She laughs, "You have a family. Well you always had mine, but now our family is bigger."

My phone vibrates again.

My cheeks light up, burning from the heat in them. I lick my lips and glance at the text.

'Hi.'

He keeps sending it. He wants to talk but doesn’t say anything. A grin creeps across my lips when I think about his fingers and the handle of the elevator. My breath is uneven when my mind fills with the distorted image of us in the brushed stainless steel of the elevator wall.

"So is Eli going to fly them over on the company jet?"

I laugh and blush and trace my fingers over his constant 'Hi's'. "I don’t know. Maybe. I guess."

Shell is still staring at me. "Did you have sex with him?

I'm pulled out of my mind. It takes me a second to realize I'm blushing and sweating. I swallow and shake my head.

She sits on the bed and lifts my face, "Did you have sex? We are talking about your family and you are blushing and sweating? Dude?"

The smile that crosses my lips is humiliating with its complete control of my face. "It's not what you think." Boy oh boy, is it not. She couldn't even come close to comprehending.

I bite my lip and look up at her through my lashes. She looks like she's stalling, processing.

My phone vibrates. I grin harder, which doesn’t seem possible.

I catch the, 'Hi.'

She is pointing at the phone and stuttering, "T-t-the night we went there, y-y-you and him…you went upstairs and…oh my god." Her fingers are resting on her lips. My phone vibrates. I laugh.

"I thought you would tease him and make him like you and make him suffer with that cute dress and the lip gloss. I didn’t think you would just give it all up. Not to him." A disgusted look crosses her face, "Him? He isn’t worthy of something like that! He paddled your feet!"

I can't explain it. Nor can I believe the image of the paddling was what gave me the orgasm. I shake my head blankly and l clutch the phone, "It's like you said. We're both so screwed up. We fit."

Her face is slowly becoming more horrified, "Has he called you? Has he tried to see you since?"

I sigh, "No. Just texting me."

She sits back, "You gave him that, your virginity and he hasn’t called?"

I shove my feelings down my throat, choking on them, "It isn’t what you think. You can't understand."

"You've been the queen of walls and barriers and the words NO and you GAVE it to him? No work? No dinner and a movie? To say the least he owes you that?"

I snap, "He's paying my tuition and yours and everything else. I think he bought me dinner already."

Her nose wrinkles and I can tell it's involuntary, "So you're working for your meals now?"

The emptiness creeps up inside of me, "I guess so. Yours too." I get up and grab my coat and walk out. I never believed she would understand but I also never imagined she would call me a whore. My boots hit the stairs with near violence.

"Em, wait. Sarah. Shit." She calls after me. I pound the stairs, pulling on my coat and mitts. She grabs my coat and pulls. I jerk free and step out into the snowstorm.

"Sarah." I stop. I like it when she says my name. I turn. Tears are streaming down her cheeks. She shakes her head, "I had no right."

I shout, "No. No you didn’t. You've slept with a dozen guys. You've had sex in like seven states." A guy walks past us. He nods at Michelle. She scowls and grabs my arm, dragging me to the path. We stand under the street lamp.

"Dude."

I shake my head, "No. You don’t have any right to judge me for anything. I have had sex once, with a guy I technically have known my whole life. I am trying, desperately, to get something formed out in my head. So I can understand sex and sexuality and desire. Without the lonely coming and taking it all back." I hold my fingers up to make an inch, "I am this close to losing it all and ending up in a ball in the snow. I am on the edge of something and it's going to be amazing or horrid, but either way I am free of the disgusting feelings I've had. For now. And I'm meeting my parents. I might have brothers and sisters I don’t remember. I have normal right there waiting for me and I can't get past this guy who is dark and scary, but I like it. Do you know how screwed up I feel? It's worse now."

She sniffles and wraps her arms around me. She's shivering and clutching me.

"You're right, I don’t understand and I know I never will. Dude, I'm super sorry. I'm excited about your birthday, really excited."

I hug her back, "It's okay. I'm sorry I said you had sex with like a dozen guys in like seven states and shit."

She laughs into my hair, "It's true. We are taking you to the doctor tomorrow. You need to go on the pill."

I grimace, "Oh god. I never even thought."

