How it Started

“I-I love you too.” she whispered as he pushed a stray lock of her chestnut hair from her face.
“I didn’t really mean that!” he laughs an amused flicker playing in his liquidy hazel eyes as they gaze into her wide green ones.
She looks away. Damn it! she thinks, her mind racing for an excuse… “oh! I didn’t mean it like that!” she blushes, her eyes darting to the side, but I did, she thinks. He grins, the smile of a predator, yes you did, he laughs inwardly. “I know” he says and leans in. She stares suspiciously at him, curiosity racing through her head and confusion clouding her tanned golden face. If he doesn’t love me, then why does he want to kiss me? She bites her rosy pink lip.
“What’s wrong?” he breathes into her untrained ear. His voice is so soft and so, so tempting… like a suspended C on that guitar he taught her how to play 4 years ago.
Maybe he’s hiding it too? Maybe he’s afraid, just like her… after that last girl… she knew how broken his heart had been. She’d been there for him through it all along, even though it broke her heart more to see him so sad and broken over another girl, a girl that wasn’t her. She’d known him for so long- since she beat him at dodgeball in the fourth grade… he wouldn’t kiss her if he didn’t care, he wouldn’t hurt her like that.
“C’mon” the warm whisper tickles her ear again. She smiles, her teeth straight from the braces she had on before he ever though of her as more than a friend, before he ever cared that she preferred dark chocolate to milk chocolate or knew that she always had a harmonica in her back right pocket. She tilts her head and he follows.
Just one simple movement and so much can change.
He presses his lips to hers. He smiles into her lips soaking in the sweetness, the innocence of her breath. It tastes like the ocean and lemonade and… “did you just eat an apple?” he whispers into her.
“Yeah,” she pulls away… he doesn’t taste as special as she thought it would, he smells like axe and that bacon bits thing all the other football players put in their mouth guards. She doesn’t like pig.
He pulls away and studies her. He leans in. She follows, but he stops and says “We should stop, we’re gonna get caught.” she doesn’t want to, this is what she’s spent every single dandelion she blew and shooting star she saw on.
She goes back inside and he waits just a bit longer so it won’t seem suspicious. This isn’t everything she thought it would be. She had imagined him not wanting to leave her after he realized everything he missed out on, the everything that was right in front of him all the while, but its good enough.
At least it happened.
Later as he sits by her, subtly stroking her hand with his, he leans over. “Don’t telly ANYONE what happened, okay?” he whispers. “Sure,” she says, she wouldn’t tell anyone anyways, her only friend that actually knows who he is, is his ex-, just like every other pretty girl around.
“I’ll call you” he grins. “Later,” she replies just like she did every other time they said goodbye.
Those are the last words she says to him for 3 months…

To be Continued…