After Helena left for her next class, I felt a little lost. Instead of finding out what the founders were talking about, I embarrassed my brother in front of his crush. No matter how pointless his “feelings” for her are, I felt bad because of it.Especially after discovering how pleasant it can be to be close to someone one likes.

With nothing else to do, I decided to take my bath ahead of time. I needed that mental break right now.

“Bad day?” Nice. Now I get pitied by the mermaid. Can’t she pretend to sleep again?

“Not as bad as yours if you don’t shut up.” Why do we have to go through that every time? Can’t she go and visit some of her mermaid friends?

As soon as the bath was halfway filled with water, I stripped off my clothes and entered. I wasn’t in the mood to pose in front of the fixed mirror or spend any more time thinking about how to best disassemble the mermaid. I wanted to relax.

I stood under the small waterfall that was used to fill the bath and felt the water push against my back. It was a weird, pressuring feeling that gave me something to concentrate on that had nothing to do with my mistakes.

It was almost as if my mind was reset until the waterfall stopped because the bath was full. But even then, my mind slowly drifted to what we talked about.

I had just wanted to tease him because I couldn’t imagine myself as a housewife. Even the whole talk about the phase in front of a marriage was, in most cases, not really accurate. Too many people had an arranged marriage, and then it was more or less expected for them to take on some roles if they wanted to or not.

Mother told me that at least most parents were not as forceful as they had been twenty years ago. Now they at least let the married couple finish school before they introduced them to the family business. This included the part about getting children as soon as possible. It was still quite common for some of the girls in the last year to get pregnant during the holidays, so I wouldn’t say it got so much better.

The problem is that I haven’t told Will about the possibility of not being able to get children. And I already dreaded the moment I needed to tell him. I mean, maybe he already guessed it, but maybe he also didn’t think about it. It wasn’t really a topic anyone talked about; it was simply normal or expected for married people to get children, and people who failed to follow this custom would soon become outcasts. No one wanted to invest in a family that was bound to die out. Most family networks were created tens of generations ago. Okay, maybe not that long ago, but wizard families did their best to pass on their network to the next generation.

People like the founders were quite the oddballs in our society from what I know. Technically, everyone except Uncle Severin had a child, but what really made them strange was that they didn’t try to invest too much effort into networking. In my opinion, the only reason they could get away with it was because they founded the school and because they were powerful enough to keep others out. At least from the marriage proposals the founders and Helena and I got, I was certain that there was no lack of attempts from other families to somehow get into the school.

Except for the problem of being able to get children or not, I wasn’t sure if I even wanted children. I was sure I would be a terrible mother. I couldn’t cook, I didn’t know how to treat a child if it got ill, and I didn’t know what to do if a child was crying. There were so many things I didn’t know. And Will made it clear that there were many other things I didn’t even know I had. The money thing was probably just one example of many other problems I didn’t know how to handle that might affect the kid or family in a bad way. The only thing that didn’t worry me were actual household chores like cleaning. I had a whole night more to do these things than other women, so even without magic, I should be able to manage that.

Damned, I wanted to talk to Will about it. I wanted to know if I was just needlessly worrying about it. Maybe he didn’t even want children. As rare as it was, people like that existed. Uncle Severin was the prime example of that.

Wait a moment. What was that sound? Did the door just open?

“What are you doing here?” I really can’t get my time to relax, can’t I?

“Hello Charlotte, I didn’t know you were here.” said Lorain, standing there in her uniform with a pink towel in her hand. I already contemplated leaving, as I thought I couldn’t send her away as I had traded the usage rights to the bath with her and she had kept her side of the deal. Damned, I was too quick to give it away.

“Yeah, I decided to take a bath early to relax a bit. But I can go now if you want to take a bath.”

“No, no. You don’t need to go. We can bathe together. The bath is big enough.” I didn’t know what to say to that. On one side, I enjoyed my bath, and my bathing time was far from over. On the other side, I didn’t want to bathe with other people in general. I didn’t want other people to see my arm, and the bath wasn’t exactly a place where you could hide anything. The problem was that even if I left now, it would be difficult to hide it anyway.

“Fine, but I like my quiet.”

“Yes, definitely. I’m as quiet as a fox.” Were foxes quiet? I didn’t know. I never saw one in person, but I guessed that they had to be.

I watched as Lorain was carefully undressing and neatly folding her clothes. Like I used to do it many times, she watched herself in the big mirror before entering. She opened her braids and shook her head so that the hair straightened up. I had to admit that her blond hair looked beautiful.

