Some girls do

Chapter 33: Chaewon

"Do you really want me to take you right home?" I ask when we've been driving for a bit. Sunoo waited to leave until after we did, and now he's following us, making sure I get her home okay. I know there's nothing romantic between them, but it still makes me jealous. I want to be the one looking out for her, not the one catching glares from her friends.

"I don't know," she says. "Yes, I guess. What else is there to say? You made your point at school."

I rub my forehead and turn into her apartment complex. Sunoo flashes his lights once but keeps going, and I relax a little.

"I'm sorry. I know I handled it like shit earlier." I pass her apartment as we drive through the complex.

"Um . . . I live over there." Kazuha gestures behind us.

"I thought we could go to the pond at the edge of the complex to talk a little. Is that cool? I'll turn around if you want."

"It's fine, I guess," she says, settling in against the seat.

I pull into a parking space near the pond. Kazuha's out the door and heading down to the little bench before I even shut the car off. She sits near one of the sleeping ducks, who barely even stirs. My mom used to bring me here to feed them back before things went off the rails. Back when I was still her little princess.

The moonlight glints off the green water as Kazuha picks up a rock and tosses it into the pond, sending ripples shivering across it. I take a deep breath and get out of my car. I don't know how to fix this, or if I even can. But I really want to.

"Can I sit?" I ask.

"It's a free country," she says. "Sort of. For some."

I stand there, fidgeting. "I don't know if that means yes or . . ."

Kazuha huffs and scoots over, fixing her eyes on the fountain spraying in the center.

"I understand why you're pissed," I start. "You have every right to be-"

She cuts me off. "What am I to you?"

"What do you mean?"

"Do you love me?"

"Jesus, Kazuha," I say, digging my fingers into my knee.

"Well?" she asks.

"Do you always have to push so hard? I'm trying to tell you I don't want to break up, and you-"

"How can we possibly break up when we're not even dating?"

I sigh. "You know I don't do labels."

"Do. You. Love. Me?" Kazuha asks, and I feel like I'm going to be sick.

Because love is . . . well, love is a trap. Love is getting knocked up and abandoned. Love is a handprint on a cheek and your entire childhood wrapped in tulle. Love is letting someone have the power to hurt you in ways you haven't even thought of yet.

"It's a simple question," she says.

"No, it's not."

"How?" she asks, and I don't look up. I can't. Not when the only possible answer I can give her is something I'll never say. I can't.

"Kazuha . . ."

"If I matter to you, then answer me!"

"I can't," I say, squeezing my eyes shut at her sharp inhale. It all goes quiet then. Even the sound of the fountain dims in my head, stuck in that tiny void of silence right before everything explodes.

"Because you don't, or because you're so stuck on not 'doing labels.'" I hear it, the hurt under the anger, tingeing her voice with pain. I'd do anything to make it stop. I lean in for a kiss-if she'd just let me show her, I've been desperately trying to show her from the start-but she jerks back. "Stop it. You can't fix this with your body."