Chapter 21

"You busy?" I asked Cory as I poked my head out through the sliding glass doors. I had changed into a pair of khaki shorts and a comfortable flowing blue tank top, with flip flops on my feet and my hair pulled back into a messy low side ponytail. It was the quickest look I could put together – something that only took me about five minutes.

"No," he replied, putting his phone down towards his lap. "Why?"

"Don't ask questions. Come inside, put clothes on, and give me your car keys."

Cory froze for a moment, but he followed my directions without comment. I couldn't help but smirk – I loved a man that didn't ask many questions. But honestly, it was all happening so fast, I wasn't even sure if I had any answers. I just had my idea and my destination.

Cory brushed past me as he walked into the house, and the feeling of his skin against mine brought a smile to my face. But as our bodies made contact, I could feel all of the eyes in the house on us. I could even hear someone snicker, but by the time I turned around, it was quiet.

I followed Cory downstairs to our bedroom, but not before Chris gave me an exaggerated knowing wink. I struggled to keep a straight face as I clomped down the stairs behind my boyfriend.

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"You know how much I trust you right now? The fact that the worst driver I know is driving my truck, and I have no idea what's going on?" Cory asked me. I looked over towards him, and I could see that his knuckles were white-as-snow as he gripped onto the armrest of his seat.

I smirked. "Will you relax?" I requested of him as I relaxed my grip on the steering wheel, which made him gasp for air. "Ye of little faith."

"I'm sorry," he stated as he used his other hand to nervously flip through radio stations. ""It's just… you know what this truck means to me. I don't know what I'd do if something happened to it."

I looked away from the road towards him, and I could practically hear his heart drop to his stomach. "I'll have you know that I have a driver's license in three states. Three!"

"Oh my god, please look where you're driving," Cory muttered under his breath.

Laughing, I looked back towards the road. I didn't say anything further. But, through the silence, I knew that he knew where we were going. We were driving down that one street that went to the beach… our beach. Honestly, I was impressed with myself that I remembered really where I was going. I can't really say that happens too often. I usually have a stack of directions printed out from websites, but never ask me to read a map. It took me about a year to understand how to read a New York City subway map, and that was color-coded.

After only a few minutes of driving in absolute silence, we arrived at the beach. The skies were looking darker, and even though it was still the afternoon, there was virtually no one around. This was the greatest beach ever!

Cory took a deep sigh of relief as I cut the engine and took the key out of the ignition. He released his death grip on the armrest and unbuckled his seatbelt. "Okay," he whispered before exiting the car.

"You are the worst!" I joked as I hopped out of the drivers seat, slamming the door shut behind me. "You're acting like I was driving blindfolded through Times Square or something."

"I'm sorry," he apologized as I walked around towards him. He reached down and took my hand before the two of us started walking towards the steps that led to the beach. "What are we doing here, anyway?"

I kicked off my flip-flops before walking into the sand, taking a mental note on where I left them. I already lost one pair of shoes on this very beach; I didn't want to lose another. Cory kicked his shoes off after me and placed them next to mine.

"Let's go for a walk down by the water," I suggested before leading him into the sand, not waiting to hear his reply.

We were quiet before we got to the water, but as soon as the cool water crashed upon the shore and submerged our feet and ankles in the foamy, sandy, watery mix, we both jumped and scampered from the water as quickly as we could while laughing. Our skin just wasn't ready for the temperature.

"So, I'll ask you again," Cory smirked as we began walking along the shoreline. "Why are we here?"

With my free hand, I pushed a fly-away hair out of my face and tucked it behind my ear. "Well, I figured we just needed some time away from the house." Our feet began sinking into the saturated sand and the wet clumpy sand filled the spaces between our toes. "It's not much of a vacation if you're surrounded by tons of people you see every day."

"Then why aren't you here by yourself?" Cory questioned as he rubbed his thumb against the top of my thumb.

"I went jogging by myself earlier. That's my alone, quiet me-time. Now, I wanted to spend this time with you. Just you."

Cory looked down at me and smiled. "I'll accept that answer."

