"Oh come on Fin!" my younger brother Dominik who is 13 yells at me as
he sits on the comfy burgundy couch across the carpet. "Kill them! They
have a gun, shoot them!" he shouts in unison with his twin, Benjamin.
"I'm trying, I'm trying!" I say as I press the buttons on the
controller rapidly.
"Give it to the pro, noobs." Josh intercepts our conversation.
"Bro, calm down, you're only 9." I tell him, turning my head away from
the game for a couple moments and then punished by dying in the game and
earning a wave of screams from my sibling audience. I pause the game
abruptly when I hear the ring of our door bell.
"If you're gonna pause the game, give me the remote so I can play!"
Jonathan whines.
"No way, I'm older! Get away!" Benjamin protests as he runs over and
snatches the remote out of my hands.
"But you played last time!" Dominik cries, attempting to pull the
remote from Ben.
"I wanna play!" screams Josh who jumps into the brewing fight.
"Benjamin, you have a visitor!" my mom Christine shouts from the door
way.
"Who is it?" He shouts back, I'm jealous of him for having an excuse to leave this mess.
"Annie" she says and I can hear her politely inviting her into our crazy, chaotic house. Oh I know her. I think to myself. Annie is the girl who always hangs out around Me, Ben and Dominik when we go to the beach. She usually goes around Ben and Dominik though. I only imagined she did this because she was shy of me but she was really cute, so I wish she hung around me too. She had an amazing laugh and a voice that sung beautiful songs in my ears when I heard it… so maybe I thought she was a little more than cute. I was totally head over heels falling for her. I never showed any of these emotions though; I'd leave Annie for Benjamin and Dominik. What would she want with an older guy like me? She's 13 and I'm 15. Maybe she didn't even notice me. So I guess I was also jealous of Ben for getting all the time around Annie. As soon as Benjamin and Dominik heard that Annie was here, they both jumped up and ran out of the fight to the doorway. I let out a sigh and left the fighting arena that is our living room.
"Hey guys, what's up?" I hear Annie's voice trail from the door and into the kitchen where I was walking to.
"Oh nothing," Benjamin says calmly, I can tell he's trying to be cool.
"Playing video games!" Dominik says at the same time and then they break out in laughter.
"Wanna go to the beach?" Annie asks, her words playing a mix song in my head. I reach the kitchen and sneak a couple sugar cubes out of a bowl on the counter. Mom said I shouldn't eat them but whatever, they taste good. I pop one in my mouth and keep some in my hand to eat later.
"Yeah! Right now?" Benjamin squeaks and I could tell by the sound of his voice that this thought greatly excited him.
"Yes, Dominik, you can come too" Annie says, I can hear the smile in her voice.
"Cool!" Dominik says, the enthusiasm potent in his voice. The strain takes over me, Annie being so close I need to see her. I contain my emotions and casually walk out of the kitchen and slowly stride across the hall in front of the door way.
"Hey Finnick!" Annie shrieks and then contains her voice. I give her a smirk and a wave, pop another sugar cube in my mouth and walk away back into the living room. I sit down on the couch and watch the brawl for the controller but then I'm called back.
"Finnick, come here!" I hear Dominik and Benjamin shout.
"Oh come on, I just sat down!" I whine, but I pull myself off the couch and walk toward the doorway. "Yes?" I ask when I get there, leaning against the doorway and sucking on a sugar cube.
"I- I just wanted to ask if you wanted to come to the um, beach with us." Annie asks nervously, a blush spreading across her cheeks. She was so cute when she blushed. I wished I was the reason she blushed, but I probably wasn't. I wanted to reach out and cup her face, tell her she's the most adorable thing I've ever seen but I couldn't. She was too young, she wouldn't understand. I just stood there instead staring into eyes that weren't looking back into mine.
"So… do you?" Ben asks, looking at me like 'dude, what the heck?'.
