https://youtu.be/ectte--ZCL4

Elias

The sun starts to rise, peaking through the pine trees, a warm yellow beam at a time. It's a new day, but I'm far from ready for everything that happened last night to be done. Everything beautiful about it is lying peacefully in my arms. And for the first time in awhile, I realize that's what's been missing.

Peace.

The peace in how she sleeps. In how she breathes. In how that peace has found its way in me. It's one of those moments in life you wish time could just stop, so that it would last forever. Where nothing's wrong and there isn't any of life's bullshit to run back to.

The light dances across her skin, highlighting the slight flush of her cheeks. The red-pink of her lips that are just a little swollen from all the kissing we did last night, besides the other things we did of course. But I missed them.

So much.

Kissing them. Feeling them on mine. So I steal one in the silence. She stirs a little. Then smiles a smile I haven't seen since we were in Jersey. The kind that no one else ever sees because its only meant for me. I stare down at her until her shyness forces her to speak.

"Elias Alexander King, didn't your mother ever tell you that it's rude to stare at people."

"I'm not staring, J, just admiring the view."

I shift my weight until she's pinned underneath me for the first time since we started messing around. Last night, I let her take control. Completely. She kept me on my back and took things slow and easy even when I couldn't. I needed a couple hours to get used to how good she felt, how confident she was, and how much I'd missed her.

God, I've missed her.

And I wanted her to feel that.

But half of me's scared that she didn't.

That I didn't do even half of what she did for me.

She was incredible.

So much so that I got lost in her. Lost in a feeling to the point where I don't know if I made her feel things as intensely as I did.

So I want to make up for it.

Right now. Today. Tomorrow. Every single chance that she lets me.

A kiss at a time.

A touch at a time.

I am hers to bend.

Hers to break.

Hers to love as long as she wants

Because I'll never

Leave her.

I want her.

I want her to feel every word I can't write.

Every word I can't say.

So I close the space between us

I close a years worth of distance

In a matter of seconds

Until there's nothing else to feel

Except her closeness.

Her closure.

Our comfort.

I kiss her, slowly, and the morning begins with the whisper of cars on Sunset Blvd. and the light in her eyes painting the sunrise gold.

***

(Three Hours Later)

"Elias, whatever you do, don't move."

I wake up to a wide-eyed and terrified version of my girlfriend glaring down at me like a squirrel on speed. Her cheeks are bright pink along with some other parts of her that I can't help but stare at.

You'd think having sex would calm the Little King down a bit, but that's definitely not the case.

I can't focus on anything she's saying, even though I want to. But dear God I want other things more than I want to have a conversation right now. Real talk.

I lean up and pull her into a less than innocent kiss which completely catches her off guard. She loses herself for a couple seconds so I run my hands down to the best parts of her chest. I don't even reach full palming status when she stops me. #Notevensorry.

"Elias, what part of don't move do you not understand?!"

I reach up and smooth out the furrow between her eyebrows.

"I don't remember agreeing to that."

"When somebody tells you not to move it's typically non-negotiable!"

"I don't even know what that means, but you sounded super sexy when you said it."

"Elias! Shut up and be still!"

Yeah, this girl's gonna need a lot more sex in her life to finally get her to relax, and I know exactly the right guy for the job.

"Babe, you know you can't straddle me like that and then ask me to keep still. There are some things I can't control."

"This is seriously not the time for--you to be--excited."

My lower half completely disagrees.

I smirk at her and she shoots me the kinda look that would normally scare the shit outta me. But right now, I'm on top of the world, and she's on top of me--again--and I'm not gonna complain about it. She can glare all she wants, but I'm a happy man this morning and nothing's gonna change that.

"What's wrong with the Little King being excited if he's excited about you?"

"Stop talking! They'll hear us!"

"Who?"

"Shh. Listen."

Jersey claps her hand over my mouth and presses herself against me to the point where I stop being able to focus on anything else. She's super warm, her heart's beating out of her chest, and her skin's so damn soft it physically hurts to not touch her. But she's got me pinned under this blanket, and while I should probably be worried about whatever the hell she's worried about, my attention's a hundred percent on her.

I try doing what she says and force myself to donate part of my brain power to listening to the sound that she's panicking about.

For the first ten seconds, there's nothing but the typical buzz of UCLA in the morning. Passing cars. People on the tennis court. Garbage trucks picking up trash somewhere outside the dorms.

