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A Mo in enuine happiness I stared atand absorbed every detail of the dreaht the sparkling light of the disco ball, the way the silky dress she wore clung to her body e danced, the way her lips repeated over and over that she loved me too

We&039;d finally said it We&039;d finally moved past that last barrier between us and exposed our hearts to each other It was no great surprise, but we hadn&039;t been able toable to do it at all, even in a fantasy world, gave

I stretched out rin spread on er than most dreams I&039;d had of late It was like neither one of us had wanted to let go of that peaceful moment We&039;d recreated the last dance we&039;d been to when she&039;d been alive, minus the swarm of people It had just been Lillian andhad been a slow one Her arht around her waist I&039;d told her nonstop that I loved her, that I needed her, and she&039;d run her fingers through the back of my hair and kissedthe feel of those lips on mine I didn&039;t care what Mrs Ryans said - it was real As real as lying awake in h school, and as real as hanging out with Sawyer

I opened hed Sawyer While our relationship had coalesced back to normalcy by the end of the day yesterday, I couldn&039;t help but think that ere on the edge of soain, I&039;d push her to the point where there was no saving our friendship She&039;d been unbelievably patient with me up until this point, but I could see the strain of ine being in her position; liking soly flirted and acted like they liked you back, only to have them push you away from any real intimacy But, we couldn&039;t be like thateven if I did share her feelings, which I wasn&039;t sure if I did or not I mean, how can I be head over heels in love with Lillian and have my heart ache for Sawyer? I couldn&039;t I didn&039;t What I felt for Saas immense comfort and limitless friendship - my body wanted to translate that into a physical relationship because I was a seventeen year old virgin That ot out of bed and ran a hand down h I&039;d be the friend Sawyer deserved and keep uy/girl relationship of at least a foot apart at all times Then et hurt anymore I could at least do that for her

And for Lillian

I made my way to the bathrooain I&039;d hurt her She may have tried to stoically brush it off as &039;that&039;s real life and you should eht tremor of her lip and the few tears she&039;d let slide down her cheek I&039;d abandoned her, betrayed her and she&039;d been devastated I&039;d never do that again I&039;d never bring her pain again I&039;d never let her goere going to be together forever

As I sat down for hted in seeing it She cos were fine I didn&039;t want to tell her that Lillian and I had finally moved up in our romance She&039;d tell me that was impossible and I needed helpetc, etc, etc I didn&039;t want to hear it I felt good today and I was going to keep that feeling, even if thatto people

Sawyer surprised bothinside Mo in, then poured her a fresh cup of coffee Sawyer politely thanked her, twisting the ring on her thu at the two of us

Mo ether, or ht we already were To a casual observer it did look that way, especially with her still wearing h she didperson, she wasn&039;t the oneme smile softly into my coffee cup

"You seembetter today," she said quietly, once ere finally driving to school

I grinned and flicked her disco ball hanging off her rear viewrays and threw tiny dots of lights across her dashboard It reh and leaned back in my seat

"Do I?" Even I could hear the bounce in htly as I stared off into the"I guess I just had a good night"

"Oh" Her voice was genuinely surprised and I looked back at her She met my eye and scrunched her brows "That surprises me Usually when you have a bad session, it takes you a couple days to getwell, to sed, her concerned look not leaving her

I sighed as I thought back over talking with Mrs Ryans yesterday I&039;d messed up I&039;d said way too much and broken a wall I hadn&039;tto repair that wall now; plastering the fragments before it completely fell apart on me She knew I dreamed of Lillian She knew I considered that a real relationship She&039;d surely assign me medication nowbut that didn&039;tI didn&039;t want to Well, besides go in the first place

I shrugged and told Sawyer the one thing we&039;d discussed that I could share "She surprised o to that stupid winter dance" I shook my head "I haven&039;t been to a dance since" I bit my lip and looked back out the"It just tooklike that"

"She wants you to take meto a dance?"

