Ryan had a way of always making people smile. It was a natural gift of his. I felt lucky enough to have moved to Wisconsin and be living with Hailey and him. I didn’t know if I would’ve made it if it hadn’t been for my built-in housemates.
I remembered back on how mean and harsh I’d been to Henry when I’d first arrived into town. How much I hadn’t wanted to be here in the first place. I hadn’t called it home since I’d arrived, but lately I’d thought it could be my home. Because maybe home wasn’t a location. Maybe it’s simply the people who you were surrounded with that made you feel as if you could be whoever you wanted to be.
Maybe home was friendship.
After class ended, I smiled at Mr. Daniels—who was really just Daniel in a suit. My Daniel. My blue-eyed, handsome, loving Daniel. He grinned back at me. The class filed out and I slid all of my books into my backpack. Tossing the bag onto my back, I stood from my desk.
“You’re not wearing one of her dresses?” Daniel asked, moving to sit on the front of his desk. His eyes traveled over my body until he met my stare and I felt warm all over. I loved the way he looked at me. As if each and every part of my being were perfect. As if I were imperfectly perfect for him.
“Nope, not today.” I was dressed in blue jeans and an oversized sweater that hung off my left shoulder. For the first time this school year, my outfit was actually mine…and it felt good to be me.
“This is my favorite look,” he said.
I glanced down at my outfit and grinned. “Mine too.”
“My roommate’s gone tonight.”
I chuckled. “Thanks for the random bit of information.”
“I want to make you dinner.”
Raising an eyebrow, I laughed. “You cook?”
“I cook.” His words were simple yet so dreamy, and I realized I would eat anything he would make. “I do a lot more than cook though…” My eyes fell to his lips. I loved those lips. I loved so much about him.
I bit my bottom lip and glanced toward the classroom door to make sure no one was walking by. “Are you trying to seduce me, Mr. Daniels?”
His thumb brushed against his bottom lip and he eyed me up and down. “I guess you’ll have to wait to find out, Ms. Jennings.”
“Meet me behind the library after school?” I suggested.
“I’ll be there.”
The way his eyes danced across my body made me feel at ease, comfortable. What I loved the most was that he’d never looked at me the way he had today. Today he’d seen me for who I really was, and the way both his lips and eyes smiled toward me made me realize that he liked me the most when I was myself.
I was one hundred percent Ashlyn Jennings.
And I was one hundred percent his.
I’d never been to his house before. I’d never been in his Jeep before either. It was a day filled with firsts. I had to admit that lately my mind had been thinking about other things we had never done together. We’d never gone out on a date. We’d never danced. We’d never had sex. We’d never said ‘I love you.’
I stepped into his Jeep and my breath caught when I saw Daniel. He was wearing a baseball cap, and I blushed alone at my thoughts. I’d never seen him in a baseball cap until now. There were so many sides to him, looks to him, characteristics of him, that I hadn’t yet discovered. He smiled my way, took my hand, and kissed my palm. My eyes shifted to the floor mats and I chuckled lightly.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
My head rose and I shook it back and forth. “Nothing. It’s just—there’s so much to look forward to with us, isn’t there?”
“Yeah, I think there is.” He didn’t let go of my hand after he kissed it. He held it as he pulled away from the curb of the library.
“Tell me the boring facts,” I said, growing comfortable in my seat. “Tell me the things that would put most people to sleep.”
He arched an eyebrow. “The boring facts?”
“Your favorite color, your favorite ice cream, your favorite movie. You know, the boring things.”
“Ah, of course. My favorite color is green. Um…” He furrowed his brows, deep in thought. “My favorite ice cream is the one with the waffle cone chunks in it and the chocolate pieces. Don’t ask me if I’ve ever eaten an entire container in one sitting—you don’t want to know the answer. And my favorite movie is a tossup between Lethal Weapon and The Hangover.”
“I love the waffle cone ice cream, too,” I said breathlessly.
He squeezed my hand. “What else? What else do you love? What’s your favorite animal, your favorite season, your favorite breakfast food?”
“Panda bears. I watched a show on Discovery Channel once, and I guess there’s a place in China where you can pay a crap-ton of money and pet baby pandas. My favorite season is spring. I get some of my best writing done during thunderstorms, I think. And if you were to put a bowl of Cap’n Crunch cereal mixed with marshmallows in front of me, I would probably orgasm from the sight.”
He laughed, and I felt his finger tracing the inside of my palm. “That’s the dirtiest thing I’ve ever heard you say,” he muttered.
“What? Orgasm?” I bit my bottom lip and tugged on it.
His blue eyes shifted over to me. “No. Petting baby pandas.” I pulled my hand away from his and smacked him hard, but I was laughing harder. “Ow!” he huffed dramatically as if I’d really hurt him, but I knew I hadn’t. He held his hand out toward me again, and I took his hold.
We pulled up to his house, which he told me was his parents place, and I gasped at the beauty of the property. The lake house looked as if it had been very much a home to someone, rather than just a house. There was a lot of love put into the property.
