"No, it's alright" he said with the slightest smirk "it's cute when you ramble"

They were still holding each other as if the dream would end if either of them let go or even a second. He rubbed her back slowly, gently.

"I've been such an imbecile, we could've been together this whole time. I was just so out of it when we met, there was so much on my mind, that somehow I convinced myself that you weren't interested based on that short chat about your ex.... But that doesn't matter anymore, we can be together now. I'll tell Chelsea that it's over, and go and see her later. I mean we haven't been dating long enough to really even call it dating, she should understand why it's not going to work. And then we can start making up for lost time."

With a small smile and reassuring nod, he leaned in to kiss her on the cheek. Things were finally on the up for them, not only were they best friends again, but their connection could start to grow into something more.

"It's okay, I guess you're just not the observant kind," Alex noted, more for herself than for Cole. Now she knew that if something needed to happen she couldn't drop hints, she needed to tell him outright. "But yeah," Alex quickly added, "break up with Chelsea ASAP. That woman is nothing but trouble."

Then the intercom went off, calling all six dojangs down to the mats again. "Oh, there's my cue!" Alex said and jumped up, giving Cole's hand a quick squeeze before racing down to the center.

She met up with the other students and they stood together in quiet anticipation.

The announcer called out the winners. For the fighting side, her dojang won third. Alex couldn't complain about this, the other schools were incredibly tough and the was the tournament was set up was quite odd.

Then the announcer cleared his throat. "And the first place for demonstrations goes to... U.S. Taekwondo Center!"

What felt like the millionth time of the day, another smile appeared on Alex's face and she, along with her teammates all bowed to the crowd. Grandmaster Ahn, sporting a uniform with a blue top and white bottoms, claimed the large trophy. They took a class photo together and were dismissed.

Alex raced to the back to grab her belongings. She hugged and congratulated her teammates then raced back to Cole, her large duffle bag with all of her gear slung over her shoulder. "I believe you offered me a victory burger?"

Cole cheered loudest of all as Alex's group were announced as winners. He clapped, hollered and kept a large smile pasted on his face. He felt so free now, a happiness that he hadn't felt in a long time. An older gentleman next to him was slightly taken aback by Cole's loud celebration. Once he noticed, he looked over apologetically.

"That girl over there?" he nodded in the direction of Alex, proudly standing by as her master accepted the trophy "that's my fr.. that's my girlfriend"
The older guy nodded approvingly, understandingly, then shortly after the crowd dispersed.

Once he saw Alex again and hugged her in congratulations he nodded at her query.
"Yeah, where ever you wanna go, just lead the way!"

Alex gave Cole a big kiss, still incredibly excited over the win. When she pulled back, she said gratefully, "Gosh it feels so good to kiss you whenever I want!"

She grabbed his hand tightly, possessively as she led him out of the gymnasium. They walked and talked on their way back to campus, never separating from each other and sharing the occasional kiss here and there. After the big misunderstanding was cleared, it was a relief for Alex that things went so smoothly. She even forgot that Cole still needed to break up with Chelsea.

Alex ended up leading them back to the restaurant they had his interview at. "Figured this would be a nice place. This is where we started our friendship. I figured we could start our relationship here. Thoughts?"

“I love it, it’s beautiful and symbolic.”

The whole way over here, joking, laughing, kissing at random intervals, Cole couldn’t stop thinking about how he had nearly decided not to come to school. With every passing second, he was more and more happy that he took the plunge.

Ironically enough, the same waitress from the day they met sauntered up to lead them to a table. Her eyes shifted down, saw their hands clasped tightly together, and smirked. She placed them at the same table, or one close enough to it anyway, and winked as she passed them menus.

“Alright, let’s see... what to ord- oh, hang on”

He had his phone silenced ever since Chelsea had left. Now that he had sat down, he could feel the vibration against his leg. He dug it out and his jaw dropped. 25 notifications in the last hour. 4 or 5 were random apps, texts from friends, the usual..... the rest were texts or missed calls from Chelsea.

“Oh god” he said aloud as he turned the screen to show Alex “Yeahhh”

Alex leaned forward to check his phone. She sucked air in through her teeth, "Yikes! What are you gonna do?"

The waitress came over for drink orders. Alex ordered a water. She thought about Chelsea and how much she would dread having to talk to her again in person. Alex technically had the upper hand as Cole was her best friend.

"Once we're done here are you gonna meet up with her?"

He ordered a water of his own before answering.

“Right now” he clicked the phone’s power button and put it back in his pocket before reaching out and taking ahold of Alex’s hands on top of the table “I’m not gonna do anything but sit here and enjoy a lunch with you. Afterwards... yeah probably best to just rip that band-aid off ASAP, huh?”

"Yeah, that's probably for the best," Alex giggled. Her thoughts began to drift into Chelsea. Alex had numerous reasons to dislike Chelsea, but why did Chelsea seem to have atone sort of vendetta against Alex? Chelsea did a lot to hurt Alex, but for what? Alex didn't see herself as a threat to anyone or their goals.

