The word pinnacle is defined as the culmination of points or, the most successful point. The top of a mountain is called a pinnacle because that's where all the angles of the mountain come together and meet finally. It's the tallest point, it's the moment right before you exhale. Lost of different things have pinnacles, mountains, careers, stories. Crushes have pinnacles. All of these have one thing in common, everything afterwards is all downhill.

Jason gave me two thumbs up as I pressed my hands against the closed door. This side didn't have the runes on it, I could feel that immediately. The symbols in the other side seem to taunt me, and pull at my gut. They had one job, open and close from the outside. They weren't carved for anything else. That to me seemed like a dumb design, but I didn't build this creepy place.

I gently pushed more of my energy against them, it wasn't enough, I could already feel it leaving my body. Have you ever accidently glanced away from pouring a glass of goat's milk, only to look back and discover you've poured yourself way too much? Now you can't put it back into the container. You're juts going to have to drink all of the goat's milk. You know it's more than you can handle, but force it down your throat anyway. Now you have to lie down, because you just drank way too much, and you're physically exhausted. Yeah that's about how I felt now.

"I can't do this," I explained, painting. My head was swimming and even in the semi darkness I was seeing spots. "If I push anymore, I'm going to pass out."

"Hmm, can you... recharge?" His hands appeared, lit up in flame. "When I'm burnt out, I recharge by relaxing, meditation, or getting a snack. "

He was so close to me, I hadn't realized. "I need rest, but I don't think we have time."

"Alright, other options?"

"Sometimes I get bursts of energy when I feel... happy. Not calm but... excited and happy. You like—" I flapped my hands in emphasis, "That's been the only way I've figured out how to control it."

Kosmos, he was looking right at me, with that stupid uneven grin of his. "What makes you happy?"

I could have sworn I heard Peri snicker. He was probably perched on the bookcase, somewhere I couldn't see him to tell him off. I blushed and ignored him. "Uh, usually it's stuff like my mom, getting Felix back..." my heart was pounding. "Um... well...." Now or never, right? "...You."

"What?" Jason blinked.

Oh Kosmos, I had mumbled.

Jason was still waiting for a response, still standing over me. The fire on his fingertips was dwindling, but I could still make out his face. There was no going back now... I wanted to tell him so badly. I wanted him to hold me like he'd just done. Kosmos, I wasn't over him at all.

"Um," I clenched my fists, "you. I have a bit of a crush on you. Especially now that... that we've grown so close. You make me really happy."

I didn't want to make eye contact but I forced myself to see his reaction. Jason's eyes widened, and his parted slightly in surprise. I could see his cheeks turn red, and the fire on his hands died and turned a dark red color immediately.

"Oh, wow. Thank you—I mean, oh Kosmos," his head dropped into his hands. "I'm sorry, this hasn't really happened to me before."

I laughed nervously, "yeah me neither. I'm not exactly... allowed to have boyfriends where I'm from."

"Me neither." He looked back up at me, with the face of a confused puppy. "I don't... know how to respond."

My heart skipped a beat and the heat of shame filled my face. "It's okay, you don't have to... I just figured I'd tell you. You're not required to do anything."

"I know—I mean, no—okay, so this has never happened to me before. I've never uh... put any thought towards liking people. Nobody usually pays attention to me, err, Look the point is, I can't say yes, but I also can't say no. I just... don't know." He shrugged, "I don't know if I like you back."

"Oh," I paused and tugged at the end of my shirt. "Well, this is a predicament."

He laughed, the way someone laughs when they're not expecting to. The kind of laughs that's a hundred times cuter. "You really... like me?"

"Psh, yeah." I folded my arms, trying to play it off like my nose wasn't being grilled off.

"Why?" He asked, his voice was so quiet.

I paused, took my time to take a breath, and felt myself relax. I hadn't been rejected, we were just stopped in this limbo, neither of us were upset. It was... okay. He looked happy, that's all I cared about.  "Well, you have this dumb smile... the soft way you talk when you not putting up a guard around people. The way you care about familiars, about keeping people safe from danger without even being asked. I could probably go on for a bit."

"Huh," he smiled, it was the same one. "I'm not really sure how to say this but..."

He couldn't seem to find the words.

Jason hesitated, then reached towards my face. Oh Kosmos. It hadn't been so cold in the cave, I would have been sweating buckets. When his fingers brushed my skin, the fire died so the two of us were left in complete darkness. I could hear his breaths, just as nervous as I was. He cupped my face and leaned down. He kissed me.

He was kissing me and it was lasting far longer than it should have. I reached my hands up around his neck, and we swayed. My back pressed against the wall of the cave, my whole brain was buzzing and alive. I was filled with beautiful energy, it twisted around between us, so delicately. I didn't have to open my eyes to know my hands were glowing. I started to unconsciously tap into Jason's subconscious, and as soon as I did, I drew out immediately because I didn't want to find out what he felt. I didn't want us to merge together only to find he felt nothing. I wanted to enjoy this.

We broke apart, gasping. I pressed my palms to the walls of the cave, whatever wall I'd bumped into, and let all the built energy from the kiss flow into it. While it was still precious, while it was still pure. I'd taken some of his magic with me, I could feel it, it was like swallowing spices. I could feel the burn on my arms from it leaving me, like being struck by gentle lightning. There was the sound of two objects grating together, we'd done it. We'd opened the door.

Jason's hand lit up, letting us see what happened. The door to cave we had come in wasn't open. The book shelf however, had slid to the side to reveal another tunnel. I looked at Jason, who was also looking at me.

"That was... something." He said

"Right?" I smiled.

The happy feeling was sucked out of me when I realized Jason was covered in guilt. From his posture to the way he fidgeted and wouldn't look me in the eye. 

"I'm sorry," he breathed. "I... I don't think.... I just don't know. We... had to get the door open—"

I realized what he'd done before he even finished talking. My throat was dry and I didn't trust myself to speak with immediately breaking down. This wasn't happening, I wouldn't let myself get sucked into this right now.

"I see," I choked, and pushed past him through the tunnel, wiping my face as I went.

Peri landed on my shoulder, I could feel his presence, keeping me afloat. He knew I didn't want to have another breakdown, and gave me his soothing energy. I was going to get through this. No words had to be said confirming this. Maybe I was even stronger for finally having this chapter behind me.

It was all downhill from here.

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A/N: double update this weekend cause these are both pretty short ;)