It was a warm summer's day on Jack's farm, the kind which made Elli think of childhood spent fishing for tadpoles with Rick and Popuri, of splashing in the paddling pool with her baby brother Stu, of lying on her back while the cows nibbled the grass beside her. The kind of day where nothing mattered save for innocence and laughter. Elli leaned back against the fence, next to which Jack's horse quietly grazed, surveying the peaceful scene: May, Stu and Carter played with a frisbee, Karen and Manna stood gossiping, and Mary was writing another of her stories underneath what Stu had called the 'Honey Tree'. And sitting by the stream, with eyes only for each other, sat Jack and Ann.
At 19, most villagers had believed their feelings to be superficial, that they would eventually 'grow out of' being in each other's company. Elli occasionally felt that way about them. Yet here on this summer afternoon, she sat and watched the couple. Content to just be, they leaned into each other, so that they seemed to be one person. Elli watched as Ann gently curved her arm around Jack's neck, as he turned to her and looked into her eyes as though she were the only thing that mattered. Elli realised then that she was. No matter what anybody said or thought, when these two were together the rest of the world paled in comparison. Nothing mattered but each other: they were probably unaware of her standing only a few feet away. That, she thought, is love in its truest form.