Chapter 2

How I lost my mind, but found true love and happiness.

“Kevin, Rachel, I really appreciate the offer, but money really isn’t an issue for me,” I began.

“You asked how I can afford to make my mortgage payments. Actually, I don’t make any mortgage payments.

“I paid cash for my house,” I told them and could see the surprise in their eyes.

“I’ve already told you some of my background, but I haven’t told you everything.

“You already know I graduated from the University of North Carolina with a degree in journalism, but you don’t know about some of my other ... writings,” I said.

I then began my story.

I was just beginning to get ready for my first year of elementary school when I was diagnosed with glandular fever, which is also known as infectious mononucleosis. Basically, there is no treatment, other than rest, so my parents kept me out of first grade for the first three months.

Glandular fever is caused by a virus and thus does not respond to antibiotics. But glandular fever also reduces your body’s ability to fight infections and when I scratched my leg (while playing outside when I wasn’t supposed to) and developed a severe infection, doctors gave me a shot of penicillin. That was when we found out I was allergic to penicillin and nearly died.

To make a long story short, I missed my entire first year of school.

If nothing had happened, due to the way my birthday fell, I would have been one of the older students in class. Having missed a year, when I did start first grade, I was over a year and a half older, in some cases two years older, than anybody else in my class.

I’ve always loved books. Nothing makes me happier than sitting down and reading a book. I actually started reading when I was five, so for the year I missed in school, I read nearly all the time. Obviously, simple books, but books nevertheless.

Due to my love of reading, I also starting writing every chance I got. I joined the high school newspaper staff my freshman year of school so I could learn more about writing. When I was a freshman, I got my driver’s license which is something most high school students don’t receive until at least their junior year of high school.

Shortly after the start of my sophomore year, the teacher in charge of the newspaper staff asked me to write a story about an upcoming school function, then take it to the local weekly newspaper in town to see if they would put it in the paper.

When I walked into the real newspaper office, the first person I saw was a much harried guy who seemed to be trying to engage in two different phone calls at the same time. He was also trying to run around the office with a phone stuck in each ear.

I waited until he was finished and he looked at me and said, “What do YOU want?”

I introduced myself and told him I was from West High School and had a short article we were hoping he could put in the paper.

He actually grimaced and told me to give it to him.

He read the article and then looked at me. Read the article again and looked at me.

“Who wrote this?” he asked.

When I told him I had, he said, “Wow. Most of the stuff I get from high schools is garbage and looks like something an eight year old would write. This is really professional.”

That was my introduction to one of the most influential men I’d ever meet in my life. Richard “Dink” Jones was the editor and publisher of The Dispatch. (And in case you are wondering, “Dink” was the name for a half roll of news print.) In later years, I would met other men in the newspaper and printing business with the nickname Dink.

Dink invited me into his office where he explained the actual newspaper staff consisted of him, one full-time reporter, a part-time sports editor and two other part-time reporters. He also had a secretary and a part-time typesetter, but other than those they counted heavily on “stringers” for a lot of their stories. A stringer is sort of a free-lance writer.

Dink then asked if I would be interested in becoming a stringer for the paper.

I, of course, jumped at the opportunity.

One of his biggest needs, he said, was someone to cover football and basketball games at my high school, plus other sports such as soccer or baseball. There were four high schools in the county and the part-time sports editor had to try to rotate between different schools.

Dink said he’d also welcome feature stories about interesting people, or people with interesting or unusual hobbies.

When Dink asked if I had a camera, I told him photography was one of my hobbies and my father had bought me a really good camera, plus I had a complete darkroom at my house where I could develop and print black and white photos.

Back then, digital photography was still in its early days.

That particular day being Friday, my school had a home game that night.

I covered the game, took a number of photos and after I got home, wrote the story, printed three or four photos and delivered them to him the next morning.

Dink read the story, looked through the photos and said, “This is amazing. This story is better written than what my sports guy normally writes. And the photos are great.”

