I was already halfway through this one when the other reply went up (which is lovely, btw!), so I figured it would be silly not to finish.
He waits till they're off the stage, which he thinks shows remarkable restraint, all things considered. He doesn't wait till they're
far off the stage - in fact, there are about a dozen people around them, all crossing one another's paths and heading in five different directions - but at least they're not in front of thousands of screaming fans.
"You are one big, gigantic tease," he says, fingers curled around her wrist.
"Why, because of this?" she says, opening the top two buttons of her blouse to show that she's wearing her hand-painted 'Anoop is my Boyfriend' t-shirt underneath.
"Yes, because of this," he says, reaching into the gap between and tugging on the t-shirt, right at her breastbone. "You with your t-shirts and your bubbletweets and your flirty looks, telling me to wait till the end of the tour. Well, it's the end of the tour now, isn't it?"
She unbuttons the rest of the buttons, lets the blouse hang open. "I guess it is. So what are you going to do about it?"
He tugs harder on the t-shirt, for a moment actually thinking she's going to let him pull her into a kiss, but she puts a finger up at the last moment. "What now? Whatever it is, I'll do it."
"Do you really want to do this while we're still all sweaty?"
"Yes!" says Anoop, tugging on her wrist this time, moving them slowly in the direction of the dressing rooms. "You could've rolled in cowflop and it still would've been fine with me."
"You sure know how to make a girl feel pretty," she says, scooting past him until she's the one leading the way through the doors, stumbling awkwardly into the hallway, their feet bumping against one another.
"You'd be pretty no matter what," he says. "You'd be pretty after a car crash."
"Smooth, Desai, smooth," she says, and he can't keep from staring at the words on her chest as she walks backwards down the hall, people still rushing past, hoping that she means them. "Smooth
and classy."
"You know it," he says. They reach the boys' dressing room first, and he kicks the door open with one foot, tugging her through with him and swinging her up against the wall next to the door.
"
Now can I kiss you?" he says as she presses one foot flat against the wall and grins at him. He doesn't wait for an answer, and she doesn't stop him as he presses his lips to hers and closes his eyes and thinks
finally, finally, finally.
He comes back to catcalls and applause behind him, but he almost doesn't look because Megan's hand is up under his shirt, touching bare skin at his waist, and her lips are still
right there.
"So who had today in the pool?"
That's Mike's voice, and out of the corner of his eye Anoop sees Todd rummaging around in his bag, pulling out a many-times-folded sheet of paper.
There's a grumbled chorus of "not me" and "I wish" and "my last date passed a month ago," and Anoop spares only a moment to wonder about just what
exactly they had a pool going on before Megan rubs her ankle against his and he forgets all about it.
"And the winner would be...Kris," says Todd, and they all look over at him, even Anoop.
"That was the first square you picked," says Adam, looking over Todd's shoulder at the betting pool. "That was the
only square you picked."
"I just had a hunch," he says with a shrug and a little smile as he collects his winnings from the other boys. "I...might know a little something about waiting."
Anoop opens his mouth to ask, but Megan turns his head back towards hers before he can, leans in closer and bites down lightly on his lower lip.
"Tour's not over till we leave the venue," she murmurs, "but as soon as it is, I promise you right now you won't be waiting anymore."
