Ray didn't quite know what she was doing, but kissing Lokela was the best thing in the world. She parted her lips for him, accidently stumbling in place. He was too tall. She ran her fingers into his hair to draw him downwards while he supported her weight.

Then he moved sideways to hold her better, but wound up knocking off several bottles of spray, deodorant and toothpaste off the sink counter. It was much too small in there.

"Bedroom," she breathed.

He picked her up around the waist and they maneuvered out the door, across the hall and into her room.

She fell backwards on the bed, pulling him down on top of her. His weight was delicious. His hands were braced on the bed at either side of her face to not squish her, but the rough rub of his shorts through the towel was doing things to her. She was hot and wet in unusual places all of a sudden. Her Mary Jane was absolutely disturbed and confused by what was happening with Lokela.

And despite the confusion, she found her hips were rotating into his. Worse, her hands were sliding up his shirt onto his bare skin. His stomach and back were silky and warm. She wanted to lick him. Was this what she was supposed to have felt with Zach, when he did those same things to her?

Zach...

Lokela sucked in his breath at her touch, every muscle in his arms popping, and all she knew was that he was on her. She shivered, wriggling under him. Suddenly torn between wanting to pull off the towel which wasn't covering much of her body and being afraid of what would happen if she did, she froze.

"Wait," she said.

He stopped mid-kiss to look at her.

Zach...

"I can't. I don't what I'm doing, or how I feel, or who I'm dating right now."

Lokela was off the bed in a flash. He even arranged her towel lower on her hips as she held it in place at her chest. Her cheeks burned with embarrassment. What must he think of her? Leading him on like that when she was supposedly dating his best friend?

"My fault," he said in a rush. "I came on way too strong there, I'm not sure what was going on in my head. I'm really sorry."

"No, I'm sorry," she said. "I shouldn't have started it. I started it, right?"

"No clue. But I was going way too fast."

"And I might be dating Zach, or I might not.I So this was all wrong," she said.

He nodded vigorously in agreement. "No, I was wrong. My bad, completely."

She stood up gingerly to not flash her Mary Jane for the second time that same morning.

Naia burst into her room with a loud bang, smoothies in hand. "Hey, sweets, I didn't know if you wanted extra banana or—oh, shit, I'm totally interrupting. Here's my ass getting out of your room. Bye!"

As fast as she had appeared, Naia disappeared, leaving Lokela and Ray blinking at each other in confusion.

"I should go," Lokela said.

At the same time, Ray announced, "I should get some clothes on."

"Right," they both said.

"See you later, all right?" Ray asked. She motioned to the door. "How about we pretend this didn't happen?"

She had a vague feeling that people could pretend they hadn't kissed and everything would go back the way it was before. That was a thing, right? Whatever. "I really have to figure things out with Zach, plus you and I had just decided to be friends. This muddles everything we've achieved so far. Right? We'll say this never happened."

"Exactly. I agree. Good. See you later." Lokela ducked out of the room, as if being chased. The front door slammed thirty seconds later. He was gone.

Ray heaved a sigh and let her towel drop to the floor. Only half of one leg was shaven, but she didn't have the energy to attack the rest. Someone knocked at the door. No, wait, it was a knock on the wall to Doug's room. At least someone had the decency to knock, though.

"I'm naked, hold on," she called.

Doug's voice answered. "Ray, take it from me, you can't pretend nothing ever happened after something happens."

"I don't need bad news before seven in the morning," she said. "And I'm really not going to figure this situation out without a huge iced-latte to wake me up."

He chuckled. She heard his footsteps heading for the stairs. "Come down in five, I've got you covered, darling."

Ray pulled on her panties, a flowing, knee-length skirt, and a strappy tank with the halter bra built in. Her boobs were small enough she could get away with that kind of top. Unfortunately, her nipples were incredibly perky, pushing out the thin cloth, and every brush of fabric on her bare skin made her ache.

Her body ached for Lokela.

Then she thought of the letter from Zach and her heart ached in an entirely different way.

***

*Ray

Ray leaned back on the large rock, only her feet in the water, and closed her eyes. Naia and she were in the shade of overhanging trees that grew on the cliff behind them, the sparkling turquoise ocean stretched endless under the morning sky. The thin strip of rocky shore was empty except for the two of them and a million birds. Approximately one million, of course, judging by the sound of birdsong.

This was why Ray had come to Hawaii—for mornings like this on the beach with a friend. They were practically underneath Diamond Head, the iconic crater that loomed over Honolulu. Since the beach was rocky and hard to access, tourists never came there, flocking instead to the artificially maintained sandy beaches of Waikiki. It was as rough and raw and natural as it got on the island of Oahu, which was to say, it was breathtakingly beautiful. She wanted to wade into the sea and stay there forever, preferably as a mermaid.

