This was going to be an amazing night, I had everything all planned out. My parents were at some fundraiser tonight until after midnight so I knew we'd have all the time in the world together.

This was what I was thinking about all day, how excited I was. Both of us wanted more intimacy and with our conflicting schedules there wasn't much of that to be had. It was the little things we both missed, like cuddling, or falling asleep together. I just wanted her near me all the time and I felt like I'd barely seen her in the last twenty four hours.

Now I was driving home after my game, I knew I had a huge smile on my face, we'd won our big game and were advancing to regionals this year. I was ready to celebrate and I was hoping Sasha was in the mood too.

When I'm about ten minutes away I send a quick text asking if she's ready. I don't get anything back for a while and I start to worry until my phone starts ringing. I pull over and answer it gladly, seeing who's name was on the screen.

"Hey baby." I say quietly. "Ready?"

"I-um.....I can't right now." She says quietly. "I'm really sorry but something really serious just happened and I can't leave."

"Why are you whispering?" I ask.

"Because, the person who it happened to is just down the hall." She hisses.

"Do you need help? Is everything alright?" I ask and she sighs.

"Yeah, I'm just really sorry." She whispers and I can hear her voice starting to break. "I know this was supposed to be our night and I've been really busy this week but....I need to be here. This is really important."

"What is it?" I ask.

"I can't tell you." She whispers. "And you don't know how hard it is for me to tell you that. But I promise I wouldn't be saying it if it wasn't important. Please trust me." She's full-on crying, I can hear it now and my heart breaks.

"It's okay....just take a breath." I whisper.

"I feel awful." She mutters through her tears. "I wanted this time with you so badly. But this is a big deal."

"Where are you?" I ask, wanting to be there and help her.

"I'm at my house." She says. "But please don't come over, I'll come over to yours as soon as I have this settled."

".....Okay?" I say feeling weirded-out by her secretive behaviour. Sasha never kept things from me.

"I'll see you soon." She says and sigh. "I love you."

"I love you too." I whisper and hang up the phone.

I felt.....really strange after that phone call. It wasn't what I was hoping for the two of us, but whatever this is it's really bothering her, she was completely broken up over the other end because she couldn't come see me right now.

I worried it might have something to do with her father. But then I remembered her saying him and her mother were out on a date tonight as advised by their therapist. So what on earth could have happened to her? Who was she with and why was she so upset?

I just had to let it go and hope she'd tell me about it at some point. It really bothered me that I couldn't be there for her and she didn't want my help with this. I had to hope she was alright and give her her space, as much as it killed me, she wanted to deal with whatever this was alone.

I went home and just went up to my room, putting away the candles I had for tonight and the box of condoms into my nightstand. I knew that wasn't what she'd be in the mood for when she did get here.

I walk into the washroom and turn on the shower. I wanted another one after the crapy rink one I'd had earlier. I stood in the shower letting the water fall over my body and I thought about her and I in this shower. How her hair stuck to her face, her wide blue eyes. It just made me miss her, it made me upset that so many things in her life kept us apart.

I did want her to go after what she wanted, but what if getting there meant losing me? She tried to warn me about this and I wouldn't listen. But I know it wouldn't have changed a thing about how I pushed her to go back to skating. I would never ask her to give up something important for me.

It was a tricky spot, I didn't even know what the right thing to do was. I just wanted her here, I wanted to talk to her about what happened, make sure she was alright. I didn't even care that we couldn't sleep together tonight, I just cared that I lost time with her.

Eventually I have to get out of the shower, I've been in here too long and I'm just starting to get more upset. I dry off quickly, pulling on a pair of boxers and turn out the lights crawling into bed. I just had to wait for her phone call letting me know she was finished with what she was dealing with.

>

I wake up seeing sun come through my window and I groan. I roll over to check my phone and I don't even see a call or a message from her. That was certainly odd, especially given how upset she sounded.

I felt really upset, I felt like I'd let her down or she'd let me down. I just felt selfish, I wished that when we made a plan like this that we could stick to it. I didn't want curve ball ruining the small amounts of time we got to spend together.

I felt most hurt that she didn't even send me another message or call me back. No matter what she always sent me a goodnight message, and she promised to let me know when she was done too. Then I start to worry, what happened to her last night? What if something bad happened? I pull back the covers and walk over to my dresser, ready to look for clothes and call Sasha.

"Nathan?" I hear and whip my head around immediately and feel my heartbeat pick up. Laying in my bed was a beautiful girl with blonde hair and a set of blue eyes. Sasha.

I rush over too fast, picking her up out of the bed. She squeals and I instantly press my lips to hers.

"What are you doing here?" I ask and she smiles.

"I told you I'd come over as soon as I sorted everything out. So I got a ride over and I still had the spare key you gave me when I stayed here. Your parents weren't home and when I came upstairs you were passed out. I was feeling tired too so I just crawled in with you." She says quietly, stroking my cheek. "I'm really sorry if I worried you."

"I just wasn't sure if you were alright or not." I tell her, running my fingers through her hair.

