Your Hand In Mine

What? Kristopher Letang likes me, 'really likes' me, Shane Matthews. But why? There's nothing special about me, absolutely nothing.

"But what if I want to say something back?" I asked him with a bit of a smile. He lifted his head up, and I watched that crooked grin of his creep onto his face. "I really like you, too," I told him.

His smile got bigger--if it was at all possible--and he stood there with his hands in his pockets. "You 'ave no idea 'ow 'appy I am. I thought that if I told you, it would ruin our friendship, and you would want not'ing to do with me."

"I know exactly what you mean." And I did. We were both afraid of the same thing.

I took a few steps forward, and he grabbed my hand as we started moving towards the doors. I smiled down at our hands, loving the way something so simple could make me feel. "Can I ask you a question?" I said as I pushed the door open.

"Sure," he replied.

"Why?"

"Why what?" he asked, obviously confused.

"Why me? I mean, there's a whole world full of people and you pick me, why?"

"That is exactly why I like you, you are not like anybody else," he said and smiled down at me. "You do not fix your 'air and makeup every three second, you do not care what people 'ave to say about you as long as you are happy, you see the brighter side of life, and you do not care that I stick out in the crowd more than other because of what I do for a living." Whoa, nobody's ever said something like that to me before, nobody. And as much as it scares me, I think I'm falling for him. But there was no way I would tell him when I had a hard enough time accepting it myself. It's all too new. Yeah, I went through that phase where you think you're in love with the guy you went out with in high school, but this, this is different.

I laid my head on his shoulder and looked up at him. "You want to know why I like you?"

"Yeah," he whispered.

"You make me feel happy.. and alive. You don't let who you are get to your head, you find the good in everyone, and you treat girls differently than most guys." I could go on and on, but it would take too long. So I told him the things that stuck out most to me.

He smiled again and wrapped his arm around my shoulder, and we finished making our way to Marc's SUV. When we went to open the car door, we soon realized that those idiots locked us out. We knocked on the window repeatedly, but they still wouldn't open the door.

"I hate them. It's my birthday and they're making me stand out here in the cold. I don't see how this is fair," I laughed. Seriously, who leaves their friend out in the freezing cold in December on their birthday? Some friends..

"'ere," Kris said and took off his coat.

I shook my head. "Huh uh, I'm not wearing your coat. It's really sweet of you, but I'm not putting it on. You're only in a t-shirt. You'll get sick and then you won't be able to play."

"Either you put it on, or it is just going to sit on the ground. Then you will feel bad that it is not doing any good if it is on the ground, and you will put it on," he told me and threw his coat on the snow covered parking lot.

I picked up his coat and I saw him smile. Yeah, you thought I was going to put it on, didn't you? Oh, how very wrong you were, Kris Letang.

"Look! A bird!" I exclaimed. And just like I thought he would, he quickly turned his head in the direction I pointed and asked me where the bird was. So gullible..

While he was trying to find the bird, I took the chance to wrap his coat around him.

"'ey! That is not fair."

"I'm going to have to disagree. It's not fair that I would have two coats and you wouldn't have any."

"Well, you were cold. What was I suppose to do?"

"I don't know. Make a fire with some sticks and a rock?" I suggested.

"I don't know 'ow to," he shrugged.

We stood outside the car for a few more minutes trying to figure out how you make a fire with nature until the wind started to pick up. Kris and I pounded on the window some more until someone slightly cracked the window.

"Haha! It's cold out there, isn't it? It's nice and warm in here," Max teased then closed the window.

"Max, I swear to God if you don't open the fucking door I'll make sure you never have the chance to get laid again!" I screamed at the window, hoping he would hear me. I heard Kris laugh behind me and then all of a sudden, the door opened. I shrugged. "It worked," I told Kris.

"Is that any way to treat the birthday girl?" I asked the boys as soon as I got my seat belt on.

Flower put his hands up in the air. "I was against it the whole time, I swear."

I looked at the other three.

"We, uh, didn't know how to unlock the doors?" Tyler said, hoping I'd believe him.

"Yeah," Jordan agreed.

"Uh huh, sure," I replied, still unconvinced.

"We could have gotten 'ypo.. 'ypo-"

"Hypothermia?" I guessed, trying to help out Kris. He was pretty good with English, but there were some words that he still couldn't get.

"Yeah, that. We could 'ave die!"

"No need to exaggerate, Tanger. It wasn't that cold," Jordan said. "Only seventeen degrees, and some snow. With a wind chill it would probably be like, five degrees."

"Yeah, really," Max said. "It wasn't that cold that you needed to threaten to take away my manhood."

"Don't tempt me, Maxime," I told him.

"Will you just take us back home, Flower? I'm sick of being jammed in the back," TK yelled.

"Yep."

On the course of the way back to our apartments, Marc thought it would be funny to hit the breaks for no reason at all and jerk the wheel to the left and right. Our seat belts choked us every time--at least they worked--and I thought I was going to throw up. We almost wrecked, too. It was a dumb idea period, let alone during winter, if you ask me.

I was dropped off second to last, Kris being last. He asked if he could hang out at my apartment for a little, and I didn't object. For one, I liked being around him whenever I got the chance. And two, it was still my birthday, after all. The only thing I had planned on doing was sitting around or taking walk. Lexa wasn't even going to come over later and spend time with her best friend because she was so wrapped up in being engaged to Ryan. Like I said before, I was more than happy for her, but I didn't like how she forgot everyone else around her and thought that she was the Queen of England just because she was getting married.

Just like we had been doing since we met, Kris and I picked out a movie to watch--21.

