Sean

Flora dug out her phone and said, "Can I tell everyone that we are back together?"

Why wasn't I surprised that this was happening again? Her phone knew more about her than I did. I didn't mind her labelling me, unlike the way Jake freaked out over being "marked", but it was the way Flora addressed issues like these that worried me.

"Yes, but do you have to do it now?" I said reluctantly. Getting back together meant different things to us. I thought it was something precious. She treated it like gossip.

I wasn't normally like this, but Flora just had this power to make me question everything about myself. Was I cool, interesting, special enough for her? Would I be able to hold her attention this time?

"I can't hold in something this big!" she exclaimed. "I'm too excited I'm going to burst like a blowfish."

"Flora, there's something I want to talk to you about."

"Wait. Smile!" She held her phone up and before I even realized what happened, she had taken a photo of us together while she planted a kiss on my cheek. She pulled away immediately and she was back into the arms of her iPhone.

"Is that going public too?"

She nodded, typing away on her cellphone fast. A smile played at her lips.

"Can I at least check how I look? I need to make sure my hair looks fine." I just wanted to redirect her attention back to me.

Flora smiled and showed me the photo. "You look how you always look. Perfect. You are so cute it's outrageous."

I didn't look perfect. I looked startled and confused, which was pretty accurate. Even her 8MP iSight camera was more perceptive than she was.

I waited while she posted on whatever social media she thought was necessary, or maybe all eight of them. When she was finished she had completely forgotten my attempt of conversation. She checked the time and gasped.

"It's past noon! We are totally behind schedule," she announced, jumping up and grabbing me. "Hurry hurry. We have to get to the next stop."

I stifled a sigh. Her batteries would run out eventually, right? Even iPhones needed recharging. Maybe when she calmed down, she would have enough patience to listen to me.

***

The next stop was a pristine lake. I had no idea why Flora knew of these places, but her knowledge of recluse locations beat Lonely Planet. After she parked her car she suggested we walked around the whole lake, which was supposed to be an easy hike.

I knew she planned this for my sake too. I liked hiking, and the view was glorious. It would have been peaceful and amazing if her phone didn't ring every thirty seconds.

"Who gets so many phone calls on a Saturday?" I complained. "It's as if you run your own newsroom."

"Well, I am news itself," she explained. "And my 900 friends want to congratulate me on my new found love."

I exhaled. "Your new found love is right here and he wants to talk to you too."

"Yes, but..." Her phone rang again. "This one I have to take. It's Sandy."

I let her talk as I followed behind her on the hiking trail. Could I confiscate her phone after being together for less than one hour? She knew I was bossy and demanding. Maybe she would let me.

"...he's going to be mad but...I don't care...he won't...I'm going to tell him..."

Snippets of her conversation drifted by me and I couldn't help but hear some very puzzling phrases.

"What did Sandy say about us?" I asked.

She bit her lips. "That I have the sick pleasure of letting you break my heart."

"What? Why did she say that?"

"It's...it's something I did," she said, averting my gaze. "But I don't want to tell you now."

"But you are making me feel very uneasy right now."

"I'll tell you later. Right now I just want to enjoy being with you. No heavy talk, okay?" She pleaded me with her eyes.

She was finally going to tell me, I realized. She would tell me and I would tell her I forgive her as long as she never did it again. I could feel this dense fog hanging between us; I liked her so much but there had always been this haziness, like I was watching her through tinted glass. It would be so nice to break that glass and talk openly.

After we completed the walk and got back to her car, she opened the trunk and took out a picnic basket.

"I made these myself," she presented proudly. "Sandwiches with truffle cream, a bottle of chilled tea, it's TWG 1837 black, mind you, and strawberries. I hand-dipped those."

I saw that the strawberries were chocolate-covered and imagined Flora dipping each and every one of them with her dainty fingers. A very pretty sight.

"Thanks, Flora. That's really nice."

"This isn't just chocolate," she clarified. "It's Valrhona."

Needless to say I had no idea what that meant but I supposed it was something expensive, as well as everything else in her picnic basket.

"This is my attempt of making something for you," she said.

I nodded in appreciation. "I know. You put a lot of thoughts in arranging a date for us. Thank you."

"I imagine this is what you like. Is it?"

"It is. Of course it is." To be honest I'd rather have a plate of hot food, but as long as she made me feel like she cared about me, I could put up with anything. Even her 900 friends. I let her feed me strawberries and I thought nothing else mattered.

Flora had packed a large waterproof blanket, but she had to add another layer of cashmere on top. Could this be anymore unreal? We lay on the grass near the lake and it was serene and wonderful. I closed my eyes briefly and let the winter sunlight fall on my face.

Flora sat up suddenly.