But then I hear it.

The sound of somebody hmming or moaning or making some kinda of animalistic noise no more than a couple feet away.

We're supposed to be alone. Sunset Rec doesn't even open for another half hour so the fact that somebody else is here, standing or sitting close enough to catch me and Jersey in the act--is bad news.

Really bad news.

"What the hell is that?" I ask.

Jersey shushes me which comes out a heck of a lot louder than it should. The humming stops out of nowhere and two sets of footsteps start heading in our direction. Jersey's face turns cherry red the closer they get.

I can see it now-- Lisa getting the call that some college kids caught Elias King and his girlfriend bumping uglies in the middle of Sunset Rec. She'd either drop dead from the shock or quit her job--which now that I think about it, could actually be a good thing.

Maybe me and Jersey should just get the anticipation over with, let ourselves get caught, and get rid of Lisa. Semi-win win situation.

"Elias, what do we do? I don't want to end up naked on the cover of The Daily Bruin!"

I smirk at her.

"Agreed. The only covers you should be naked on are mine. Just keep still. Maybe they'll go away. Maybe they won't hear us."

"We hear you. But we're not presumptuous enough to judge you. Because what can truly be said about two souls whose energies have been heard but not yet seen?"

"That their existence is mysterious, yet eternal."

"Babe, that was transcendent."

"Was it?"

"Cosmically. Come here, Little Sage."

So--I have absolutely no idea whats happening outside right now, and I don't know if I want to. Jersey's got a furrow the size of San Diego etched in the middle of her forehead which tells me that she's probably as lost and confused as I am. I could be wrong, 'cause I'm wrong about a lot of things, but I'm pretty sure one of those voices is GoGo's--which is awesome and not awesome at the same time.

Why?

'Cause GoGo understands me and Jersey's situation well enough to not tell the media that we totally had naughty beautiful sex in the middle of an open field.

You know, I should probably get her a trophy for recommending this location. In all six hundred and forty two million fantasies I've had about Jersey, I imagined us doing it on random pieces of furniture in my room, in my shower, and in a handful of publicly forbidden spots like classrooms and shit. But Sunset Rec. was--something else. GoGo knows her stuff, I'll thank her for it once we're face to face--if she is the face that's hovering over our blanket right now.

The only problem is, she's not alone. Somebody's standing next to her and this somebody is a dude who, given the loud smacking sound coming from outside right now, is probably playing hardcore tonsil hockey with her. Now, I know me and GoGo aren't exactly buddy, buddy or whatever, and I probably like her more than she likes me, but she's my girlfriend's best friend and if some rando's putting the moves on her, I gotta make sure she's okay. UCLA's full of creeps, crotch grabbers, and fraternity assholes, and GoGo deserves way better than that. Real talk.

Jersey's eyes double in size once she picks up on the sexual soundtrack going on and nods towards the edge of our blanket.

"Peel it back on three. I think I need to rescue my roommate," she whispers.

"Shouldn't we put on some clothes first? I mean, I'm fine with you naked but--"

"Shh! Just silently hand me my clothes, and I'll hand you yours. Speaking of handling things, you should also do something about that before they see you."

"About what?"

She glances down towards my waist and gasps loud enough for me to realize what she's talking about.

"That."

"Hell no! Not with people watching--unless you wanna help me and you're into that kinda thing."

"Elias! I'm serious!"

"I am too. Look, since I can't exactly spank the monkey right now I'm gonna have to get creative and waistband it."

Her face bunches up like a prune.

"Please tell me you're not doing what I think you're doing."

I am. I pull on my boxers, strap down the Little King into his makeshift "seatbelt", and wriggle back into my jeans once the jobs done. Jersey's still staring at me by the time everything's covered up.

"Wow, you learn new things everyday. Anyway, um, I'm going to get us out of these covers on three, okay? One, two, --"

Before I know it, we're both partially dressed and she's mumbling her way down from three.

Jersey yanks the blankets half-off and we find ourselves staring up at GoGo sucking face with a dude wearing next to nothing aside from basically see-through harem pants, hemp sandals, and a guitar pick necklace.

Normally, dudes like this are lanky, pale, and generally look like they're vegan-ing themselves into an early grave. But GoGo's tongue buddy is cut. Not that he's in better shape than me or whatever, but girls would probably be into it. Not Jersey, though. She's probably just staring at him because he's dressed weird.