"Anyway, I wanted to talk to you about something," I blurted out. At first, I wished I could have reached out, grabbed the words I muttered, and shoved them all back in my mouth. What was I thinking, bringing up a matter that I was about to bring up so quickly on our outing? But after thinking about it for a few nanoseconds, I realized that maybe it wasn't the worst idea. If I just got it out there, then we could just talk about it and get it over with, and move on with our afternoon.

"Okay," he replied innocently.

I inhaled deeply before speaking, knowing there was no going back. "Basically, we've been together now for only a few days, and I feel like in these past few days, we've moved faster and have done so much more together than other newly coupled couples can say that they've done. I mean, if you thing about it, we've now slept in the same bed together and had multiple sexy make-out sessions with an extreme loss of clothing. The one last night, apparently, we had an audience."

Unexpectedly, Cory started laughing. "Sadly, I figured we would. I just tried to ignore the idea of being peeped on, but I was getting some really different looks around the house today. Kind of made me feel like a boss."

"Oh my gosh, stop it!" I squealed before laughing. "I feel so embarrassed!"

"Why?" he smirked. "What was so wrong with what we did?"

I shook my head. "I don't know. Nothing was wrong with it, I guess. I'm just a private person, you know that. Maybe that it was just because it was the first time that we did anything like that, that I just wanted it to be something between the two of us."

"It always will be just between the two of us. We were the two in the pool. It was your body that my hands were wrapped around. Who cares if people were watching? Clearly we must have been putting on a pretty good show. It wasn't like they were turning away in disgust, and that's what most people do when they see me shirtless."

I laughed loudly before hitting Cory on his arm with my free hand. "You're terrible," I said with a bright voice. "But really, do you get what I'm getting at?"

"Yes, yes, yes," Cory confirmed before squeezing my hand.

"Do you want to see what happens if we maybe take things a little slower?" I questioned.

Cory stopped walking, which made me stop quickly. My stomach flopped as Cory dropped my hand. Shit. Shit, shit, shit, I messed this up.

"Hi," he then said, offering out his hand. "I don't think we've met."

I looked down at his hand before looking up at him. A large gust of wind bellowed on the beach, tossing stray hairs around my head. I put my hand in his and shook it. "My name is Lea. And you are?"

"Cory," he replied with a tiny smirk before releasing my hand. He tucked both of his hands in the pockets of his shorts. "You come around here often?" he asked, nodding his head towards the ocean.

"No," I replied. "I'm from New York."

"What are you doing in La Jolla, then?"

I smiled before clearing my throat. He wasn't kidding with this re-introduction. "I'm here on vacation with some friends from work. I have a job up in Los Angeles. What about you, what brings you here?"

"Struggling actor," he replied quickly.

While I was fishing for something to come back with, I felt a few raindrops fall onto my face and shoulders. I tried to ignore it, but suddenly, as if the skies had opened, rain poured from the sky.

I looked up at the sky and the rain fell into my face. I let out a loud gasp as I felt Cory grab for my hand, and we took off running down the beach. I laughed as I jogged alongside him, and in the distance, we saw a rock formation. We must have both seen it at the same time, because he pointed to it just as I had noticed it. It didn't take us long to get there. I'm big into running, and Cory just took strides as if he was a gazelle. The boy has long legs.

We made it to the arched rock formation on the beach and we stood underneath the widest part of the rock for cover from the rain. I laughed as I wiped the rain off of my face, and Cory ran his hands through his brown hair to shake the water from it.

As we sought protection from the rain, we were both quiet. It was incredibly relaxing, listening to the sound of falling rain in combination with the sound of the ocean crashing upon the shore. After a few moments, Cory wrapped his arm around my shoulder and he pulled me in close to his body. I looked up at him from the corner of my eye, and I couldn't help but just think about all of the things that I absolutely loved about him.

The way he protects me. The way his skin feels against mine. The way he isn't afraid to take risks. The way he understands our differences. The way he finds a way to make my weaknesses strengths. The way he knows how to talk to me. The way he understands my thought processes.

I really could have went on and on with all of the things that I loved. But as I was thinking, he interrupted my thought processes. He bent down and placed a small, light kiss on my forehead, like he knew that I was wrapped up in him. And with that one small little kiss, I allowed myself to relax completely into his body and let my mind go blank. This moment… it was pure bliss.