Josh and Hazel's Guide to Not Dating

Stretching, she kisses me, eyes open, lips resting on mine.

I’m an optimist; I always anticipated having a good life. But to have dreamed something like this would have felt enormously selfish.

“Sometimes I imagine going back in time,” she says, reading my mind, “and telling myself that I’d end up right here. With Josh Im.”

“Would you have believed it?”

She lets out a husky laugh. “No.”

I can’t pull her as close as I want, chest to chest, thigh to thigh, so instead I dig my fingers into her bun, pulling it apart so that her hair falls around her shoulders. Her breath catches—I think at the hungry, possessive expression on my face. She looks a little wild, too: her cheeks are pink from the wind, her eyes bright and amber.

“I thought this was your plan all along,” I say, kissing her again.

“In my dreams.”

I look over at Jia and Miles. She’s swiping grass from his skirt, helping straighten his wig. And as soon as she’s done, he tears off down the hill again under the watchful eye of his sister.

“Well,” I say, “I’m pretty sure that if someone went back in time and told me I’d end up with Hazel Bradford, it would sound just crazy enough to be true.”