17th July 2011

Maddie Hyun had never understood the significance of turning sixteen. Technically, she could now play the lottery and have a cider at the pub - as long as her dad bought it for her, of course - but there was one benefit that her friends had all pointed out seconds after midnight. Now, she could legally have sex. They all seemed to be ignoring the fact that not only was she completely and utterly single, but that she didn't actually care that much. After all, she knew plenty of girls in her year who had been active for a year or even two - more for a couple of the most promiscuous young women - and it didn't seem like too big a deal.

Her dad didn't seem to agree.

At five o'clock, that time in the late afternoon caught on the cusp of evening, Maddie was getting ready in her bedroom. In half an hour, she was due to leave to meet her best friend in town for a meal out before a film, so she stood in front of her wardrobe with the doors open wide, assessing her clothes and trying to figure out what would look best.

At five past five, her dad knocked on the door that stood slightly ajar. Three knocks; three nervous knocks. A little more time between the second and third than between the first two. Maddie lay one of the dresses she was holding on the bed and pulled open the door with her foot.

"Hey, appa" she said, frowning at a second dress in her hands. Maybe a dress was too ... dressy. And she didn't want to give Peter the wrong impression. It probably would have been easier to have asked a whole group out but of her solid group of five friends, three were on holiday. Only she and Peter were stranded in England with parents whose jobs couldn't accommodate a trip abroad. Especially not during the school's summer, when everyone was off school at the same time and prices hiked.

"Hi, Maddie," said her father, Jung-min. He edged into the room, one hand still on the door handle. His eyebrows pulled together above his nose, his lips pressed into a thin line, and when Maddie looked up at him, she mirrored his expression.

"Is everything ok?" she asked, draping the dress in her hand over her dresser.

"Yes, yes, of course," he said, though his expression didn't change. "Do you have a moment?"

Maddie nodded and stepped back, inviting her father further into her bedroom, and sat on her bed. The dress caught beneath her thigh, wrinkling the thin fabric. "What's going on?"

"I think it's time we had a talk," Jung-min began, and then his expression cleared as he backtracked. "You're not in trouble, ttal." He wrung his wrists and eased his way over to Maddie's dresser to lean against it. The knitted brow returned and he set his jaw.

"Come on, Dad. What is it?" Maddie looked up at him, her eyes imploring his for some kind of hint. "You're kind of worrying me here. Am I still allowed to go out?"

Jung-min smiled, finally looking his age rather than the ten years older that his concern made him seem. "Of course you are. It's your birthday," he said. "You're growing up. You're sixteen now."

Maddie grinned. "I know. Crazy, right?"

Her father nodded and dug his hands into his pockets. "You're sixteen now," he said again, his tone softening. "I know this is not the sort of conversation you want to have with me and I wish your mother was here to talk about these kinds of things but..." He trailed off and Maddie watched him expectantly. Her mother had died almost fourteen years ago, when Maddie was still a toddler, and it had somewhat gone over her head. After a while, she hadn't even noticed the absence of her mother in her life and as she matured, she often found that she had to remind herself of the pain it had caused her father to lose his wife.

"I trust you," Jung-min said, a sudden determination in his voice. "I know you make good decisions, and I know you always will. I just want you to be careful. With boys."

The penny dropped. Maddie's cheeks burned hot pink at the realisation of her father's implications, and she dropped her gaze to the floor. "Oh, God," she muttered. "I don't need the talk, appa."

"I know, I know, you're a good girl," her father said. "I just want you to be careful. I don't want anyone taking advantage of you. I just ... I need to know that you know how to ... protect yourself. I trust you, but I don't trust sixteen-year-old boys."

Maddie wasn't sure she could cringe any harder but each word that left her father's mouth sent her cheeks a deeper, more painful shade of pink. "I don't even have a boyfriend, Dad." She held up her hands. "You don't need to worry, ok? I promise, I'm not going to run off and sleep around just because it's legal now."

A mixture of relief and mild embarrassment crossed Jung-min's face and he tipped his head in appreciation towards his daughter. "Thank you, ttal. I know you probably don't think so, but if you need to, you can talk to me. And you have imo, too."

Maddie nodded. She'd much rather talk to her aunt than her father about all things body-related, but even then it wasn't the best option. Any questions she had tended to be directed towards one of her friends. Peter was only helpful to a point; after that, she tended to consult Sydney, or the internet.

