I was half way out the building, books in hand, headed to a class I wasn't looking forward to. My sisters were walking on either side of me and we were talking about our set list for later that night while escorting each other out of the building before we headed our seperate ways. Other than when we were on stage, these moments were the only times we could spend together. We lived together, the three of us in one Brooklyn apartment, but with all of us taking classes in seperate colleges and trying to make rent payments, it was trading bathroom time in the morning, passing in the hallway as we came and went, and sometimes coffee between seperate our commitments that we ever really got to see each other, outside of gigs and rehearsals.

And then there was him. The other occupant of my spare moments. And here he comes, walking towards us surrounded by a group of our mutual friends.

I was ready to fall into the routine. We were just friends, as far as anyone was allowed to know. I had a twisted, twisted soul of a boyfriend who was my own age, therefore completely acceptable and all that anyone was supposed to know about. The last thing I would have wanted was for this man whom I reluctantly loved to get into trouble for being with someone under legal age.

I looked away. Our eyes weren't allowed to meet when there were other people around and I was prepared to avoid that sapphire stare until I could find it in the dark of his bedroom, later that night. But he was looking right at me this time.

My heart was pounding in my ears. No one was supposed to know...I willed him to look away with my mind, quick before someone saw. Distantly I heard my sisters greet him as he got closer, but he didn't respond. This was it. This was bad. He was up to something and I forsaw the entire world crashing down on me.

For a moment I thought I was day-dreaming as his hands grabbed me by the waist. It was a moment I had been dreading for weeks, since I had first sensed his reluctance with keeping this a secret any longer. And still, I longed for it. In another place and time, I ached to share that moment with him. From the first time he wrapped his arms around me, I'd been dreaming of how good it would feel not to have to hide it. I wanted to sit on his lap on a park bench. I wanted him to wind his fingers through my belt loop and pull me to him on the street. I wanted to kiss him in broad daylight.

But this wasn't in my far away fairytale land, it was our mutual apartment building on Ninth Street, Brooklyn New York, in front of a whole group of people who were still being kept in the dark. His words sliced into my haze of disbelief, fear, and shock..

"Why don't you want to be with me?" he asked painfully, pulling me against him, disrupting the direction of my body and throwing me off center. My head was in disarray, so many different emotions surfacing caused me to shake slightly and trip into him. I looked up at him in disbelief and something close to hurt.

The world stopped turning for a moment. I was concious of the other people, standing there gaping at us, but I couldn't see or hear them anymore. He was staring into my eyes so intensely that I wavered slightly under his gaze.

"...Zack..." I breathed, in awe "Wha...no...don't..."

"I'm in love with you." he responded, boldly, so sure of his statement. "And I know you love me. Lets just try."

I heard my sister gasp and I shook my head, feeling suddenly bitter.

"I thought you understood." I said, anger creeping into my voice. Now everyone knew, it would have to be the end of us. And there was no way to explain this all away or avoid it at all. "I thought you understood there was a reason we couldn't be together. God! Don't you get it!? What is wrong with you!? This is gonna get back to my parents now and they're gonna take you to court, is that what you want?" I spat at him.

He kissed me.

It was the wrong time and place for it and I couldn't have been more frightened of the uproar is was bound to cause amoungst our audience, but still it felt even better than I had ever imagined it could be. Surrounded by people, broad daylight, his lips on mine. I choked on tears when our mouths seperated again.

"Can't you just believe...." he breathed, as we pulled apart, "That everything will work out?"

And in that moment, I did.

It didn't matter what was going to happen next, what my parents would do, how my boyfriend would feel, or the looks that would be on everyone's faces when we turned around to face them. I loved him. And we were gonna be okay.