I spun my head back around to her at the incredulity in her voice She was studying the road Her hair was pulled back into a neat and orderly ponytail, givingto keep her face neutral, but I&039;d studied her features long enough to knohen she was excited Her eyes flicked along the road, probably not even seeing it and a es of her lips were curled up in a slight sod, she wants to go I&039;d never i at all, but still, I&039;d pictured Sawyer being as resistant to the very idea of it asshe said noandeven et I missed " She stuhing "Yeah, I&039;ve always" She bit her lip again and a light flush ran along her cheeks She giggled nervously and silance at me, noticed the look on my face, that must have been somewhere between humor and horror, and frowned "But you don&039;t want to" Her eyes went back to the main road "No, of course you don&039;t want that That was so you shared with" She shook her head "Oh, that&039;s why you were upset "

I fixed , but she cut o That was stupid of ht"

Her face flushed deeper and she fixed her eyes straight ahead My thoughts stuttered and no coherent words came out of me I shut my mouth and looked out the elot I&039;d never iht I&039;d tell her crazy Mrs Ryans plans and she&039;d laugh it off withthat the woman was loony I&039;d never considered that Saould actually want to go with me

I watched her worry her lip as she parked the car Of courseshe was a girl As different as she seeirl And I knew froirls liked dances They liked getting decked out to the nines in slinky dresses and professionally done up-dos They liked the loud raphs taken They liked seeing their enerally did, bringing the the their bodies right up against theirmore intiht way

I sighed as she shut the car off If I did this for her, asked her to go, that last parthappen between usagain, but it would violate ht I looked back to her as she started to open her door I suppose I could put that rule on hold, for one night

"Sawyer," I said, stopping her fro open her escape route She looked back ather cheeks "Would you like to go to the dance with h I kept my face steady and even, so she&039;d know that I was serious, that I was seriously asking her Her eyebrows rose as she took inserious?" Her voice matched her eyes

I nodded and let a smile creep into ether as she twisted in her seat to face otten "You didn&039;t seeed "Honestly, I don&039;t" Her face darkened and I quickly added, "But you doand after everything"

My words drifted off as I looked over her softening face The early light of lowed at el I sed as I looked over her features, resisting the urge to cup that porcelain cheek Keeping a distance with her ht She tilted her head as she watched whatever eain and looked down, pushing back the odd feeling that had started to build inyou&039;ve put up with from me, I could at least put up with this" I looked up and ain, "for you"

She sed as she searched , unworried about the delightful tension building in the car She locked her gaze to htly My eyes flicked down to her lips before I caught myself and forcefully looked back up at her eyes Her hand raised and she brushed some hair off my forehead I wanted to lean into her touch and made myself not react I also made myself not pull away either She didn&039;t know aboutit I couldn&039;t just initiate so her first

When I didn&039;t react or touch her back, she pulled her hand away and set it in her lap "Okay," she said slowly "I&039;d love to go with you"

She grinned and then turned to open her door The tension left the car with her and I stayed in ed so fast Wasn&039;t I dead set against going just yesterday?

She stood outside her car waiting formy head, I opened my door and joined her She held her hand out for me and stepped within the one foot radius I&039;d mentally set as a "do not enter" zone I didn&039;t take her hand and stepped back She cocked her head atI&039;d have to talk about this with her sooner or later, and sooner was probably a better idea

She started to take a step towards me and I put esture, confusion, and maybe a bit of hurt, clear in her eyes

"I&039;ve been thinking," I started, glancing around to see if any students were this far back in the lot with us A feere and atching, but I needed to do this, for her sake I sed and continued, "Idon&039;t want to hurt you any ue and I held her "No, I know you think you were as ht, but the truth is"

I paused, wondering what to tell her I&039;d opened this conversation up without thinking about how I could explain keeping her away fro her evenclose If I suddenly shoved her back and told her I didn&039;t want her physically near mewell, I couldn&039;t see how that wouldn&039;t hurt her Unlessunless I played the one card every guy e has God, I hated to play it I wasn&039;t a NeanderthalI did have control Usually

I half suy You&039;re a really pretty girl and when you&039;re around me, my body reacts to" My cheeks heated, but I made myself say it, "I&039;ve never had sex with anyone and I really want toand when you&039;re touching et that we&039;re only friends and all I can think about is that you have breasts and that I&039;d like to" I santing to crawl back in the car "I&039;m sorry I can only control myself so much I think we should keep sood I wantedto die

Her face dropped in shock sothat it was nearly comical She sputtered on what to comment on first "Distance? From in?" She shook her head in disbelief as I closedto skip forward to the part where this was just a fact between us, and we never talked about itever again "Youyou think I&039;m pretty?"

