"Almost there, Wilshire Boulevard," I murmured to myself as I saw the ten-mile exit announcement for UCLA's campus off Highway 405, the most ridiculous parking lot impression of a highway I'd ever seen.

The air between my car's hood and the white Toyota Prius twelve inches ahead of me wavered from heat as I absently watched while two small children batted their hands against each other in the back seat while the Mom chirped away on her phone.

Fuck, that's never gonna be me.

I'll rip my own uterus out with my bare hands before that happens.

"Exit fifty-five, I'm begging you," I pleaded with the standstill traffic, then shifted my car into park and stretched the nearly numbed calf muscle in my right leg.

A quick side glance on my right showed a couple who filmed some kind of seated dance routine video in their car, horribly by the outtakes then subsequent accusations they threw at each other, which I groaned at quietly. Unfortunately, a left glance showed an older man in a business suit with his eyes already focused on me, eyebrows wagged suggestively, and his tongue gently ran over his parted lips.

Fuck no.

With a sigh, I rested my left elbow on my door's interior. My middle finger had just lifted against my temple when, thankfully, Mom's Prius lurched ahead. The relief was short-lived and, for the next forty-fucking five minutes, I alternated between a game of which lane moved the slowest. While my body was completely relaxed like always after I had sex, I still shook my head at the last Jake Harrison billboard that advertised the nearest exit for USC games.

I exhaled a string of curse words by the time exit fifty-five appeared and, with no ounce of shame, pulled onto the shoulder and crept around the slowass traffic.

Thank God. If I see one more Jake Harrison billboard, then I'm driving this car through it.

Each billboard I'd seen, seven in total, grated on my nerves more and more.

I'd felt a mix of emotions after Jake had left my bedroom along with my dignity that Saturday morning before our senior year of high school started - embarrassed, used, angry, somewhat. But more than anything, I felt empty, abandoned, and rejected. The taste of how he'd made me feel for just a moment, that dangled threat of an emotional connection, felt like he'd ripped a hole in my chest and carried my heart out with him.

After this realization, the typical rom-com story emotions flooded out of me like a hormonal dam had been blown open. Jake was the dynamite that had burst open my emotional blockage and I was powerless against anything other than how I rode out the floodwaters after he left.

I cried, I screamed. I cursed. Boy, I sure cursed.

Once these emotions settled down, I washed away my snot and tears in a scalding hot shower that left most of my skin warm and pink. While I patted my hair absently with a towel, inside I was an even more empty, shallow vessel of my former self. With one look at the dull, lifeless gaze that reflected back in my bathroom mirror, I made some decisions.

Never again.

Jake's charisma, charm, and magnetic personality had managed to set the bar high for any other potential boy in my life, but he'd also knocked the bar right off once he'd left me at rock bottom. He hadn't quenched my desire to be with someone though. There was, and always would be, something about that initial spark, that interest, that thrilled me psychologically as well as physically.

Ironically, when love had been placed so close to me where I'd almost tasted it, Jake helped me set up boundaries so I'd never feel that open and vulnerable ever again.

I need some rules.

Once dressed, I pulled my seventeen year-old self off my tear-stained state of existence and pulled out a notepad on my desk. My trembling fingers made the task difficult but I wrote down all the words that I needed and taped them up to that same bathroom mirror. Even if the handwriting looked like a chicken had scratched them, my news rules of engagement were established.

Rule number 1: Date one person at a time, i.e., no cheating.

Rule number 2: Don't date ridiculously hot guys with big egos.

Rule number 3. Take what I want from the relationship.

Rule number 4. End it.

Rule number one probably seemed contradictory since Jake had just cheated on his girlfriend for probably not the first but last time with me. Again, I surprisingly felt no guilt towards his girlfriend since Jake was the one who contacted me, even climbed through my window, but my slight sense of moral code couldn't allow me to do that to someone I dated.

So one dick at a time.

I wrote rule number two out of self preservation. If I found someone with an attractiveness level slightly below Jake's, then I operated on a more level playing field from guys who wanted to date up on a superficial level. From a shallow perspective, break-up circumstances were forever tilted within my favor.

An unanticipated fallout from rule number two was that guys usually placed me upon some 'my girl is really hot' pedestal. My hatred of pedestals certainly applied to me being placed on one. Once that realization set in, which always happened, I freaked out and took the early exit.

The first relationship I flew from was Ryan, who had the displeasure as my longest actually 'normal' relationship throughout high school, and the fucktastic crash at our demise. I ended our relationship for completely selfish, guilt-ridden reasons.

I actually first saw Ryan, in all of his tall, pale-skinned, lanky-limbed glory while I was being hit on by a total meathead outside of Santa Cruz High School's auto shop classroom.