"He looks exactly like you," I told Kris. The main character, Ben, he's identical to Kris. He even acted the same way as Kris, sort of. I didn't think Kris was as smart or knows how to count cards, either.

"But I am still better looking than 'e is, even if we look the same," he joked.

"Yeah, and you can speak French," I said and scooted closer to him.

"Oui, je peux," he said, and I gave him a look. I loved when he spoke in French, but I didn't like how I couldn't understand him. But then again, I'm sort of glad I couldn't understand it because it made me like him that much more. "It mean 'yes, I can'."

"Thank you," I smiled.

A little while later, the movie ended. It was actually pretty good, and I didn't expect it to turn out the way it did.

"I'm hungry. How about you?" I asked Kris and then stood up from the couch.

"Yeah, I could go for some food."

"Well, what do you want?"

"I don't know," he said as he picked himself up from the couch and stretched his arms out in front of him. "What do you 'ave?"

I gave my shoulders a shrug. "Let's find out." He followed me into the kitchen and we started opening the cabinets.

"You were not kidding when you said you 'ad a cabinet full of cereal..," Kris said.

"I don't joke when it comes to cereal," I laughed then got back to the cabinet that I was looking through. Cans, cans, and more cans. I really wasn't in the mood for soup.

"Tofu, really? Why do you even 'ave this?" Kris asked me.

I stood up and turned to see his head sticking out from the fridge and a pack of tofu in his hand. "I was at the store the other day with Lexa just for something to do, and we decided to walk around Giant Eagle and buy each other something. She got me tofu, I got her spam."

"Do you plan on eating this?"

"Actually, yeah. I like trying new stuff. And how bad could it be? Don't people live off of that stuff?"

He scrunched his face up in disgust and put it back in the fridge. "You can eat that some other time, when I am not present."

"Okay. I'll let you know how it goes."

We looked through my kitchen for a few more minutes until we decided on pancakes.

I had just finished dumping the mix into the glass bowl when I saw the white powder come flying at my face. I gasped and stood there, taking in my appearance. I could feel it up my nose, and it was all over my hair and clothes. I dumped a hand full of mix into my hand from the box, then threw it at Kris' face. He ducked then moved to the side of the island opposite of me. The powder was all over my microwave and stove, I frowned. I grabbed some more mix and tossed it at him, this time covering his face with it. We ran around the island throwing any food we could get our hands on, trying to catch each other. I tripped over my own two feet and Kris took the chance to tackle me to floor. We landed next to the fridge, with him on top of me.

"You 'ave some right there," he said as he wiped his thumb across my left cheek. His touch made my skin burn, and when he lifted his thumb, there was a tingly feeling left on my cheek. I had a bit of a flashback to the time we painted the city.

"Thanks. You have some on your forehead," I told him then ran my palm across his forehead.

He smiled down at me. "There is still some on your face."

"Where?" I asked.

"Right 'ere," he said then leaned down and placed his lips on mine. At first, I didn't kiss back because I wasn't really expecting it, but after a few seconds I started to move my lips in sync with his. The kiss started out sweet and shy, but then he started to deepen it. He was the first one to pull away, though, and when he looked down at me, I saw a him turn a few shades of red. "Sorry.."

"No, it's alright," I smiled. He let out his breath then stood up and offered me his hand. I took it and attempted to dust off all of the pancake mix.

"There is no use," Kris said.

"Yeah, I guess you're right. Oh, well," I said and shrugged. "It's only pancake mix."

"Should we clean the kitchen now, or after we make the pancake?" he asked me.

"Hmm.. How about after?"

"Sound good to me."

I found my iPod and plugged it into the speaker and hit 'Shuffle'. We danced around and sang as we re-measured the mix, finished making the batter, and got out everything else we needed.

"I t'ink we should make one big one," Kris suggested.

"I don't how we're going to flip it, but okay." He poured the majority of the batter into the pan, and we let it cook for a couple minutes.

"Okay, on the count of three, we'll flip it," I said. The pancake was ginormous, and it was going to take two of us to flip it.

"Un.." Kris said and we stuck the spatulas under it.

"Two.."

"Trois!" he finished. We flipped the pancake over, and amazingly it all made it back into the pan, but it was a little on the burnt side. We just looked at the pancake and laughed.

"Well, I guess we could cut the top off," I said and made a circle above the pancake with my finger.

"Yeah," he agreed and gave his head a nod.

We had some batter left over--if you can believe it--and made two, much smaller pancakes. We ended up eating the really big pancake and leaving the other two on a plate. Despite it being a tad bit black, it was still pretty good if you drowned it in syrup. We left the kitchen a mess and went back to the couch. We turned on Versus and watched the San Jose and Washington game.

"Shane?" Kris asked, and I could feel his eyes on me.

"Yeah?" I answered, eyes still glued to the TV.

He hesitated for a moment. "I was wondering if you wanted to, uh.. be my girlfriend?"

My eyes weren't glued to the TV now; they were focussed on Kris. "Really?" I asked with a huge grin. It wasn't the most creative way to ask someone to be your girlfriend, but I didn't care. I was just happy he was asking.

"Really, really," he said, sort of on the shy side, but with a bit of a smile.

"Yes," I smiled and moved so I could give him a quick kiss on the lips. "This is probably the best birthday I've ever had. Thank you," I whispered and gave him a hug.

"You are welcome," he said. I turned in his arms and laid in front of him on the couch.

The Sharks ended up beating the Craps in a shootout that night, and we fell asleep on the couch next to each other, leaving the kitchen a complete disaster.