of us had ever been in a real relationship before. The line between friendship and love can be blurry. It was entirely possible she was just confused. My hands trembled as I typed out a long, rambling explanation, deleting and rewriting it over and over. She must have seen the "typing..." indicator flickering on her end for ages without receiving anything. Another message from her arrived. "I'm not kidding, Chloe. I really like you. I always thought we were dating." "I thought you felt the same way about me. Otherwise, why didn't you ever stop me when I kissed you?" I groaned, the memory of how we gave each other our first kiss flashing through my mind. It really was an accident the first time. We were fooling around on my bed, and our lips just... brushed against each other. I felt awkward, but Audrey didn't seem to mind. She even licked her lips, as if savoring the moment. Noticing my discomfort, she'd said breezily, "What's the big deal? Neither of us has a boyfriend. What's wrong with a little kiss?" She’d added, "Besides, that doesn't even count as a real kiss. Real kisses involve tongue." But by the summer after we graduated high school, her tune had changed completely. 2. After our final exams, our class threw one last big party. High school sweethearts were popping up everywhere, finally able to be open about their relationships right under the teachers' noses. As Audrey and I left the classroom, we even saw a couple making out in a corner, just for the thrill of it. It was like a dam of repressed hormones had burst. Audrey scoffed, calling the guys horny animals just trying to get one last grope in before we all went our separate ways. "Look at that guy. Remember him? The one who confessed to you in sophomore year." Audrey made a gagging motion, then quickly covered my eyes before I could look. "Don't look at the filth." All I could do was listen to her description of the make-out session. "After you rejected him, he immediately got with another girl. This is, like, his nth girlfriend now. Ugh, what a 'devoted' man he is~" she said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. She'd been bad-mouthing that guy for nearly two years, all because he'd had the nerve to confess to me once. She even nicknamed him "Mr. Deeply-In-Love" because he always pretended to be completely smitten in every relationship before seamlessly moving on to the next girl. I covered my ears, just hoping we wouldn't run into anyone else we knew. "Hey, why are you covering your ears?" Audrey whined. "Are you sick of me?" At the party, buoyed by the atmosphere and our own curiosity, we both had a little to drink. A couple next to us started kissing amidst the cheers of the crowd. Even though we tried not to stare, we couldn't help but catch the details—the stringy saliva, the tangled tongues, the wet sounds… That night, Audrey stayed over at my place. We were lying on my bed, talking about everything and nothing, from our future college lives to the events of the day. Suddenly, she asked, "Is kissing really that good?" I didn't have an answer. In the twelve years before I met Audrey, my world consisted of books and studying. After I met her, my world consisted of books, studying, and Audrey. The books never mentioned whether kissing was enjoyable or not. It was a topic two romance-clueless girls couldn't possibly figure out. "I don't know," I mumbled. "Go get a boyfriend and find out." A look of disgust crossed Audrey's face at the thought of those guys. Just as I was drifting off to sleep, she blurted out, "Hey, why don't we try kissing?" That woke me up instantly. I stared at her, my expression clearly asking, Are you serious? The more she thought about it, the more plausible it seemed. She looked at me defiantly. "Neither of us has a boyfriend. And a kiss between friends doesn't count as a real kiss, right?" I instinctively propped myself up, backing away slightly. But she scooted closer. "People in other countries kiss as a greeting. We're this close. What's the big deal?" I wanted to tell her that was completely different, that she was talking nonsense. But she just pounced, pinning me down. "Just one kiss." She must have been drunker than I thought. When she leaned down, she misjudged the distance and bumped her lips hard against mine. It hurt. But she didn't let up, holding my hands down firmly. After a moment, she pulled back slightly, as if tasting something. "Sweet," she declared. "Again." I squirmed. "No, no, no! Audrey, get off me! Stop being a drunk idiot!" "I didn't even use my tongue," she argued. "It's perfectly normal for best friends to kiss." But the second time, she tentatively slipped