Dink went through the story with me, line by line, and made a number of changes, but again said he normally has to do a lot more editing with the stories from his sports guy.

I still remember Dink sitting down and taking out his check book and writing me a check for $45. My first professional paycheck!

Normally, he only paid his stringers $20 for a story and $5 for each photo, but he was paying me $25 for the story and $10 each for the two photos he was going to use because they were so good. He made me promise to not tell anyone how much he was paying me.

Over the course of the next year, at first I had one or two stories in each weekly issue, then three or four, then five or six articles. As I began writing more and more, it would not be unusual for me to have 10 or 12 stories in a single issue.

Most were either sports related, or features about different people.

What I didn’t know was that every year, the North Carolina Press Association would have a competition among its membership for Newspaper of the Year, Story of the Year in different categories, and Photo of the Year (sports, news or human interest), just to name a few categories.

The competition was divided into different classifications, depending on the type of paper (daily or weekly), and circulation. Thus a medium size weekly like ours would not be competing against large daily newspapers with their vastly greater resources.

Dink, without my knowledge, entered a number of my stories and photos into the competition.

My first year as a “real” writer and I (and the paper) won Sports Story of the Year, Sports Photo of the Year, Feature Story of the Year and Human Interest Photo of the Year.

I was floored when Dink told me about all the awards.

Dink also presented me with my official North Carolina Press Association Press Pass. It was better than a get out of jail free card in Monopoly! For one thing, it was real and while the get out of jail free card would get you out of jail in Monopoly, the Press Pass would get you into just about anything.

I could now go to any museum in the state FREE. I could attend any high school, college or even professional sports game FREE. I could go to Carowinds, an amusement park similar to Six Flags, FREE.

And not to mention now that I was semi-famous as an “award-winning” reporter for the local paper, my social life really picked up! Girls who normally wouldn’t be interested in someone like me, suddenly became interested. And some of those girls were, in fact, married women!

It was just about the best time of my life!

Shortly after I started my junior year of high school, Dink called me in a panic.

He had to cover the county commission meeting that night and his full-time reporter was supposed to cover a city council meeting, also taking place that night. Only his full-time reporter was in the hospital recovering from having his appendix removed.

Dink asked if I could cover the meeting. This would be my first “hard news” assignment. I had no idea the meeting would change my life.

I always read every story in every issue of the paper, so I already knew that a couple of the city councilmen had a rather acrimonious relationship.

Of course no one suspected their heretofore war of words with each other would get physical at that night’s council meeting.

Halfway through the meeting, one told the other “that’s the stupidest thing I have ever heard you say – which coming from you is really, really stupid!”

The next thing anyone knew they were exchanging punches and wresting throughout city hall.

Of course I had my camera with me, so I got a number of photos of the physical confrontation, complete with blood dripping down faces.

Both men were arrested and hauled off to jail, so I used my press pass to gain entry to the jail where I saw the assistant police chief. His daughter attended my high school, so I knew them both rather well and he allowed me to interview both men while they were locked up.

The next day was the day the paper was printed, so I immediately went to the newspaper’s office where I typed up the story about the meeting, a separate story about the fight and the rather contentious relationship between the men and a third and fourth story based on the interviews with both men.

As I was finishing, Dink came in. His meeting had been very boring, but had lasted several hours so my story was the first he had heard about the fight.

The next day the entire front page of the paper, plus several inside pages was filled with my stories and pictures.

That same day the state’s largest daily newspaper, The Charlotte Journal, called Dink. They had heard about the fight and wanted a story. Dink faxed them all my stories, as well as emailing copies of the story and most of the photos.

Rather than rewrite the stories, the editor of the Journal asked Dink if they could simply use his stories and they would of course give our paper full credit. Dink agreed, but only if they included my byline.

The next day, almost the entire front page and several inside pages of the state’s largest daily paper was filled with my stories and photos. And my byline was included on every one.

