• CHAERIN'S POV •

 

"Chaerin ," Dara was saying in her teacher voice before homeroom, the morning after we'd shared our first kiss. "What I did yesterday wasn't right, and I shouldn't have done it." "It takes two people to do what we did," I reasoned. "And it wasn't all you."

 

"Even still, I shouldn't have let it happen."

 

"Yes you should have," I pressed, upset that she could possibly go back on this again. Since the very beginning, she'd had me on a constant yo- yo; telling me that she liked me, but that we couldn't do anything about it; touching me, holding my hands, flirting with me constantly, but then going back to her girlfriend; kissing me, then saying it was wrong. I knew that it wasn't malicious - malicious wasn't in her capacity - but rather, it was her confusion manifesting itself and projecting itself onto me. I didn't want to be sacrificed in that equation, but if it was what I had to go through to be with Dara, I would.

 

"You're only seventeen," she said as if I didn't know.

 

"And you're only twenty-two. Dara , age is just a number," I spit platitudinously.

 

"It's more than that from a legal standpoint," she argued. "You're a minor."

 

"We didn't have ." Yet, I added in my mind, but that wasn't helping my cause so I swallowed it.

 

"I could lose my job."

 

"Not if no one finds out," I said. Then, coming closer, I took her arm comfortingly. slowly and lovingly, I assured, "So no one will find out."

 

She put her hands around my waist, the way I always hoped she would when she would lift me at cheering, but this time it was more sensual and intimate, and I knew that, thankfully, the relationship had grown since it began. I wrapped my arms around her neck and gave her a kiss that I only hoped would change her mind.

 

"I know how to keep a secret," I said, to answer her question from about twelve hours earlier. "Do you?"

 

She smiled devilishly. "If I don't, I guess I