"Thanks, Dad," she said, knowing the words would settle his no doubt furiously turning mind. "I appreciate it. You don't need to worry though."

"You wouldn't tell me if I did," he said, and a moment of honest silence lingered between them like an exposed wound. Jung-min then stood straighter and removed his hands from his pockets, his change in position synonymous with a change of conversation. "When do you want to go?"

"Half five," Maddie said, relieved to be off the topic of boys. Her father smiled.

"I'll be downstairs at twenty-five past."

*

It took almost ten minutes to decide on an outfit, after which Maddie was finally able to choose her make-up. She spent the rest of the time sitting cross-legged in front of her mirror, trying to match the eyeliner of one eye with the other. Her patience only lasted so long, however, and she didn't expect Peter to notice whether or not she had symmetrical wings.

At exactly twenty-five past five, her father was ready and waiting downstairs, and Maddie joined him three minutes later in a pair of heels that she was sure she would regret before the night was over, despite hardly being more than an inch off the ground.

"How do I look?" she asked as she trotted down the stairs, her shoulder bag bouncing against her hip.

"You look lovely," her father said with a wistful smile, key in hand. "Where am I taking you?"

"Town," Maddie said. She and her father lived in a modest village twenty minutes from the nearest town, which wasn't a great deal larger. It pretty much consisted of one high street with the occasional alley streaking off to the side, but any shops not on the main road tended not to last long.

Maddie pulled down the sun shield to check her reflection, dabbing her lipstick to fade the colour a little. In her room it had looked ok, but in the light of the sun, it was a bit dark. "I'm meeting Peter at Twenty-One," she said. The quiet, unassuming restaurant was either trying to make some kind of statement with its name or the owners just hadn't bothered to come up with anything other than the building's street number.

"What time do you need picking up?"

"I can get a bus," Maddie said, but she could sense her father's disapproval.

"Not at night," he said. "What time?"

"The film finishes at half nine," she said, pushing the sun shield back up and promptly being almost blinded.

"I'll be in the car park," Jung-min said, always careful to respect his daughter's space. It had proved difficult over the years, he as her only parent and she as his only child, but they managed to muddle along in harmonious synchronisation. Maddie smiled in response, and for the remainder of the journey, hardly a word was said to interrupt the classical music playing on the radio.

*

Peter was standing outside the restaurant when Maddie arrived, tipping out of her father's car and waving a goodbye before he drove off. She greeted her friend with her widest grin, showing off her teeth. She didn't particularly like them, but her love of a grin outweighed any distaste for her incisors.

"Hey, Mads," Peter said, wearing a charming beam and holding a card. "Happy birthday."

She wrapped her arms around him and took an almost identical envelope out of her bag. "Happy birthday, Petey."

"How's sixteen treating you?"

"Well, I got the talk," she said, throwing a knowing look in Peter's direction, "so don't take advantage of me, ok?"

Peter chuckled and took her elbow, leading her into the restaurant. Fairy lights were strung up on the wall, casting a soft glow around the room that bounced off the mismatched mirrors at various heights on each wall. A perky waitress led them to the table Peter had booked a week ago in anticipation of their shared sixteenth, a cosy corner booth with more than enough space for the two of them.

"I never would," he said once the waitress had left. "Take advantage of you, that is. I never would."

Maddie rolled her eyes. "I know. How about you? How does it feel to be legal?" She almost laughed as she said the words that her friends had pestered her with for weeks before she had actually hit that milestone age.

"Well, I've definitely taken advantage of that," Peter joked, stretching out in his seat. "What else do you think I've been doing all day? Sex, sex, sex. It's all I think about, you know."

"Now that, I can believe." Maddie filled her glass with the jug of water the waitress had left them with, two slices of lemon floating amongst cubes of ice that clinked against the glass, a sound that always threw Maddie right into the middle of summer. "Shame about your chronic lack of a girlfriend."

Peter copied her, filling his glass and taking a long and loud gulp. "No more than a technicality, my dear Madeleine."

Maddie loved it when he used her full name. He was the only person who ever did: even her father never used it, to the point that she had checked her birth certificate more than once to check whether Maddie was short for Madeleine or Madison. It always said Madeleine, of course: daughter to Jung-min and So-yi. A tingle fluttered from her spine to her toes when Peter said her name like that, with his offset grin.

