I shrugged. "She was a great girlfriend. We had lots of fun together.

But when I look back at how much we really gave each other emotionally..." I shook my head and sighed.

“We had no real future together."

“I'm hearing a Lot of past tense. You say that Like your relationship is already over.”

“I suppose it already is." I shrugged.

“Don't get me wrong. I'm not blaming her. I'm not even really mad at her. I sincerely believe Neevie didn't do this on purpose and never meant to hurt me. But she's still in love with Conor. Her parents are never going to let her see me again anyway. We haven't formalized it yet, and don't tell any of the girls until I can talk to Neevie first, but... yeah, it's over."

Saying those words aloud hit me in the gut, and I felt bile in the back of my mouth. I scowled, Looked away, and had to pause to collect myself.

Sam leaned forward, reaching out far enough to wipe from my cheek the tear that I hadn't even realized was there.

I inhaled sharply, took a deep breath, and collected myself. I wouldn't shed any more tears over this. Just then, my stomach growled rather loudly.

Sam barked a quick laugh and stood up. Reaching one hand down to me, she asked, "C'mon. Let's go get something to eat."

Food sounded great. I took her hand, Let her pull me up to my feet, and we started on the trail back.

After walking back to my house, Sam had me hop into her SUV and she drove us out to get Chinese food. I was emotionally drained and only ate half my meal, but she kept my spirits up with pleasant conversation and eventually drove me home. But after she parked in my driveway, I found that I didn't want to open the door and get out.

Sam caught my hesitation, and after a few seconds, she gave me a look of concern and asked, "You okay?"

I took a deep breath and muttered to the dashboard, “I don't really want to be alone right now."

Sam promptly turned off the engine and opened her door

I turned quickly and said, "Oh, no, I didn't mean that as a request. I know you've got a super-busy schedule and I've taken up too much of your time on a school day already."

Sam had already stepped down onto the driveway and looked back at me.

“It's fine. For you, I've got all the time in the world.” She stepped back, closed the door, and came around to my side.

Sam opened the door and looked at me expectantly. I finally unbuckled my seatbelt and stepped down from the car. Once I let us both into the house, she took me by the hand and led me up to my bedroom.

Despite the fact that Sam's shapely ass swayed left and right as she escalated the stairs ahead of me, my head was in a weird place and I wasn't really paying attention to it. She got my attention a moment later though, when she turned to face me, unzipped my jacket, and then started pulling it off my shoulders. I looked at her curiously, not understanding what was going on just yet, but when she started tugging my shirt up, I grabbed her wrists and asked, “What are you doing?"

The gorgeous platinum blonde smiled.

“What does it look like I'm doing?"

"You appear to be taking off my clothes.”

Sam dropped her hands, so I let go of her wrists. "Fine," she said.

“You take off your clothes. I'll take off mine.”