"Uh, yeah, let me get my swim trunks and a towel. I'll be right back." I say, spinning around and running up to my room to retrieve my things quickly. Up the stairs and down the hall, I peer into Ezio's room. He's on the computer as usual with Alexandra sitting on his bed chatting with Kortney. I'm surprised that he let them sit there but maybe they made some agreement or something. I turned the corner and entered my room on the left. Grasping my green swim trunks and an old white towel from the drawer, I sprint back around the hall and down the stairs meeting them where I left them. "Okay I'm ready."
"Great, lets go." Annie says, moving aside and letting us out of our house to follow her.
"I'm surprised you decided to lug me with you. Are you sure you don't me tagging along?" I ask, wanting to start conversation on our walk to the beach that was about 10 minutes walking distance from my house.
"I don't mind." Annie answered quickly staring into my eyes for a moment then snapping her head away and blushing again. I laugh and grip the shorts in my hand tighter as they were slipping. I see Ben look at Annie reflexively, jealous of the quick response.
"Good thing you invited me though." He says, linking his arm around hers. Surprising for him, because according to him all girls have cooties. "Someone's gonna have to take care of him." He laughs, an exact replica of my laugh. Dominik walked on my side being very quiet so I decide to ignore Ben and talk to him instead of starting a fight over this.
"So what are we going to do at the beach?" I ask out into the open, mostly directed at Dominik, but anyone was free to answer.
"I wanna swim, I just got my bronze medal in swimming class and I wanna show of my serious swimming skills." Dominik boasts his own little accomplished goal.
"I was kind of hoping to swim too." Ben adds, looking at Annie, waiting for her answer. Annie looks down, unaware of the stares radiating off my brothers. The question hangs there and when she lifts her head, she realizes it's her turn to speak.
"Well I didn't really wanna swim. I was kind of hoping to collect seashells, but I don't want to do it alone." She says, looking at me but then shifting her gaze to Ben, whose arm was still around hers.
"I wouldn't mind collecting seashells." I say, the silence getting awkward. "I love walking on the beach, I do it all the time so I can you get some really cool shells." I add looking straight at her, waiting for her to meet my gaze so I can see her beautiful blue eyes.
"Okay." She says, staring down at her feet and kicking stones along the pathway.
"Look, we're almost there!" Dominik shouts and points to the beach that is only about 3 minutes away. Any moment now, we'd be walking onto the wooden bridge that lay on the beach.
"If we run, we'll be there faster." Benjamin states and he lets go of Annie to prepare to run.
"Yeah, let's run!" Dominik agrees.
"No thanks, I'll walk." I say sluggishly. I don't feel like running to a place I'll be in 3 minutes if I walk at my own leisurely pace.
"Oh come on," Annie finally looks into my eyes and says encouragingly. She grabs my hand and runs in front of me forcing me along. Though if you told me that Annie was going to run with me holding hands, I'd never of protested in the first place. I ran behind her, but I caught up quickly and jogged beside her, enjoying the feeling of her hand in mine. I smile at her and she returns the smile, only she does a million times cuter.
Just as Dominik predicted, we arrive at the beach in to time at all.
"Oh no! I forgot my swim shorts!" Benjamin complains and throws his hands up in frustration.
"Here bud, take mine." I say, throwing my shorts and towel over to him. He caught them and grimaced when he saw that I was holding Annie's hand. That only made me hold on tighter, I didn't want her to let go. I wished to hold her hand forever but, we both knew that was never going to happen. For all I know, she was grossed out by the fact she was holding my hand.
"Let's go searching for shells." She grinned a striking grin that spread from ear to ear and led me toward where she wanted to search. I trailed along happily. I would've gone anywhere with her.
"Lead the way, ma'am." I say, motioning with my free hand for her to start going. She walks along the shore and bends down every once and a while to pick up a seashell she thought was pretty.
"Finnick," She starts. Oh god, I loved the way she said my name. "I don't have anything to hold these in." She says looking frustrated. Scrambling for an idea to help her some of the seashells she was holding fall out of her hand. Something about this made me feel good, she didn't want to let go of my hand either. She'd rather drop them then let go of me. Suddenly an idea hit me.