"Harper." I think his name actually was Greg... or Fred, something oddly eighties-inspired.

His black hair was slicked with too much gel but he'd grabbed my elbow on my way to Algebra class. A cigarette was tucked behind one ear and his all-black attire choice screamed one application of eyeliner short of closet emo that waited to be released to the public. His dark black hair hung over his forehead in chunks and his brown eyes stared at me with a predatory level of intent.

I remember how my back had sunk against the cool, smooth texture of the white painted cinder block walls of the hallway. With one elbow rested on the wall above my head, he leaned into my personal space with no remorse or signs of forgiveness.

In other words, he made my girly parts squishy with the not-subtle approach.

"Wanna go under the bleachers and do something that'll get us detention?" His eyes roamed over me suggestively.

"Don't you have class?" I raised an eyebrow at him. "I certainly do."

"It's just shop." His shoulders shrugged but his intense gaze never wavered.

"Boring." I scoffed but a quick visual inspection hinted that this asshole possibly offered me more than the simple fact he shared shop class with Jake. "Tell you what, you take me out for coffee after school then we'll have hours to get into trouble together afterwards."

"I'm going to enjoy putting my hands all over you." He smirked as he stepped forwards and, again not subtly, let me know how excited he was about that idea while he slightly grinded his hips against mine.

"Makes two of us." I giggled softly in what definitely was not my proudest moment.

"Harper," a deep voice practically growled at me from behind Greg/Fred/not-the-first-name-I'd-forgotten. "You can't be seriously talking to this loser."

My eyes widened as Jake's tall frame came into my view. He assumed his signature angry jock posture as his dark eyes narrowed, flickered a shade darker, nostrils flared, and hands clenched in white-knuckled tight fists.

A few steps beyond this giant, dark-haired hulk stood Ryan. He was barely an inch taller than me, with pale skin and soft brown eyes set wide in horror behind a thin-framed set of silver-rimmed glasses. He threw me an 'I hope you're okay and I'd like to help but these guys would rip my skinny limbs apart' look, excused himself around us, and stepped into Algebra class a few doors down.

"Jake." I wrapped one hand around his wrist and tugged him a few steps away from Mister Magic Hands.

"Are you okay?" Jake's glare softened and he visually inspected me like he expected to see damage.

"No..." My eyes narrowed and my mouth tugged into one corner of my cheek. "Fuck off, Jake."

"What the fuck, Harper?" One of his hands dragged his fingers through his hair, a tick he did when he was uncomfortable. "I do care about your well-being."

I wanted to believe what he said, but his actions lately had screamed otherwise.

"Redirect that caring towards your sister," the words initially snapped out of me but my voice softened the more I spoke. "Since she told me she's having nightmares again, about... well, you know."

"Shit." Jake ran his hand over his hair again while his other hand landed on my shoulder. He jumped to false assumptions with his perpetually friendzoned best friend. "Again? If it's Kieran bugging her again, I swear -"

"Not him," I muttered and shook my head when Ellie told me a group of rival school football players harassed her at work. "Talk to your sister about who showed up at Pizza Palace, not me."

After I dismissed Jake with a raised middle finger, I slunk into my Algebra class and took a seat diagonally behind Ryan's left side. My attention for the rest of class was directed more on him than the stupid subject that assigned numbers to letters then applied math relationships on them.

Ryan's thin, yet muscular, frame hinted that he was some form of athlete - cross country team, I found out later - but his longer arms and legs looked like he still needed to grow into his frame. His pale skin tone rivaled the background color of my notebook paper.

He was attractive though, in a geeky kind of way, and not too much to the extent no other girl had their eyes or claws on him.

Rule number two? Check.

One look back at me and a shy smile later, my interest was piqued. He never talked to me directly, but most likely because another shop class meathead stopped by and monopolized my conversations before class. Ryan sat close distance-wise to me during Algebra and, after a few of the shyest smiles ever sent in my direction melted the curiosity inside me, I formally met him during one of his cross country team practices.

With as many of the football games and practices I'd seen, the cross country team's practice was certainly no comparison. For starters, just two spectators sat in the stands, a sophomore named Sophia Hernandez and me. From her short stature, her brown eyes had looked up at me curiously, like she'd expected I was lost. She also mistakenly assumed since my ass was also parked on the bleachers that we were destined to be friends, but I only needed one conversation and convinced her otherwise.

I'd caught Ryan's eyes on me more than once, as he lapped around the track a few paces ahead of his herd of gangly teammates, but each time his gaze just glazed past mine.