I would even admit that I was a little envious of how she looked in general. Her skin had a much healthier tone than mine, without being too dark; she was slim but without looking too thin; and her breasts were a bit bigger than mine. It wasn’t that I wanted to glare, but seeing them bounce up and down as she walked into the bath just drew my eyes there.

“Do you need to come so close?” The bath was really big; why did she have to come directly next to me.

“Yes.” Was she trying to trigger me on purpose? Even the mermaid is grinning in schadenfreude.

“And why?”

“Because I want to.” It was a mistake not to leave the bath. Was it too late to change my mind?

“Don’t be like that, Charlotte. I just wanted to chat a little bit. You know I had to take care of Will again and wanted to ask you what happened.” So foxes are quite chatty animals, I guess. Damn those foxes.

“Fine, but don’t come any closer. I don’t like that.” It was already difficult enough to hide my arm out of view, and I didn’t want her to come even closer.

“So what happened? I thought you were doing fine. You even slept in his bed already?” She said coming a little closer. She was now close enough that I could feel her every movement through the water.

“We had a little quarrel that made me realize that we knew almost nothing about each other, and I wanted to slowly get to know him instead of treating him like a husband from one day to another. So I decided that we should go on another date and kept a bit of distance till then.” I said, not really sure what exactly I should tell her.

“So it's not because you are still angry? He just told me that you quarreled and that you wouldn’t meet until Friday.” So she already talked with him about it.

“What? No, I wasn’t angry at him. I mean, maybe a little at the beginning, but not anymore. I actually regret doing it a little bit, but it's probably still for the best. Was he very disappointed that I proposed something like that?”

“Ohh, don’t worry about it. If it were any other guy, I would tell you that what you did was reckless, and I wouldn’t wonder if another girl would snatch him from you if you did something like that, but if Will was so easy to steal away, he would have a different girlfriend right now. So while he was a little sad about it, you don’t need to worry.” I don’t know if that should calm me down or upset me. But I still felt sorry for Will. I should probably make it up for him during the date.

“And who would that different girlfriend be?” I asked a little threateningly, but obviously not seriously.

“Oh, there come many girls to my mind. Alicia, Gwendoline, I think there was also a Nightquill girl that tried to ask him out, or naturally me as well. There were also a bunch of girls who tried to get close to him because their parents wanted it. His family is quite old, and with the dragonbreeding business, his parents were also quite well off. Many new or medium-aged families would want to marry into such a family. And with the deadline his parents set him, he would be pressured to accept one of them sooner or later. If you had waited any longer, he would have probably needed to find someone else. I was sure you would reject him forever so that he would look for someone else. In the best case, me.”

“Wait a moment. What kind of deadline?” I decided to ignore her comments about her being interested in my boyfriend. I was unsure if it was normal for other people to talk so openly about it, and I didn’t care, as she was right. Will wouldn’t leave me for someone else. But that deadline was something I needed to know about.

“Didn’t he tell you? Damned, I thought that was how he got you to accept the date in the first place. His parents told him that if he didn’t come home with a girl during the next holidays, they would arrange something for him.” Wait a moment. The next holidays? That was in around three months. Right after the New Year's party. Does that mean I have to decide if I want to marry him until then? I’m not ready for this.

"No, he didn’t tell me. So does that mean we need to... if I go with him, his parents would want us to get married as soon as possible?”

"Well, yes, but I think they won’t push for it instantly. I think they just wanted him to bring someone home. His parents normally aren’t super fixated on that. They were probably concerned that if he waited too long, all good matches would be taken. And even if they took it more seriously, they would probably be more lenient with their demands, as the connection to your mother is far too valuable to risk it over a few months. Especially because it will probably increase the odds for Will's brothers to get better matches. You are really lucky in that regard. I mean, my mother just wants me out of the house as soon as possible, and it's not so easy to find someone decent if your family isn’t old or super connected.” I remembered that Will told me that her mother was a widow who worked part-time as a seamstress. With all I knew about it, it was probably difficult to find a family that was eager to have her as a marriage partner.

“That is good to hear, I think. I mean that they won’t push for it instantly. Do you have someone in mind? Someone besides Will!”

"Well, there are a few. I mean, it's not like there aren’t any rich boys who are interested in me. The problem is that they want to do IT all the time, but I don’t want to do IT until I’m sure I want to marry someone. That was the reason my previous two relationships broke apart. But as much as I want to do it, if I don’t marry them, then it will become basically impossible for me to find someone after that. I mean, the girls from the old families are doing it with whoever they want, and no one cares, but I’m not so lucky.” Wow, I never considered all those things. Her life probably isn’t as easy as I thought. …Wait a moment.