"I have an idea" I announce and let go of her hand reluctantly for a moment. I see the confusion flash on her face but I ignore it and pursue my idea. I grab onto the bottom of my shirt and bring it up over my head. Her face went from confused to fazed. I smirked slightly and bent down to pick up her dropped seashells and put them in my shirt then lifting up the ends of my shirt to make a bag like thing. "Here you go, hopefully this will help." I say, giving her my shirt full of shells.
"Thanks." She says, blushing again. Before I can stop myself, my hand goes out to touch her face. Her eyes widen and I pull my hand back then turn away to continue walking along the shore, pretending that didn't happen. No, Finnick, no! She doesn't want you, leave the girl alone. I scold myself
"Finnick, wait!" She shouts after me and I turn around to see her a couple feet away from me. "I still wanna collect seashells." She says, looking like she's trying to find more excuses for me to stay.
"We left Ben and Dominik swimming all by themselves. You invited them here, remember? Not me." I say bluntly, trying to hide my inner protests to the words I'm speaking.
"I invited you too!" She says but it is true. She invited them here first and it's rude to leave them all by themselves no matter how badly I want Annie all to myself. I think she finally realizes that I'm not going to budge because she breathes in a deep sigh and walks up to my side then to my surprise, grabs my hand once again. "Fine, let's go see what Ben and Dominik are doing."
When we approach Ben and Dominik I see that Josh has joined them. They were no longer swimming. They were sitting in the sand and singing a weird song about taco flavored kisses.
"Taco taco, burrito burrito." Josh says in a mexican accent.
"To fill all your wishes with my taco-flavored kisses." Ben joins in.
"Don't think just because I've got a lot of money means I'll give you taco flavored kisses, honey" Dominik sings, terribly.
"What the heck are you guys singing?" Annie asks, giggling a string of melodic laughs.
"Taco flavored kisses, duh! Noob." Josh says.
"Please excuse my brother and his foolish Mexican ways." I laugh and then Josh, Ben and Dominik join in. Suddenly, the laughter stops and Dominik looks down at mine and Annie's hands.
"Well well well, what have we got here?" He says, walking up to us and pointing to our hands.
Annie looks down and shrugs. Ben looks upset but doesn't say anything but "Guys, I think we should go home. It's getting late and mom's gonna be mad when she see's Josh got out." I could tell by the way Annie's hand went slightly rigid that she didn't want to go home.
"Okay, bye guys." I say, getting the message across that I was not going to be joining them. They understood and started across the wooden bridge and left. I turned towards Annie, and saw that her eyes were wide and shocked.
"Why did you do that?" She asked, stunned. "Why did you-"
"You don't want to stay here with me?" I ask and my voice sounded very sad because I was suddenly very worried. What if I mis-read her? What if she did want to go home, and the rigid-ness was just excitement to finally leave me?
"Yes but… you want to stay with me?" she asks, very confused. I tightened my grip on her hand as a re-assurance.
"Of course. You yourself said that you still wanted to collect seashells, no?" I question smirking and arching one of my eyebrows. I lead her back to where we were before but instead of collecting seashells, I let go of her hand and sit down in the sand, facing the sun that was going to set in about 30 minutes.
"I don't really want to collect seashells anymore." She says, sitting down next to me.
"Then what do you want to do?" I ask her, watching… no more like staring at her marvelous beauty as she sits there, just inches away.
"I just really like spending time with you." She says and then her hands fly up to her mouth as if she just said something she shouldn't have.
"Annie, whats-" I start but then she interrupts me with a wave of her hand, motioning me to stop. We sit there in the silence and watch the beginning of the sunset. I thought it'd be quiet the whole time until Annie begun to speak. Maybe she just needed time to think.
"Finnick. I- I don't know how to… I don't understand why you hang out with me. I'm just a little unimportant kid." She mutters as she draws in the sand, not looking at me again.
"Maybe it's because I just really like spending time with you." I say, copying her exact words, giving her a message I feel the same. Her head perks up and her eyes spark with a light of joy.
"You do?" She asks. "How could someone like you, like someone like me?"