"Fuck that," I muttered, stood up, and walked down to the bottom steps. I noticed a small rock, a pebble really, then picked up and turned the small, hard object over in my palm.

"What are you doing?" Sophia asked me from her front row seat, curiosity bright in her eyes.

"Speeding up the process." I winked at her, then chucked the rock right at Ryan on his next lap as he passed by.

I hit him on one of his long, pasty-skinned legs, right above his knee. He nearly tripped over his own feet as he came to a full stop and stared at me. His herd stumbled around him but he just stood, hands on his hips in that awful, red tank-top like running outfit, and a shocked expression on his face. My response was a small 'oops' giggle, a wave, and a wink.

After a quick flirting session at the fence, Ryan didn't stand a chance. We went out for coffee after his practice and became inseparable since. He even asked me to the Homecoming Dance right away, which I admired his forwardness on and said yes.

Despite the first application of my dating rules and six weeks of the longest 'true' relationship I'd ever had, I messed up with Ryan. I allowed him to get too close.

No, we got too close.

He met Ellie and we actually dated in my only fairytale-like romance where I seduced his virginity out after he'd propositioned me to go running one school night.

"My legs are twitching." He pointed at his knee, which bounced so much that the bed vibrated.

The action flooded dirty thoughts, all of them inspired by other ways we could have vibrated the bed, through my mind. By the way I'd always initiated any kiss between us, I was obviously more physically experienced than Ryan though, so I coughed and waved a distracted hand at his bedroom door.

"If you need a break, then go ahead but there's no fucking way that I'm going running with you. Running is for escaping California wildfires, chainsaw massacres, and that creepyass clown who hides in storm drains."

Ryan was an avid horror film enthusiast, to the extent that almost all of our dates involved us curled up on his living room's sofa or bed while we watched movies. He threw me a lazy grin in reply, although after this particular night, we rarely reached the end of movies on all of our subsequent 'dates.'

Ryan's bedroom was typical for a teenage boy except for one aspect: it was incredibly clean. I'd visited his house a few times and never once found a spec of dust in his bedroom. Light blue walls and dated furniture hinted at how he hadn't updated the décor since he was younger. His desk was too small for two, so we sat cross-legged and faced each other on his bed with our Algebra books spread open and 'studied' for an upcoming exam.

There's a reason I nearly failed Algebra the first half of that semester... Ryan's ridiculously skimpy cross-country shorts.

"But I can think of so many more enjoyable ways to burn that energy off." I leaned forwards, smirked into his lips, then kissed him gently.

Despite pretty much zero experience with girls, Ryan's kisses were something else. They were soft, warm, and tantalizingly, achingly, amazingly slow. His entire body stiffened and his arms reached towards me but his hands paused like he wasn't sure what to do with them.

"It's okay," I murmured into his velvety soft, additive lips. "You can put your hands on me."

Surprisingly, he pulled back and sat away from me. Behind his square, silver-rimmed glasses, his light brown eyes were full of confusion as they searched mine for what felt like eons.

"So... What are we?" he finally asked.

I blinked rapidly. "Uhh, a boy and a girl? Unless you're not and if that's the case -"

"Are you my girlfriend?" he blurted the words out suddenly, then his ears adorably turned pink. "I-I mean I like you so much, I'd be honored if you were but I don't know -"

"If that's how you feel..." I smiled as I took his hand in mine, intertwined our fingers, and watched as he visibly relaxed. "Then I'd be stupid not to be your girlfriend."

"So... yeah?" His entire face lit up in pure, unmasked happiness as I nodded silently, then he tugged my hand so I leaned forwards closer to him.

"So I can do this then?" He pressed his lips firmly against mine, which sent a smile from my mouth all the way down into my toes.

"You can do more than that." Me being, well, me, took his hand linked with mine and placed his palm on the outside of one of my breasts.

His breath hitched audibly, then a look cast over his face that I still remembered every detail of. His eyes were full of bewilderment, awe, and excitement.

A tantalizing slow, slightly clumsy on his part, explorative process later, Ryan and I slept together. He surprised me in that, after all the awkwardness and clumsiness of the first time passed, he was warm, tender, and loving. I unleashed his inner monster after seventeen years of sexual repression and we couldn't keep our hands off each other after that. Despite his inexperience, he actually showed me the slower, more intimate side of sex I hadn't experienced except for Jake's cruel tease.

We continued that relationship for almost seven weeks, until everything fell to shit Homecoming Night. Like we'd done several times, we slept together after the dance but the condom broke. Like a cold-hearted bitch, I promptly broke up with Ryan and left his house shortly afterwards.