her tongue into my mouth. I guess she liked the taste, because she explored deeper, our tongues tangling together. My struggles weakened under her assault. Flashes of the couples from the party came to mind. We were just like them now, lips pressed together, tongues intertwined. Audrey bit my lips until they were sore, kissing me until I was breathless. My whole body went limp, like water, my brain slow and fuzzy from lack of oxygen. The new, strange sensation was so intoxicating we both got lost in it. After the kiss ended, the effects of the alcohol had mostly worn off. We just stared at each other, our faces flushed. Audrey mumbled an apology. The second I said it was okay—after all, I had enjoyed it too—she was back to her old self. "See? I told you it was good, right?" "Want to go again? Don't you think it's kind of addictive?" I grabbed a pillow and covered my face, muttering a muffled, "No." I think a part of me felt that doing this with Audrey wasn't right. In my mind, kissing was for partners, not for friends. Audrey, sensing my hesitation, tried to comfort me. "It's totally normal for friends to kiss. Look at guys, they jerk each other off all the time. Isn't that way weirder?" "We're just kissing." I pressed the pillow harder against my ears. Where did she learn to say things like that? I couldn't handle it anymore. Either I'd have to explain myself, or I'd have to pretend this never happened. But Audrey wasn't letting it go. She was relentless, and I was cracking under the pressure. The fight, the confusion, her sudden confession—it was all too much. I needed to understand what was happening, what I was feeling, before I could face her again. This wasn't just some silly argument; it felt like our entire world was shifting on its axis, and I was terrified of where we would land. 3. Honestly, everything Audrey said was bullshit. First, she brainwashed me with the "it's normal for friends to kiss" line, and before I knew it, I had accepted it as our new normal. She would kiss me whenever the mood struck, and sometimes we would find a private place for a more intense make-out session. I had other friends besides Audrey, but none as close. She would get upset if I got too close to anyone else. My interactions with other people were, naturally, different from how I was with her. We were best friends, after all. But even so, I had a nagging feeling that kissing every day wasn't normal, but I didn't want to change it. First, kissing Audrey was nice. She was a really good kisser. Second, if I said no, she would be unhappy, and when she was unhappy, I was unhappy. So, ignoring that little nagging feeling and continuing to kiss her seemed like the best option. But now everything was different. Audrey had laid her cards on the table. She wanted to define our relationship. This wasn't the mutually supportive friendship I had envisioned. All those memories of kissing were now tinged with a new, romantic intimacy that made my face flush and my heart race just thinking about them. That had never happened before. Audrey sent me several more messages, all asking to meet up. I either refused or pretended I hadn't seen them. So, of course, she showed up at my house unannounced. Babe: Open the door. My heart sank. I was starting to develop a phobia of my phone's notification sound. Every time it went off, I just assumed it was her—and eighty percent of the time, I was right. I saw the message and died a little inside. I quickly flipped my phone face down, grabbed a book, and pretended I had been too absorbed in reading to see her text. Babe: I know you're home. A thud from the balcony, followed by a soft rustling sound, was impossible to ignore. I turned my head and saw a scene straight out of a horror movie—Audrey was climbing the tree outside my window, trying to jump onto my balcony. My eyes widened, my heart leaped into my throat. I didn't know whether to be panicked or worried. I slid open the glass door. "Are you insane? Get down from there!" She clung stubbornly to the tree trunk, glaring at me before sizing up the distance between the branch and my balcony. "Not unless you open the front door," she said. I gritted my teeth. "No. Go home." She scoffed, testing her weight on the branch. "Then watch me climb up." "You'll fall and kill yourself!" I yelled. "This is the second floor! You'll probably just break a leg, so I'm not going to bother saving you!" I grabbed the railing, trying to create an obstacle to convince her the jump was impossible. But Audrey has always been fearless. She never thinks about the consequences. I underestimated her audacity. Before I was ready, she took a running start