Chapter Eight

Jon missed Sansa. It was actually quite pathetic how much he missed her after four days. But, to be fair, this was the longest they'd gone without some kind of contact. A text message, a phone call, an email – there was always something if they weren't physically hanging out together. Now it was just radio silence.

Where there was an absence of Sansa, there was an abundance of Ygritte. They had figured out when they both had breaks between classes and so they met up after or before, had dinner together, hung out in his dorm…made out.

Jon had only been with Val and he found that she and Ygritte were not that different in their approach to all things sexual. Both were straight-forward about the whole thing. When Ygritte wanted him to touch her in a certain way, she would put his hand there or tell him to put his hand there – wherever 'there' was.

He felt…untrained. He was definitely not aggressive when it came to anything involving sex. He actually kind of feared the moment when things advanced to actual sex. He could easily imagine Ygritte as the dominatrix sort. Honestly, it was a bit of a downer to have her tell him what to do all the time. Jon wanted to be able to explore, not be told what to do.

But, he was still a guy and he was still getting something (hand job) so he couldn't exactly complain, could he?

But he missed Sansa.

Friday evening he went to her dorm to see her and ended up catching her as she was on her way out. She was dressed up, in a dress – black, a bit short, but modest at the top, and flats. Her hair was pulled away from her face, but fell down around her shoulders. She didn't see him at first, fiddling with something in some black purse she was carrying, until Jon reached out and touched her arm. "San."

She looked up, startled. "Oh! Hey! How are you?"

He smiled at her. "I miss you."

Hurt flashed across her features and Jon hated himself in that moment. He never wanted to be the one to hurt Sansa, and yet he had.

"You've been busy," she said and stepped away from him.

He frowned at the distance she put between them. "I acted like an ass," he admitted. "I know I did. I'm sorry."

She fidgeted with her purse. "Forget it."

"No, I can't forget it. I shouldn't have yelled at you like that. It's just that I worry about you, Sansa. I don't – I couldn't – if anything happened to you—"

"I know," she said softly. "You'd have a lot of explaining to do, right?"

"Sansa, no—"

"I release you from your duties as protector," she said with a forced smile.

"You mean more to me than someone I was asked to look after," he told her. This was not the way he'd imagined this conversation going. That she saw herself just as someone he had to play bodyguard for was irksome. "Sansa, you're my best friend."

"Robb is your best friend."

He tried not to let his annoyance show. "Fine, then you're my best girlfriend."

"Shouldn't that go to your girlfriend?"

"It's been a week, I don't know if I'd call her my girlfriend, but no. You are."

She pursed her lips together and then sighed and shook her head. "I'm sorry, I don't know what's wrong with me."

"Do you have a few minutes so we can talk? Where are you off to? You're all dressed up."

"I…" she averted her eyes and then looked back at him. "I have a date."

Jon felt as though ice had settled over him. "Oh? With who?" He hoped he sounded nonchalant because he didn't feel nonchalant.

"You don't know him," she said hastily and her eyes darted away from him.

Jon's eyes narrowed. "Sansa, please tell me it's not Dr. Lannister." If it was, he was going to pummel the guy into the middle of next week. Or report him. Possibly both.

"No! Geez, Jon. You were right about me being stupid about that. I'm not going to do anything with him. And he doesn't even see me that way anyway…"

He doubted that very much, but if what he'd said four days ago had penetrated her sometimes thick head then he'd go with it. "So, who is this guy I don't know? Does he have a name?"

"Hmm?"

"Does he have a name, this guy you're going on a date with?"

"It's um, Dr…ogo. Drogo."

"Are you sure?"

"I always pronounce it wrong, you know how that must go dating a girl with a name like Regret."

"Ygritte."

"To-may-toe, To-mah-to, whatever."

"Sansa—"

"So, I'm gonna go," she started walking backwards away from him, "meet my date…like ya do…"

"Where is he taking you?" Jon asked and took a step towards her.

"To dinner."

"Where?"

"Jesus, have I asked you where you've taken what's-her-face?"

"Why are you getting so snippy with me?"

"Because I have to go and you're asking twenty questions."

"Why isn't he picking you up here?"

She threw up her hands in exasperation. "Exhibit A. Goodnight, Jon."

