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night.
    “You should probably get dressed,” Mike called from the cupboard. “You’ve got a class at nine thirty, don’t you?”
    “Yeah,” I said remembering, “yeah, I do.”
    It was my final for history. It was my best class, so I wasn’t too worried. All the same, it wouldn’t do to be late.
    I went to the bathroom and dressed quickly. When I came back out, Mike was sitting at the table, laptop opened with two steaming mugs waiting.
    “I know you don’t drink coffee,” he said still staring at his laptop, “but there were some tea bags. So, I made that instead.”
    “That’s perfect,” I said.
    “I put one cream in yours,” he said finally looking up at me, “that’s still the way you like it, right?”
    I smiled at him and nodded, my heart was now pounding in my chest for an entirely different reason. The thought that Mike remembered how I took my tea gave me a warm feeling all over. That idea alone made the silence less awkward as we sat at the table. Mike looking at his Laptop, obviously still looking for information on McBride and me simply watching him.
    But, when our tea was finished and we had left the apartment building for the subway stop down the street, we still hadn’t said a word about last night.
    The thrill of having tea made for me was beginning to wear off and I felt increasingly as though I should say something. Anything to break the tension.
    It took me the entire silent uptown subway ride for me to work up the courage. We were one block away from my school building when I finally spoke.
    “So, are we going to talk about what happened last night?” I asked. “Or would you rather we maintain an awkward silence until we both forget it happened.”
    “That depends,” he said. “Do you want to forget that it happened?”
    I didn’t like the ball being in my court like that; I’d never liked it. So, I threw it back.
    “I guess that depends,” I answered. “Do you want to forget it happened?”
    There was silence for a moment.
    “I’m not sure it’s as simple as that,” Mike said, as we reached my school building. I stopped at the doorway. I knew I wasn’t going to let him leave it like that.
    “What’s making it complicated?” I asked.
    “Besides the obvious?” he answered.
    “Mike,” I said with an eye roll, “it’s not like we’re related. We met when we were teenagers. We even have different last names!”
    “I know that,” he answered. He moved his hand across his face the way he always did when he either felt nervous or guilty. “Look, let’s talk about this tonight. When you get out of school. Would that be okay?”
    I wanted to press the issue. I wanted to tell him that I wasn’t moving until we’d worked this whole thing out here and now. But, my history final was calling and I knew there would be no time to work things out properly.
    “Okay,” I answered, “but, promise me. After I’m all finish here, we’ll talk.”
    “I promise,” he said. I was glad when a smile finally crossed his lips.
    “Now go on and play nice with the other kids,” he said.
    “I’ll be through at five,” I answered. “Pick me up here?”
    “I’ll be here,” he said.
    Mike made good on his promise to pick me up but, as I learned when he met me at the front of the school building at five pm that evening, circumstances beyond his control had forced us to postpone our little relationship chat.
    “I’m really sorry,” he said, “just, Zach from my unit wanted a bunch of us to meet up for drinks. It’ll probably be the last chance we have to see each other before we ship out again.”
    “But, when you do ship out you’ll be with those guys non-stop for six weeks!” I said. I knew I sounded like a cloying kid, but I couldn’t help but be a bit frustrated. Here I was needing to have an important conversation with my possible boyfriend and this “Zach” (whom I immediately decided I disliked) wanted to hang out and couldn’t be bothered to give more than