Three months. For three whole months, I'd had to be Oliver's girlfriend. It had confused my mother, I think, for me to go from refusing his advances to being his "one and only". I don't know what she thought. I sort of hoped she'd tell me that I was too young to date seriously or something, but I guess she thought I could make my own choices about boys (just not girls, of course). Little did she know, or anyone for that matter, that I had no choice in this…

After two weeks of Oliver being around me constantly, texting me all the time (calling me baby for God's sake!), I just shut down. I stopped caring. My grades started dipping. I was almost failing algebra. The only subject I did well in was French. I loved that language so much.

It was near the end of May. My birthday had come and gone back at the end of April. I was now fifteen. I hoped that with my new age, better things would come to me. Oliver's birthday was only a few days before mine, a fact he was ever proud about.

As I was saying, it was near the end of May. School was about to let out for the summer, and I'd be through with my freshman year.

I was at homeon the computer, whih was not set up with the screen facing the licing room. It was just another "preventative measure" taken by my mother so I wouldn't do anything that—well—she didn't like.

My phone buzzed with a new text. I glanced at the screen. The display said it was from Oliver. I almost didn't open it… but then I figured I wouldn't have to respond if I didn't want to.

FROM OLIVER: hey can I call u? its important.

Puzzled, I typed out a quick 'yeah' before sending it.

Moments later, my phone started to vibrate, and the picture of Oliver's dumb smiling face appeared. I had been tempted to put something more… rude there instead, but careful is as careful does.

I answered, "Hey."

"H-hey.." came the reply.

"So um, what's up?" We didn't talk much on the phone like this, so saying I felt awkward was an understatement.

"Well… You know I think you're cool, right?" he asked. His voice sounded breathy, like he was nervous or something. I could almost see him wiping his sweaty paws—I mean, hands on his jeans.

"Yeah?" I answered tentatively.

"And that I would never want to hurt you, right?"

My mind screamed. 'Hah! Yeah, right, you—you—jerk!' Refraining from cussing in my own head was tough, but it lowered the risk of accidentally saying something out loud. I did that once. My friend thought I was telling her to sit.

"Yeah, I know that, Oliver. What are you trying to say here?" I was growing tired of this question/answer game.

"Well… You see…" I could almost hear the gears grinding in his head, even over the phone.

"Go on." I urged.

"Well… The guys at school—well, they're telling me I should go out with this one girl, and I kinda like her, but you know you're my girlfriend, so I thought I should tell you and all, and I was just kind of thinking that maybe we could, um, take a break." Oliver spoke what had to be the longest run-on sentence I'd ever heard.

Then my brain processed what he said.

Shock set in, and my eye were large and round, and—and—

I bounced in my chair gleefully and watched the screen saver on the computer: 3D pipes.

Then I composed myself and tried to drain the excitement from my voice. "You mean… You want to break up with me?"

"Well—yeah. So I'm not cheating on you with this other girl." The tone of his voice told me he was convinced that this is what chivalrous people did.

I sat back in my chair and fiddled with the hem of my shirt. Then I switched my phone to my other ear, because my cheek was getting sweaty.

Trying to sound thoughtful, I said, "Well… Okay."

"You're okay?" Oliver's shock seeped into his voice. "You mean, you're okay with this?"

"Yes, Oliver. I'm fine."

"Okay then. Good. I'll uh—talk to you later then."

"Bye." I hung up the phone and was still for a moment. Slowly, a grin spread across my face.

'Yes, Oliver. I'm more than fine.'

A/N: This will be the last update for a while. Bear with me.