The Open Door - Sean and Kaycee

18. Following

Kaycee

We're back at the same café again. The one with invitingly squashy chairs and adorable framed pictures of puppies on the walls where I (accidentally) spilled hot chocolate on Sean. It's so far away that there's absolutely no way that our fanatic friends or other people from the convention will find us.

The feeling of safety--being comfortably by myself with Sean--envelops me like a warm blanket. It's just us now. Is it wrong of me to wish that it could be this way forever? In a perfect world, I would see only his brown eyes and dimples forever.

But we don't live in a vacuum. People come in and out of your life every day. Nothing ever stays the same, as much as you would like it to. You can never hang onto a perfect moment as if it were to last forever.

Even though I know this to be true, I can't help wishing that it weren't. And maybe I've even convinced myself that it can always be this way. That I would never have to leave him--the only person who has ever truly understood me. Even though I know that I will one day have to walk away, I am still holding on because I love him so much.

"Kaycee?" Sean's voice, both warm and hesitant, nudges me gently out of my reverie. "Er--did you hear what I said?"

I look at him blankly. "Uhhh... I wasn't really listening, sorry."

"Yeah, I was wondering why you didn't seem to be reacting at all," he says, flushing, "I--I asked if--oh shit, this is awkward--if you want to be my--" He whispers the last word so softly that I can't hear him.

"If I want to be your--?"

"My girlaknlkasnd," he rushes out unintelligibly.

"Did you lie to me when you said you only spoke four languages?" I ask him jokingly, "Because I definitely didn't understand that at all. You must have said it in Shamunese by accident."

"Right," he says, coughing and clearing his throat awkwardly. Sean takes a deep breath in, before saying, "Do you want to be my girlfriend?"

"Do I want to--WHAT?" I say incredulously. Did he just--? I'm internally freaking out right now.

"Er--did I still not say it right?" Sean asks, looking around himself self-consciously. "I'll say it again because it's worth repeating. Kaycee, I realized today--well, scratch that, I realized it a long time ago, probably ever since I met you--that I really love you. Everything about you. The sound of your laugh, the fact that you're always daydreaming and you think that people don't notice, the way that your hair is always organized chaos, the luminescence of your eyes... they're so bright, it's as if you gazed at the moon one night and a moonbeam got trapped inside of them, the beauty of your mind, which is more enlightened and insightful that you'll ever admit, the fact that you can always find the silver lining in even the darkest rainclouds..." He pauses, out of breath. "But most of all, the fact that every time I'm with you, I feel complete. Before I met you, there was a part of me that I didn't know I was missing. I was unfulfilled, but I didn't know why. And now that I'm whole, I never want to be without you ever again."

I'm absolutely speechless. The words are running around uselessly in my brain, but nothing is coming out. Yes, of course I would love to..... but no, it's just not possible....... but I love you too, more than you know........ and yes, I feel more complete around you too........ but I can't risk hurting you, not when I care about you so much.

He looks up at me, his face burning. "Did I say too much? I'm sorry... I couldn't control myself, it just came out--"

I hold up my hand to silence him. "Sean... I don't know where to start."