on the branch and leaped. The words died in my throat. My mind was screaming— Oh god, she's going to be crippled. Oh god, it happened on my balcony, my parents are going to kill me. They'll probably make me her 24/7 caretaker. But she landed on the balcony. Just as I breathed a sigh of relief, she lost her footing and started to teeter backward. I reacted instinctively, lunging forward and grabbing her, pulling her toward me with all my strength. She grabbed my hand, swung herself over the railing, and landed squarely in front of me. Her crisis was over. But as I looked at her set jaw, I realized… My crisis was just beginning. I had personally pulled a wolf who wanted to devour me into my den. The next second, the wolf lunged. I turned and ran, trying to slide the glass door shut and trap her on the balcony. But she was too fast, sticking her foot in the way. I hesitated for a fraction of a second, afraid of hurting her, and that was all the opening she needed. She yanked the door open. "Audrey, wait, let's just talk about this calmly." Her eyes were terrifying. "You want to talk calmly now?" she roared. "Who was it that was ignoring all my messages?" "You're the one who was talking crazy," I muttered. "Was I wrong?" "About what? Everything you said was a lie! I am not dating you!" She stared at me in silence. Or rather, she was staring at my lips. Alarm bells went off in my head. I knew that look. We’d kissed so many times that I could tell what she wanted from a single glance. There were times we'd be watching TV on the couch, and she'd suddenly go quiet. When I'd look over, her attention would no longer be on the screen, but on my lips as I spoke. She'd grab my hand, pull me into my room, and kiss me where my parents couldn't see. I swallowed hard and took a step back. "My mom's home," I warned in a small voice. "Don't try anything." She tore her gaze away from my mouth. "So, you're saying everything I said was a lie? We never hugged? We never kissed?" "We did that as friends!" "What kind of friends hug and kiss with tongue?" My face was on fire. "You… you were the one who said those guys…" I stammered. I couldn't bring myself to repeat her crude words. She had used those examples to trick me into kissing her, and now she was just watching me, a smug look on her face, as if to say, Let's see you talk your way out of this. And she was right. It was a pathetic explanation. Now that I thought about it, her examples were completely insane. But at the time, I was so caught up in the moment I couldn't think straight. And our daily life was so… normal. Or rather, it was the normal we had created since we were kids. I never saw anything wrong with it. But the truth was, no normal best friends acted like we did. Before I could sort out my jumbled thoughts, she hit me with another question. "You didn't enjoy it when we kissed?" I couldn't argue with that. "No, I didn't," I lied. She launched another surprise attack. In the instant I was distracted, she closed the distance and kissed me. I came to my senses and pushed her away. "Don't kiss me!" She grabbed my hands, her brow furrowed in genuine confusion. "You said you didn't enjoy it. Then why did you just use your tongue?" It was a reflex from kissing her so many times! I shoved her away, humiliated and furious. "If you come near me again, I'm telling my mom!" As if on cue, there was a knock on my door. "Chloe, honey?" my mom called out. "What's all the commotion in there? Can I come in?" I looked at Audrey, who was still practically on top of me, and pushed her off. "You can, Mom." My mom saw Audrey and paused. "Audrey? When did you get here? I didn't see you come in." That's because she didn't use the door, I thought. "I just got here, Mrs. Evans," Audrey lied smoothly. "Chloe let me in. I hope I wasn't disturbing you." I kept my mouth shut, refusing to look at her. My mom looked from her to me, sensing the strange tension in the room and probably connecting it to the loud noises she'd heard. "Did you two have another fight?" she asked with a weary sigh. "Do you need me to mediate?" The memory of Audrey showing up on our doorstep in the middle of the night was still fresh in my mom's mind. She always tried to intervene when we argued. But you can't fix this one, Mom. If you did, you'd be the one having a breakdown. "Yes, please, Mrs. Evans," Audrey said shamelessly. "Chloe's mad at me. She won't talk to me or answer my messages. I'm trying to talk to her, but she's ignoring me." I whipped my head around to stare at her, my jaw dropping. She tattled on me. She actually tattled on me to my mom.
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