She shakes her head, "You're probably fine but I'm going to give you a pack of my pills to start taking tonight, cause dude. No wants to be that college girl."

I laughed, "Ok."

She pulls back, "This is so weird. I never imagined we'd be having the safe sex talk. I've just always had you one-way, I need to change my mind about you. I need to see Sarah."

That hurts me in a good way. I feel my eyes water, "Thanks."

She kisses my lips softly and grips my face, "I love you."

I nod, "Me too dude."

A man's voice interrupts us, "Are you cheating on me already?" I glance up at Sebastian on the path to Speare Hall. I laugh and squeeze Michelle's hand. She whispers, "We cool?"

"Always. See ya in a bit."

"Text me lots k." I nod and pull away. She grins, "You crazy kids have fun." She crosses her thin arms and wipes her eyes, "Damn snow always makes me cry. Don't let me forget to get that stuff for you either, Sarah." She emphasizes my name and makes me feel awkward.

I laugh nervously. Sebastian looks confused and slightly frightened.

"Hey." I say and can't stop myself from feeling weird around him.

He takes my mitt in his and pulls me along the path gently, "Hey."

I tug on his hand and shake my hand, "We need to talk first."

He nods and looks up and the snow falling on us, "Can we just get out of the snow?"

I shake my head, "No. I need to say this now. Before."

He looks worried. His eyes are dark-brown, the hazel is gone. "Okay." His voice is hesitant.

I look at him and shake my head, my teenage hormones are losing me. He smells good. I step back and point to the path, "Can we just walk?"

He nods. He looks terrified. I hate it.

"So, I know Shell told you some of the stuff that was going on, but she didn’t tell you everything." I look back at the dorms, "She didn’t know everything."

He gulps.

I wrap my arms around myself and close my eyes, "I was taken when I was two." The story finds its way out of me, in an efficient and tidy way. I leave out the torture and some of the obvious horrors. They are like rocks I don’t want to lift and look under. The creepy things that live under them will crawl out and chase me around.

I don’t look at him.

I look at the snow or the cars driving by or the building behind him.

I finish talking and shiver. My face is frozen, my hair is soaked from the snow. I tremble, part hypothermia and part anxiety.

"That's it." I say softly. In the sounds of the traffic and snow falling and my own rapid heartbeat, I think I can hear him stepping back emotionally.

He doesn't move but it feels like he couldn’t be further away. After a second he pulls out a bottle of hand sani from his pocket, "So, I don’t need this anymore?"

I laugh. It's filled with relief and tears. He wraps his arms around me and kisses the top of my head, "I'm so glad. My hands are so chapped." I cry/laugh harder. He laughs too and I swear for a small moment I hear a sob in there.

"I'm so sorry, Em."

"Sarah." I whisper.

He pulls me back, "I like Sarah better anyway." He presses his warm lips into my forehead and takes my mitt in his again, "But I can't actually feel my legs so can we go now?"

I nod.

I don’t offer him a way out. I don’t tell him he can leave and let me go home. It's not like the first date. He's become part of the baggage I now carry. I have a morbid curiosity to see where it goes.

"So can we eat at a normal restaurant?"

I nod, "I haven’t done it yet. Been in crowds and eaten at a regular place." His eyes light up and the hazel flashes under the street light, "So a first?"

I smile, "A first."

Chapter Seventeen

The restaurant is busy. The waitresses look like they might be selling something beyond food.

I cut my piece of chicken and try to keep calm. I've cut everything on my plate into tiny pieces. My stomach doesn’t like restaurants yet. Not this kind. The noise of everyone else is disturbing and annoying.

"Stop."

I look up at him and frown, "What?"

He laughs, "Stop. I see it still. Your eyes are darting around the room like you're plotting something and you look like I'm forcing you to eat liver."

I drop the cutlery and shiver.

He leans forward and touches my hands. I like that. "Not everything is going to change all at once."

I pull my hands away and rest them in my lap and try not to feel failure in the meal. "I'm disappointed in myself. I hoped I would be able to do it."

He nods at the blonde waitress. She comes over grinning at him.

"Can we get our bill please?" He says. She looks at our full plates and frowns, "Is everything okay?"

He shakes his head, "It's fine. We just need to leave."

I watch him. I force myself to stop staring at his mouth.