Made to Love by DL Kopp

basement.  No
problem.
    “ You know you’re a boy,
right?” I asked, and Byron nodded.
    “ Anatomy has been a part
of the meager education your dad has given me,” Byron said. 
“I know that you are a girl, and that it’s not the same thing as
being a boy.”
    “ Okay,” I said, warming to
the subject.  “Did he teach you anything else?  Read any
books to you?”
    “ He taught me to read on a
few books.”  He smiled.  “I really liked
Shakespeare.”
    “ Great!  You remember
in, um, Romeo and Juliet ?  No, wait, that’s no
good.  You remember Much Ado About Nothing ? Claudio and
Hero were getting married.”  I sat up, and Byron helped me
prop the pillows up.  “Did my dad explain marriage?”  He
shook his head.  “It’s when a boy and a girl like each other a
lot and decide they want to be friends for their entire
lives.  Octavius and I are friends.”
    Byron looked wounded. 
“Friends don’t hurt each other.”
    I took a deep breath. 
Oh boy.  “We were just kissing.  That’s what friends like
we do when we really like each other.  It’s part of… well, if
we decided to get married, that would be part of how we would
reproduce.  That was part of your anatomy class,
right?”
    His eyes widened. 
“You would make a new life?”
    “ Not like you.  But
yeah, we could have a baby.”
    “ I think there’s more to
it than that,” Byron said slowly.  “There’s much about love in
Shakespeare.”
    “ Yes.”  I flushed,
thinking about Octavius.  “There really is.”
    Byron thought to himself,
gazing out the window.  He really was very, very
handsome.  I wondered if the stitches hurt.  “Are we
friends?”
    “ Yes,” I said, “of
course.”
    “ Then…”
    He leaned over the bed, and
before I could realize what he was doing, he kissed me.  His
lips were hot like the rest of him, and soft, but a line ran down
the middle of the right side.  A stitch.  He tasted like
iron and musk, like wine.
    It was a chaste kiss, and
when he pulled back, I touched my own lips.  Wow.  That was… kind of nice.
    No.  No it
wasn’t.  Octavius.  Right.
    “ Uh,” I said, searching
for words.  “Um.  We’re not friends like that,
Byron.”
    “ But did you like it?” he
asked, smiling.  Cocky jerk.
    I didn’t want to lie to
him, so I said, “It was unexpected.”
    “ Marriage is exclusive,”
Byron said.  “Don John was in love with Claudio, but once she
married, he couldn’t be with her.  Are you married to
Octavius?”
    “ No,” I
admitted.
    His smile turned into a
grin.  Byron stood.  “I am reading books too.  Maybe
I can help assemble myself.  But my education is lacking, and
I still have so much to learn.  Will you teach me?”
    “ I’m not really much of a
teacher,” I said.
    He took my hand and helped
me out of bed.  I had to crane my neck to look up at
him.  “You know very much.  I am eager to learn.” 
Byron lifted my hand to his mouth and kissed my knuckles. 
Where he had learned that, I had no idea, but I swooned.  “I
am going to go study.  Will you come to me tonight and teach
me?”
    “ Sure,” I said, struggling
to catch my breath.  “Why not?”
    And then he was gone,
disappearing up the stairs, and Octavius entered the room not
moments later.
    “ I have food for you,” he
said, holding a tray awkwardly.  “You like peanut butter and
jelly, right?”

Chapter
Thirty-One
     
    “ You know,” I said as I
walked toward the lab after my dinner.  “You don't have to
stay.  It's just going to be a lot of science.”
    Octavius growled.  “I
won't leave you alone with him.”
    “ But I've been alone with
him a lot!”
    “ It isn't the same ,” he said.  “I love you.  I must protect
you.”
    Great.  There was no
way he was going to leave me now.  I could see myself having
to leave a chair in the corner of my room so he could watch me all
night and make sure I wasn't assaulted by Byron.  I'd never
sleep another