I remember being you. Being you, with your hands tucked under your thighs in skinny jeans that never quite fell to the ankle. I remember those hands, & how they wanted to wander over into his & how you told him with your lips that you would always wonder what it would be like to kiss him, but your lips stayed tucked together. He said he'd always feel that way too, and you let the moment pass, utterly kissless.

You were at Lake Champlain. Grey waters lapped sallow shores where rocks & kelp & garbage kept each other company in the morning tide. It was probably a Sunday. It felt like a Sunday.

You were on the rock ledge at the collarbone of The Bay, & the water didn't reach up to lap your toes, but it was early May and still too cold in Vermont to let toes out anyway.

He was there. Sitting too close for a boy with a girlfriend. Not close enough for things he said to you over text. His hand splayed on the rock between you, teasing you.

You remember this, don't you? All the aching & heartbreak & worry about “saving yourself” & why & how he would ruin you & will you ever be kissed? & but why didn't he choose you?

The wind shifted and the cold left you leaning into his body heat, but you didn't touch him. You wouldn't touch him. You pressed down into the palms of your hands, rubble digging into flesh.

All that time and you never kissed him.

I'll tell you now, ten years later, that it won't matter that you did or didn't kiss him. I wish it did. I wish I could tell you that your resolve and integrity made all the difference, but the truth is, you could have kissed him there on that beach, even though he had a girlfriend, even though he didn't choose you, even though he wasn't tall enough, or cute enough, or the right guy… you could have kissed him.

It would have been sloppy. All awkward angles & donut breath & tongues imitating acrobats. After, he would have told you he felt guilty because of her. He would have kissed you again that day & through the rest of summer & all that time never stop loving her.

You knew this, didn’t you? You sat on the edge of the bay, with your hands tucked under your bone-thin thighs, trying your hardest to do the right thing. You spent your whole life trying to do the right thing.

You felt guilty anyway. Guilty for liking him. Guilty for wanting to kiss him, for telling him. You’ll call yourself a homewrecker & a whore. You’ll tell him you can’t speak to him. You’ll write him a dozen letters. You’ll tell him you never loved him. You’ll wish you had kissed him.

But you didn’t.

I want you to know that someday, you will be married to a good man that loves you & only you, and kisses will be as ordinary as putting on pants. That is not to say they lose their magic, just that life expands to hold more magic.

Your first kiss won’t be on the windswept shores of the Champlain Bay with the boy who has a girlfriend and makes you feel like it's your fault he didn’t choose you. It won’t be with any of the boys you know right now (for that, be grateful). It won’t be when you're sixteen, or seventeen, or eighteen, either.

It will feel like an eternity, but one day you will be almost twenty, sitting on a dresser in your pajamas. Your hands will be tucked under your thighs. You will tell a new young man in a Hawaiian shirt that you can’t go out with him on a date because your mom is feeling jealous, & you need to stay home tonight. He will say “Okay” and kiss you anyway.

It will be soft & quick & gentle & you’ll wonder how he found your lips with his eyes closed.

You will kiss this man a thousand times & sometimes a thousand times in one day. Some of them will be sloppy & acrobatic. You will kiss him on Sunday afternoons & on the shores of Lake Champlain, where he complains because he’s never touched water so cold. You will kiss him before you brush your teeth, & while you are brushing your teeth, & after. You will kiss him when his nose is snotty & after you vomit in the morning. You will kiss him with his baby latched to your breast. You will kiss him after arguments in the middle of the night, after threats & expletives have expired on the bedroom floor. You will kiss him & never feel guilty. He will choose you, & he will kiss you, & all the missed kisses of your life before won’t matter anymore.

 I promise, you will be kissed.

-Sarina Michel

Sarina Michel was raised in the frigid tundra of Northern New England, but now resides in Central Florida, where she writes poetry, narrative essays, and short stories. She has previously published work in Cardinal Sins and The Oracle.