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“Okay,” I said. She stared at me, probably expecting more resistance.

“Okay, so. Your curfew is still in place and when you go out on dates, we want to know where you’re going and when you’re going to be back. I would also prefer that you seriously consider the consequences of any, ah, activity.” Shit, we were having a sex talk. We’d had one before, but now things were different.

“I’m not going to tell you what to do because I know you’re smart enough to know what’s right for you, but I do want you to be careful. Okay? And I know you’re going to be off at college and can do whatever you want, but I’m still having a problem realizing that you’re all grown up. When did that happen?” She sighed.

“Thanks. I can do that,” I said.

“Good. I can see how much you care about her, and I just want to wrap you up in a bubble so you don’t get your heart broken, but I know that I can’t do that.”

“I really like her, Mom. A lot.” She stroked my head.

“I know. I can see it. And I still want to meet her.”

I didn’t want to share just how much I liked Stella. Not yet.

“I’ll ask her about it.” I was going to put that off as long as possible.

Mom looked down at her wedding ring. “I fell in love with your father when I was fourteen, so I know that it can happen when you’re young and that it can last. Even if I could have dated around and gotten married later, I wouldn’t have picked anyone else.” I wouldn’t pick anyone else but Stella, but it was impossible to know the future.

“Anyway, I just wanted to have that little talk with you. I love you, honey.” I leaned in and she gave me a hug.

“I love you, too.” She didn’t mention anything about pot smoke and I scurried away to change my clothes.

“S
o, is this our first real date?” I asked when Stella picked me up the next day. I’d told my mom where we were going and when we were going to be back and she hounded me again about having Stella over for dinner so I guess that was going to happen sooner rather than later. My mom was persistent.

“I don’t know. Do you count last night?” Shit. Last night. After I’d gone back to my room I’d undressed and thought about kissing Stella as I got myself off.

Four times.

“I don’t know. Let’s see how today goes and then we’ll decide.” I turned on the radio and flipped through the stations.

“But we need to know the anniversary of our first date so we can celebrate.” Good point.

“Okay, last night can be our first date and this can be our first date-date.” I found the pop station and hummed along to the current song that was playing twenty-four seven.

“What’s a date-date?” We argued about that for the rest of the way to the movie theater. I bought the tickets and Stella got the popcorn and sodas.

“I can’t believe we’re doing this,” I said, taking the popcorn from her and handing her a ticket.

“We’re dating just like normal people.”

“I know, right?” We laughed and headed into the theater.

The movie was one of the latest romantic blockbusters. I hadn’t really cared about seeing it, but I figured if we weren’t watching the movie, we could potentially make out in the back of the theater.

“Let’s sit back there,” I said, pointing to the last row of seats. There were only a few people and they sat way up front, so we were pretty alone back there.

“I know why you want us to sit back here and I completely approve of it,” Stella said, sitting down and putting her soda in the cup holder.

“Good. I was hoping you would.” I popped a piece of popcorn into my mouth and smiled at her.

“Don’t eat it all,” she said, shoving her hand into the tub.

“I’ll share because I love you.” I tilted the tub toward her and she smiled.

“Aw, you’re so sweet. You’re trying to out-sweet me.” We had nearly finished the popcorn by the time the previews started. Stella pulled some wipes out of her purse and we cleaned the fake butter off our fingers.

She leaned over and I put my arm around her.

“I’ve never done this before. Not even with a boy,” she said, leaning closer.

“Me neither,” I said watching her eyes glow from the light of the screen.

She kissed me softly and then turned to watch the movie.

I just wanted to watch her, so I did. Half of my attention was on the movie (which was very heterosexual) and half was on her. The way she smiled, the way she laughed, how she concentrated.

“Stop staring at me,” she whispered at one point.

“Can’t help it,” I said. She smirked and then reached her hand over, sliding it slowly up my thigh. I went rigid in my seat and Stella laughed softly next to me.

Shit.

Her fingers leisurely walked their way up my leg and stopped on the top of my thigh. She squeezed gently and then withdrew her hand.

“You are evil,” I whispered. “I’m going to get you for that.”

“God, I hope so.”

“I
wonder if anyone knows we’re on a date,” Stella said as we were seated at the restaurant. It was just one of those nicer chain places, but I didn’t care as long as we were together.

“Probably not. They just think we’re friends.” I looked around, but no one was paying attention to us.