"I'm sorry," she said, innocently sucking on an ice cube, "but I don't think it's called sex if you're alone."

For the merest of moments, Peter looked a little embarrassed, but when Maddie scrutinised his face, the expression disappeared and he was left with nothing but an endearing smile. It was that smile that had initiated their friendship, five years ago now. It had been their first day of secondary school, when Maddie had very much been an eleven-year-old fish out of water, and catching a glimpse of that crooked grin from across a crowded classroom had instilled her with the hope she had desperately needed.

"You look really nice, by the way," Peter said. He held her gaze with his words before dropping his eyes to the menu. Maddie did the same, scanning the dishes and tapping her foot beneath the table, and only slightly dreading the walk to the cinema once the meal was over.

"Thanks, Petey."

Peter chuckled and when Maddie cocked her head at him, like a confused dog, he explained. "That's it," he said.

"Huh?"

"That name. Petey. Reason number one hundred and forty-eight why I will never get laid."

Maddie just sighed and shook her head at him. Sex really was all Peter ever thought about, but she wasn't sure she could claim complete innocence of that. Sure, she had never done the act, but that hadn't stopped her from experimenting in other ways.

"You'll get laid one day," she muttered, focusing on the menu to stop the blush that rose without control. She didn't even have to be embarrassed to blush - it seemed to be her body's natural reaction to most conversations, a nervous itch spreading across her chest.

"I have an idea."

She looked up. "You do?"

"You and me," Peter said, and this time Maddie's blush was for real. Her father popped into her head and she blinked in disbelief at Peter.

"What?"

"You and me," he said again, as though suggesting they go for a drink. "Not now," he added, and Maddie waited for him to explain himself. He slurped his water again. "How about an agreement?"

"What kind?" she asked cautiously, her hand poised over her water without picking it up. She didn't move a muscle in anticipation of Peter finishing his thought.

"Like ... you know how people do those marriage pact things? Like, if they're not married by forty then they marry each other?"

Maddie narrowed her eyes. "Yes..."

"We could have a sex pact," Peter said, lowering his voice out of the range of the middle-aged couple nearby. "If either of us is still a virgin by our twenty-first birthday, then we sleep together."

"Oh my God," Maddie said, the words a near whisper. "You're serious."

"I am." He nodded, an eager grin spreading. He was momentarily interrupted by the waitress returning to take their orders, and once they were given and she was gone, he continued. "It makes sense, really. We've been best friends for five years; by then it'd be ten. That's pretty cool, I think. It'd be like doing each other a favour. I don't know about you, but I don't want to be a virgin forever."

Despite her shock, Maddie had to give Peter credit for his ballsy approach to the topic. As she mulled it over, it made sense. Sort of. And after all, it was five years away. By then, she was sure, they would either have forgotten or they would have voided the agreement anyway. So she shrugged, and held out her hand.

"Ok," she said. "It's a deal."

With a broad grin, Peter stuck out his hand and they shook on it, before he dug a pen out of his pocket and took a napkin out of the pot with the cutlery.

"What're you doing?" Maddie asked.

"Commemorating the moment," he replied, scrawling something on the napkin in his illegible chicken-scratch script. When he finished, he pushed it across the table to Maddie.

If, by the 17th of July, 2016, either Ms. Madeleine So-Mi Hyun or Mr. Peter Oliver Jensen have yet to lose their virginity, they are bound by both verbal and physical contract to share a night together.

A coy smile spread across Maddie's lips, and blossomed into a laugh that brightened up her eyes. This was crazy, she thought, but she didn't mind. After all, it wasn't like it would ever actually happen. As soon as Peter got home, he would lose that napkin, she was sure. And if not? Well, a lot could change in five years.   

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this chapter is dedicated to sterilestorms for being a wonderful person whom i am honoured to call a friend. thank you, amora. she also made such a cute fanart for maddie and peter, which you can see here:

how are you liking the story and the characters so far? do not fear: after this little scene-setter of a prologue, the following chapters will focus on maddie in the present day (2016) and will be longer and, of course, more mature. what do you think of maddie's and peter's arrangement? i hope you enjoyed this chapter - please don't forget to comment and vote if you did! below is a wee edit i made of maddie. if you want to make any graphics for this story (which i would of course love!), please send them to me at hennwithapen[at]gmail[dot]com so i can add them to a chapter and dedicate it to you!

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