The editor of The Charlotte Journal was really impressed with the quality of the writing and photographs and asked if I would be willing to drive to Charlotte (about an hour away) and meet with him.

That turned out to be one of the funniest meetings I’ve ever had.

The editor, with the rather pedestrian name of Tom Smith, was in his mid-50s and, at least sartorially speaking, almost the opposite of Dink.

Dink rarely wore a tie, almost NEVER wore a jacket and I think you could almost tell what he had for lunch by examining the food stains on his shirt.

Tom Smith was dressed in a suit with vest and wore a bow tie. “Impeccable” is probably the correct word to use to describe his attire.

I remember the first thing he said after meeting me was, “Damn, now I know I am old. Every year you journalism majors seem to get younger and younger. Why, you look like you should be in high school!”

“Well, Sir,” I answered with a smile, “that is because I am a high school student. I’m a junior in high school.”

I actually had to get out my high school identification card and driver’s license before he would believe me. The rest of the day he took me all over the newspaper building and introduced me as “a damn high school kid who just wrote the story of the year!”

It turns out his words were prophetic. I not only won the first place award for news story and news photo of the year for the weekly paper I was working for, but at the same time won the same awards for the daily papers as well.

I was soon a stringer for both papers, which continued even after I enrolled in college.

My senior year of high school, I also started attending classes at the local junior college so I could get some of the required courses out of the way.

I actually began my college life as a sophomore.

Midway through my junior year, the editor of the daily Charlotte paper called me and asked me to stop by his office, saying he had a special assignment I might be interested in.

North Carolina was home to one of the most prolific and most reclusive writers in America.

Every two years, for more than 30 years, Sebastian Cabot Vandiver would release a new book. He has won every conceivable writing award, including a Nobel Prize for Literature and a Pulitzer, for both Fiction and Non-Fiction.

He had also not given an interview to anyone, television, newspapers or magazines, in over 20 years. His last interview had not gone well and he always claimed the guy was really trying to do a hatchet job on him.

The editor of the Charlotte paper had been trying to get him to give an interview for more than 15 years and Vandiver would always turn him down.

Several weeks earlier Tom Smith had sent Vandiver another request for an interview, but this time sent over 30 stories I had written, dating back to the very first sports story I had ever authored.

He also sent a short bio, including that I had written that first story while still a sophomore in high school.

For whatever reason, Vandiver finally agreed to a one-hour interview, but only with me and only if I came by myself.

I presented myself at his estate at the scheduled 9 am for the one-hour interview and left 10 hours later at 7 pm.

I had so much information, the one story turned into a week-long series that was not only printed in the Charlotte paper, but also picked up by The New York Times and virtually every other major daily newspaper in the United States.

It was even reprinted in the “other” Times – the Times of London – sort of the Holy Grail for journalists. I had also taken over 100 photos of Vandiver, many with his beloved dachshunds, and over the course of the week-long series, most of those were used as well.

And, of course, every story included my byline and every photo included in the caption who took the photo.

It was heady stuff for a college junior.

After the series was printed, I received a hand-written note from Vandiver asking me to stop by his mansion again.

Vandiver told me it was simply the best stories about him he had ever read.

Then he surprised the heck out of me:

“How are you coming on your novel?” he asked, completely out of the blue.

“How did you know I was writing a novel?” I answered.

Vandiver said he had started in the newspaper business and knew that “inside every journalist is a novelist struggling to get published.”

He explained that nearly every week, he would get two or three manuscripts from people, asking him to “just look at my book,” and yet I had spent 10 hours with him and never once brought it up.

“I wouldn’t presume to ask something like that,” I truthfully answered.

“Well if someone offers, then you aren’t ‘presuming’ anything,” he said.

I told him I was about half-way through and if I really worked at it, I could be finished in another six or eight months, which would roughly be by the beginning of my senior year.

Vandiver asked me to email him the story when I was finished and a few days after my senior year started, I did exactly that.