Yeah, that's--gotta be it.

Right?

"Indigo-Rose Wilder, you didn't tell me you were dating anyone! Who's the model?!"

The fuck? Sure, the guy's better looking than the average hippie but model is going too far.

He pulls away from Gogo, throws an arm around her shoulders, and shoots Jersey an easy-going smile. Holy shit. I know this guy. He was the super cool guitarist dude GoGo introduced me to at the needle stabbing center we went to a couple months ago.

I wish I could hate him but the guy's chill. He's easy to talk to, knows his way around guitar, and he helped put some relationship things in perspective for me when I was super depressed about Kai and Jersey. Him and GoGo are like little UCLA buddhas--wise beyond their years and shit. Atta' girl.

#GoodforGoGo

"Sorry for the secrets, Alex. I still consider you my psychedelic sister, but Ryker and I like to keep things low key."

"Subterranean," Ryker says.

"Right on, Ry."

Gogo and Ryker give each other some trippy version of a high five/secret handshake while Alex starts cooing and awing over the two of them like crazy. I gotta admit Gogo and her guy are good together. Weird as fuck, but good together. Not as good as me and Jersey, 'cause nobody's better than royalty. #QuoteMe.

I sit up and salute Ryker once he finally takes his attention off his girl.

"Nice seeing you again, man. It's been a while."

"It has. Glad to see that you've made peace and love with your lady," he says.

"Me too."

I look over at Jersey who's cheeks have turned rosy pink, and kiss the blush right out of her. She leans her head against my shoulder and I mouth a silent thank you to Ryker as she snuggles up next to me.

He throws up a peace sign and I catch sight of the callouses on his fingers. I already knew he played guitar, but he's got like, professional grade callouses on his hands and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little jealous. I barely practice, and when I do my fucking fingers bleed because I'm not serious enough about music. Maybe I should try to be. Maybe I should try to be more serious about things in general like Ryker is.

I don't know what it is about him, but he comes off like a man.

Not like some insecure college guy still trying to prove himself to the world or his girlfriend.

He just seems sure of himself.

And Gogo seems sure of him.

Every time she glances his way she looks at him like he's the center of her fucking world and I want things to be like that for me and Jersey. I want to be the kind of man she can be proud of, not a guy who still feels like he has to make up for his mistakes. I want to look at her without being scared of who I am, and I want her to look at me without being afraid of who I used to be.

I just wish I knew how to get there.

Maybe Ryker can help me figure out how.

"Hey, Ry--sorry, is it cool if I call you that?" I ask.

He sits down next to me in the grass and shoots me a lazy smile.

"I've been called many names, Elias. Ry's as good as any."

Shit. He's--cool. Cool enough to kinda low key be my hero, but that's weird. I need to relax. If I actually wanna have friends aside from my girlfriend and Indigo, I need to try to be as cool as he is. Okay. Here goes.

"Dope, um--I was wondering what you and Go--Indigo were up to later. Me and Jersey don't really have any plans for today so maybe--"

"We don't? I actually was thinking we could go back to the dorm, shower, and then get a head start on the reading for next week. We can also get some pre-study time in for your biology class so you're ahead of the game for finals! Imagine how much we could learn about animal cells today!"

Jersey looks up at me, beaming like a lightbulb, and it's tragic and adorable all at once. The fact this girl gets more excited about animal cells than trying to plan a date with her boyfriend is kind of depressing. I gotta fix this problem. Stat.

"I'm sure we could turn ourselves into little scientists if we wanted to, babe, but I kinda wanted to spend the day getting lost in Los Angeles with you--and Ryker and Indigo too, but mainly you."

A smile pulls at the corners of Jersey's lips.

"I'd like that a lot. But come tomorrow, it's study time, okay?"

Sure if studying is code for sexy time, I'm totally down.

"You got it."

"Well, I'm glad the two of you are finally on the same cosmic plane, but you don't really have a choice either way. Going back to the hearth's not an option for any of us today."

Indigo sits down in front of us looking more serious than either me and Jersey expect her to.

"What do you mean, Indigo?" Alex asks.

"The paps are still creeping around your dorm, and apparently sometime earlier this morning, our favorite RA Roxy took it upon herself to talk to the press about the famous Elias King's quad and name drop everyone who lives in it."