“I could kiss you and then that would make things clear. Or we could sit on the same side and feed each other.” I made a face.

“I love you, but I draw the line at feeding each other. Unless it’s like, chocolate strawberries or something.” Her eyes lit up.

“Ohhhh, that would be sexy. We should do that for our anniversary or something.” I thought the anniversary talk was a little premature, but it was really sweet that she thought that way.

Our server came over and took our drink orders and asked if we were ready to order food.

“I think we’ll have the spinach and artichoke dip as an ap, right, baby?” Stella said, winking at me. The server, a guy who probably wasn’t much older than us looked from Stella to me and his face went red.

“Sure, babe. That sounds good,” I said, grinning at her. The guy stuttered that he was going to put that order in. We waited until he left before we started laughing.

“I think you just gave that guy a heart attack. You’re so bad.” Stella shrugged.

“If he’s scared by lesbians than I have some bad news for him. We’re everywhere.” I snorted.

“So, what did you think about Tris and Polly? They’re really cute, right? I think we could be friends with them,” I said and Stella put down her menu.

“Polly is adorable. I feel bad about Tris, though. I can understand why she was a little suspicious of us at first.” It was a reminder that not everyone was as accepting as our friends and families.

“I think we could be friends with them. It would be nice to have gay friends.” I agreed.

I told her about my mom’s little “talk” she’d had with me last night and she laughed.

“My dad hasn’t said anything to me. I guess he figures that since I’m going to be in college he might as well not bother.” I wish my mom had felt that way.

“Has she backed off about the practice essays?” she asked me after we ordered our food.

“Not at all. Her new idea is to have me write about being gay. She thinks they’ll be more eager to accept me because of ‘diversity.’” I put the word “diversity” in air quotes.

“She did not.”

“Swear to God. And I might actually do it. I mean, I have a lot of things to say about and it’s better than writing something stupid that I don’t care about.” Our dip came and Stella dove for the first chip.

“That’s a good point. Maybe I’ll take a leaf out of your book.” I snorted.

“I’ll let you take a leaf out of my book anytime, baby.” Stella threw a chip at me.

“That was a terrible innuendo.”

“Made you think about me naked, though, didn’t it?” Her face went red.

“Everything makes me think about you naked, Ky.”

I
finally agreed to go over to Kyle’s house for a dinner with her family on Sunday. I figured the sooner I got it over with, the better.

Kyle opened the door and gave me a nervous smile.

“Don’t freak out,” she whispered as she held the door open.

“Stella, it’s so nice to officially meet you,” Kyle’s mom said. “You can call me Kate and this is my husband Cody.” I shook both of their hands and gave Kate the flowers I’d picked up at the grocery store on the way over. I figured it couldn’t hurt to suck up a little.

“These are lovely, thank you,” Kate said as I followed Kyle into the living room. After Kate put the flowers in some water, we all sat in the living room and I prepared to be grilled.

Kyle took my hand and squeezed it. I stole a glance at her parents, but they didn’t seem too upset.

“So, Stella, Kyle says you’re a big reader,” Kate said.

“Yeah, my father’s an English professor so it was kind of inevitable.” I laughed a little nervously and then Kate started asking me about my favorite books and that opened up a book discussion and I finally started to relax.

Dinner was roast chicken with mashed potatoes and salad and it went off without a hitch. Kyle kept squeezing my hand under the table to reassure me that I was doing okay.

“What are your college plans?” I’d been hoping I could get out of this dinner without talking about that, since it was a sore spot for me and Kyle.

“I’m not sure yet. My dad doesn’t really care where I go as long as I study something I care about.” Kate and Cody shared a look. I knew that wasn’t their philosophy when it came to Kyle, but I wasn’t going to lie.

There was a bit of an awkward silence until Kyle asked for her mom to pass the potatoes and then mentioned that I was a cheerleader, so they started asking me about that.

“Mom?” Kyle said as we cleared up the dishes and took them to the sink. “We’re going to hang out in my room, okay?”

“Keep the door open!” she called from the living room.

I gave Kyle a look and she winked.

“A
re we ever gonna talk about college?” she said as we both sat on her bed, me at one end and her at the other. Just in case her mom decided to drop in with a plate of cookies or something.

I looked up at her ceiling.

“How about we not?”

