They're too cute not to write. Dedicated to Howan, who made me such a pretty Friend's Only banner on LJ. X3 Je t'aime!
He's shy, when you kiss him on the beach with the sun already down and making the sea black. He enjoys it, and it sends thrills to your head when he realize this, but he's scared. When footsteps crunch against the sand and laughter drifts down towards you with the fluttering faerie lights of hand-held lamps he steps away self-conciously, chin tilted down to chest and eyes sneaking an apologetic glance.
You can't help but forgive him, because a few minutes later he has flung his arm around your neck and is dragging you along so close that sometimes your bare feet step on each other, salt-flavored sand sliding and rubbing in between.
You eventually make your way from the front of the pack to the back, his steps slowing and yours slowing to match his untill you are beyond the circle of light and into a more comfortable darkness. The arm around your neck loosens a little, but it's only a sign of more comfortable companionship - he's not scared of you running off now.
It had bewildered you, at first, how he could cling to you so completely, and yet refuse to hold you close. Now you have accepted it, and with that acceptance has come a sort of understanding. His hand lingers on the back of your neck as you lean into the shadows on his face and get lost in them. Your lips connecting is the completion of a connection, sending electric thrills through your body untill they can ground themselves into the sand. You wonder if you're leaving footprints of glass as your walk slows even further.
His eyes are bright and the moon and the lights glint off of them like when he smiles; and he is smiling now, at you and your seriousness. Your arm reaches around his waist and doesn't quite make it all the way, so you tease him about needing to loose a few pounds, just to make him laugh and headbut you in the cheek.
You know a few words in english from your mother, who's mother before her was from England. You teach them to him periodically, and tonight you're patiently, desperately trying to fix his pronounciation of "love", which no one but you could understand to mean what it does.
He doesn't use this one word from his very limited english vocabulary on you. Perhaps he won't, because even though he shies away from your hands sometimes and blushes when you kiss him, he knows how big this is. How beyond love it is.
You know that your story won't be a love story - it'll be a life story, a basketball story, a friendship story.
A story of bare feet and moonlight beaches and a troupe of crazy basketball players.
And he leans his head against yours and you look at each other through the corners of your eyes, smiling a little at this secret moment in the dark before you dare him to a race - and you're off, running blindly and laughing because you aren't trying and he's ahead of you and trips and falls into the sand and looks back to you and laughs while everyone crowds around and you catch up in time to be the one to haul him to his feet.