"So what was Chelsea saying about me?" Alex asked, naturally curious.

“You don’t wanna know” Cole said “she insulted your sport, claimed that you were the reason that you and your ex split. I didn’t even listen to most of what she said, I was really sick of her attitude. When she started attacking you personally, that was when I had enough and told her off”

At Cole's description Alex couldn't help but smile. "So everything she insulted about me was all superficial? And I'm sure any of the personal attacks were less than true." Alex shook her head and sipped at her water. "Well I'm glad we won't have to deal with her after today. I don't wanna have to kick her head off."

The waitress came by again, this time taking their orders. Alex chose a chicken dish with rice. After everything that happened today she really didn't want to eat too heavily.

She looked Cole up and down. It was still hard to believe that he felt the same way too, even though she saw all of the signs. Alex had given up hope long ago that Cole felt the same way and that he was just naturally flirty. But sitting at the table his attraction was as clear as day. The way he looked at her and smiled or the way he was constantly making contact with her, whether it be by hugging or holding hands. Everything felt like a dream. Alex hoped when she went to bed tonight and woke up the next morning she would still be with Cole.

Cole ordered the same as Alex, then when the waitress left, he turned back to her.

“Superficial mostly, yeah. Character attacks, just real nasty stuff. I don’t know, I feel like such a fool for falling for it. I’ve known girls like her in the past, hanging around sports teams and latching on to the players, justtt in case they make it big, y’know? I should’ve picked up on it the second I realized she knew nothing about hockey, but enough about her.”

Who would’ve thought they’d end up here? Certainly not him. He just kind of chuckled to himself as it set in again- he was here, with Alex, on an actual date.
“Look at us, did you ever think this would happen?”

"I hoped it would happen, but the longer it became the less I was convinced. I thought you really didn't like me like this," Alex confessed. She thought back on the past weeks of being confused with Cole, how it seemed like they were playing cat and mouse. All of that time had been so frustrating. Every time she made some sort of attempt to flirt he either deflected it or ignored it. It made her feel stupid at times. But now those feeling were all gone.

Alex giggled, shaking her head, "I still can't believe you didn't know I liked you! Why did you think I kissed you?"

“We were drunk!” He said as his only defence “I didn’t know what was happening or what it meant afterwards. Maybe I’m just really bad with signals”

He laughed again at his own expense.

“I will say, I was startin’ to question things in the last couple days, I’m just glad we finally figured it out before things got too deep with... her.”

"Yes, we were drunk!" Alex laughed, the story now highly amusing, "But still, I chose to kiss you and dance with you! I let you grab and grope me! Do you think I would do that if I didn't like men?"

Alex giggled and shook her head. It was clear that she was in much better of a mood than she had been in the past week. Everything had finally smoothed over. "I'm glad you began to question it- I'm not sure how much more obvious I could have made it."

“I..... I have no defence. I’m just an idiot”

He just grinned, slightly nervously as he thought about all the obvious signals that he really, really should’ve picked up on. He thought she was just being friendly.

“Last thing I’ll say about her... I should probably go to Chelsea on my own, not that I don’t want you there, but well, you know how she is. Once I have that sorted though, wanna hang out?”

"Yeah, I don't wanna be around her anyway," Alex said, understanding his choice, "But I would love to spend the rest of the day with you after that."

The waitress came by and dropped off their food, giving them a quick, friendly wink before leaving to attend her other tables. The food look as great as always. This restaurant never seemed to fail, even in their most busy times.

Alex tried the chicken and was pleasantly surprised by a slight spice. The rice was mixed with several veggies including carrots, peas, and corn. She took a few bites, not realizing how hungry she was until she was finally eating. The last time she had ate was that morning and it was only an orange so she was starving.

"Was that your first time seeing Taekwondo in person?" Alex asked between bites.

“It was yeah” Cole said between a couple of particularly delicious bites.
“I liked it, definitely wanna see more. It kinda reminded me of the tournament at the end of Karate Kid and I love that movie, so yeah, fun day”

He fell silent for a minute or two. Part of him was slightly worried over how Chelsea would react when he told her it was over. The whole tome they’d been sitting there, his phone had been vibrating, but he had kept his cool and tried not to tip Alex off to the fact that more messages were coming in. The other part of him was excitedly churning out ideas for their data. He looked up from his plate and realized that Alex was staring at him.

“Don’t mind me” he said “Just trying to think up a few things we can do. Like maybe we can head down by the beach and walk the pier? Or maybe the Kings have a game tonight at the big arena downtown? Or y’know if you want to keep it lowkey I’ve got some movies on my computer, could just sit back and watch some of those? Pretty much whatever you wanna do is fine by me.”
He flashed another smile, hiding how nervous he was getting over confronting Chelsea.