"Question," Ray said.

Naia mm-hmmed from her reclined position, arm over her face to block the faint light.

"If you had to leave Hawaii, but could choose anywhere else in the world to live, where would you go?"

"Easy. The Alps in Europe. I love the mountains there, and life is so organized and neat. They've got plenty of tourists, too. I could set up another smoothie booth or small restaurant in one of those old towns. You?"

Ray thought a moment. "The southern tip of South America. They have penguins and the ocean. It would be chilly, but I would love it, I think."

"Haha. It would be Chile-chilly. Nice one."

"Thank you," Ray said, pleased Naia had caught her pun. "I bet you would love the mountains. You'll have to come with me to Colorado. My sister and I used to always go hiking in the summer, and by hiking I mean picking up some fast food and going to a picnic area with a great viewpoint and taking lots of pictures."

"Your sister sounds so awesome. How is her baby bump coming along?"

Ray took out her phone to show the latest picture. "It's growing. Everything is good. We've all got our fingers crossed for her. Next question. How did it go for your first time having sex?"

Naia rolled over to prop her head up and study Ray. "Is this your way of telling me you're a virgin?"

Ray didn't answer.

Naia smacked her leg. "It is!"

"First of all, virginity is a social construct. Life is a series of firsts, the first time you walk, eat solid food, go to school, start a job, go on a date, but none of these other states of life have a specific name. Even if you die and get resuscitated, you are alive before and alive again after the first time you die. So why the specific word pre-sex? Social construct. You are a virgin before sex and a person afterwards? Really? It means nothing."

"It means nothing?" Naia asked. "Interesting. I knew something was up when you started gushing about how much you were obsessed with Zach. That being said, it wasn't Zach in your room this morning. Want to talk about it?"

"Not really," Ray said. She slurped the last of her bananas and strawberry vegan yogurt smoothie, then scraped the sides with her paper straw. Her brain was obsessed with the smallest details...like Lokela's soft lips, the silver of his bullring, the lighter streak of his scar on his face.... "Tell me about you, if you can. How did it go? Were you confused and worried? Did you tell him, or her it was your first time, or just go for it?"

Naia had recently come out as bi, but she and Ray had both announced they weren't attracted to each other, so they would stay strictly platonic.

"Actually," Naia said, sitting up, "we were both virgins, and were good friends. We had joked about doing it together in order to get that first time out of the way for when we were dating someone later, then one weekend his parents were away. It was incredibly fast, and pretty hilarious. We're still friends. It took a lot of performance pressure off, admitting we had no idea what we were doing, but having fun together. That said, we were really stupid and didn't use a condom or any lube. Neither of us knew much about oral sex, but we bungled our way to the end and luckily I didn't get pregnant."

"Yikes."

"You can be incredibly dumb at sixteen, you know?" Naia continued. "However, it was really smart to decouple the relationship with the act."

"I didn't follow that."

"For example, what's the best way to learn how to ride a bike?"

Ray frowned. "No idea. I learned when my mom bought me a bike, put me on it at the top of the hill and sent me down. It was...horrible."

"What kind of monster—I mean mother would do that? Don't answer. The best way to learn is to decouple the actions. That's why toddler bikes don't have pedals anymore. They push themselves along, learning first how to steer, having short moments of balancing. Later, they get a bigger bike with pedals, but they already know how to do the steering part."

"Explain how this is related to having sex, please."

"You decouple the emotional side from the act. Take it apart and experience it in pieces. By doing it with a friend, it was just a physical activity, with no pressure to make a relationship work. No one's feelings were hurt if things weren't amazingly romantic with earthshattering orgasms."

"Do it with a friend?"

"Do it with someone you trust and can talk to. And yes, you should absolutely tell the person it's your first time. By their reaction, you will instantly know if they'll be a good partner in crime or just a self-serving misogynist with a pervy obsession about so-called purity."

"I'm glad we decided to come to the beach before work and classes," Ray said. "We should make this a regular thing."

Naia tipped her smoothie cup in salute. "Absolutely. You're my best friend on this island, and things have picked up at the shop the last few days since we started the mutual discount coupons with the snorkel shop. You're sure the owners are all right with it?"

"They love it. It drums up business for us, too," Ray said, stretching the truth quite a bit. Strictly speaking, she hadn't told anyone she was giving ten percent discounts to snorkeling customers for proof of purchase of a smoothie from Naia's café. But there was a sign on the counter....

"Wonderful. Here's to good business and great beaches." Naia reached out her hand.

Ray clasped it. "And even better smoothies and the best of friends."

Naia lay back and flung her arm over her eyes again, but Ray stared out to sea. The words do it with a friend echoed over and over in her head.

*** Good advice... Hit that star my darling readers like it was the hotty you've been dreaming of.... ***