In the Fall

Our story unfolded so slowly and sweetly, it snuck up on me. Those beautiful September school days you walk home with the sun warming your cheeks. Soon a couple leaves would blush, too, and then all at once, my favorite thing happens. A crisp wind swirls in and Autumn wraps around you. You are immersed in the Fall.

It was Autumn when I really got to know you. I had known your smile and your laugh, but I didn’t know quite what inspired them. I knew you were kind and thoughtful and humble, but I didn’t know what you looked for in a girl. It was over Chemistry textbooks I realized I liked the way you treated me. Always with such patience and gentle kindness. When we were out with friends I would sometimes catch you watching after me. I quickly became very much myself around you—entirely uncensored, unabashed, and unable to completely conceal my crush.

As the seasons changed again, so did we. Good friends can spoon if it is a particularly cold early Winter, can they not? During these months I was incapable of maintaining long eye contact with you. I was aware that if we looked at each other for too long, we’d move in closer, and closer, and closer, until we couldn’t get any closer without our fingers intertwining and our lips touching. And if during those early Winter days I let our lips touch, I couldn’t blame it on the cold. You were now my very good friend and my roommate and my daily source of joy. How could I risk all of this to answer my growing curiosity of how you would kiss me?

The snow piled and froze and the Winter dragged on. It was the first February I didn’t mind the slow pace towards Spring. The cold meant more time inside our warm home with you. Though, we had begun to flirt with disaster; enjoying dangerous eye contact, and tempting tipsy nights out, and cozy movie nights in. My friends observed the tension growing between us. I think I knew then it was less a tension growing than an understanding: neither of us wanted to ruin it.

As a transparent favor, you took me out for a little Valentine’s Day distraction. When we came home I went to my room and lied awake, struggling to remember why we weren’t allowed to kiss? In a moment of dangerous bravery, I joined you, also awake, on your bed. I sat on the edge swinging my feet like the little girl I was, taken aback by my building fear to ask you what I knew I had to ask you and absolutely knew I wanted to ask you. Finally, I said matter-of-factly, “I need you to kiss me.” And you did. It was nice, and I was shaking through most of it. Had I never kissed anyone before? What was wrong with me? In a moment, I left, too scared to really make eye contact with you. What if everything had changed and I would lose you all together?

Back in my room, on the other side of your wall, I got teary. I felt overwhelmed and confused…what would happen tomorrow morning when we would pour cereal next to each other? There was only one thing to do.
We had to kiss more.

When I hesitantly returned to the edge of your bed, nervously chattering about my concerns, you took my face in your hands and kissed me slowly.
You took over. I loved it. Butterflies circled inside me as you kissed me deeper and slower and softer. I felt it in my core and I just kept thinking two things, “Finally we are kissing” and “Please don’t stop.” The way we kissed, it felt like we were in love. I had never been kissed quite like that before. When we took a moment to look at each other, I searched your face for clues. I wanted to know that you felt what I felt, and that we were going to be okay, was this all okay? You smiled at me and wrapped me up in your arms and whispered, “I’ve waited so long for this, Abbey.”

As time passes, new reasons to love you sneak up on me each day.
And, I am still immersed in the fall.