But a couple of minutes later, Christina settled down and managed to doze off. Apparently, I was the only one making a huge deal out of this. "Yes, please do, and right damn there"? Looking at it objectively, according to UKARI guidelines, we looked like a normal family. I only had brothers who, by the way, had moved out ages ago, and no sisters because my parents had decided to stop with me. Christina was an only child, which nowadays is practically an endangered species. So naturally, neither of us had any idea how a guy and a girl were even supposed to coexist under the same roof like normal people. With regular female friends, you never expect anything from them, even though theoretically, nature finds a way. Maybe this is how it's supposed to be: you feel a pull towards her, but you're so used to ignoring it that you forget she's actually a girl, not just one of the bros.
According to UKARI statistics, the first kiss between a virgin couple usually happens around week two or three. It was only with the other Christina that I'd been flying over the surface at breakneck speed; with this Christina, things weren't running smoothly, or rather, they were running strictly on her schedule. All her barriers were supposed to collapse right around now, give or take a couple of days. And that was terrifying, because I didn't want to accidentally spark any feelings or make her start falling for me without realizing it. But what if she already had? You're supposed to panic over that kind of responsibility, but for some reason, I felt oddly calm. I was probably just overthinking nothing; otherwise, I would've been reacting to her in some special way by now. But everything was business as usual. I'd read about the Red Dress Effect, after all: when a woman shows interest, a man starts peacocking, and I hadn't. What if I was just too lazy? Do sloths even peacock? Or are they just living in slow motion, like, "L-o-o-ove you-u-u-u," before falling asleep on a branch? Well, if so, we still had a couple of months to burn. I wondered if Christina had ever kissed anyone, even on a dare, or if, like me, she'd been saving herself for "The One."
I turned my head and looked at her lips. Did I want to kiss them?
I got up, walked over to her bed, leaned in, and planted my hands on either side of her pillow. She cracked open one eye.
"What are you up to?"
"Just wanted a closer look." I caught my breath. "While you're asleep. Mind if I?"
"It's just a face," Christina mumbled, looking flustered. "You already have my photo."
"I'm looking at your lips. And thinking."
Christina pursed her lips into a little duck face.
"Have you ever kissed anyone?" I kept trying to figure out if I actually wanted this. "I mean, on the lips?"
"Only once, in a dream."
"Oh, who with? Same thing happened to me, with a classmate who got her assignment way before everyone else." I started to pull back.
"I don't remember. It was just a dream..." Christina started to blush and grabbed my sleeve. "Don't run off like that, I'll die of embarrassment. It's like you're punishing me for not being ready to open up. That stings."
"I'm not..."
"Just keep quiet for a second." Christina closed her eyes, took a few deep breaths to centre herself, and opened them again. "Even if it was just a dream and I don't remember the details, I remember the feeling. Imagine you suddenly brought up the other Christina and I shoved you away like that?"
"I was just trying to back up." I felt a wave of guilt.
"I know, but psychology doesn't run on logic, you should know that. Mannequins taught us at the seminar that you have to move at a snail's pace in someone's personal space, or it registers as aggression. You get pissed off when people shove you on a packed bus, even knowing nobody's doing it on purpose."
"My bad." I tried to ease backward, inch by inch.
But Christina matched me inch for inch, pulling my sleeve right back to where it was. I raised a questioning eyebrow.
"No bailing out before the next stop," she deadpanned.
"I'm just getting a head start towards the exit," I tried to joke my way out of it.
"What, love 'em and leave 'em?" she shot back with a smirk.
"I didn't love 'em and leave 'em," I protested, but froze in place.
"Even worse. And here I thought his intentions were pure."
"Is this that old joke about the money in the underwear?"
"Something like that," Christina grinned. "Only we were talking about a kiss."
"Want me to kiss you?" I threw it out there. "You can test it out and compare it to the dream."
"What about Christina?" She swallowed hard, her throat bobbing.
"Right, good point." Reality came crashing back. "Probably a bad idea to violate a sweet girl's personal space. Sorry."
"Not accepted." Christina rejected my sincerity, biting her lip. She thought for a second, then added: "Take some responsibility."
"For what? I didn't even do anything." I tried to sit up, but she grabbed my collar with her other hand and refused to let go. "You were the one lecturing me about not taking responsibility like people from UKARI's homeland do."
"Not that kind of responsibility." She loosened her grip slightly. "You tricked me and now I feel like a total idiot, so I'm going to nag you like a grumpy old lady until the final bus stop. That's the kind of woman I really am. I'm not as sweet as you made me sound, and I can bite, so do not romanticize me."
"I still don't get why you're mad at me."
"For everything." Christina hesitated. "For what you tried to do in my dream."
"But I couldn't possibly influence that. It was just a dream."
"Dreams are a reflection of reality. I never dream nonsense, so I trust my intuition. You aren't giving me what I'm helping you and the other Christina for. As a result, I want things I shouldn't want. And I'm saying this not for you, but for UKARI."
