“It'll be cold,” she replied.
I shrugged. “Probably.”
“We have to just jump in. No toe testing. Just one quick cannonball in,” she told me.
“No swan dive?” I asked.
Julie looked up and smiled. “Only ladies swan dive. Us spontaneous runaways, we cannonball,” she replied.
So, we did.
♥
The water was indeed cold, and we both felt it as we came up for air. Julie's eyes were widened as she looked at me and shivered.
“Bad idea, very bad idea,” she said, her teeth chattering. She was doing her best to stop them, smiling as she did, but it wasn't any use. They continued to do so.
I swam the short distance between us and swept her into my arms. She held to me as I moved us to the wall. Trying to swim and hold her was not any easy task, despite how it looked in movies. Moving her to the wall was easier.
The closeness wasn't so bad either.
I got her to the wall, and had managed to box her in. Her hands were holding to my shoulders for support, her back against the concrete wall of the pool, and though her teeth were still chattering a little, she didn't seem to mind it.
“Are you okay?” I asked her.
Her eyes met mine, and held them. She smiled, nodding. “Perfect. You are, you know?” she replied.
I smiled, using a hand to pull her face closer to mine. Kissing her seemed like one of those things that I was always doing, but I enjoyed it. I was a teenager in love, and kissing was the one thing I could do to her that neither hurt her or aggravated her.
Julie pulled me in closer, aiding our kiss. Her mouth met mine wantonly, and seeking comfort that I was more than happy to give. I couldn't hold her, because I knew I would bring us both under, but I had her pinned to the wall, and her body was pressed against me.
I couldn't help from being completely enveloped by her. Julie was all I was, and all I ever wanted to be, and I would give anything to go one step forward.
It wasn't just my teenage hormones either, just like it wasn't hers. This was love that we shared, and with that came a certain amount of lust too. It was impossible for me to look at her, and kiss her, and feel her beneath my fingertips, and not want her. I'd give anything to have all of her.
But that wasn't how things were suppose to be.
I was the one that pulled away, because for a while, Julie had lost her control, and I knew it. If I didn't pull away now, we would both regret it later, and when your girlfriend is dying, regrets are not the best company.
I could move on from not having slept with her, if she died. I would get over that, because it was, after all, just sex. Compared to the love I had shared with her, the way she had become a part of me, and I had completely succumbed to her, sex was just a missed pleasure.
I couldn't live with helping her do something she would regret until the day she died, whether she realized today or not. I couldn't live with doing that to her soul.
She slowly opened her eyes, and there was a trace of hesitant embarrassment as they finally met mine. I watched her swallow back an apparent lump in her throat, and then roll those envious green eyes of hers.
“I guess I lost my head, for a while,” she said.
I used one hand to lift her chin back to me. She looked at me as I leaned down to kiss her softly and innocently. When I pulled away, I whispered, “You're entitled to lose it.”
She sighed, pressing her forehead against mine. “I don't want to regret not knowing how amazing it could be between us,” she replied. She slowly pulled away, looking at me directly. “I know you're thinking the same thing. I know you want me as much as I want you,” she told me.
Now, I had a lump in my throat. I swallowed it back, laughing slightly. “Of course, I want you,” I said, but I also felt a little guilty about saying it. Because of how much I did want her. How if a few more seconds, or the slightest touch could have pushed me past my control, and we could have been having a different conversation.
Julie sighed, shaking her head. “And then I also know that I don't want to ruin everything. Since I can remember, I've always known that I was going to marry someone wonderful, and he would be my first and only. I'd never want anyone else, and I wooed be able to control myself until then,” she replied, then touching my chest.
Her fingers once again traced along the lines and got caught in their webs. She did this absentmindedly, but I felt every touch, and it was driving me crazy, however I was unwilling to stop.
“And then I meet you, and I fall so hard and so fast because you're more than wonderful. You're perfect, and beautiful, and I want nothing more than to be with you in every way possible, and I start to think, 'One day I might marry this guy' and then everything goes completely crazy and I realize I might not even live until Christmas,” she says, stopping abruptly and looking up. Her eyes were watery, and moving over mine. “And I'm scared I'm going to be cheated from all of the things I could be sharing with you, and that terrifies me.”
“It scares me too,” I admitted. “But, it is, in the end, just sex. You can't really miss something you never did,” I told