“Baby, why don’t you want to talk about it?” Wasn’t it obvious?

“Because it makes me think about us being over.” She stared at me.

“Why? Because we might go to different schools and then break up?” Obviously.

“It’s just . . .  it’s not realistic.” She rolled her eyes.

“That’s bullshit and you know it. We’re not other people. We’re us. And we love each other.”

“So?” I said.

“So?! That’s the whole point!” Her mom walked by and poked her head in.

“Everything okay in here?”

“Yup, just fine,” Kyle said, her voice on edge. I gave her a smile and she left heading back to the living room.

“You wouldn’t even consider going to the same school?” she asked, picking at one of her pillows.

“That seems like a recipe for a breakup.”

“Okay, so should we just break up now and save ourselves some time?” I groaned.

“That isn’t what I meant.” She hugged the pillow to her chest.

“Then what
do
you mean?”

“I mean that I don’t want to talk or fight about this, which is why I’ve been avoiding it for so long.”

Silence fell over us.

“I’d want to go where you go,” she said quietly.

“Yeah?”

She looked up.

“Of course. I figure one college is pretty much like the next and I don’t think wanting to go to the same place as the girl I love is a stupid reason to pick one school over another. People pick schools for a lot worse reasons.” She did have a point there.

“But what if it doesn’t work out?” She stared at me and I was uncomfortable with the intensity in her eyes.

“And what if it does?”

I didn’t have an answer to that.

T
hings were a little weird after that conversation, so I decided to head home sooner than I might have. I had a lot on my mind, but I still gave Kyle a kiss goodbye and told her I would text her later in that night.

Dad was home and in the living room with a book, as usual. He looked up and must have seen the look on my face.

“What’s wrong? Did the dinner not go well?” I sighed and crashed on the couch, leaning back and closing my eyes. It felt like this day had lasted forever. I was exhausted and it wasn’t even eight.

“No, it did. Kyle and I had a little bit of a fight about college. She doesn’t see a problem with picking a college based on where I’m going and I think that’s a recipe for disaster.” He put a bookmark in his book (no dog-earing pages. Blasphemy!) and set it down.

“Why do you think it’s a recipe for disaster?” Was he serious?

“Because it’s not a good reason to pick a school.” He gazed at me.

“Why?”

“Because it’s not!” Why couldn’t anyone understand this? It was a known fact.

“It seems to me that making a decision based on what matters most to you would be the best way to go. So perhaps making a list of the things that matter to you might be a valuable exercise.” I opened my mouth to argue, but then all I could think of was Kyle and I making the list of reasons that girls were better.

“But what if it ends?” I said.

“What if it does? You can always transfer, or, if you’re at a big enough school, it might not even be an issue. I’m not telling you to go one way or the other, but what I don’t want you to do is make a decision based on what you think you’re
supposed
to do instead of what you
want
to do.” I gaped at him.

“I don’t want you to look back on your life and wish you’d been bolder with your decisions. Just think about it before you decide.” Huh. I didn’t know what to say. I just sat there for a few minutes and then told him I was going to take a shower.

I started making my list as the hot water poured down my back.

What did I care about? Kyle, obviously. A good English program. I didn’t particularly care about the campus size, or if it was in a city or rural. I didn’t care about activities, although if they had a cheer program, that would be an upside. I guess I just wasn’t that picky. I’d already looked through brochures and online, but no place had really screamed at me. They all pretty much looked the same.

So if they were all the same, how was I going to make a decision?

I braced myself against the shower wall and thought until the hot water ran out. Shivering, I got out and wrapped myself up in a towel. Even though it was still early, I put on a pair of shorts and a tank top and got into bed. I texted Kyle that I loved her and goodnight and she sent me a kissy face.

I scrolled through the pictures of her that I had on my phone. They made me smile and laugh and wish I was with her.

Was I refusing to consider going to the same school just to be stubborn? Was I depriving myself of being happy for no reason?

I thought about it all night.

T
he morning didn’t bring clarity, but it had distracted me from remembering that it was the Monday after the barn party and everyone was probably going to know that Kyle and I were together. I texted her to meet me by my car, as we’d planned.

“Hey, I was worried about you last night. Are you okay?” she asked when she got out of her car and hugged me.

“Yeah, just thinking about a lot of stuff. You ready for this?” She kissed my cheek and took my hand swinging it with hers.

“You bet, baby.”