One Day At A Time

Chapter Twenty-Five: Chilly Saturday Evenings

After Rose and Lucas each begrudgingly go home, Ava is left alone with Lilly in her bedroom, now absentmindedly playing, "Minecraft" with her.

Lilly hesitantly looks at Ava, words tumbling around in her head.

She opens her mouth to speak and her brain goes with it, getting the right words out right-off-the-bat for once.

"I read your, uh, note thingy, the thing you gave me on Valentine's Day."
Ava pauses the game and sets the controller down in front of her.
"I know you did. I wanted you to read it. Um... how... how are you feeling about it?" She stammers, thinking about all the mushy and romantic stuff that's possible for them to do, all the stuff she's been dreaming about in the last few weeks.

Lilly clears her throat when her answer gets into her head.
"I'm happy about it, honestly. You said all those nice things about me and how you feel excited and jittery around me and it makes me so happy that after all these years-" She pauses herself to catch her breath.

Her heart is pounding in her chest and she takes a deep breath to calm it down so she can say everything properly. "After a long time of thinking that you'd... never feel the same way, you do. You feel the same way."

Lilly is smiling now, smiling with pure bliss and love in her eyes.
Ava is looking back at her, smiling as much as Lilly is, maybe even a bit more. "That's how I'm feeling about it." She finishes with a sigh.

Ava sits quietly, grinning and thinking to herself.
"That's great. I'm happy you're happy about it!" She says after a few moments.

Her curiosity as to what they do next is sticking out in her mind.

After her grin dials back a bit, she asks,
"Lilly, can I ask you something?"
"Yep." Lilly replies quickly.

Ava thinks on how she wants to phrase her question, looking away from Lilly for a bit.

When she looks back at her, her question comes out.
"You... like me and I like you. I, I want to be more-than-friends, but I don't know if you want that."

Lilly can't help but smile so wide her cheeks hurt.
"I really want that, Ava." She says, looking right into her eyes.

Ava looks right back at her, her heart going wild.
"Okay." She smiles. "So, are we, are we, like... girlfriends now?"

Lilly's heart could burst out of her chest right now, it nearly does.

That's a possibility she's thought about for a long, long time and she's over-the-moon happy that the possibility is just one single step, one single word away from being a reality.

With a happy grin, she answers a little louder than how she normally talks,
"Yes!"

Ava is grinning with her face pink and aching.

She can't help herself.
Ava moves towards Lilly, pulling her in for a tight hug, one of the tightest hugs they've ever done.

"You're my girlfriend, you're my girlfriend, I have a girlfriend." Ava tells herself as she hugs Lilly.

They're words she never thought she would say or even think, but she's saying them right now, as happy as can be.

The newness will take time for Ava to get used to.
It'll also take Lilly a good while, too.

Lilly's head is resting on Ava's shoulder, as the phrase, "I have a girlfriend! Ava's my girlfriend!" repeat joyously in her mind.