"Let's do something crazy."

"How crazy? Like breaking into an empty construction site crazy, or get matching tattoos kind of crazy?" I said dryly.

She mused. "Hmm. These are pretty good ideas. Wait....I got one. Do you have a dream car?"

"Maybe a Ferrari 458? Or any type of Lamborghini."

Flora nodded solemnly. "Let's go test drive one."

"Are you serious? They won't just let us test drive unless we look like serious buyers."

"We will pull up in my Mercedes and I'll flash my VISA black. Oh my god that's so exhilarating!" She sat up straighter and I could practically see lights shooting off her eyes like laser beams.

"But we are teenagers and I'm wearing Converse."

Flora slumped down. "That's true. What a shame. The idea of you driving a Lamborghini really turns me on." Her lips curled up slyly. "Where do you want that tattoo?"

I laughed.

"How about a shooting range?" She didn't give up. "Come on, there must be some crazy stuff you want to do together."

I rolled over on the blanket and propped myself on my elbows. "There is, actually. There is something I've always wanted to do with you but it's not crazy. In fact, lots of high school couples are doing it everyday," I suggested as a joke.

She tilted her head and pretended not to get it. "No thanks, Sean. I don't want to study together."

I chuckled. "You know what? Can we not do anything crazy and just be together? I really just want to hold you and talk to you. I don't need any outside stimulant." That was typical Flora. With her it was like five exciting dates rolled into one. Unless I suggested robbing a bank, she would never like anything I planned.

"Alright then," Flora agreed. I pulled her back down so she was lying in my arms. She played with my fingers. I closed my eyes and breathed in her hair. She smelled so nice, like she just rolled around in a bed of jasmine. I savored the weight of her on me.

"Okay. Tell me the worst thing you've ever done," Flora said.

My eyes flung open. "You're so full of drama."

She wiggled her body, and we were facing each other. "I'm curious what evil you could possibly have done. You seem like the kind of guy who doesn't have a single thing to hide."

That wasn't the first time I heard something like that. My friends all thought that I didn't have secrets, but that's because we had different definitions. What I did on weekends, contents of my e-mails, and who I dated were not secrets.

Secrets were, for example, what I felt around Flora. It was a Pandora box of all the wrong feelings: vulnerability, uncertainty, rapture, possessiveness, jealousy and a feeling of out-of-control.

"I bet it's something boring like you cheated on a few tests in middle school," Flora said.

"I actually never cheated on tests."

"Duh." Flora smacked her forehead. "That's true. Whose answer are you going to peek at? You might as well trust yourself."

"I played a bit of online video games in seventh-grade," I told her the first thing that came to mind. "There was a bully in my school, and I hacked into his account and stole all his weapons."

Flora was silent for two seconds and burst out laughing. "That's it? That's the worst thing you've ever done? Big deal. You stole some virtual swords."

"I thought it was pretty mean. He must have spent tons of money and time on it."

"All I know is that you were a hacker and that's so cool. I'm adding another 5 points on you. Hacker Sean is very sexy."

Flora always had a whole different take on things. "Okay. There's something I've never told anyone before."

She nodded for me to go on.

"When I started middle school there was a kid on the school bus who got picked on a lot. There was a lot of name calling and shoving, but I never said anything because I just wanted to stay out of trouble. I thought I was an easy target myself. I was scrawny back then with braces, plus I was labeled as a brainy kid which is a bad thing in the middle school anarchy.

By the second year the bullying got worse, but I had started playing basketball and I grew a lot taller, so from time to time I would tell the other kids to back off. They didn't. Even Dylan joined in, and he would sometimes say nasty stuff to him. He may not be an angel now, but back in middle school he was a lot worse."

"I know Dylan teases people a lot but I never take him for a bully."

"Yes, but if it's any excuse, his dad was dying of cancer then and he had a lot of frustrated anger. Anyway, one day on the bus, I helped him. The whole school was watching, and after that I was viewed as this kid's savior. He thought I was his only friend and whenever anyone picked on him he expected me to stand up for him, and I always did."

"I'm waiting for the plot twist," Flora said. "So far you sound like a hero riding on a white horse."

"Don't worry, there's a twist. I hated the idea of bullying, but I can't say I really liked Martin--that's his name--either. Just because I stood up for him doesn't mean I wanted to hang out with him. I was just doing what I thought was right, but he was always hanging around my locker and complaining about how miserable he was, and it got increasingly annoying. One of these days he showed up again and he was whining about how someone tipped over his drink in the cafeteria, and I just lost it. I mean, I wasn't his guardian angel. He should learn to fight his own fights once in a while."

"I agree completely. You can't defend him all the time," Flora supported. "Even Spiderman wants to take a break sometimes."

