Is this what couples do?

Rhyolol was sitting in his bunk thinking about what happened last night.  It was very confusing for him considering it was his first real kiss.  But it made it even more awkward the girl he did it with was in the same room.

It wasn't as though Catherine hadn't ever thought about what would happen if she were in this kind of situation; she was, after all, a teenage girl, and teenage girls almost always eventually find themselves in her predicament: dating a boy for the first time. Until last night, Catherine had never kissed a boy. In fact, until she had met Rhyolo, she had never even wanted to kiss a boy before.

She knew that there had to be some sort of way to go about this--some sort of way to talk to Rhy, for Christ's sake--but she had no idea what it was.

Worse still, Rhyolo was in the same room as her, slept in the same room as her. Catherine looked over at him, at a loss. Was he going to talk first? Was she supposed to talk first?

Rhyolo looked over to Cat and didn't know what to say. He thought for a couple of minutes about what to say. His mind failed to come up with something and her decide to give up. He then just sat next to her and held her hand.

If it hadn't been so awkward, it would've been sweet. Well, no--it was still sweet, but sweet in an awkward way. She sighed and turned to look into his eyes. "So...." she began, but then lost her train of thought. Had talking always been this hard? Had Rhy's eyes always been so....absorbing? Was "absorbing" the correct word to use?

Rhyolo sighed as well. He tried to forget the awkwardness and look at Cat and talk. He then got lost in her hazel eyes and her pretty face. He then began to get lost in her beauty before he shook his head and got focused again. "What do we do now? I don't want thing to be this awkward. "

"That makes two of us," she told him, trying to sound more confident than she felt. Her eyes rolled upwards as she considered their options. She had read plenty of books on the subject of teenage romance, but she felt as though The Fault in Our Stars wasn't the best material to refer to. Finally, she gave up and returned her gaze to Rhyolo's piercing one. "I'm going to be honest with you here," she told him. "I have absolutely no idea what couples do."

Rhyolo held her hand and smirked a bit. "I bareley have a clue myself. From what I guess we should just wing it. Let it flow and go with what is comfortable to us. "

"Okay," she said, closing her eyes for a second. What, exactly, was the flow? She sighed again. Catherine was clueless when it came to things like this. "So we can just talk about normal stuff, too, though, right? I mean--that doesn't have to change." She looked at him questionably, wondering if he would understand what she meant. She didn't want everything to change because they were....well, dating?

"I mean.. Yeah. We are still friends. We are just closer than friends. " Rhyolo scratched his head and blushed a bit. He honestly had no idea what he was saying. He tried to sound sure but it can out shaky.

She contemplated his words. ....still friends....just closer than friends. Before last night, they had known exactly what they were comfortable with. "So, do you wanna....how do I say this? Establish 'ground rules'?" she asked, hoping against hope that her curly hair was covering her burning ears. Why was it that she was reminded of her dad when she said that? Gods, she was really bad at girlfriending (and she knew that wasn't a word, but she was beyond caring at this point) if she thought she sounded like her father when it came to boys.

"Yeah, that would probably be the best. I think the first one is be honest with each other. " Rhyolo took the hand that wasn't in her hand and ran it through his own hair. He honestly was trying to use his collective knowledge from tv and books to figure out what to say. This whole relationship thing was new to him, and it felt like he could ruin it in an instant if he said the wrong thing.

"Yeah," Catherine agreed, nodding a bit. "Honesty's good. I think. My mom wasn't really honest with my dad but that doesn't count and oh God why'd I just say that." She audibly groaned and wiped her free palm against her jeans. All right, Cathy--think. Use your brain that God or whoever gave you. "Um....I'm totally okay with you talking to other girls. Just saying. Like, back at home, the girls used to go livid whenever their boyfriends talked to other chicks and I don't want to be like that," she added awkwardly.