I wasn’t really expecting to ever hear from him again, but two months later he again asked me to stop by so we could discuss my novel.

To say he ripped it to shreds isn’t completely accurate, but close.

He told me what he liked and what he didn’t. He said to lose certain story lines and expand others. He suggested several possible plot twists that I had considered, but didn’t think would work. He didn’t make any actual changes, just numerous suggestions on what and when to tighten and when to loosen up, and left it up to me to use my best judgment.

About mid-way through my senior year, I emailed it back. This time, when we met, he only had two or three suggestions, which I completed in a few days.

After I emailed those to him, he said he would get back with me.

A month later I received a call from the publishing company Vandiver used, asking me to fly to New York. They offered me a contract and gave me an advance check, against projected book royalties, for $100,000.

Vandiver was also at the meeting and for only the second or third time in his career, wrote the foreword for a book. It was unbelievable how quickly the novel took off.

When I mentioned to Kevin and Rachel that Vandiver wrote the foreword, Rachel actually jumped and started to say, “Wait...” but then said never mind and to continue the story.

In a month the book was on the New York Times bestseller list. A month later it was in the top 10 and a month later it hit number one for 27 straight weeks.

Every month I started getting a check for six figures from book sales. And the amount of the checks kept increasing.

The horrible downside to this was the day I graduated college. I’d received a dozen advance copies of the book two days before graduation and immediately autographed copies of the book for my parents and my younger sister.

I had not mentioned anything to them about the book – not even the fact I was writing one. I wanted it to be a complete surprise.

On the day of my graduation, my parents and younger sister were driving to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, for the graduation when they were hit head-on by a drunk driver. They were all, including the drunk driver, killed instantly.

I didn’t know about the accident until after my graduation.

Inside each of my parents’ coffins and my sister’s coffin was an autographed book.

A year after the book was published, I sold the film rights for a half-million dollars and the producer of the film paid me $100,000 to co-write the screenplay for the movie.

Two years after the first book was published, my second book came out, only this time my advance check was in the mid-six figures. By the third month of publication I again started receiving monthly six figure royalty checks.

Film rights to the second book were sold for $750,000 and I was paid $200,000 to co-write the screenplay.

“I’m still receiving royalty checks from both books,” I told Kevin and Rachel. “So, as you can see, money is not an issue. I could never spend what I have now, plus I still get very large checks each month.

“Wow,” said Kevin. “Wait ... if you are such a successful author, why haven’t we ever heard your name before?”

“You can thank Vandiver for that,” I explained.

I told them the third time I met Vandiver, in New York, he told me one of his biggest mistakes was using his own name.

“Now I can never go anywhere without someone recognizing my name,” he said.

“I haven’t been to a movie, or restaurant, or even a museum in years,” he complained, “unless I want to wear some kind of stupid disguise.”

“Being famous has its perks, but it has an even darker side also,” Vandiver added and suggested if I ever do get published to use a pseudonym, or nom de plume.

“I wanted to honor my family, so I used my father’s first name, my grandfather’s first name and my mother’s maiden name,” I said.

“Oh ... my ... God,” said Rachel.

“Christopher Winfield Hunt,” she whispered.

I nodded “Yes!”

“But I’ve heard of you,” Kevin said, “in fact I think we have both your books here.”

“As soon as John mentioned Vandiver wrote the foreword, I think I knew,” Rachel said. “I’ve read both books and I remember reading the foreword.”

“The publishing company also thought it would be a good idea to make the author kind of mysterious,” I said, “plus they were worried no one would buy a book written by someone who was only 22 years old at the time.”

I asked both Kevin and Rachel to not say anything to anyone about my being Christopher Winfield Hunt and to especially not say anything about my books to Beth or Christy.

“I want to tell them myself,” I said.

They agreed and I was getting ready to leave when I remembered I’d promised Beth to not leave without telling her.

Rachel went to Christy’s bedroom to get Beth and a few minutes later she walked into the living room. It was obvious she had fallen asleep.