For some reason, the sadness in her voice just makes me want to wrap my arms around her and kiss her. Tell her it's going to be okay. But it seems every time I do something I tell myself I shouldn't, I just want more. Don't do it, Finnick. She doesn't want you to kiss her. Don't do it. I leave the question hanging for some time. How could I explain to her the joy I feel every time I hear her name, or see her face? How could I tell her how I'd do anything just to see her smile even if it's just for a couple seconds? How could I manage to show her how every time she comes over, I'm overwhelmed with the desire to wrap her in my arms and tell her I love her?
"I don't know how to explain it." I settle for that even though I could tell by the look on her face that it wasn't enough.
"Well that makes two of us." She mutters again, I could barely hear her. I probably wasn't supposed to, but I'm used to people who can't alliterate their words properly. Like Mags. She can barely speak but I understand her. She gave me the ability to listen and understand people.
"Annie." I say, and then she turns to look at me with a look so thoughtful, I just- no Finnick. Don't. "Annie I-"
"You what?" She prods me, trying to get me to spit it out. How could I tell her I love her when we've been together such a short time? But I knew that wasn't true, we've known each other for a long time. I took her hand and layed back on my elbows to get a better look at the sun.
"I want to watch the sunset with you." I say, my heart beating like a drum, staring into her blue eyes that are deep as the sea. Her eyes narrowed and she starred at me quizzically.
"That's not what you were going to say." She accused, staring me down for any facial give-aways.
"No it wasn't." I say, a sudden surge of confidence rushing through me. Or maybe it was just the sugar cube rush. I couldn't tell which but whatever it was; it gave me the courage to say it. "I was going to tell you that I love you. I was going to tell you how I have since the day I first saw you and that every time you came over since, I get overwhelmed with a desire to wrap you in my arms and tell you how much you mean to me. I wanted to say how I feel because I am so uncertain that you feel the same way, and scared that you're grossed out by me. But I wanted to tell you how special you are to me. I was going to say how amazingly beautiful you are and-" I was cut off when Annie grabbed my face gently and kissed me.
"Well… it's a good thing you didn't say all of that, or we would've missed the sunset." She says when she pulled away, and for a moment I'm confused. Does she mean that she didn't want to hear what I wanted to say? Does that mean she wanted me to stop because she didn't feel the same? "And then I wouldn't be able to tell you what I feel." She adds, aware of my worry.
She takes a deep breath and starts "Finnick, If alice told me that today when I asked you out-" she stops her self and rephrases. "When I asked you guys out to the beach with me, I never thought this would happen. You know what happened? This morning, I woke up with the emptiest feeling. I didn't even enjoy my favorite breakfast!" She complained. I didn't really understand why she was telling me this. Does she mean she didn't want this to happen? "Alice asked me what was wrong, and I told her that I liked one of the Odairs and honestly, she didn't have to guess to know it was you. She told me to take you guys out to the beach and so I did. When I saw you crossing the hallway, my heart jumped because it was you! And when I shrieked and said hi, I for sure thought you would think I'm a lunatic. Who would like someone like me? So in summary, I feel the same way, if not a bazillion times more confusing because I'm crazy."
"You're not crazy." I interject.
"Crazy in love." She says, staring straight into my eyes, hypnotizing me. "And even though you're probably thinking well she's only 13, she doesn't know what love is, she's too young she doesn't understand. Well… you're probably right. But if there's one thing I know for certain it's that I love you, Finnick."
I lay there silent for a moment, still propped up on my elbows in the sand. Am I dreaming or did Annie just tell me that she loved me? She loves me. Say something Finnick. Say something! But my body was numb and I was too over-joyed to speak. I looked at her again and I saw that she still had a beautiful smile plastered on her face.
"Finnick, you're crying." She points out and moves her hand on my cheek, wiping a tear away. I reached up and kept her hand there, closing my eyes and enjoying the feel of her soft, delicate hands.
"I'm just so happy." I manage to say through my happy-tears. She smiled bigger and layed down beside me in the sad, her head on my chest. We stayed like that for a while, feeling the remaining warmth of the sand beneath us and the rays of the sun beaming on us.
"I love you" She says.
"As I love you, Annie."