"Listen, you're a living human being too. Even though I have the other Christina, I still see you as a girl, and I like you. But that doesn't mean..." I trailed off because I noticed the blush on Christina's cheeks. "No, wait, that wasn't a confession. I just meant that you're sexually attractive, and that I also want to..." Great, it seemed I'd made things even worse. I probably just confirmed her dream right then and there. After all, we'd spent all yesterday listening to a lecture about sex, acting like middle-graders in sex ed rather than actual adults. "Listen, UKARI didn't pair us up for nothing. We're supposed to be attracted to each other. Let's just kiss, and you'll realize there's nothing to it without love."
"What about Christina?" Christina repeated.
"She had a husband before me, so I have the right to compare."
"That's not how it works." Christina looked away.
"Some people in some countries kiss each other on the lips and there's nothing personal about it. I'm just offering this for the experiment. Besides, UKARI will definitely understand we're friends, not lovers."
"I don't want to." Christina closed her eyes, leaving her lips slightly parted.
"Fine." I tried to back away.
But Christina grabbed my sleeve at the left wrist and pulled me down towards herself almost imperceptibly. That probably meant she didn't like the idea itself, but was willing to put up with it. She hadn't said "no," after all.
"I'll be gentle." I started leaning in.
"No," Christina whispered, and with her hand already braced against my chest, she curled her fingers and bunched up my shirt. As if she was pulling me closer, unnoticeably. As if unnoticeably.
I kissed her, a quick, casual brush of the lips, screaming the total absence of passion, and pulled back.
"Don't." Christina opened her eyes and looked straight into mine. As slowly as pupils narrowing after coming out of the dark, Christina squeezed my shirt with both hands and pulled me in. That meant "do." And to get the next "not there," I needed to kiss right there. Why was I lying to myself? I actually wanted to kiss her. I liked it. And there had been passion, only I'd tried to extinguish it with words.
I stopped pulling away. With every movement of my lips, Christina seemed to melt like a snowdrop in spring, fragile, fresh, the only sign of life in a frozen white wasteland, the harbinger of the sun and sweltering summer just a couple of months away. But I didn't want to wait. I wanted happiness right now, I wanted it just like with the other Christina. I wanted to love.
I shifted onto my knees, propped myself up, and tried to kiss her with actual fire, but Christina just gave in and started letting go of me, holding on less tightly. I backed off, forced myself not to rush, and Christina came back to me. Pulled me closer. Just a tiny bit closer. And a little more. And more, until my chest was lying right on top of hers. I must have been heavy. I was crushing her. She was breathing heavily through her nose. But when I decided to lift myself up a little, I felt the weight become even greater. Christina was pressing against me herself, wrapping her arms around my back.
I... I didn't even notice... didn't notice how I lost control. It wasn't me kissing her, it was her kissing me. I only thought I was leading, because we were clearly moving somewhere we didn't want to go, because... Because now, this wasn't just an experiment, not a friendly kiss, completely not what we wanted to show UKARI. Completely not what we were prepared to show anyone at all, even ourselves. And it hurt because of this. It hurt to deceive the other Christina, because I loved her. But then what was this? What is this, if not love? I was ashamed, but... but I was saved by the thought that I wasn't alone. This Christina also knew we were doing the wrong thing. She could have stopped me if she'd tried harder, if she'd kept her promise to bite. Why had her "no" sounded like a "yes" to me? I knew the answer, but I didn't want to think about it. I didn't want to be guilty, didn't want to be the only one to blame. I didn't want to pretend anymore that we weren't right for each other at all. We wouldn't be able to hide our feelings. We were traitors to love and friendship. Because of this, it became bitter in the soul, and we were trying to sweeten this bitterness with each other. And even if we were the most terrible people on earth right now, I still... still loved.
Christina let out a small sob, not from sadness, but from pure sensory overload. It seemed to wake her up, and she started devouring the kiss as if from a starving land, as if the previous part hadn't even happened, as if she'd stopped holding back, as if she intended to eat the whole buffet for the price she paid.
I stopped holding back too. My hands wandered across the curves of her body. The fabric of her clothes felt incredible under my palms, sliding smoothly and pleasingly against her skin. I stroked her as if with a velvet glove.
Another sob from Christina. She got a little tired and gave the initiative back to me. I tried, tried hard, but she was cooling down anyway. Not quickly. I caressed her for a long time, but the passion still flowed into smooth tenderness, and then into sated laziness.
Exhausted, I rested my head on the pillow right next to hers. She still had just enough energy to look me in the eye. Another ragged sigh, half-sobbed into the quiet. I knew it was just the adrenaline crash; I felt it too.
I took a deep breath through my nose and exhaled through my mouth. Christina reached up, cupped my cheek, pressed her palm hard against my skin, and triggered a sudden, awkward rush of saliva. I had to swallow hard to keep from drooling on the pillow. But it worked. It snapped me right back to reality and kept the sinking feeling at bay.