"I told him to shut up and I swore at him. That evening he slashed his wrists."

"What!" Flora gasped. She covered her mouth with one hand and her eyes widened, full of compassion. "He didn't die right? Tell me he didn't die."

"He almost did, but then he pulled through. Nobody knew I had anything to do with it but I did. He tried to kill himself because of me."

"Oh, Sean. You can't blame yourself for it. You did what you can."

"No I didn't. I betrayed him."

"Hey, that's not your fault." Flora reached over and held my hand. It was amazing how the mere touch of her fingers made me feel lighter.

"I couldn't face him afterwards. I wanted to apologize but I was too scared. I have always been very bad at expressing feelings and I tend to avoid confrontation at all costs. When I'm faced with a traumatic event I usually just bottle up my feelings and never talk about it."

Flora's phone rang and she embarrassedly pressed mute. "Sorry. Please go on."

"After that Dylan dragged me with him to the hospital because he felt guilty, but actually he really didn't do that much to him and he stopped long before it happened. We went with Dylan's mom, but because Martin wouldn't let anyone visit him, she suggested that we wrote a card. Dylan sat in the waiting area and I was so surprised he had that much to say. He filled up the whole card explaining how angry he had felt when his dad passed away and how sorry he was.

He asked me to write a few words too because he thought Martin would like to hear from me. I wrote get well soon and signed my name. Even in writing I was a coward. He transferred later and I never saw him again and I never told him I was sorry."

"Wow. That was...really heavy." She took hold of my hand again, squeezing my fingers gently. "I didn't know you and Dylan shared such a dark past."

"Yeah, we go back a long way."

"He's a pretty decent guy after all."

"Yes, nowadays he only picks on me and Jake. Mostly me," I said. "That's why my dad told you I was bitter and cynical in middle school. I really hated middle school. Not even my parents know what happened."

"Thanks for telling me, Sean. I feel very privileged. But you know, these supposedly bad things you've done only make me like you more. You really are Church Sean."

"Come on. I almost killed someone."

She rolled her eyes. "Stop being a drama king. You have a really good heart."

She wrapped her arms around me and I felt strangely comforted. I did not even know what propelled me to tell her, because I knew Flora wasn't the best listener in the world, but as her warmth seeped into me I knew. It was because Flora was the most important person to me and I wanted her to approve of me badly, to tell me that it was okay, that she still thought of me as a good person.

Paradoxically, as much as Flora made me feel insecure, she also made me feel safe at the same time. She gave me an adrenaline rush but also calmed my nerves. She could give me all the emotional support I needed without saying anything.

"Sadly that incident didn't make me more compassionate," I continued. "Part of me was even upset by the unfairness of it. I did more damage to him than the people who bullied him for years, because it's worse to stop being nice for one second than to be bad all the time. I really don't feel like going out of my way to help people anymore, and I generally just mind my own business. I went from being disinterested to being withdrawn."

Flora looked at me like I was Dalai Lama. "No, you are just saying that. If you come across some sort of injustice, I know you would still stand up."

"I don't know. Luckily high school is a much better place. Everyone more or less found where they belonged and there's no one waiting to be rescued right now."

"Probably just me drowning in my admiration toward you."

I laughed and she hugged me tighter. It struck me that we had never been on a date during which we just accompanied each other and talked. Flora loved a huge crowd so we were at a lot of parties or hanging out with friends, either that or we would be in her room getting physical, with me roaming my hands where they shouldn't go and hoping that she would let me do a little more than the last time. It meant a lot that I could talk to her, and I felt myself sinking in Flora's charm like in a quicksand. I was the one that needed rescuing.

"I kind of dig that you are...detached," she said, her face full of affection. "I mean, everyone dreams of making friends with the whole school and be voted prom king, and you can totally do it but you are too cool for that."

But you obviously dig the prom king too, Flora. "That's so not everyone's dream. The crown looks fake and it crashes with my style," I mocked her tone and she giggled. "I have a very narrow comfort zone. I only feel comfortable around probably five people and it doesn't even include my parents."

She smiled and stroked my face gingerly. "Do I make the cut?"

"I wouldn't use the word comfortable to describe what I feel around you," I admitted.

"Then what word would you choose?" Her eyes sparkled.

"I'd probably go with...overwhelmed."

She laughed. "I thought you were going to say horny, but I guess overwhelmed works too."

I joined in her laugh. "I have to be honest, I pretty much feel horny all the time with or without you."

She leaned in and kissed me. Only Flora could kiss me the way she did. It literally melted all my troubles away, and I was so glad her phone didn't ring. We made out properly for a while until she pulled away, and I knew the time had finally come to settle this one last thing.

"Flora, what's the worst thing you've ever done?"

***