My lungs tighten in my chest the second those words leave her mouth.

"She told--she told the press what?" I stutter.

"She told the press where all of us live and the video of her little "interview" went viral on Youtube two hours ago."

"Isn't that--isn't that illegal? She can't do that. That's a complete violation of our privacy. What if random people start showing up at our dorm, it's bad enough as it is already!"

Jersey's voice is shaking. Fear floods every single word spilling out of her mouth and drowns out everything good about this morning. I tighten my grip on her hand.

"Don't worry just yet. UCLA got the original taken down so I'm sure nothing will come of it," Gogo says trying her hardest to keep her cool, but I still see the worry in her eyes.

"Yeah, but what about mirror copies? People rip videos all the time. It could still be out there. It could still--I need my phone. Where'd I put my phone?"

I shoot up off the ground and start scrambling around in a panic, but Ryker stands up and stops me before I lose it completely. He takes me by the shoulders, looks me dead in the eye and waits until I can meet his gaze to say anything.

"Elias, take it easy, brother. It's a beautiful morning, you're with a beautiful girl, and the only thing you should be worried about is showing her a good time. I'm playing a show tonight and I want you guys to come. I'll put you on the guest list if you're up for it. Think of the invitation as my way of teaching you how to keep on keeping on."

I wish it were that easy. I wish I could just brush things off and take Alex out for a night without having to worry about stupid shit like Lisa, or the press, or what people will say if they figure out that Alex is Jersey. I'm tired of driving myself crazy trying to keep my secrets out of other people's reach. But I got myself into this bullshit, and I'm the only one who can get myself and Jersey out of it.

"I want to go, Ry, and I appreciate what you're doing but it's just---"

"What? Roxy? The video? Let it go, man. If you don't conquer the fear, it'll conquer you. Question is, are you gonna let it?"

Something in my head clicks and all the panic rising in my chest slows to standstill. Other people have told different versions of what Ryker just told me at least a hundred times in the past year, but I couldn't hear it.

I always came up with excuses to cave into myself and to let anxiety drown out this truth. My common sense. Everything that would've let me live my life the way I'm supposed to instead of checking out of it. I kept letting myself fall apart in rehab because I thought I lost my reason to get my shit together. But now I have her back.

I have everything and everyone I need right here, and some bullshit video isn't gonna screw with us.

And neither is Roxy.

I look over at Jersey and the light in her eyes is enough to put enough fire in my blood to do what I'm about to do. I turn back to Ryker, breathe out the last of my reservations, and give him an answer.

"We're coming to your show tonight no matter what. But I need a favor first," I say.

"How can I be of service, Mr. King?"

"How down are you and Indigo for a little retaliation mission? Nothing too serious, but I have a plan."

Jersey walks over to me looking a little concerned, but I take her by the hand and squeeze it, hoping she'll trust me enough to not ask questions. She doesn't. I'm more grateful than she knows.

"For every Yin there's a Yang. All things need balance and if your idea balances out the scales, we're with you. Right, Indie?" Ryker asks.

Indigo nods without saying anything, and as stoic as she is, I'm glad she's rolling with it.

"What did you have in mind, Elias?

"I gotta bone to pick with a certain RA. I think it's about time that Little Ms. Roxy understood that she picked the wrong people to fuck with."

***

(Hey guys! Happy New Year from me and Kristen! We hope you guys had an awesome and restful holiday! The last couple weeks have been extremely busy, full of traveling to LA and back to Europe, so sorry about the delayed updates!

It's important as writers for us to take a break every now and then so we can keep doing what we're doing and not get too burnt out in the process of writing this story. Not gonna lie, sometimes it's tough to maintain weekly updates with everything we have going on. We always want to bring you the best chapters we can and do justice to the story, so in this New Year we want to make sure that we keep that promise to you. So we hope you guys understand if there's a week here and there where an update comes a bit later than expected (and maybe there will be weeks where we have double updates!). Thank you for still being here, for still sticking with this story, and for continue to support what we do!

Some of you have asked how many chapters are left. About that--we know where the ending is but we can't give you an exact # of chapters b/c the length varies. But we're getting close-ish. Hang on to your hats, it's gonna be one heck of a ride ;)! Definitely expect for unexpected, and a lot of emotional intensity along the way! Next update will be next weekend unless we say otherwise! Have a great week!)

-Jenny & Kristen (kaelking12)