This Is Where the World Ends by Amy Zhang

(not us) is cheering, so I guess that means it’s over. I catch sight of Ander’s face when he finally peels it off the ground, and I know it’s over.
    He’s not going to state. He’s not getting his scholarship.
    He stumbles toward the risers like he barely remembers he has feet. He rips off his helmet and his blond angel hair is plastered tight to his scalp. I’m moving before I know why, running down the rickety stairs and calling his name.
    He stumbles right into my arms, and he clutches the back of my (favorite, now sweaty) dress and his hot, hot tears bleed through the fabric and right into my heart. He smells rancid, but I hug him tight around his perfectly narrow hips and tell him that it’ll be all right, all right, all right. All right?
    â€œAll right,” he answers. All right.
    And then he kisses me.
    I am drowning in saltwater, burning tears and hotter sweat, and the crowd—which had been so terribly quietafter he lost, all three fan buses of people gone dead silent—erupts, howls .
    We are the center of the universe.
    Then he breaks off and rests his head on my shoulder for a moment before he pulls his soaked shirt over his head and walks off to the locker room. I am wet where his saturated skin brushed me, but I don’t care. My fingers are still on my lips, my lips on fire, and the crowd is still cheering for us, and Piper laughs from the sidelines and squirts me with a water bottle. I watch Ander go and imagine him in charcoal: bone and muscle and salt and sweat. I memorize him walking away, head bent and shoulders curved and vulnerability radiating like angel wings.
    â€œI love you, Ander Cameron,” I whisper, trying them on my tongue.
    They taste like ice. They melt in my mouth and disappear. Stomach butterflies and air.
    I thought they would taste more like peppers and chocolate and pop rocks, like putting a Mento in your mouth and washing it down with Diet Coke. I thought it would be bubbles and breath and heat and spinning.
    But they’re words, little moments, and they pass.
    That’s okay. That’s what moments do. And I want to remember moments, bright and perfect, because you’re allowed to do that. You’re allowed to Photoshop. You’reallowed to crop things like the way Ander held me too tightly, how he held my wrists instead of my hands, how it never occurred to him that I didn’t want our first kiss to be like that.
    Besides, kissing a sweaty Ander in front of a crowd trumps phase ten ice cream kisses on the swing set anyway, right?
    I’m pushing myself toward yes when I see Dewey in the stands, and I do a double take when I see Micah with him. Oh, right, I told him he should come. I didn’t really think he would. His eyes are on mine and they’re wide, wide, wide.
    Oh, god.
    He mutters something to Dewey and then he’s coming down the bleachers, and I’m all frowny and awkward trying to figure out what to say to him. What? Yes, I know that Micah is in love with me. Of course I know. I will be in love with him someday too. That’s obvious. We’re predestined. But can’t that wait? Can’t I just kiss my sweaty scary angel boy in the meantime?
    Oh. He wasn’t even coming for me. He’s leaving the gym.
    I look around to make sure no one’s watching, and then I follow. “Micah,” I call, and I finally catch him a few hallways down, grabbing on to his shirttail and pulling him to a stop. He doesn’t turn around.
    â€œI can’t believe you actually came,” I say to his back.
    He shrugs. “Dewey wanted to. Same reason you did, probably. Find some stupid wrestler to hook up with.”
    I swell. “I’m not hooking up with Ander. I have a plan! We’re perfect.”
    He laughs. It’s not a nice laugh. “Not the word I’d use.”
    â€œYeah? What word would you use? Awkward? Oh, wait. That’s you.”
    Too far? Too far.
    â€œOh,