The front porch was crafted from earth-toned stones, with pebbled steps. On the porch rested two oak chairs and a matching rocking-bench. Daniel didn’t allow me too much time to study the home. He walked me around to the backyard and I sighed at the view. The sun glistened off the lake. I walked across the dock and ran my fingers through the chilled water.
“It’s beautiful,” I said, looking out into the distance. I sat down on the edge of the dock and took off my shoes and socks. My toes trailed through the water, making slight ripples.
“Yeah,” Daniel said softly. He sat down by my side. “It is.”
He took off his shoes and socks, rolled up his slacks, and put his feet in the water, too. We both waved our feet back and forth, creating big waves.
“Tell me the awkward facts,” he said. “Your worst date. Your oddest favorite book. Your weirdest turn-on.”
“Hmm…” I inhaled the fresh smells of autumn by the lake. “I haven’t dated a lot, but my last boyfriend took me to the movie theater for our first date. He thought it would be romantic to show me his...” I blushed. I couldn’t believe I was saying this to him. “His penis. And I giggled and asked him for his 3D glasses to magnify it, because it definitely wasn’t coming to life.”
“Ouch,” Daniel whined, grabbing his chest. “You’re brutal!”
“He showed me his penis! On the first date!” I cried.
“Note to self: don’t show Ashlyn my penis tonight.”
I blushed and gave him a coy smile. “We kind of already had our first date at Joe’s bar. You can pretty much show me anything.”
A wide, toothy grin landed on his face. He flicked some of the water toward me. “Continue.”
“My oddest favorite book is a random one about zombies. In the end, the zombies just turned out to be corporate America, and the people they were trying to turn and corrupt were the creative individuals of the world.
“They turned Steven Spielberg into one of them, and he documented his whole transformation before letting the pull of the Zom overtake him. Then they turned Ellen Degeneres, but the joke was on corporate America because she was just as funny being a zombie as she was being a human. And she made the other zombies laugh, too. Sometimes they laughed so hard they would lose their noses and their arms would fall off due t
o how funny she was. It was actually a beautiful coming-of-age book that explored the realms of truth, acceptance, and being comfortable in your own skin—even if it was rotting.”
“Wow,” Daniel sighed, listening to my story.
“Yeah. I know right?” I paused. “They all died though.”
He inched closer to me, our legs lying against one another. “The Neighborhood Zombie.”
“No way,” I breathed. “You’ve read it?!”
“Junior year of college. Best book ever.” He smiled. I swooned. “Now. Your biggest turn-on?”
“Oh, that’s easy. My biggest turn-on is a boy who reads to me.”
His finger brushed against the side of my face. “I read.”
“You turn me on, I guess.”
His hand wrapped around my waist and he lifted me into his lap. “You guess?” He took my bottom lip between his teeth and lightly tugged on it. My body responded instantly to his touch. My hands fell against his chest, and when he released my lip, I gave him a soft kiss.
“Well, you haven’t read to me yet.”
He smirked, and as he lifted both of us up from the dock, my legs wrapped around him. “Let’s go make dinner.”
I shook my head back and forth. “I’m not making dinner. You are.”
His hands wrapped under my ass as he carried me toward the house. I secretly wished that he would never put me down, but when he did, it was on top of the kitchen counter. He went digging through the kitchen, pulling out his ingredients for the ‘dinner of a lifetime,’ as he called it.
I giggled when I saw a box of mac and cheese sitting next to the stove. He pulled a pocketknife out of his back pocket and used it to open the box. “You always use pocketknives to open macaroni and cheese?”
“My dad always did. He carried this knife everywhere, saying you never knew when you might need it. So he pretty much made up excuses to use it. Opening boxes, envelopes, water bottle cases.” He laughed to himself. “I guess when I got the knife, his quirks rubbed off on me.”
He paused for a moment. Remembering his dad.
“Tell me the saddest fact,” I whispered, watching him fill up a pot to boil the water in. He sat the pot down on the stove and turned on the burner.
Moving over toward me, he spread my legs and stepped in between them. “That’s some heavy dinner conversation.”
“We aren’t eating yet.”
The room was silent. Daniel stared at me, and I at him. He moved my hair behind my ear. “March twenty-second of last year.” His eyes moved to the window above the sink and he stared out toward the backyard. His voice cut like a knife. “My mom died in my arms.” My hands moved to his face and I pulled him closer. “And my dad watched it happen.”
My eyes bled with sorrow for him, and his bled out remorse. I kissed him intensely, filling him up with all my apologies for his worst day ever, wishing I could make the pain dissipate.
His brown hair fell to his face and I combed it back for him. When our lips separated, I missed his taste. I imagined that he missed mine, too, based on how he came back to rest his mouth against mine.
“How do you get over something like that?” I asked.
He shifted around and shrugged. “Easy. You don’t.”
“Do you know who did it?”
He shifted again. Not only his body, but his personality. It grew darker as he stepped backward, turning away from me.
“That doesn’t matter. It doesn’t bring her back.” He moved to the kitchen sink and stared out into his backyard.
“But it can bring her justice.”
“No!” His shout sounded like a clap of thunder shaking sparrows from the tree branches. My skin crawled by his sudden outburst. A gasp ran from my lips. When he turned to me, his face was reddening with anger—or was it guilt?
