The room is cold, but I’m sweating.

You’re sitting on the edge of the hotel bed, motionless. One leg tucked beneath you. Hands clenched in your lap. Wearing my fucking hoodie. But you haven’t looked at me since I walked in.

I shut the door behind me like it might stop everything else from spilling in. Like it might erase the fact that I crossed the one boundary even I never thought I would.

Not the sex.

Not the lies.

The kiss.

We have no label. I don’t believe in love—you don’t believe in love either.

But there’s something between us. Something that made me stop fucking a different girl every night.

My jaw aches from clenching it the whole walk back. I wish it had meant nothing. I wish I hadn’t felt it linger. Wish it hadn’t reminded me of all the times I stopped myself with you.

Because I don’t kiss people. I don’t give that.

Not since her.

Not since Bethany left me shaking and split open when I was fifteen because she saw the scars and decided I wasn’t worth the mess.

But tonight, I did. To someone who wasn’t you.

And now I’m standing here.

With no excuse.

No way to take it back.

No name for what we are, but still every part of me feels like I’ve fucking betrayed you.

You finally look up at me. Eyes hollow.

You don’t ask what happened. You don’t need to. You know.

“I would’ve forgiven you for fucking her,” you whisper. “But you kissed her. You’ve never even kissed me.”

And it’s not rage in your voice. It’s not even heartbreak.

It’s disbelief.

Like you didn’t think I was capable.

Like I’ve finally proven something to you that you didn’t want to be true.

I step forward, then stop. My mouth opens, then shuts again.

There’s nothing I can say that won’t sound like a lie. Like damage control.

But I speak anyway, because it’s all I have left.

“I don’t know why I did it.”

It’s honest. And that’s the worst part.

Because I kissed someone else.

I broke my no kissing rule after six years for a stranger.