"If you do decide to kill me, know these two things: one, I am trained in the ancient art of ka-rah-tay, and two, if you somehow succeed, Leo Romano will snuff you out like a Dollar Store candle."

Asha doesn't respond, just maneuvers her car through the sludge and onto the ordained Wealthy Part of town. I hate this time of the winter, when everything looks depressed and gray-brown and abysmal. Hate it. But the air fresheners in Asha's car make it smell like vanilla, and the fast food trash I noticed in the backseat at least ensures that she's human, so I'm vibing.

Well, kind of. Not really.

I don't understand why she dragged me here. It was a seemingly normalish conversation I overheard, I guess. That's what I'll tell her. It was a normal convo. Nothing to gossip about. Pregnancy? Moans? Noooope. Why am I here again?

Why am I here?

Asha's house has a large two-car garage and this whole colonial vibe that seems straight from HGTV, all navy blue shutters and curving cobblestone walkway that is mostly shoveled but still slushy from the snow.

She turns to me in her seat, unbuckling her seatbelt, and gives me an even, cool stare. "You're not going to tell anyone I brought you here."

"Okay."

"I mean it. Not even Romano."

"Okay." This car feels cramped and suffocating. I desperately want out.

Asha opens her door and steps out onto her wet driveway. I follow suit, trying not to slip. "Come inside."

I follow her, cautious. Is this how all those wild animals in Bambi feel? I don't really remember much of Bambi, but I feel like there was some nervous hesitation and/or scampering. "You sound really enthusiastic about this. Maybe you should just take me back to the school—"

"Don't fuck with me right now, Foot Girl."

"Ooh, Foot Girl, original."

Her head snaps around to look at me so fast that she must get whiplash. "I will chop off select parts of your feet and sell them to perverts on the dark web."

"Toes and heels? Like in Cinderella?"

"I will break a nail over this shit, I swear to God. Don't make me waste a nail."

"Do you come up with these beforehand, or—"

"Connor."

"Yeah, okay."

I follow Asha inside. She doesn't take her shoes off, just scrapes them dry-ish on the entry mat. I've never understood wearing your shoes indoors. Feels wrong. Like sleeping with socks on your hands. Upside down. Dangling from a bear trap. I follow behind her, not taking my shoes off either, even though it feels unnatural and somewhat disgraceful.

"Don't touch anything. My room is this way," Asha says, moving along the open floor plan at a quick pace, down past a kitchen dripping in marble and a living room with cream white couches. Seriously, someone copied and pasted a magazine home all up in this (probably cheeseball-less) hiz house.

There's a large staircase tucked in the back corner of the main floor, the kind with a whole-ass half of a wall for a banister. Asha rushes down it, and I follow dutifully. She's like, probably going to kill me down here? But at least they can put on my gravestone "died in Asha Wood's bedroom."

There's a notable temperature change as soon as we're down here, going from tolerable to bone-chilling. It's nice, though. There's a giant flatscreen TV and an Oculus headset tossed on the floor in front of the leather couch without a care. Asha walks right past it and through an open door. I, again, follow behind her, like a lamb to the slaughter.

Asha shuts the door behind me. I feel like I'm walking into a really inhospitable job interview. She grabs a hoodie off the back of a fancy gaming chair and slips it on, covering up that disturbingly perfect cropped tank top. It sucks how she looks like Gretchen Weiners if Gretchen Weiners's hotness levels were multiplied by a bajillion and then some. Like, damn, girl. I can't tear my gaze away from her. When I really, really should.

"That's one fancy chair," I say, standing awkwardly across the room from her, lurking in front of the closed door like the world's most useless phantom.

"Thanks. It's an OMEGA."

Must be a fancy-shmancy gaming chair brand. "Oh, sick. I'm jealous." Blatant lie, seeing as I have no idea what a fucking omega is, aside from the Wattpad werewolf fics Romano was obsessed with in middle school. But, hopefully I get bonus points for complimenting a desk chair.

Asha looks back at me, scooping her curls from inside the sweater. They bounce when she drops them. The golden light shining from between the blinds of her window well creates a fuzzy white outline around her body. "Thanks. You game?"

Again a Romano field of interest. "Um, no. The cake is a lie."

She snorts. Oh lord, what a cute snort. "Okay. So you play Portal. What else?"

This joke that always makes Romano laugh was not as charming here. "The cake is seriously a lie. I ... I don't even know what Portal is."

"You're a character, Connor." She rolls her eyes when she says it.

"Yeah, and you're a gamer girl."

I went from snorting to eye rolls to harsh glaring. "I'm not a gamer girl," Asha says. "I'm a girl who plays games and doesn't find cute the mocking generalizations from a girl who takes photos of strangers' feet in bathroom stalls."

I don't know what to say for a second. Flames creep up the sides of my face. "I wasn't trying to mock you."

"Mmhmm. Okay." She gestures to the bed. "Have a seat."

Asha's bed is huge, the kind of bed that seems promiscuous and just begs for dirty things to happen on it. (A completely valid thought. I'm sure plenty of people have oversized, unchaste mattresses.) Even though I don't want to sit on it, I do. It sinks beneath my weight. Asha, ever the power-mover, stays standing.

"So," she says, "tell me what you thought you heard in the bathroom."

Thank goodness no attempted quippy remarks surface. "Just, something about a pregnancy scare, that's all."

She's silent for a moment. It's almost like she's somewhere else. Then she breaks her silence with, "That's all?"

Ugh. "And the kissing. Lots of kissing"

She sighs. "Right. The kissing. Listen, Connor, I—"

"I won't tell anyone," I say, and I really do mean it. "I'm sorry I told Romano. That wasn't cool at all." I mean that, too.

"I can't exactly trust you on that," Asha says. "I'm going to need some insurance."

I shrug. "I ... I'm a lesbian."

"Really?" She looks genuinely surprised. Yes, Asha, there are more queer people in the world than you and your bathroom stall girlfriend.

"It's not like I have a lot of people to tell." My parents know, and Romano knows, and his close friends know. That's it. "I kept it a secret for a long time. Whatever is going on with you and Emma is none of my business. And I get wanting to keep it a secret, whatever the reason. So, your secret is safe with me."

She looks a little taken aback. "Damn, Connor, I had no clue."

"Because I can keep a secret," I say with a terse smile that hopefully looks happier than how I feel. "And no one pays attention to me anyways. Why do you think I'm Romano's dumping ground for gossip? I know everything he does, but he's always the center of attention while I'm, well."

"Invisible?" Asha offers, her tone bordering on snide "Unseen? The world's most useless phantom?"

"I would be offended, but I'm pretty sure I called myself that like, two minutes ago."

"Wow, look at this wavelength we're on," Asha says, and she smiles slightly.

"Yeah, crazy."

She narrows her eyes at me again. "So you seriously ... get it? The secret keeping?"

"Sure." I shrug. "I've never made out with a girl in the bathroom, but I think I get where you guys might be coming from. Especially if this is more than an experimentational thing." I've never experimented, but I don't tell her that. And I don't tell her how I just know or how I tell Romano everything except for my gay stuff.

Asha exhales slowly, her lips a small, pursed 'o' shape. "Look, okay, the whole thing you overheard.... It's an absolute mess."

"Hey, I get it. I'm an absolute mess too."

She laughs once. And then she starts crying.

God is an asshole today.

A/N - shoutout to my poor boyfriend to having to field my questions about gaming chair brands at 1 am. also free hug to whoever points out the candy gram reference first. 

hope you guys enjoyed this chapter!!!!