“Come here,” I instructed.
Daniel’s shoulders fell and his eye twitched. “Sorry,” he muttered, walking over to me. “I don’t talk about her. I don’t want to think about who did it to her. I want to move on.” I didn’t reply, but I pulled him back between my legs. “Can we talk about you instead of me?” he asked quietly.
He never wanted to talk about the accident, which made me sad.
I wanted to know everything.
Yet I didn’t want to scare him off. After I nodded my head, he sighed with relief.
“What is your saddest fact?” he whispered, placing his hands on my hips.
“Leukemia.” It was only one word. But it was a powerful one. One word that had put a time limit on Gabby’s and my relationship. One word that had made me cry each and every night for months. One word that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemies. A tear rolled down my cheek and he kissed it away. He gave me the same intense kiss I’d delivered him. His kisses tasted like forever soaked in always.
“What is your happiest fact?” he questioned.
I placed my hand in the air and he placed his against mine. “This,” I whispered, staring at our touch.
His other hand went up and I placed mine against it. We laced our fingers together. “This,” he smiled.
I inched my hips closer to him, and he began kissing my neck slowly, lovingly. “Daniel,” I closed my eyes as his kisses trailed down my shoulder.
“Yes?” he muttered against me.
“That feels good,” I sighed as his tongue slowly ran up and down my shoulder.
“I always want you to feel good.” His blue eyes looked up to me and his smile stretched far and wide. His lips landed on my forehead. “I’m crazy about you, Ashlyn Jennings.”
I inhaled deep and released my air. “I’m crazy about you, Daniel Daniels.” We stared at each other, laughing and laughing at the craziness of our situation. Was I dating my English teacher? Was what we were doing truly unethical? Falling in love? Could falling in love ever be wrong? “We’re insane, aren’t we?”
He leaned against me and I wrapped my arms around his neck. “Fucking insane.”
Fucking insane. That might have been my favorite fact about us both that night.
We were both so fucking insane.
If we run away today,
We’ll beat the sunsets.
~ Romeo’s Quest
We crossed things off the list together.
We never talked about his past, but I learned much about his present.
We kissed a lot too, because we loved kissing.
If we run away too late,
We’ll lose the sunrise.
~ Romeo’s Quest
#23. Kiss a Stranger
#16. Go to a house party
#14. Make a new friend
#21. Learn to juggle.
#15. Run five miles.
#6. Try to play the guitar.
#1. Fall in love
I’ve been thinking about something we should do,
We should fall in love around two.
And then when it becomes four,
I’ll start loving on you even more.
~ Romeo’s Quest
Our visits became more frequent. Our connection grew stronger, because growth was the only choice we gave it. After school each day, I would wait behind the library with a new book I found to share with him.
He would read to me while we made pots of macaroni. I would read to him while he hung up different paint cards around the house—trying to decide what colors to paint his parents’ home. He would lie upside down on his living room chair and read to me while I completed homework. I would recite the novels while he graded papers.
The words sounded so much sweeter, had so much more depth when they traveled from his lips to my ears. His voice heightened with the characters’ anger, lowered with their deepest fears.
Today he sat with his back against the coffee table as he read to me and I stared at him for the longest time. I watched his eyes blink, and his lips move. I studied his fingers turning the pages as his feet tapped against the carpet. And I cried. It wasn’t due to the words on the pages, but the tears stood for
hope. For an actual chance at happiness.
“Daniel,” I whispered, moving closer to him. I placed my hand against the book, bringing his reading to a halt. He looked up to me, a warm grin on his face. I took his hands in mine and moved them to rest over my heart. “You’re doing it.”
“Doing what?”
“Bringing me back to life.”
There were times when we would visit and I wasn’t as strong as I was the day prior. Sometimes memories tried their best to pull at my heart about Gabby being gone, so Daniel would stop reading. He would put one of his ‘hipster’ upbeat CDs into the stereo and started blasting music.
“Dance break,” he instructed, pulling me up from my sadness.
“Daniel,” I whined, but I never declined a dance break. It was a few weeks ago that I told him how much I love dancing.
“Come on. Move it,” he said, shaking his hips and pushing out his lips. He looked like a freaking clown, and I fell for him that much more. I held my hands up in the air and slowly started moving back and forth. He reached for one of my arms and spun me around in a circle, pulling me closer to him. “Tell me her happiest fact.”
I smiled as we danced across the living room together. “Bentley Graves.”
“Tell me her silliest fact,” he said.
I bit my bottom lip in thought. “She loved to eat peanut butter and pickle sandwiches. When we were kids, she set up a business outside trying to sale lemonade and PB&P sandwiches. Needless to say, she didn’t become rich from that venture.”
He scrunched up his nose. “Have you ever tried one?”
“Ew, no. Gabby was the weird one, not me.”
“I beg to differ. You eat cereal with marshmallows. You’re a freak.” His finger brushed against my nose and he disappeared into the kitchen. When he came back, he had pickles, bread, and peanut butter.
“No,” I sternly stated.
He arched an eyebrow. “Bucket list. Try something new.”
I sighed, knowing that trying something new was on the list. But did it have to be so disgusting?