Balanced Milestone Chapter 1!

(AN: Hello! Congrats on your first Balanced Pathway Milestone Chapter. A quick reminder- these are chapters that you can not choose a path in the previous chapter thus your decisions on how to approach things in these typically longer chapters are made more closely in line with the Pathway of the Milestone Chapter you are going down. In this case, that would be the balanced path, so this chapter will have a little bit of a mix of male dominant and female dominant situations, while also allowing you to remain somewhat traditional and predictable with some of your answer choices. Hope you enjoy and good luck!)

“Oh, it’s nothing, I just thought I saw this girl I met earlier today and was double checking to see if it was her or not.” You explain to Danny who suddenly starts smirking.

“Already getting the girls huh? You must be popular to be getting that kind of attention. Especially from a Gymnast.” Danny says back. You try and brush it off without ignoring it, but he continues. “Someone in particular catch your eye?” He asks, as you again shrug it off but this time answer vocally as well.

“Nah, I just got to meet one of them earlier because we go here early. Nothing too crazy.” You explain but Danny’s not quite buying the full extent of your story giving you an “are you sure about that?” Type of look. You laugh, before reaffirming the situation. “Nothing crazy is going on Danny, I just saw someone I met earlier, it’s nothing more than that.” He looks down the table himself for a brief second before returning his glance back to you, which now feels more like a glare.

“You know they are kinda hot. I wouldn’t blame you at all if you had a little crush on one already.” He says slightly teasing you which makes you laugh a little bit but not really in an embarrassed way. “Assuming you’re single of course.” He follows up, which of course you are.

“Yeah, I’m single but I’m not really looking for a crush or a partner or any sort really. I’m here for the sports and the academics. Those are my priorities.” You tell him. He relaxes his aggression a little bit getting a social read that you’re not going to fight with him on the topic and instead giving you some advice.

“Look, sometimes that stuff just happens. I had a crush on a girl in middle school and nobody but you and me knows about it. It’s totally okay, just try not to fight it and embrace it a little bit. It can be fun, exciting, and a good thing. Friendships and relationships with other people are healthy to have as long as you two aren’t toxic. Which let’s be honest, if you’re going to be the toxic boyfriend type you would have been sorted into Fire rather than Air.” He says genuinely trying to be supportive of whatever your thoughts and feelings might be towards this girl. “Real talk, do you like one?” He asks, concluding his short ramble.

“I wouldn’t necessarily use the words like or crush or relationship or anything, but there’s one girl I think is pretty attractive.” You whisper honestly to him. He laughs a little bit but not loudly enough to gain anyone else’s attention. He smirks a little bit at your admittance.

“I figured. Well good luck with that, I’m about to head to my dorm room, I still haven’t checked it out yet. Have fun with the girls Lucas.” Danny says as he leaves and you realize that during your conversation with Danny the rest of the team left already not wanting to interrupt the conversation the two of you were having. You are indeed left alone as the last Cardinal guy left with a small group of girls, one of which happens to be Emily again.

“Hey Lucas, come join us over here!” She calls for you noticing Danny had left and you were now alone by yourself. You question how closely she was paying attention to you given how quickly she knew you were alone, but she at the very least tries to play off that she wasn’t watching.

“How long have you been by yourself? Hopefully not too long, you need to be more social!” She exclaims. One of the other two girls she was with laughs at her question.

“Come on Emily, you know the answer to that, don’t pretend like you weren’t just watching him the whole time.” The girl who laughed says. You raise your eyebrows as Emily blushes at the suggestion.

“{Valerie!} I was NOT! Gosh I just looked over there once to see who he was sitting with, that’s all!” Emily replies. The girl who’s name you now know to be Valerie smirks, but you can’t tell if it’s in a mischievous I’m going to embarrass the heck out of you way or it’s an I caught you you’re so busted way. Real or fake it didn’t matter as it was still getting into Emily’s head a little bit.

