The Goodbye Thing

We were walking. I was thinking. We were holding hands I think. We had been holding hands for about a week and I liked it. I was pretty sure that meant that I liked him too. It was really dark. The only light came from the inside of his house, glowing onto the bushes and trees closest to the windows. There was no breeze. The air was still and wet, like breath.
“Tomorrow, right.” He had asked me the same question a few times that night. I excused that, of course. We had spent that evening together, first with his family playing yacht zee or something like that and then I took him along for volleyball at the stake center with my older sister and some of friends. Titles were the most confusing thing of the night. Introductions and that sort of thing, you know, “This is my—friend? Boyfriend? Boy who happens to be a friend? Boy who I let hold my hand?” I let it slide, of course. After all, I left tomorrow, right?
We finally made it to the doorstep. I don’t remember being nervous. We stepped onto the door mat. It was glowing from the light through the window. I was a year older than him, and, happily, I was the girl. I was pretty sure that all I had to do was stand there.
I honestly don’t remember saying anything. There was no preparation, no leading to it all. It seems odd now that we both knew exactly what we were doing on that doorstep, our feet illuminated, our faces dark in the still, wet, night air.
He leaned in. I am pretty sure I closed my eyes. I felt him on my face. It was wet. Then, it was over. To this day, I am not certain what happened. I felt something wet, it slid off my face, quite literally, embarrassingly enough, and then my eyes were definitely open, because I saw him lean in to hug me and—this is the part that makes me cringe with embarrassment—he apologized. He did. He said, “Sorry…”
Poor guy. I hugged him back, of course, and told him not to worry about it. Cringe. I said goodbye, he said goodbye, and then he disappeared into the light of his entry way. Goodbye.
I didn’t wipe my face off for a while. Not for sentimental reasons, but because the experience had been too traumatic. I didn’t want to acknowledge that I had his slobber on my top lip.
My sister was waiting anxiously in the car. “So!?”
I sat down in the front seat, silent. Wow. Seriously? That was how it was? “I do not want to talk about it.” It took a great effort to get those words out. I could still feel it on my top lip. Eww.
“Well that’s it then, huh? We won’t be seeing him again until—who knows when?!”
I banked on that fact. Moving was a relief. Okay, it hadn’t been all that bad; it was just that it was goodbye like that and then no real emotional attachment for me. I wasn’t sad. I didn’t feel anything but embarrassed. My sister started to drive out of the cul-de-sac, down the street and away. I rolled down the window and the air finally moved through my hair. Relief!