My excuse was that, after a broken condom and clinic trip for plan B, I couldn't look at Ryan without feeling ridden with guilt from the 'what-if' scenarios. In hindsight, my period was due three days later so I was outside the ovulation window but lied to the Planned Parenthood nurse and said I didn't know.

The truthful reason I ended my relationship with Ryan was that he hadn't freaked out after the condom broke. His soft brown eyes looked deeply into mine, then he clutched me in his arms tightly, stroked his fingers through my hair, and assured me that no matter what happened, he loved me and wouldn't ever go anywhere. He placed one gentle kiss on my lips that simultaneously reassured me of his affections and scared the shit out of me because they weren't reciprocated.

In response, I utterly freaked out and bolted.

My guilt for how I'd hadn't felt entirely the same way as Ryan did, with the normal, healthy relationships feelings, lingered for the rest of my senior year. Ellie helped me of course. Short-term, she was right at my side during the clinic trip, invited me over afterwards, and took care of me. We watched a marathon of my favorite movie when she got up to use the bathroom when the last person I'd expected sympathy from came in.

"Harper?" Jake's voice for once sounded tentative, borderline weak, not cocky and arrogant like normal. He crept towards Ellie's bed where I laid huddled under the blankets, silently sat down, and the bed sank towards his weight. Almost instinctively, I leaned against his shoulder as tears sprung into my eyes and his arms wrapped around me warmly.

"Are you okay?" Jake pulled back slightly, his dark eyes looked full of concern, almost soulful. "If it'll make you feel better, I'll give you a free pass to punch me in the balls instead of Ryan."

Any other day, my hand would've already been pulled back, cocked and ready to punch him. But not that day, I was uncharacteristically vulnerable, emotionally raw, and exposed.

"He said he loved me," I mumbled into Jake's hard chest.

"And that's a bad thing?" One of Jake's large hands ran over the top of my head and smoothed my hair down behind my ear before he enclosed both arms around me and tugged me closer.

"It is because I didn't feel the same." I lifted my head slightly and rested my cheek against his shoulder, where the faint smell of much-needed deodorant filled my nose.

"Well, shit." My head bounced as he actually laughed a little. "I can't beat the piss out of him for that reason, Harper."

Saying that Jake had anger issues was a colossal understatement, but weirdly he cooled off almost as quickly as he set himself off. I didn't answer him, just buried my face against the space between his chest and shoulder and closed my eyes.

"You'll find someone else, better than that skinny runt," he whispered into my ear. "Someone who gets you and loves you just as much as you love them."

I didn't believe a single word Jake said but at the time appreciated the rare display of kindness. His hands warmly rubbed my lower back and he whispered something further but I hadn't heard him over my sobs.

Ryan deserved anyone else, someone who returned the loving looks his sad eyes sent me for the rest of the school year. I nearly failed the rest of Algebra the second half of the semester because whenever I skipped a class and fooled around with another boy, I made damned sure that was the class I avoided.

My traitorous body and fragile ego both craved male attention but I was cautious and had nothing more than casual flings so that I controlled when they ended. My rules worked amazingly for my self preservation and ego, horrendously for my conscience, but that approach brought me here to this day.

Rules number three and four were about me taking more control and ensuring protection of my feelings and emotional state.

And despite rare moments of being a decent human, Jake Harrison was still an asshole. With another billboard that flashed his cocky face and football accolades, my brain thankfully served me a much-needed reminder.

One I want nothing to do with.

The problem was never convincing my mind of how much I hated Jake, it was the rest of me that reacted traitorously. Three months after our hookup that ended his relationship with Camille, his subsequent girlfriend Chloe broke up with him after he'd moaned my name during a blow job.

A week later, I'd even attempted to get back at Jake and threw his hateful, "We both know it was shit and didn't mean anything" line back at him the night Ellie left for Logan's Homecoming Dance. Even though I'd slammed the door behind me, I was really mad at how content my body was after he'd played it like his personal finger puppet.

Just three weeks later, Jake tempted me into a sex-only relationship that stretched us through high school and crushed Ellie further down a spiral of depression.

As I pulled up to the first traffic light on Wilshire, I groaned quietly at my past mistakes and tightly gripped my steering wheel.

I can't do that again. Hiccup nine months ago aside, I'm better than that.

He is the one only who's literally worked me over in both holes.

Even nine months ago, with the same intentions Jake and I were a horrible, toxic mess of two humans who unfortunately had mind-blowing sex together, my body caved again to Jake's charms in less than twenty-four hours within his proximity.

So, even though he has my new number, as long as the rest of me blends into the sixty thousand students between our two schools, then I'll be fine.

Given my track record with Jake and now that I arrived into his territory, I didn't believe myself either.