Coder Girl /Dreamwastaken/

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"You helped me so much!" I stuck out my bottom lip, thinking of ways I could thank him.

"I had fun actually. Been years since I wrote an essay," he smiled, shutting down the laptop and putting it away, "what you wanna do now?"

"I don't know.. let's-"

I wanted to say something when he got  a notification on his phone and the screen lighted up. The lockscreen was different from the one he had before, but it looked familiar as hell. Squinting my eyes at it, I finally recalled what it was.

The picture Nick took. Of me and Clay kissing.

"Uh- uhm, I.. I don't know." I tried to continue my sentence without seeming off. Maybe he didn't see me looking at his phone.

"Can I ask a question?" He made eye contact. Oh no, did he see? "It's a bit personal, but I've been wanting to ask it for a while now."

My heart started beating faster from the intimidation. I was already flustered to begin with, and his seriousness made me lose my self control even more.

"Go on." I couldn't say that I wasn't curious.

We both got comfortable, sitting on the bed in a way that made it easier for us both to be fully visible to each other. I always valued looking at people's body language during conversations, cause sometimes it said more than the actual face expression.

"I don't know how to put this to not seem out of the blue," he cracked his fingers, "but.. uhh.. I wanted to ask, uhm, if you've ever been in a relationship before? You can totally not answer if you're uncomfortable or if you don't want to."

"It's okay.." I chuckled, relieved that it wasn't anything too serious, "Yeah, I have. Not with a guy tho."

As I expected, he was taken aback from my words.

"How many relationships did you have?" He asked.

"One. That one only." The memories were coming back, but the pain wasn't as strong as it was before.

"So, uh.. how did it go..?" Clay was being careful with his question, probably already guessing that we were talking about one of the most traumatizing experiences of my life.

"As you can see from my commitment issues, very bad." I laughed to fight back the sadness that was threatening to come, thinking if I wanted to go there or not.

He didn't say anything else, giving me the full control of the situation. I could start talking about the details or change the topic. It was all in my hands. And after a bit of thinking, I realized that I want him to be the first person I talk about that experience openly to.

"She was my best friend of like 8 years. And uh, yeah, over time, when we were like 15 or something, I realized that I have the biggest crush on her. It didn't make sense to me at first, cause I hadn't explored my sexuality at that time and had no idea what was going on. I was confused."

I started playing with the hem of my shirt anxiously. Talking wasn't my strongest suit, and talking about this particular memory was even harder.

"At around 16 the way I felt about her was like changing rapidly. Didn't feel like a crush anymore, she'd constantly be on my mind and I would try to look good when we sent each other stupid selfies..? I never did that, and it was the first time something like that was happening to me. I was still young, didn't even know what it was that I was feeling."

I watched him nod, keeping his attention fully on me, while I tried my best to keep mine on random stuff to make it easier for me to talk.

"And then a year later I came out as bisexual. It wasn't a big deal for my family and friends, they kinda had already figured it, but it was a big deal for me cause I was finally confident in what I was feeling and who I was."

"Aw.." His lips curled into a sweet smile from my words. I know he had probably guessed it by now, but it was the first time I was admitting it openly.

"And she never spoke about her sexuality. All I knew was that she was supportive of me and used to like flirt.. not just casual flirting. In a way that messed with my feelings." I sighed before continuing, "And one day we got in a fight about something, and it escalated very quickly from yelling at each other to kissing. I don't even remember, the memories are mostly blocked by now."

He could see clearly how hard it was for me to even remember what happened. My brain had really strong coping mechanisms, and the memories that were traumatizing to me are halfway gone by now.

"It's okay if you don't want to-" he started but I shook my head, wanting to continue, "okay, at least come here."

I crawled to the pillow he put on his lap and put my head on it, looking up at him as he played with my hair for comfort.

"Yeah, so.. long story short, we confessed our feelings to each other and started dating. For a year," talking was way easier now when I was under his touch, "and I was falling for her more and more throughout the relationship, I was like madly in love."

I paused after that, laughing at the worst part that was about to come. The climax of the whole story, the thing that broke me so much back then, yet was making me laugh now.

"And after 8 months of dating, she just ends it all by saying that being in a relationship with a girl wasn't for her. And that she was just exploring her sexuality, and realized that it's not for her," I didn't know why my own words sounded funny to me, but they did, "and yeah, I basically lost a best friend, girlfriend, a lover and my will to commit to someone in one day. Fun."