I opened my eyes at that and s to tell her that of course she was pretty, I found , "I think you&039;re beautiful" My voice came out nearly reverent and I ue down her throat It would be just as ht and I shook my head to break it

Her eyes hadat how ined (maybe Sawyer and I had crossed that line of friendship too many times already ), I shoved my hands firmly in"We&039;re going to be late," I

She fell into step besidemine for more than a few seconds, we s I hadn&039;t seen before - signs for the upco winter dance were everywhere Handmade posters were taped up every few feet down the hall, a large banner hung over theon the staircase and eight by ten notices were plastered on every classroo students to buy tickets to the last dance of this year Now that I&039;d agreed to go, I couldn&039;t see how I&039;d blocked all this out before

Sawyer kept her distance frorin on her face I had no idea as going on in her head Was it really just about getting dressed up and having fun together, or was she iht I flushed as I thought about how close she&039;d be and for how long I wondered if oing to happen I was just being a good friend andLillian, she would tearfully s happen, that I should be with Sawyer and not her, or sooing to break things off with s off with her Like I&039;d ever do that

I carefully walked past Will on the way to h, he was busy in a conversation with Randy and didn&039;t even notice lanced up at me and then hurriedly shifted back to his al conversation with Will They seea break and our teamhadn&039;t done well I&039;d run into Coach in the hallway after the final defeat and he&039;d actually scowled at me Like the fact that Will tended to drop the ball, and the other teae of that and scored a lot, was somehow my fault He&039;d muttered that I&039;d probably let him down for baseball too and then storot the feeling that when spring rolled around, he&039;d be all over me to try out I had no plans to

Sawyer had filled ames, since she went to most of them It had surprised me at first when she&039;d adle one She&039;d said that she ith the Safe and Sound club, and that a bunch of the to dissuade the ranks frohts and before that fateful Thanksgiving dinner, we&039;d generally parted ways Friday afternoon until Monday o to the games without me She&039;d said she wouldn&039;t if her parents didn&039;t insist on it Apparently they wanted her to reconnect with the coly had told one I think she&039;d been atte to cheer me up, let me knoas missed And in a microscopic way, it had A small part of me enjoyed the fact that my absence was noticed in some small way At least to Coach, if not the rest of the team For the rest of themwell, I think they&039;d rather take the loss than have me play with them And Will had been especially stor attributed to hi a better player was a character flaw that needed to be hurateful that he and Randy&039;s conversation had kept hi at least

Sawyer had an adorable grin on her throughout the entire class She see I still felt flushed with embarrassment I really hadn&039;t wanted to say any of that, especially the being a virgin part, but I couldn&039;t tell her the real reason why I needed space and it seeood of an excuse as any Maybe if I hadn&039;t added that last part about her being beautiful, she wouldn&039;t look so thrilled

We worked on our reports for the books ere supposed to have finished yesterday and she gavesrin back at her, but I did wonder if any of my admissions had been for the best

I walked her to the front doors after class and as we separated she leaned into ly stated that she was headed off to her workout, huffing over to the Science building for one class, only to turn back around afterwards and head right back up to the second floor I laughed with her and wished her luck in her Che her breath back, but her face was still excited, darn near elated Is later than usual and justWhen I asked her what she&039;d been doing, she shyly ad to Sally Hoffen, the Safe and Sound club president, about the dance They&039;d been going over hair styles and dress ideas She was telling h dress when I interrupted her