Serena

N i n e

Time passes by slowly as we sit in silence. Jake's leans back in his seat, his eyes gazing up at the starts through his opened sunroof. Crickets chirp from somewhere outside and in the distance a few fogs croak out melodies in a nearby pond. In a few weeks when the temperatures would begin to drop, they will burrow down and not make another appearance until spring.

I spend this time contemplating whether or not to confide in Jake, an internal battle going on with my conscience.

It could be possibly comforting to share my secrets with him, to have someone other than my aunt or Dr. Kim know what I had gone through...what I still am going through. To be able to have someone get it. Sure, Tess is always there for me, but it can be awkward at times divulging in what happened given that she's family.

That being said, I'm not sure if I'm ready to completely trust him. Letting someone in was scary as hell because once you did that was it. Everything is out in the open and they can either stick by your side or decide that your issues are too much and leave you without another word.

With repetitive deep breaths, I've been able to keep my tears at bay as these thoughts float through my mind, but now I want nothing more than to curl up in my bed and hide from the world. I'm supposed to be at work at nine in the morning but that was most likely not going to happen.

"I don't have a kid, you know," I say out loud, no longer wanting to be silent. If he was going to be my friend...or anything else for that matter, I needed to let him in, just not all at once.

He looks over at me and frowns. "You heard that earlier huh?" he asks, ashamed of himself as if he were the one who was talking shit about me.

I slowly nod my head, "Yeah, I did. I mean I've heard it before from others too so it's nothing new, but I just thought I should let you know."

He swallows hard and turns his body towards me in his seat, leaning against the door. "Well I appreciate you for telling me, but I never thought you had one. I mean obviously I know something happened but I could tell it wasn't that."

We sit in silence a few moments longer trying to think of what to say and it's Jake that breaks it this time. "Serena," he begins, his tone gentle. "I don't know if what I said to you while we were dancing had anything to do with what happened tonight but if I did I'm sorry. I didn't mean to freak you out and I know I probably stepped over the line."

A weird chuckle escapes my throat and I shake my head back and forth slowly. "It's not you, I promise," I answer, resting my head on the sleek leather headrest. "There are things that I can't tell you about me. Sometimes I want to because it'd be much easier, but," I pause, shaking my head once again, "I'm afraid of what you'll say or what you might think about me."

Jake looks away and sits back in his seat again, his eyebrows furrow together. A minute passes before he speaks again, "I know what you mean. I really do, but I want you to be able to trust me. I meant what I said earlier, I do like you Serena. You're so different from any other girl I've ever met as cliché as it sounds. You're smart, beautiful, funny, and actually have a personality. You're brave and confident in your own ways and you usually think before you talk which not many people do. I want to be able to get to know you, the real you, that isn't hiding behind walls. Even if it's just for us to be better friends, I'll be okay with that. I mean sure I'd like to be something more eventually but I'd never pressure you to do something you didn't want to and that means I won't force you to tell me what happened tonight. You can do that on your own time or not at all, but in order for us to trust each other more you have to try and trust me."

His eyes are filled with an assortment of emotions and something else I can't recognize. He's right though, I have to be more open with him if we are ever going to be anything more than having the basic vanilla friendship we do now.