“Unhand me, you vile seducer, you virtue bandit. I feel sullied by your irresistible yet immoral touch!”
Serene’s eyes widened and her grip went loose.
“No, I didn’t mean it!” Elliot exclaimed hastily. “I was teasing. Maybe also role-playing a little bit? I’ll tell you all about role-playing. I read about it in a book.”
Serene’s eyes got even wider, and she lunged at him. They went rolling across blankets and grass, her hair winding around his hands, him laughing helplessly and her murmuring amusement in his ear and in between kisses.
“Oh, you did, did you,” said Serene, rolling her eyes and smiling so wide that Elliot knew in a human it would have been a laugh. She held him pinned down to the ground. “You are such a minx!”
“You know that’s right,” murmured Elliot.
“There is something I want to ask you. I was talking to your friend Myra,” Serene said. “I had a few questions for her, but as it turned out I find her company most congenial. She too is often puzzled by the strictly human way of doing things. She told me, though, about a facet of human romance, in which people are romantically involved not with the specific purpose of marriage but with the intent of providing companionship for each other. I must say that seems efficient. Everybody’s needs are met and neither party is in any way disgraced.” Serene paused. “She called it ‘dating’ or ‘being boyfriend and girlfriend.’”
Elliot hardly dared to breathe, in case it interrupted Serene’s flow of thought. He knew her better than that, though: knew her serious face when she was intent on a purpose.
“How about it?” asked Serene. “Do you want to be my boyfriend?”
Elliot smiled, and the smile drew Serene down to kiss him, so the smile might have been answer enough. Just in case, though, just to show her how much he meant it, he murmured, “Yes” just before their lips met.
Later, Serene slept through her morning archery practice. Elliot looked at the sunrise, golden rays caught in the treetops and sky catching fire. Warm light spilled over Serene as she slept, her skin illuminated and her shoulderblades golden crests and her back a valley, her bare skin a wonderful and strange landscape. Elliot rested a hand gently at the dip in her lower back, and felt both awed and scared.
He had been wishing for love his whole life, and if he’d had just one wish that wish would have been her. He was not sure how it had happened, or why: but the wish granted, he had to prove he could deserve it. He did not know how to be grateful enough.
“This is my plan,” said Serene as they entered the lunchroom, and Elliot gazed at her with deep appreciation of her strategic mind. She steered him toward the table where Luke was sitting. “I will tell Luke of the newfound status of our relationship, for I wish to express that I am in no wise ashamed of you.”
“Thank you, Serene, excellent decision!”
“And then I will go get my nourishment and you two can have a longer conversation about feelings. I know boys like to gossip about girls and romance.”
Elliot’s squawk of protest was cut off when Serene pushed him forcibly onto the bench opposite Luke and said: “Elliot and I are dating now. You have four minutes to gossip about it. Good-bye, blossom!”
She pressed a firm kiss to Elliot’s horrified mouth and strode off. Elliot loved to watch her go, but he really hated her leaving.
“We don’t have to gossip,” Elliot informed Luke. “Let’s be strong and silent. In a manly way. That would be awesome, right?”
“So you were . . . serious about . . . all that?” asked Luke Sunborn, secret gossip fiend.
Elliot was disappointed, and then he actually listened to what Luke was saying and took a sharp left turn into being offended. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
Luke fiddled with his pudding rather than looking up. “You were always so . . . exorbeetent . . . about it.”
“Ex or bee tent? . . . Oh. You mean ‘exorbitant,’ loser. And as opposed to all the other reasonable well-balanced sides to my personality, you mean?” Elliot scoffed at the very idea that he might not have been serious. “Like you’d know anything about how I feel.”
“Fine,” said Luke. “I hope you’ll both be very happy.”
“Thank you,” said Elliot graciously.
“You know, for about the one minute that it lasts,” Luke added, with a smug twist to his lips.
Elliot opened his mouth to say: hey, how dare you, it’s going to last forever, but then he shut his mouth. He had been bold when he knew, secretly, that there was no chance at all. Now he had a little hope, hanging in a fragile balance, and he was terrified that being overconfident would upset the balance and he would lose everything. It was terrifying to have something: he wondered if other people lived their whole lives in this strange state between exultation and absolute dread. He’d never had anything to lose before.
“You think so,” he muttered as Serene put her tray down, and then there was no opportunity to say anything else.
His feeling of panic eased as he looked at her: beloved and best, her eyes like water reflecting a morning sky and her hair like water shadowed by trees, dark but with a sparkle of light through the leaves.
She smiled at him. “Did you have fun gossiping?”
“I can’t describe to you how much,” said Elliot. “But I missed you.”
He leaned in and kissed her. He hoped it never stopped being so sweet it was almost painful.
“You missed archery practice,” Luke remarked, his gaze on Serene. “You never miss.”
Serene almost smiled, and Elliot was thrilled. “I was a little preoccupied.”
“That’s great, everybody already thinks we can’t obey regulations because of him,” Luke said. “Well, I’m going to practice archery some more. Someone ought to.”
He got up, pushing his tray aside. They stared at him in dismay.
“Luke, you have hardly eaten anything!” said Serene.
“I’m not hungry,” said Luke.
“Luke, please don’t develop an eating disorder,” Elliot begged. “We do not have any therapists in this world!”
“What’s a therapist? I said I’m not hungry!” said Luke.
Elliot paused. “Don’t eat any therapists. That’s not what they’re for.”
“Then I don’t know why you brought them up, other than the fact you always want to be talking about something stupid.”
Luke fixed Elliot with a look of definite dislike. Elliot reached for Serene’s hand, for comfort, but she was looking at Luke, who was now making his way out of the room.
“Okay, I know what’s going on,” said Elliot. “You said you were best bros with Luke, right? And obviously, as a supportive boyfriend, I respect your close bonds of platonic friendship. When one bestie starts dating and the other’s still single, conflict can occur. I read about this.”
Serene nodded seriously. “That makes sense.”