“How’s Christy?” I asked.

“Completely lights out,” Beth said, rubbing the sleep from her own eyes.

I told Beth I was leaving and she immediately said she wanted to walk me home. When I told her it wasn’t necessary, she insisted, so I finally agreed.

As we crossed over into my yard, Beth grabbed my hand and asked me to stop for a minute.

She turned around until we were both facing where Christy was being held earlier that day.

“Do you know what I was thinking about when I saw Christy and that Creep,” Beth asked.

Before I could say anything Beth answered her question.

“I honestly thought he was going to kill Christy right in front of me and I kept remembering what you said about ‘You never really realize how much you love someone until they are no longer around,’” she said. “And especially about how you never told your sister how much you loved her and now you never could.

“I thought Christy’s last memory of me was how angry I was at her and she would never know how much I love her,” Beth said as she began to cry.

I opened my arms and Beth stepped inside and put both her arms around me and I held her until she stopped crying.

Holding hands, we finally walked the rest of the way to my garage where the roll up door was still open. I flipped on the light switch as we stepped inside.

“John, if I don’t tell you this now, I don’t know if I will ever be able to tell you,” Beth began. We were only standing about six inches apart, but now she dropped my hand and put her hand on my chest.

“There was one thing Christy was wrong about, one thing I never wrote in my diary,” she said.

“Only one thing?” I asked with a smile.

I think Beth then remembered everything Christy had said, about how Beth was hot for me, how wet she got and how she would play with herself imagining I was with her because she blushed a furious scarlet red.

Even the tips of her ears were red!

Christy completely ignored my comment, other than the blush. After a brief silence, she continued.

“I never wrote that I loved you, or was in love with you in my diary.

“I wrote how cute I thought you were and later that I thought you were someone I could fall in love with and even imagined I was in love with you. And I wrote about some of the things I ... I wanted to do to you ... and ... and wanted you ... you to do to me.

“But I never put in words I was actually IN LOVE with you.

“I found out this afternoon that I ... that I am IN LOVE with you.

“Do you know when I realized I was actually IN LOVE with you?”

I told her, “No, I didn’t know.”

“After everything was over, when you starting throwing up,” she started to say.

Before she could say anything else I interrupted.

“Oh, great!” I complained, “The most beautiful woman I’ve ever known tells me she is in love with me then I find out she is some kind of crazy, deranged pervert who gets turned on watching men puke!”

Wham!!! Beth actually punched me on the shoulder. Damn, to be so small she packs a hell of a wallop.

“No, you idiot ... not MEN ... just YOU!” she said with an exasperated grin.

“Now I don’t know whether to hit you again, or kiss you?”

“Do I get a vote?” I deadpanned.

Then Beth was again in my arms and we were kissing.

Oh ... my ... God!

I have actually kissed a lot of women in my life – but I don’t think I have ever had a kiss that seared my soul like Beth’s kiss did.

Because of my work for the local paper throughout high school, I actually had an unusual social life. I rarely had conventional “dates” while in high school, since I was always so busy. But I quickly found out that some women seemed to be attracted to someone who is quasi famous. And having your byline appear in the paper week after week seemed to meet that definition.

What was most unusual for me – at first – was that most of those women were older than I was – sometimes a lot older – and in fact a number were married. I was taught, not only about sex, which is easy for a young male, but also about making love to a woman, which is a lot more difficult.

In high school, most of the women in my school who seemed most interested in me were the rather geeky and nerdy ones – not necessarily the prettiest. It was still great!

In college, that changed. Now as I became more “famous” for my newspaper writing, the really pretty ones started pursuing me. Not necessarily the brightest, but some of the prettiest. It was still great, but I soon realized that some of the truly sexiest ones were not always the prettiest. And when I found one both smart and beautiful, well, it was magical.

After selling the film rights to my first book and being asked to help write the screenplay, I moved to Hollywood for three months. In Hollywood, the only nights I ever spent alone were by my choice. I was surrounded by some of the most beautiful women in the world and took full advantage of most of the opportunities presented to me. And there were LOTS of opportunities!