Rhyolo laughed a bit at her awkwardness before smiling. "Yeah. But that probably won't even be an issue due to the fact I am not that popular. But yeah, same goes for you when it comes to you talking to other guys, though i can't promise i won't get a tiny bit jealous."

Catherine couldn't help but snort at that. "I guess that's an understandable reaction," she told him, shrugging. "Anything else we should go over? PDA? Hanging out in the cabin?" she jokingly added, giggling a bit. She wondered how often a boyfriend and a girlfriend lived in the same cabin. Before the they started adding the minor gods and goddesses, probably just the Hermes cabin--and the unclaimed, at that.

Rhyolo shrugs. "That shouldn't be an issue. After all I'm cabin leader. If anyone has a prblem with it they can come to me about it. Plus besides last night the most we ever do is hold hands. I really can't think of anything else right now."

"I can't either," Catherine admitted, shrugging a bit. She looked over at their entwined hands, thinking back to the night before and how she had felt then. Even with her supposedly great memory--which, after learning of her mother's identity, had always struck her as ironic--she couldn't really remember all of it properly (so much for that). Emotions, she decided, are a messy business. "What now?" she asked, switching her gaze from their hands to Rhyolo's eyes.

Rhyolo shrugged a bit as he looked to meet her hazel eyes.  "I don't know.  Maybe we should just hang out here and talk about other stuff. "

Catherine nodded at his words. "Hang out. Talk. Sounds good," she agreed. They sat in silence for several more grueling seconds. One. Two. She felt like she should say something. Books she had read seemed to encourage the forwardness of girls in a relationship, something about "it's the 21st century" or something like that. Seven. Eight. This was slowly descending into awkwardness once more. Twelve. Thirteen. "Well, uh, do you want to go....I don't know--somewhere else? Anywhere else?" she asked him. Despite the "ground rules" they had set down, staying in the cabin suddenly felt....well, awkward. It was probably them that were awkward, not the cabin, but that didn't dissuade her opinion of it at the moment. "The lake? The library? Anything?" Maybe he wants to stay in the cabin, she thought. Maybe it'd be fine. No. This cabin was driving her insane.

Rhyolo looked at their hands and surroundings for a few moments it still seemed a little bit awkward for them to be a couple here. Several seconds went by before her decided to speak up and answer her. "Uhm, yeah, how about the, the uh, lake. " Rhyolo chose the place at random, but a small part of him maybe wanted to see her in a bathing suit.

"Lake, cool beans," Catherine replied, feeling the tension in her shoulder that she wasn't even aware of slowly relax. She stood up abruptly, her hand still in Rhyolo's. Her eyes flashed there for a moment before looking back at Rhyolo's face. "Uh....want to go now?" she asked. She just wanted to get out of this claustrophobic cabin already.

Rhyolo nodded. "Uhm, yeah, sure. But first we have to get some stuff. Gotta be prepared and all that good stuff. " he then stood up with her and smiled to her. He then looked to their hand realizing he would have to let go if he were to get his stuff, it would be no problem to do so but really didn't want to.

"Good stuff?" she asked as she let go of his hand to walk over to her bunk. Does he like swimming that much? she wondered as she dug through the mess that was her belongings, searching for the....the--what was it called? She briefly shut her eyes and dug in the recesses of her memory. Towel. Yes, she was looking for the towel. Her head was being stupid again. She hoped this wouldn't be a permanent result of hanging around Rhy. "What good stuff?"

"Nothing, it is just something I say." Rhyolo the goes to his bunk and grabs his small bag he keeps packed for the lake or beach. The bag had his change of clothes and a towel in it. He then goes back to her. "Ready?"

Catherine shoved a couple of items in her backpack before turning to face Rhy, slinging it over her shoulder as she did so. "Guess so," she said as she walked over towards him. She raised her head slightly to meet his gaze before grabbing his hand and walking towards the door of the cabin.

Rhyolo would smile look to her and smile before following her out of the cabin.