Summer
The first time I realise I am in love with Addison, we are both nineteen. It's summer, and for the third year in a row a big group of us are staying for a week in the Shepherd family's condo in South Carolina. Derek, Addison and I, and Naomi, Weiss, Sam, Savvy, and Archer. It's idyllic, just for a week every summer, where we shut out the world, and run, half dressed through the fields, dive into lakes when we can't gauge the depth, dance to Sam's crackling radio until the early hours of the morning.

It's become something of a tradition, ever since Derek's mother decided we were old enough to take care of ourselves. The sun is hot and yellow and the grass is always brown and dry, and the water is warm and slightly murky, but between us, just for seven days, we shut everything out and we laugh.

We're sat around the camp fire, tonight. Things are different this year. Savvy's curled up with Archer's arms around her in the corner – the expression on Weiss' face indicates his discomfort. Naomi and Sam are dancing around each other with their eyes, darting glances, brushing fingers. Derek's sat with Weiss, glaring at the ground. I'd never known Derek and Addison to fight before, but there is something wrong there tonight. They aren't meeting each other's eyes and Addison is pacing, holding the vodka and… hell, she'd stopped diluting it hours ago. I should probably ask Derek about it, get it out of him while the alcohol is still taking its toll, but I can't bring myself to. Even staggering beside the fire, her hair a mess, her eyes bloodshot, she's entrancing. And when she looks at me and crooks her finger, nodding towards the path down to the lake, I don't even look at Derek. I follow. I tell myself that I'm going to sort this out between them, that tomorrow, thanks to my intervention, they'll be Derek-and-Addison again, as always, and I'll just be Mark. But somehow I know this is different. I follow her regardless, knowing Derek trusts me with her.

Knowing he shouldn't.

She doesn't stop until we reach the banks of the lake, and by the time I catch her she's already started crying. I know it's the alcohol, I know it's not my business, but I put my arms around her gently, testing, and hold her close. It's not like any other hug we've ever had, because she leans into me like she knows she shouldn't, and again, it's the alcohol again, but there's something different in her eyes tonight, behind the tears. Something reckless and wild, and I can't help but be drawn in… I've had a few too many beers myself.

She's laughing, suddenly, the direct polar opposite, and pulling away to hold my hands.
"Let's swim, Mark." She whispers. I know I shouldn't, but as she tears off her dress, discarding it beside her and standing in front of me in nothing but her underwear I realise I've long gone beyond the point where I can say no to her. I've known her eleven years, and I'm pretty sure, in that second, that I've been in love with her for at least ten of those, although I've never even admitted it to myself.

So when she dives in, I dive in after her.

The fact that neither of us can feel the chill of the water should highlight how drunk we are, but I can feel the warmth of her body pressed against me, Her legs beginning to tangle with mine, and the water reaches my shoulders, so I'm pretty sure I'm holding her up… she's tall, but not that tall. And her mouth is close to mine, too close to mine, and somewhere in the back of my mind I think that if Derek was to see us now, everything would be over, everything would be ruined, because surely I couldn't be feeling this much without there being some outward sign.

Derek. With a sigh, I realise I am not just her friend, but his as well.
"Addie…" I breathe, and my own voice sounds foreign to my ears, "Addie, what's up with you and Derek…"
Everything seems to take that much longer to sink in, but she smiles slowly, and presses a long white finger to my lips.
"Let's not talk about him." She whispers, and then transfers her hand to my shoulder, pulling her face even closer. "Tonight, just tonight, just us…" I can feel her breath on my face, and although it stinks of alcohol, it's intoxicating, suffocating, but it's Addison, so all of that's good.

I can't let her get any closer, I just can't, but I do anyway and all of a sudden her lips are on mine. I'm painfully aware of every inch of her skin against every inch of mine, the fact that we're least half a mile away from the rest of them, and none of them are in a state to remember we're even gone.

Not to mention neither of us are in a state to remember tonight.

When her lips touch mine, it's different, and always will feel like that. New, unusual, unexpected. My life hasn't taken the best turn these past few years after my grandfather died, and there's been girls. Too many girls. But Addison, and here and now… it's like everything is starting again. Everything is new and strange with her… I'm awkward again, innocent, and my whole body is screaming out for more.

I don't know how I managed to get us safely back on the bank, and I didn't know how I would remember forever afterwards how we made love in the soft grass, bodies soaked in river water, when I would always be wishing I could forget. I didn't know then how I would wake the next morning without a trace of clothing, and without anyone beside me.

How I would walk back up to the condo and see her eating breakfast on the veranda with the others, one of Derek's arms draping around her shoulders, back to the old order of things. How that would set the scene for everything to follow.

And right then, I knew that I loved her.