"I'm so sorry I ruined everything last night." She says quietly and I sit us down on my bed. "That was supposed to be time for us....I wanted to make this week up to you." She's got a few tears running over her cheeks now. "I can't tell you what happened last night, but it involves somebody close to me and they've asked me to keep it a secret for now."

I nod quietly, wiping her tears away. "It's alright."

At the end of the day, I know that the only person who wanted to spend time with their significant other more than me, was Sasha. Whatever it was, it seemed serious and I knew she wouldn't give up that time easily.

"It was just bad timing." She mutters. "I wasn't planning on doing anything that conflicted with our plans last night." I nod, pressing my lips to her forehead and she hold onto me tighter.

"You're alright though?" I ask and she nods.

"I'm just fine." She says quietly, running her fingers through my hair. "I missed you."

"I missed you too." I whisper.

Right now I didn't care about last night anymore, I was just happy to have right now. I was glad that she was safe, she slept right here in bed with me last night and that she wanted to be here. I missed her so much this week.

"I have something for you." She says quietly. "I was going to give it to you last night, but.....you know-"

"I get it." I whisper. "What is it?"

She smiles and gets off of me and goes in search of her clothes on the floor. It's only now that I'm realizing she slept in one of my t-shirts. I just smile thinking about that and I add it to the list of reasons I love her. She fishes out a box from her jacket pocket and comes back to sit next to me.

"This is it." She whispers, placing it in my hand. "I hope you like it."

I was happy to receive anything from Sasha, it was a sweet gesture. She looks almost nervous as I open the small gift box. Inside I see two metal rectangles on a chain. I look at them closer and realize they're a set of dog-tags.

"There's a keychain in there if you don't want to wear them." She whispers and I laugh pulling them out of the box, the first has a few dates etched into it, the second has a few words written in what I would presume was Russian. On the other side of both are our initials inside of a heart.

"What are the dates?" I ask and she smiles.

"This one was the day we first met, when we were six." She whispers. "This one is the day you harassed me at the coffee shop into becoming your friend again." She teases and I laugh. "This one's the day I crawled through your window and we decided to start dating."

"The Russian Words......" I start and she laughs.

"Don't you remember them?" She asks and I smile knowing even if I did I couldn't read them, they were written in the Cyrillic alphabet.

"They're not written in English." I remind her and she laughs.

"It says 'I love you to death, you'll always have a piece of my heart'." She whispers kissing my cheek. "I wanted to give them to you because I know this week has been terrible, I know we haven't gotten enough time together and I'm really sorry about that. But I want you to know, no matter what I do or where I am, that I'm thinking about you. That I miss you, that I'll never stop loving you." She stops and takes the thin ball-chain out of the box and loops it around my neck.

"You have a piece of my heart." She whispers and I can feel my eyes starting to sting. "Where ever you go I'm with you."

I almost couldn't believe it, it felt absolutely surreal. It was perfect, it was exactly what I wanted, it was the confirmation I needed. I couldn't help but laugh at the irony that she got me a piece of jewelry to show me how much she loved me.

"Thank you for pushing me to skate again." She whispers. "I know it's breaking up our free time but I love it. You made me love it again and I can't thank you enough for that. I'm bad at being a girlfriend and I know that, I just assume you know how much I love you and I go on my merry way. But I know that's not enough, I know you want more of me and I'm trying to figure out how to make that happen."

I wrap my arms around her feeling tears threatening to fall over my face. She presses her face into my chest and I sniffle a bit, trying to keep the tears out of my eyes.

"You're not a bad girlfriend." I whisper. "I know you're giving me as much time as you can, it's just selfish how much of it I want. I'm a bad boyfriend."

"Don't say that." She scolds, pulling back to hold my face in her hands. "You are an amazing boyfriend, I don't know where I'd be without you half the time. You understand me in ways nobody else does, you're patient with me even though I know I'm the most confusing girl out there. You make me, me."

"I love you." I whisper and she nods.

"I love you more." She whispers back. "I need you in my life."

"I'm not going anywhere." I breathe and she nods.

"I just feel like I ruin everything." She says quietly. "I feel like I make everything into a big deal and I just make you sad. I ruin our plans and instead we just end up like this and I end up crying. I don't want to make things so awful."

"You don't." I tell her, holding her face in my hands. "Just because we spend time together differently than we planned on doesn't make it any less special. I love you the way you are, everybody has baggage, but you let me in. You don't shut me out, you tell me why you're upset and you trust me to help you." She presses her lips together and I lean my forehead on hers. "That means you love me, and it means the world to me." She nods, smiling through her tears and I lift her back into my lap.

"I'm free tonight." She says. "Can we go out? No tears, no problems, no brothers interfering. I want to spend time with you, I don't care what we do." I nod and she wraps her arms around me. "I'll figure this out Nathan, you come first." She whispers. "Everything will settle down after Nationals, you can have me all to yourself." I laugh, giving her a tight squeeze and I hear her laugh a bit too.

"You're amazing." I tell her. "I'm proud of you."

The two of us fall back into bed and spend all the time until Sasha's afternoon practice, talking quietly and laughing together. There wasn't anything like this, it was what the two of us missed.