“Hey, I’m Valerie nice to meet ya, I’ll be with this cutie on the Gym team this year, you should come check us out when you’re not busy working on homework or your own sports.” Valerie says teasingly, as Emily still blushes at the embarrassment being thrown her way.

“Thanks, I’m definitely down to support our other teams I’m not on for sure. I really want to help us win the Copper Cup, so anything I can do to help.” You say as Emily breathes a slight sigh of relief at your ignoring Valerie’s calling her cute. You notice this however, and decide to get a little **** for what happened earlier when you got lunch. “Especially if I can help out someone that I think everyone agrees with you is a cutie like Emily.” You say flirtatiously as Emily immediately gets embarrassed and Valerie bursts out laughing, not at your flirting but at the way you used her word and built off of it.

“I like you, you’re funny Lucas, Good Luck, you’re probably going to need some even with your looks and smarts and athletic skills.” Valerie says as she stands up from the table along with the other girl who didn’t say anything or try to interject in any way leaving you and Emily as the last two Cardinals left at the table. She has her head in our hands looking down at the table clearly flustered as you quickly wave goodbye to Valerie and the other girl and return your attention to Emily.

“When I invited you to come over here and sit with us, that was about the last thing I expected to happen.” She said now that Valerie was gone. You laugh a little bit and smile naturally.

“Oh, you know, with how Valerie was talking, it felt like the perfect time for me to get a tiny bit of **** on you for what happened earlier.” You say to hear as she looks up and side glares at you not in an angry way but in an are you serious type of way. “You had to know it was going to happen eventually right? Besides, you’re enjoying this, aren’t you Emily? Me teasing you like that.” You say as she laughs at your exact copied quote she said to you a few hours ago. She rolls her eyes, clearly finding it somewhat funny which is a bit of a relief that you’re not coming off too pushy and scaring her away.

“Dang it, I really thought I had you with that one. Nice. I have to give props on that one, that was well done. I hate it, but that was well done.” She admits, as she calms down a little bit with the immediate teasing seemingly over as you agree that it served it’s purpose before you continue a regular casual conversation with her about the food you chose and the teammates you got to meet. Overall it sounds like you both had a pretty similar positive experience.

Still though, you had to admit that Danny may be on to something with what he said. This feeling that you’re starting to get is only continuing to get stronger, and it’s not stopping or going away any time soon. There’s obviously no way you can be crushing on someone you just met earlier today on your first day, but you definitely feel like she’d be a great friend to have and it would be worth keeping it that way. You don’t need to compromise athletics or academics to have friends- if anything being involved in athletics will help you make friends and having friends will help you with academics which will in turn help you with athletics. It’s a fun cycle that you envision being able to start and Emily could be the start of building it up successfully.

You don’t even notice as you’re in your own head thinking about the way that everything has played out, but when you finally return to reality you’re already leaving the Dining Hall with Emily right next to you and her talking about something you completely missed. Dang, hopefully it was nothing important.

“So yeah hopefully you can kinda help me with that. I’m sorry if that was being a bit too open or personal or whatever, but I just felt like I had to ramble on about that for a little bit. It’s been bothering me since this morning to be honest.” You unfortunately have zero clue how to respond to anything that you just heard so you just try and be as general and vague as possible until you can pick up more info you missed.

“Why would you feel bad about being open or personal?” You ask her. You see her look up at you and take a deep sigh, as she probably caught on that you hadn’t heard most of her rant. She takes a deep breath.

“I completely forget how oblivious you are, never mind.” Emily says as she enters the elevator, softly smirking not in an evil grin way but almost a relaxed thankfully you didn’t understand what I was saying their type of way. You enter the elevator with her on your way up to the Cardinals Capital Room and of course dorms. You use your ID to sign in and with that it’s time to say goodbye to Emily for the night most likely.

“Hang out tomorrow some time?” You ask her as she smiles back softly.

“For sure! See you tomorrow Lucas.” She says as you as she exits the elevator in front of you, leaving you smiling overall happy with how your first day at Cielisium ended. Having a few friends already with Danny and Emily could not be a much better start.