I know this is the Truth About Forever section, but I feel like there are more readers here and I did not want this story to get lost in the fray. This is set within Lock and Key, right after Ruby and Nate go swimming in the pool on page 322. It's another one of those stories that I wrote at 3:00 in the morning when I should have been studying for a final or maybe sleeping. Either way, first year of college, almost done, first Dessen fanfic, finished.

Disclaimer: I do not own Lock and Key or it's characters.

For the record, I truly believed that this is what happened in the story. Ruby and Nate really did have this kind of interaction in the story, Dessen was hinting at it from the beginning of the scene and future passages support my theory. She just could never write something like this because she's a YA author and yada yada yada...

Pull ............ Me ............ Down

I was about to shake my head, say it wasn't that at all, but before I could, I felt his hand close over mine. "Don't worry," he said, "it's warmer the deeper you go." Then, to prove it, he went under, and I took a deep breath, the biggest I could, and let him pull me down with him.

I let his hands hold my waist as he treaded water to keep us submerged. I let his lips run over mine, the pressure of the water and sheer weightlessness of everything making all of my senses seem pointless. I let him arch my back forward, pressing his body closer to mine.

Then I let him lead me out of the pool, across the deck and into the pool house.

When the door shut behind us interior became instantly black. But there was light, dim pale light, reflecting through the windows from the moon outside. We stood facing each other and in that moment I could not break the intense eye contact I had with him. I needed to hold on to reality, to the here and now. I wanted to feel the present and what it meant to be in it with Nate.

He was nothing like Marshall. I knew without even having to ask that Nate would never do what Marshall did. And the minute my thoughts switched to the other boy they instantly switched to the other girl; Heather. The other girl had never matter to me before, until Peyton, my friend, became the significant girl in the picture and I became the other.

Nate must have seen my troublesome contemplations. He dipped his head, lowering his eyes to my height and staring at me intensely, as if telling me silently that there was no need to worry. That Heather was not important, not here, not with us. It was his need to reassure me, however subtle, that made me realize how little it all mattered to me as well.

Heather wasn't here, and neither was Marshall. Neither one of them mattered to us anymore, because we had both found someone that mattered more.

Still holding my gaze, he backed me slowly toward the futon. We stopped in one of the moon's rays that came through the far window. His features were highlighted, his damp hair speckled with glistening droplets. His chest, far more masculine and toned that I had realized was bare and shining.

I couldn't tell how much the light had changed his ability to see me, but I knew my face had probably gotten clearer. He could see, I'm sure, all of my imperfections, all of my fears, doubts, and uncertainties. That may be why he slowly reached for one of my hands and cradled it gently between both of his.

He brought my fingers up to his lips and made the slightest, most fleeting yet intensely passionate connection with my wet skin. "Ruby," he said my name. His voice may have been a question or a statement or an explanation. But I only processed and responded to the trust I heard pouring from his lips.

I brought my free hand up to his cheek, resting it gently across curve of his jaw. It was only because of all the conversations we had had, the stories we had told, the realization that he came to the woods that day for me – for me – and the knowledge that I now knew we were the same, that I was able to cup his cheek and whisper, "Nate."

And then we were back in the pool, the water was all around us, the currents and the waves and the tide were tossing our bodies back and forth as they met, lips locked, tipped our heads back, released, and came up for air again. And again. And again.

The pressure was on every inch of my skin, the small beads of water sliding off as he slid my bathing suit straps down past my shoulders. The slick material peeled off of my body like a second skin, revealing everything I had to reveal but nothing I had ever bothered to keep hidden.

He ran his hands slowly down my sides, feelings my curves and wrapping his hands around my bare back. I dragged my fingertips through his hair, letting them tangle in the damp curls. He lowered his head to my neck where his lips met the sensitive skin above my collar bone. At the same time his hands drifted lower to my hips. He gently guided me backwards until my legs hit the end of the futon.

I slid my fingers between the waistband of his trunks and the smooth skin that the fabric was clinging to. I let my hands run up his chest, slowly rubbing over each strand of muscle. He was taller than me, bigger than me, and in a different way, wider than me. I felt his presence, his strength, in a way I never felt before with any other boy.

