Preface

It was the perfect pool party on that wonderful sunny June afternoon, the day that everything happened. Everyone was having fun, laughing, swimming, eating, and there was a pizza stuffing contest (where you have to stuff an entire slice of pizza in your mouth and swallow before the other people) in which I had won. But at the moment I was standing at the edge of the pool watching my friend execute a perfect swan dive, aka not-so-perfect after she landed on her stomach. Then, out of nowhere, a pair of arms encircles me.

I knew exactly who they belong to by looking at the hot, tanned, muscular build. Now I want it to be made perfectly clear; I did not have a boyfriend. These arms belong to my best friend Natsume. But, I'm not gonna lie- the two of us have a track record of pushing each other into the pool, so my next move was not surprising.

I throw my left arm behind his back, hook onto his right side and flip him over my head and into the pool like an expert ninja (I had taken ninja classes when my family went to Japan and I was a natural!). I then lean down when he surfaces and reach my hand down to pull him up while saying,

"You know I wasn't going to let myself be pushed into the p- ahhh!" I screamed.

Natsume had grabbed my hand so that now I was flying down straight towards him. During this falling moment, that is all of a sudden slow motion, I'm thinking AW CRAP! Our heads are gonna collide! Shoot! Why did I try to help him get out? I should have seen that coming! Well I guess even expert ninjas wouldn't have seen that coming if they had been, and was still trying not to be, in love with that person. How can I think about ninjas and love at a time like this! Then the magical event happened.

For a moment— as our heads were colliding, I put both of my hands on his shoulders to break the fall, and then the moment before our heads would have smashed together, he turned his head to the side and we had a full on, full speed forward, for me, first kiss! IN the pool. With his head half under water, waves of if all around us, while I'm still falling but it still feels like slow motion! Now you can imagine how I felt, I was kissing the hottest boy in the school, the one I'd had a crush on since the second grade but had always hide it perfectly, the one who all the girls crushed on and even had a fan club that was gathering more and more supporters from all across Japan. This was the most joyous moment of my life and I wanted it to last forever!

But this joyous joy wasn't meant to last. Half a second after our kiss, the force of my fall slammed into him knocking both of us under the water's surface and knocking the air out of me. Which is definitely not good at all.

I'm going to be honest here and say I'm not a very good swimmer, but this is mostly because of my athletic ability, 112 pounds and 5 ½ feet in height that is all muscle (what? I'm an athlete! I'm proud of my build! I worked hard for it!). So I don't float very well at all. Now just imagine if you were out of air and were sinking like a rock to the bottom of a twelve foot deep pool, how would you react? Yes, that's right. I passed out.

Meanwhile Natsume surfaced then frantically looked around for me. Then everyone started screaming and they all jumped in to get me out because by now I was lying on the pool floor.

They managed to pull me out the started trying to wake me up and revive me. It didn't work. So now I was out everyone was crowded around me and there was only one thought stream passing through everyone's heads, and that was OH SHIT NO!

Why did I feel the need to help him again?