For several moments, Mary couldn't hear anything over the violent pounding of her pulse.

I nodded. I was ready. In fact I was so ready that if he didn’t do something soon, if he didn’t touch me in the next five seconds, it was very possible I might die. Right there on the bed. Still a virgin.

I felt so much older now, so much more responsible. I guess that there were some positive outcomes: I knew more things than usual, and I knew that I really could accomplish anything and everything. But sometimes, all a fifteen-year-old girl wants is to stop growing. She wants time to slow down and eventually stand still where she can be young and inexperienced forever. Sometimes, she simply wants to remain a child.

Time is a funny thing. You can go through it and meddle with it, but nothing can stay permanent. So even if everything so far had not happened, time would still have managed to find a way to make all this happen.

The four of us stood in silence as we watched the surrounding girls play games or gossip. It was almost as if I did not belong here anymore. It was like I was peering in through a window from a completely different world.

Oscar always said that books are truly our best friends. He said that they never think poorly of us and that they always have a shoulder for us to cry on or relieve stress. They take our minds away from the real world by telling us captivating stories. When we look back at our choice of books, we can nostalgically recall our younger years.