That's why when his arms wrapped around my torso and he gently laid me down along the futon I let my head roll back and closed my eyes for just a moment. I wanted to remember this, this new feeling. This new sense of awareness and desire was overwhelming me. I wanted to remember it so that someday I might be able to put a name to it.

Nate kept his arms wrapped around me as he supported his weight on his elbows. He brought his lips to the untouched skin between my breasts. The contact made me shiver and I moved beneath him. He glanced up, noticing how my eyes were closed, my forehead wrinkled in concentration as I tried to record every thought and emotion that was bombarding my mind.

I felt him shift his weight so he was suspended above me and when I opened my eyes his face was inches from mine. "Ruby," and this time it wasn't question although he was asking. The tenderness with which he said my name was meant to reassure me. His need for approval, the respect he showed, nearly made me cry.

But I didn't. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and locked my eyes with his. Silently, with a slow nod that was followed by the ghost of a smile, I gave him permission.

And he held my gaze for a moment longer, knowing that we had all of the time we needed. All of the time we wanted. And he lowered his lips to my own, his tongue slowly circling my mouth as I explored his. I felt him detach one hand from my body as he reached between us to free himself from his pants. I used my foot to pull the wet, weighted trunks down the rest of his legs and he slowly kicked them off of his feet.

Then we were positioned the physics ceased to matter. There was no race for pleasure, no desire to escape anything, as I had attempted to achieve many times before. There was only me and Nate, lying naked on his futon, breathing heavily as the water on our skin was heated by the rise in bodily temperature.

He brought another hand to my face, cupping my cheek as I had done his, rubbing his thumb gently along my brow bone before kissing me there, and kissing me on the forehead, on the cheek, on the eyelid, on the nose before finding my lips once again and entering me.

Nate was slow and calm. He treated me with more gentleness and care than I had ever been proposed with before. His lips never left my skin and his hands never left my face, my stomach, the small of back, or my own outstretched palms.

When we were finished he laid beside me, pulling me against him, our bodies facing each other. His eyes were level to mine and I watched him gaze at me and smile, his fingers tracing soft circles on the skin above my hip. I laid my arm over his, letting my fingers wrap around his bicep.

It was in this silence that we stared at each other, for what seemed like hours but was probably minutes. Until he reached up and wrapped his fingers around the key, lying limply against my bare skin before turning it over his hand and placing it against my heart.

Like earlier, in the pool, I took a deep breath as I felt the cold touch of the key on my previously warm skin. The key had never felt heavy before, but it did now. The shape was sharp and jagged and the metal was odd and crude in this space of puerility and peace.

It had stuck to the skin over my heart, where Nate placed it. But I reached up with my free hand flicked it off, letting it fall pointlessly against the futon cushion, looking Nate in the eye the entire time. The I borrowed myself closer to him, shifting so his body was curved against my side as I lay on my back, one of his arms wrapped around me and the other still tracing shapes on my skin.

I didn't worry about Cora or Jamie looking for me. I didn't think about school in the morning or the math test in a month. As Nate's breathing slowed beside me I stared wide-eyed at the ceiling and thought of my mother.

I thought about how she could never give me this, this peace I felt lying here with someone else. I knew that every time I thought about my mother, now and for the rest of my life, I would remember that she abandoned me. I would remember that even maternal bonds, natural, biological and psychic bonds weren't always a guarantee.

But sometimes we found our own support, our own connections. Sometimes we found someone else who was able to help us float, even if it meant going beneath the surface to find them. And even then, those connections may not be perfect; they could be the most fragile link possible.

We were both broken, Nate and I. Damaged goods. And we had learned to lock away the parts of us that were bruised and broken. My mother left me, abandoned me, and I had undoubtedly developed negatively because of it. His father was not much better. Although I didn't know the extent of their relationship I knew it was similar to the unequal form of servitude I had shared with my own wayward parent.

But maybe, together, we could begin to heal. Maybe, as I lay here with him on top of me, silently sleeping in my arms with his head resting on my chest, he was healing me, slowly, from the inside out. Silently coaching me from behind the lock, coaxing me softly to turn the key.

Thank you for reading. Please review. I'd really like to read your thoughts about my writing, the story, my take on Ruby and Nate, whatever.

-LeFay