She hurried off before Jon could ask her something else and for half a minute he considered following her to see what this Drogo looked like. For the second time in four days Jon very much wanted to hit something. No. Someone.

xxxxxxxx

Sansa was nervous about her date with Jaime – was it a date? It was dinner at his house, so that had to be a date, right? Or was she being too "little girl" about it and thinking it was something all romantic when he just thought of her as a student and a friend?

Either way, she was still nervous, and running into Jon had thrown her off. After four days of no contact, she had been happy to see him. Well, happy and sad. All she kept thinking when she did see him was He's with Ygritte. He has a girlfriend. You are no longer important to him anymore. Then she thought of the things that Jon probably did with her, like fool around. Had they had sex yet? It hurt her heart to think of that.

When he'd asked about her date (is it a date?), she had realized that if she told Jon she was going to Jaime's again he would have a canary. Then she'd had to pause as the image of a canary flying out of Jon's rear end invaded her mind.

She'd thought fast and came up with her RA's boyfriend's name as a way to cover where she was really going. Jon bought it, or at least she thought he did. She hoped he did. Granted, he'd gotten all protective again a la Robb, but that was probably because that was exactly how he saw himself: her big brother on campus while her actual big brother was not around.

What did Ygritte have that Sansa didn't, she couldn't help but wonder. She and Jon had been close – she didn't feel so close to him right now – they spent every minute together practically, what was it that kept him from ever feeling anything for her? And why the hell was she thinking about this?

Now, in Jaime's car, Sansa just wanted to focus on him and them, if there was a them, and not Jon and his stupid girlfriend (even if he did say he didn't know if he'd call her that!).

"You're quiet," Jaime said.

"I know," she said with a little laugh.

"Have I told you how beautiful you look tonight?"

Well, that was one way to derail the obsessively-thinking-about-Jon-train she'd been on. She felt her cheeks redden and she smiled in what she hoped was a coy manner. "Thank you," she said. "You always look handsome though, Jaime, I don't think I need to tell you that."

He grinned. "Why thank you, Sansa. So, I've made us lasagna. And by made it I mean I ordered it from the Il Forno in town."

Sansa laughed. "That sounds wonderful."

"I thought after dinner we could go outside on my deck. I hear there is supposed to be a meteor shower tonight and I thought we could use my telescope to check it out."

Sansa beamed at him. "That sounds so awesome."

As soon as the words were out of her mouth she wished she could take them back. She sounded like a high schooler. Granted, she was only nineteen, but still. Jaime was so…cultured. Worldly. She clearly was not, but she wanted to be.

But Jaime was ever gracious and he laughed and smiled and said, "It is pretty awesome."

It was then that Sansa relaxed. A little at least. He asked about her classes, how she got along with his brother, Tyrion, and then how things were going with Jon.

She wrinkled her nose. "I don't want to talk about Jon."

And so they didn't.

By degrees Sansa relaxed more. She had all the butterflies of a first date and the anticipation of what could happen, plus she hated awkward silences – but she held her own. When stumped as to what to say, she asked a question and listened to Jaime talk. Jon was always so quiet, yet Sansa never felt she had to fill the space when silence fell between them. It was always comfortable with them.

They settled in the kitchen together as before, talking and laughing together and then they ate – it was very good and Sansa complimented him on his ordering skills to which he laughed – and then went outside to the telescope.

Jaime showed her how to use it and they took turns chatting and peering through it. Sansa didn't care if she saw any meteor's, she was just enjoying looking through the telescope as it was.

When she managed to catch a falling star in the telescope, she grew very excited. "Oh my God, Jaime, the shooting star! I can see it in here! Wow, that is totally amazing!" When she pulled away from the telescope to give him a turn to look, he kissed her.

Sansa gripped his shirt, and it took her a second to catch up to what was happening. But then she kissed him back and hoped she did it well. In her limited experience, Sansa thought Jaime was a practiced kisser. His lips were soft, his touch gentle upon her waist. When he broke the kiss he pressed his forehead to hers. "I hope you don't mind that I did that," he whispered. He pulled his head back and looked at her. "I've been wanting to do that all night."

She smiled. "I don't mind at all. In fact, if you wanted to do it again…" I promise to do better.

And then he did.

When they broke apart this time, Sansa looked up at him. "So, this was a date, right?"

Jaime laughed and kissed her again, quickly. "Yes, Sansa, this was a date."

"I won't tell anyone," she whispered.

"Not even Jon?" he asked with an arched brow.

"Especially not him," she said and leaned up to kiss him again.