The Casanova's Class Clown

Chap. 57: Fireworks

Her hold was weakening, so he took his chance to lean back, and met her face to face. She wouldn't look at him, her head down and lower lip bit, her face a tinge redder than his.

Somewhere, the last rocket was being lit as a band finished playing a love ballad.

Oliver held her chin, tilted her head up so she would look at him, and smiled from the heart so she'd know how much he loved her.

"Gather every point of jealousy you've ever felt toward me. Every time you thought I looked cute or cool and outright gorgeous yet still saw me as Oliver, the insecure heartthrob wanting to meet everyone's expectations. Every time you wanted to scream at the top of your lungs what you truly felt but was never able to because you were scared I'd reject you."

She tried pushing his hand away.

He held firm, keeping his eyes on her and leaning forward to the point their noses brushed against each other. "Now, multiply all those times by five years, and that's how I've felt all this time."

His breath smelled of mint. She met his eyes, hers of shock and his of determination, sincere. "You mean it wasn't recently that you...?"

He pulled back, shaking his head as he rested the hand that once held her chin on her shoulder. "Em, and you think I've been dense? You planned this entire extravaganza! Weren't you planning on confessing then?"

She stared down at the floor. "Actually, I was planning on letting whatever happened, happen. B-because if you ever rejected me, then we'd have been seen in public anyway, so the relationship I treasured died along with my expectations."

"And if I reciprocated?"

She stared at him, neither blinking. "Are you reciprocating?"

He glared.

"Yes! Yes! You are! I see that now! Sorry for denying what was obvious in front of me this whole time! Jeez!" She pouted in annoyance. "It's not my fault I was always nervous around you that I didn't notice though. Falling in love is a lot harder than how they put it out to be."

He rolled his eyes heavenward. "Tell me about it."

She looked up at him, and he leaned forward, his lips meeting hers, catching her by surprise.

It was an innocent, chaste kiss that never went farther than their lips, but her heartbeat was so loud that it drowned out the massive explosion of the final firework. A blast of DDA's colors exploding into a gigantic heart with butterfly wings, followed by an array of random, smaller fireworks exploding in different areas of the sky around the larger heart.

Fireworks were such pretty things, Emma thought as she deepened their kiss, pulling onto the lapels of Oliver's blazer, the heartthrob more than welcoming her advances.

There were a dozen thousand and more sayings comparing fireworks with life, and Emma loved each and every one of them. How your life begins in a container, pushed by a light that would send you rocketing. Some went up to the heavens, others go wrong and hit the ground, but all leaving an impact, an explosion for everyone else to hear, some to remember, most to forget, but the lives touched by the sound would always remain marked, even if the lives didn't know it themselves. And then you disperse into different directions, slowly disappearing, as was life, whether it had been lived extravagantly or ordinarily, it was fleeting, ultimately turning into nothingness.

But the remnants remain in the air, stagnant for a while before going away as well, but the impact remains there for as long as others will to remember it. And when the day comes that she and might as well everyone else disappears and leave their own individual impact, both the light and remnants drifting away, she'd be content with having touched a few lives here and there, content whether she'd live extravagantly or ordinarily no matter how fleeting.

God, she sounded like she was saying goodbye to him. But that wasn't the case, she decided. No, this was something new. A new chapter opens at the end this one, and she wasn't bidding farewell, but instead, greeting a brand new hello.

All her life she had sharpened her abilities as a comedian, the one able to make anyone laugh, the class clown.

All his life, he'd done nothing but flirt, impress, and flirt; the heartthrob, the unconscious Casanova.

And now they were together, him hers and vice versa.

She was content.

Content that she was in the arms of the person she loved that eve of his birthday, and possibly forever onwards.

She's been in love with Oliver Samder for the longest while now, and she didn't mind falling for him even more.

Happy birthday, Oliver. This gift from me to you, I'm glad you accepted it.