After the first two months, however, I found myself seeking more than just beauty. I wanted someone I could talk to after a couple of hours of hot sex. That was a lot more difficult to find in Hollywood!

After the screenplay was finished, I moved back to North Carolina but wasn’t really completely happy with my life. The truth was I missed my parents and sister so much, and being in North Carolina just seemed to always remind me they were no longer with me.

In Hollywood I had more than my share of fame, and will always be grateful to Vandiver, not only for his help in getting my first book published, but also his advice about using a pen name to write under.

My publishing company actually helped me obtain a completely new identity. I am not sure if it is entirely legal, but I have a driver’s license and credit cards in my nom de plume, plus my “real” identity as well.

I had fame when I wanted it, but most of the time I had complete freedom when I needed it.

I also had a boatload of money – more money than I’d ever dreamed of in my life. I spent the next year in North Carolina, completing my second novel. As you can perhaps imagine, considering what had happened with the death of my parents and sister, the second novel was much darker in tone. And even more successful.

After it was finished, I moved back to Hollywood to work on the screenplay for the second film, where I again engaged in an orgy of sex for two months.

After a while, I grew tired of that lifestyle, only now I moved to Florida where I bought the house next door to Beth’s and Christy’s parents.

For the past two years I had been working on my third novel, plus writing articles for magazines and newspapers under my real name. By now, the third novel was in the hands of the publisher and would be released in the next few weeks.

I am not going to say I was exactly celibate during those first two years in Florida, but sex, just for the sake of sex, no longer meant as much to me. Every couple of months I would spend a week or two or three in Miami where I could always find a willing companion.

When you booked the most expensive suite in the most expensive hotel in Miami, it was incredibly easy to find a beautiful woman, or even women, to spend the nights with.

Only on rare occasions would I find a woman I would bring back to my house in Florida and that never lasted more than a day or so.

Now Beth and I had kissed for several minutes and it just seemed to get better and better. Our tongues were deep in each other’s mouths and she was rubbing her body against mine.

I can honestly say I have never had a more passionate kiss in my life. And it wasn’t just that Beth was so beautiful. I have kissed many, many beautiful women.

I knew Beth was incredibly smart. Yes, she hadn’t really applied herself in high school, but it was obvious after just a few minutes of conversation how smart she actually was. If she wasn’t genius level, then she was so close it didn’t matter.

But I have also kissed many very smart, beautiful women as well.

There was just something different about Beth I think my soul identified with. I think I can say that I had finally found someone I could consider spending the rest of my life with.

After finally breaking the kiss, neither of us could even talk at first. Finally, Beth began the conversation.

“Oh God, that was even better than I ever imagined it could be,” she said.

I couldn’t help but agree. We just held each other for another couple of minutes.

“I was trying to tell you something,” Beth said, “before you kissed me.”

“Hey, I didn’t kiss you ... you kissed me.”

“No, I was trying to talk and you kissed me.”

“The only thing stopping you from talking was when you put your lips against mine.”

“No, you kissed me first.”

“No, you kissed ME first.”

Then – suddenly – we were kissing again.

It was even better than the first time.

When we came up for air the second time we were both gasping for breath.

“That was incredible,” Beth said.

Again, I agreed.

“But if you don’t stop kissing me, I’m never going to be able to tell you what I want to say,” Beth added.

Of course that prompted another round of:

“Hey, I didn’t kiss you, you kissed me.”

“No, you kissed me first.”

“No, you kissed me first.”

The only thing that stopped a third passionate kiss was when Beth hit me again.

Wham! In the exact same spot on the shoulder.

“Damn. Not only are you a pervert who likes to watch men puke, you also are a sadist,” I complained, but with a smile.

“If you don’t shut up, I’m going to find that baseball bat and show you just how much of a sadist I really am,” she answered, but with her own incredible smile to take the sting out of the words.

