She smiled back. “I wanna thank you, Vincent.”

He pulled back to look in her eyes again. Something he loved to do now. “For what?”

“I’m gonna remember this day forever, but not for the reasons I thought I would earlier. You’ve completely turned today around for me. I can hardly wait to move in with Grace now.” She hugged him, leaning her face against his chest, and it felt perfect holding her like this. “Vincent?”

“Yeah?”

“Kiss me again.”

He laughed as she pulled away to look at him. “I was already wondering if it was too soon for that.” Before he did, he held her face in his hands for a moment. “This doesn’t end this summer, Rose. I’m coming back next year, and in between I’ll text you every day. I’ll see what I can do about coming down to visit you, too.” She didn’t have to respond; he saw it in her big, bright eyes. This made her as happy as it made him. So before she could respond, he leaned in and gave her another much longer kiss than the first.

~*~

Rose

Like most girls, Rose had daydreamed about her first kiss for years. She never would’ve imagined that it would be on a day when she’d finally had to face the devastating fact that her mother had no interest in raising her. And she certainly hadn’t imagined it would happen the day she professed her love to the guy doing the kissing. She’d always assumed the kissing would come first, and later there would be declarations of love, but this made it even more special.

Rose had heard of boys Vincent’s age mistaking lust for love all too many times. They’d put up with girls who they didn’t even really like, just because the girl was giving it up, and they truly thought they were in love. Vincent had yet to even kiss her when he’d told her he was in love with her. So it meant that much more to her.

Sex was not something they’d talked about yet. Rose got the feeling Vincent was almost afraid to. Judging from all the other things he’d already experienced in his short life, she was sure he was no virgin. Going by his kissing alone, she’d say he was plenty experienced.

Kissing was their favorite thing to do the last two weeks he was there. Of course they were careful no one ever saw them. But Vincent had behaved so well throughout the summer that, by the end of summer and with Rose using the ole “but he’s only here for a couple more weeks—days” plea, they pretty much got to spend every day of those last two weeks together. They’d made the most of them.

Rose cried the day he left. Grace had warned her enough when she saw how close she’d gotten to Vincent that even thinking about any kind of relationship surpassing a friendship was unwise. He lived too far, and it probably wouldn’t work out. Having gone through what she had with Sal during their breakup, she was terrified of Rose being hurt.

Just knowing she wouldn’t be seeing him for a while hurt like hell. But Vincent had promised to be true to her, even from as far away as he lived, as long as she stayed true to him. Rose couldn’t even imagine another boy making her feel what Vincent did. He was her prince in what now felt like a fairy-tale life.

Rose’s mom had moved away weeks ago. For her whole life the woman had managed to hang around like a dark cloud dimming even the pleasant events in her life by simply not showing up. That was all behind her. Rose was happy now. She was done letting her mother bring her spirits down.

Rose had gone from living in the slums and going to one of the worst high schools in the district to living in the hills of La Jolla in a beautiful home and attending one of the highest-ranked schools in the area not just academically but in sports as well. She was now part of one of the best teams in San Diego County, and she was a starter. On top of all that Sal insisted on sponsoring her, so she could play on a club team as well. She had once upon a time until her mother decided she wasn’t paying for that anymore. But unlike in her old neighborhood, the teams out here were all ranked silver and above, and yet she’d still made the cut when she tried out.

She was already done with her first semester at her new school. Things between her and Vincent were still perfect. He’d been out to La Jolla many times thanks to all the parties leading up to Grace and Sal’s wedding. Then there was the wedding itself. He’d been there the whole weekend. In between all the parties Vincent had come up a few other times on his own. His dad was so proud that he’d been completely trouble free for so long that he’d let him use his car a few times to drive down and see her. Vincent hadn’t been in trouble even once since his tagging incident.

Now he was back again for another visit, and she packed a picnic they could take to the beach where they could have some alone time. Done eating now, they lay on the blanket she’d brought doing what they loved doing most.

Vincent completely respected the fact that she wasn’t ready to do more than just kissing and what had progressed to heavy petting now. But she loved how intensely deep he kissed her sometimes. That alone felt almost erotic.

Most recently he’d begun to run his hands up and down her legs like he was doing now, and he literally groaned in her mouth. “Damn, this drives me nuts.”

Rose smiled, squirming as his lips moved from hers and nipped her neck now. Feeling him tongue-suck her neck drove her nuts and made her tingle in places she knew she shouldn’t be. She wasn’t ready to go there yet. Still a small moan slipped. “You drive me nuts, Vincent.”

The moan had been embarrassing enough, but being so breathless that she could barely get the words out surprised even her.