Epilogue

Later that night, Gav is lying in my bed, in my room, and not in my head as we watch late-night anime on Cartoon Network. He snuck in through my bedroom window after everyone went to sleep, and after about an hour of kissing practice, we decided to watch TV and talk. I've learned a lot these past few hours.

Like the fact that Gav realized how much he cared about me the night of the Homecoming Dance when he woke up and saw me staring in the mirror in the school bathroom. He said that I looked so beautiful, and he couldn't stand it that I was there with someone else and that he had no way of being there with me except as an interloper—which means third wheel, I guess. That was why he lashed out at me so harshly, because he was pissed off at the whole situation.

So I forgave him for that.

When I told him how hard it was for me to hide how I felt about him, which I admitted to having realized shortly before Homecoming, he looked shocked. He said he hadn't sensed even an inkling of my feelings until right there at the end when I let everything go. Guess I must have done a good job of hiding.

We shared a lot. We kissed a lot. And now we are just lying in silence, content.

"Hey, Ashe?" he says after a while.

"Hmmm," I murmur sleepily, happily tucked into the crook of his shoulder.

"It was all worth it." When I don't immediately respond, he continues, "Just for this, right here. This moment. I would go through it all over again, from the very beginning."

I still don't respond. I can't, because I'm crying too hard. That was the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me, and I have nothing with which to respond. Later, when Gav falls asleep, I take a piece of chalk to my wall.

Gav is the only

One who could ever make me

Want to get married

(and do what comes after)

Another crappy haiku, but when I wake up in the morning and Gav is gone, I see a little note written underneath it.

I love you, too.

Well, he said it. So now I'm going to have to say it too.

I look at the alarm clock and realize that I'm about twenty minutes late to school already. I grin. Who cares? I have a hot, smart boyfriend who isn't psychotic and who just told me he loved me first, and even knowing that he isn't going to get into my pants for a very long time.

You can't beat that.