“I was trying to tell you what the older EMT said,” Beth began, “before you so rudely interrupted me by kissing me.”

I was just starting to open my mouth to answer her when Beth held up her clenched fist and said, “Stop! Don’t even start it again.”

I closed my mouth.

“After he watched the video on the cell phone, then watched you throwing up, the EMT told me he spent three tours of duty in Vietnam with the Marines,” she said.

“People have the wrong idea about what makes a hero. They think a hero is someone who is not afraid. People who are not afraid are called psychopaths.

“People who are afraid – usually terrified – and do what needs to be done anyway ... they are the heroes.

“He said he’d met many people like you in ‘Nam. Ones who did something incredible to save other people’s lives, at the risk of their own, then started throwing up afterward.

“He asked me if you were my boyfriend and suddenly I realized how much I loved you ... and had been loving you for a while.

“I told him, that ‘yes, you were my boyfriend ... you just didn’t know it yet.’

“He laughed and asked me to tell you something. He said for those people who have served in combat, there is no higher accolade than this: ‘I would be honored to serve with you.’

“He then asked me to ‘tell your boyfriend, I would be honored to serve in combat with him.’”

I was stunned. I actually began crying a little, but Beth gently reached up with her hand and wiped away the tears.

“See? That’s why I love you.”

I was just starting to kiss her again when Beth turned her head.

“John, there is nothing ... nothing ... I want more right now than for you to carry me into your bedroom so we can make love all night long.”

“I think I hear a ‘but,’ in those words,” I answered.

She nodded her head.

“If it is the ‘but,’ I am thinking of, then I understand ... and agree,” I said.

She looked at me with a questioning look.

“I think ‘but, Christy’ is the ‘but’ you mean,” I said and I could see the relief in her eyes at my understanding her situation.

“Christy may sleep all night long, or she may wake up in an hour. And she may wake up not really remembering everything that happened at first, or she may wake up screaming.

“In either case, she needs someone there who loves her ... loves her completely,” I added.

“John, I am afraid ... afraid that if you kiss me again I may not have the strength to leave you tonight. And right now, my baby sister needs me even more than I need you, or you need me.

“But I promise ... I PROMISE ... I will make it up to you!”

Beth then rose up on her toes and kissed me on the side of my face.

“I love you, John. I mean that ... I love you truly.”

Beth was just starting to leave the garage when I called her back.

“Hey, Beth. I’m sure your parents want to spend all day tomorrow with you and Christy, but if your parents agree, would you and Christy like to spend Sunday with me? We can take my boat out and spend most of the day on the water.”

“You have a boat?” she asked.

“Yeah, it’s not that big, but pretty nice,” I said.

“I would love that, John,” she said, “and I know Christy would as well. She loves boats and water.

“Why don’t we plan on having breakfast together Sunday morning around eight, then the three of us can spend the day together,” she offered.

“That is a date,” I said. “My first date with two beautiful girls.”

Beth blushed a little.

She again started to leave, when I called her back again.

“Uh, Beth, I think there is one other thing I think you should know and if I don’t tell YOU now, I don’t know if I will be able to later on,” I said.

When she asked what, I began to explain.

“Christy said you wrote you sometimes used your fingers on yourself and thought about me,” I said.

Beth blushed scarlet red again.

“Well, you are not the only one. There has been more than one night when I did the same after seeing you in some of your bikinis!”

And it was my turn to blush crimson red.

Then Beth was in my arms and we were both crying.

When Beth tried to kiss me, this time I turned my head and told her if we kissed again I would never be able to let her go.

We just held each other for 10 or 15 minutes, until finally it was time for Beth to walk back home.

“See you Sunday, beautiful,” I said.

“See you Sunday, handsome,” she answered.

I really didn’t think I’d be able to sleep at all that night, just thinking about what happened during the day and about the upcoming Sunday, but I think I must have fallen asleep within seconds of lying down.