26. A Friend To Lean ON

The next four days went pretty much the same as Monday had. The worst part was trying to take notes in classes and then read them again later. My left handed chicken scratch looked for more like the pre alphabetic scribblings of a one year old! If Connor and the others hadn't been so kind as to photocopy their notes from classes for me I would never have been able to pass a test over any of the material covered that entire week. I was praying that Saturday would hurry so I could finally get the stinking brace off and resume life as a self sufficient individual again.

Connor continued to be a gentleman taking care of me all day and taking me home after rehearsals every night. There was never an awkward moment between us. Conversations seemed to flow so simply between us with very few lulls of silence. It was now natural to hold his hand, and I was now doing it without even thinking twice about it. Things were comfortable between us as they were, but we still hadn't bridged any new frontiers in our relationship. Besides the occasional kiss on the cheek or forehead when saying goodbye, there was no further "lip action" involved, which was okay with me because I was very nervous at the prospect of my first kiss. I knew he probably had more experience at this whole relationship thing than I did and I was really worried that I was going to be bad at it. For this reason, I was more than a little anxious about our weekend plans for our triple date.

Every night for the next four nights I also spent my last few waking minutes talking, or at the very least texting, with Seth. He had such an amazing week. He got to see more of the movie made, got to do personal interviews with some of the stars, and got to tour some of the major landmarks during his stay. His favorite part of the whole week was the beautiful weather and the unending sunshine, which of course made his Friday morning return to dreary La Push a bit of a downer.

"Everything just seems so gray here now." He complained as he talked to me while sitting in front of his living room window at home.

"Yeah, I'd kill to get to go somewhere sunny for a little while. I'd love to see California one day. Maybe I can talk Jake and Nessie into taking me sometime."

"That'd be awesome, maybe I could come down and meet you guys and show you all the stuff I saw this last week."

"Maybe this summer, if we're lucky, we can talk them all into it. I'm going to keep my fingers crossed!"

"So, how was school today? That Amy girl still giving you trouble?" Amy had been purposely doing things to mess me up at practice the past few days trying to make me look bad in front of Mrs. J. Luckily Mrs. J wasn't so easily fooled and called Amy on it, but it was still annoying and unnerving. Five more weeks to go and if she was going to keep this crap up it was going to be a long five weeks.

"Eh, she was okay today. I think she knows she got busted last time and doesn't want kicked out of the whole thing. All I know is that if she keeps holding on to this grudge, the next five weeks are going to suck big time."

"How about the big date? Everything still all set?"

"Yeah, we're pretty much sticking with the same game plan as last weekend. I hope it all goes smoothly."

"I'm sure it will and if he tries to get too hands on I hear you're perfectly capable of kicking the crap out of him, so we won't have to worry about that at least!" He said laughing.

"Now who could have ever told you about that? Let me guess you ended up talking to Emmett recently."

"How'd you guess?" he responded still chuckling.

I just sighed not really knowing how to respond. "I don't really think that will be our problem." I finally responded sarcastically.

He got really quiet. "What exactly do you mean by that?"

"Well, it's just that he's never really tried ANYTHING besides holding my hand and kissing my cheek. He's been alone with me in the car every night for a week and has never made any moves." I sighed as I felt my cheeks turning pink over the embarrassment of the things that were pouring out of my mouth, but Seth had become my best friend and I just really needed to talk. "I mean, a part of me is glad he hasn't. I'm really nervous about the whole kissing thing since I've never done it before or anything, but then again it concerns me that he hasn't even tried…like maybe something's wrong…like maybe he doesn't WANT to kiss me."

Seth was very quiet on the other end of the line. I started feeling bad for babbling on at him so much about all of this teen drama when he sighed and started in, "Well to be honest I'm glad he's not pushing too fast. He seems like a good guy. I seriously doubt that it is that he doesn't want to kiss you, but rather he's looking for the right time. Don't worry things will work out fine and you don't want him to just plant one on you on a regular boring night. It'll be better if it's really special…especially when it's your very first time."

I laughed lightly, suddenly embarrassed to be getting kissing advice from a guy friend. "Thanks Seth, you're right. And I'm sorry for laying all of this on you, it's just well, you're my best friend now and sometimes you just need to be able to talk about stuff that's driving you nuts with someone other than family members who would probably rather you stay locked in a glass box until you're thirty anyway."

I heard Emmett cracking up from the room down the hall that he shared with Rosalie. "Well, I guess Emmett agrees with me anyway, he's busting a gut."

Seth was already laughing too and at the news of Emmett he laughed even harder. "It's okay Lina, it's only fair. I tortured you with stories of LA all week, the least I can do is listen to your worries about dating."

"Oh, well LA wasn't torture at all, but thanks. I appreciate it."

"Well, I need to get off here and get to work I guess. Now that I have all of this material to work with, I need to get going on actually putting this thing together. Wish me luck!"

"Good Luck! Night Seth!"

"Night Lina."

As soon as my conversation with Seth was complete. Alice and Rose came sweeping into my room with an armload of new outfits to choose from for my date the next night. Alice, having seen it would be a nice warm night, had picked out all short sleeve shirts for the occasion. I tried on several outfits but today I found in the pile a totally "me" ensemble. I smiled in the mirror as I admired the tastefully simple yet elegant way that the silky black blouse draped my frame. It would have been a tank top if it hadn't been for the lightweight material that created a small sleeve on either shoulder making the top look a bit dressier. This was matched with black jeans that had been faded to a semi dark charcoal color and a pair of sturdy black leather boots with a relatively low thick squared heel. To finish the effect my sisters slid a necklace that held a large silver heart around my neck that worked perfectly to bring just the right touch of class to the otherwise slightly plain outfit.

"This is it! It's perfect! I love it!" I beamed from my place in front of the mirror.

Alice and Rose beamed at me, proud of themselves for finally making me happy while maintaining their idea of styling standards. I made them take a couple of pictures with my cell phone before they left me to get ready for bed. I laid out my outfit carefully to keep it from wrinkling overnight, changed into my jammies, and slid into bed. I picked up my phone and looked at the picture and then put it back down on my bedside table, rolling over to turn myself into a Lina burrito with my comforter.

I laid there for a second and then rolled back over, opened my phone and brought the picture up sending it to Seth with a short note.

Alice and Rose got hold of me. This is my outfit for tomorrow. I actually like it for once. What do you think?

I put my phone back down and rolled back over to my original position. A few minutes later I heard my text alert ringing on my phone. I picked it up to see that Seth had responded.

You look wonderful! How could you ever think he would NOT want to?

I smiled and wrote back. Thanks, I needed to hear that. I was suddenly feeling much better about my date the next day.