“Didn’t you ask me about when I planned to do IT with Will? I thought it was something normal to do because of you. I thought you did it too with all your talk about your boyfriends.”

“Hey, it’s not like I have no experience. I just didn’t do IT. And if I were in your shoes, I wouldn’t even need to think about doing it with Will. I have known him since I was little, and I know he would take responsibility for it. He isn’t like those other horny boys.” I knew it. Will was the best. Haha. But what experiences could she have if she hadn’t done it? Is she talking about kissing? I have done that too.

“What exactly do you mean with experiences?” I was a little curious. Maybe I could learn something and surprise Will with it later. If it wasn’t too perverted.

“You really have no idea, don’t you? Did your mother never talk with you about it?”

“Talk about what exactly?”

“Oh, you are such a sweet, innocent child. How could I ever think you are an evil monster when you are so innocent?” Is she trying to provoke me there? Because she is on a good way to fly out of the bath. Naked or not.

“Don’t glare at me like that. I will tell you, don’t worry. Okay, first of all, you know what sex is, right?”

“Yeah, but I thought you meant something else.” Okay, now I was confused. Did she have sex with her boyfriends or not, and what was IT if not sex?

“Yes, I just wanted to make sure that you at least knew that. So then you know that a man changes his size if he is aroused right?” Did I really want to answer that? How could she talk about that without even blushing, because I sure as hell am. I decided that simple nodding would be enough to answer.

“So, the question is: how can you get them aroused, and what do you do when they are? I’m sure you know that most boys like big breasts and a well shaped butt, and most of the time it is enough to show these to them, but there are more ways. If you touch them close to their thing or even touch it directly, it works just as well. And if they are aroused, you can actually grab it. Not too tight, but not so loose that they think you don’t want to do it. Then, if you rub it for some time, they will, ... you know, shoot their load. If you are really brave, you can even lick or suck on it. But prepare for the taste. It’s not exactly delicious. I mean, it also isn’t really that bad, but if you don’t know what is coming…”

“Are you serious?” I mean I could imagine doing that if it was really necessary but the thought was weird to say the least. Okey sex in general was a little weird but I guess it was normal if one wanted to have children, right?

“Well yes. But it's not like you can’t have fun either. Have you ever mastubated?” Hold on, that was quite some personal stuff. Okay, now that I think about it, the whole talk was quite personal. Still, it’s not something you just ask about.

“No.” I answered truthfully. I know what it was from some of the books I read even thought they didn’t really go into much detail, but so far I never really thought about doing it myself.

“Wow. I never thought I would meet someone so innocent at your age. So anyway. Instead of rubbing yourself down there, you let them lick you there. It feels amazing, but I must warn you. If you let him do it, you and he would want to go a step further, it is really not easy to say no after that.” Okay, now I don’t know what I would rather do. It was surely embarrassing to let Will lick me down there. On the other hand, sucking his thing was less embarrassing but promised less … fun? I should probably wait until I talk with Will about something like that. Would I even talk with him about something like that, or would it just … happen at some point? Should I ask Lorain? Should I have another talk with mother?

“Did you think about Will just now?” About whom should I think, if not him, girl?

“Yes, why?”

“Let's just say I can see that. Hihi. You are actually really cute, you know.” Why is she coming closer?

“Stay away from me. Hey, don’t touch me. I’m not such a kind of girl; let me go.” I tried to push her away without hurting her, but she was clinging to me, trying to grab my chest… again. Why did she do something like that?

“You are quite inhibited, Charlotte. I just wanted to tease you a little. Consider it payment for my lesson. Hihi.” I’m never letting her enter the bath with me again. But at least she didn’t seem to have seen the scar yet.

“Don’t worry, Charlotte. I won’t do it again. You can stay still now.” I wasn’t sure if I trusted her, but I slowed down. She wouldn’t be able to catch me now that I was alerted, but it made the bath quite more stressful than it needed to be.

We talked a bit longer about some more casual stuff, like how she was a little overworked now and how she worried about her grades, while I told her about my worries about the lessons I had to give. Naturally, that ended in me somehow promising her to give her some help if she struggled with potions. I couldn’t reject her after she told me that a graduation with decent grades would increase her odds of getting a good marriage or a good life in case she didn’t find someone in the next two years.