Our love story: part 2

There he was. Lookin' all cute and mormon-y. It was pretty obvious he had just returned from a mission. He looked over at me and at that moment I realized I'd been staring at him since the second he walked through the door. I hurried and looked back at my phone. Play hard to get. You're single now, but don't let him know it, I thought. He sat on the couch opposite me and was talking to another girl. I couldn't decide whether or not to approach him. You know, just be nice and introduce myself. But I decided against it. He was busy and I didn't want to look too desperate.

He got up to get some ice and I glanced back at him only to find him, once again, looking at me. I gave a quick smile, but it was more of a raise your eyebrows, "I-notice-you-looking-at-me-and-I-feel-awkward" smile.

[side note: Chad claims I was staring at him and he purposely got up to get ice to see if my eyes would follow him. Not true, but whatever]

It took about 15 minutes before we started talking. He initiated the conversation, yet I never stopped talking. You see, Chad has this way about him. He's really good at getting information out of people without them realizing it until it's too late. Ten minutes into our conversation I had told him pretty much every detail of my life, yet I knew nothing about him. When I finally gave myself time to breathe he asked me if I was single. I almost said no but decided to tell him that yes, I in fact was single. He then looked me up and down, VERY conspicuously I might add, and said,

"Wow, something must be seriously wrong with you of you're single".

Really? At first I thought he was kidding, but nope. He was serious. I didn't know whether to be flattered or extremely offended! I decided based on the fact that he had previously checked me out hardcore, he was attempting to give me a compliment.

I was a bit taken aback. Not only had he just given me a somewhat backhanded compliment, now he was putting me in the position of either lying or going into further detail about my life. Do I tell him my boyfriend and I had just broken up because he wanted to get with another girl or do I go for the "I'm single and loving it!" approach? I tried to change the subject but that didn't work out too well. He kept prying so I told him, "Well, it's pretty recent. My boyfriend and I broke up a few days ago but it's so not a big deal", as I choked back the tears. I was coming off the exact opposite of how I wanted. I wasn't the cool, nonchalant, cute, happy girl I wanted to come across as. I was nervous, emotional, fidgety, and couldn't keep my mouth shut. Oh, and I was rude because not once did I ask him any questions about himself. I felt ridiculous and although I knew I should probably get out of there before I made an even bigger fool of myself, I was drawn to him. His smile made me melt. He had such a positive energy, I had to be near him.

Before I knew it, it was almost midnight and we were headed to Merritt's, a 24 hour hole-in-the wall diner with the best scones in the state. We were driving with another couple (who are now our closest friends). Dan, Chad's best friend since childhood, was driving down the road in his brand new car when a deer appeared out of nowhere. He slammed on his breaks and barely grazed the deer. The deer froze. We froze. We didn't know whether to go around her or wait for her to move along so we just sat there. The deer wasn't moving and neither were we. Dan got out of the car and tried to shoo her away but she wasn't having it. I put my hand on Chad's back and said how bad I felt for the poor fawn. When I felt his warmth on my hand I hurried and took it away. It felt like a bolt of lightning running through my veins. We just touched! That was the moment I realized, yep, I like this guy.

[Chad later told me that was the moment he realized he liked me too-but not because I touched him. It was because I felt so bad for the deer! What a weirdo]

Luckily another driver knew to turn off his lights so the deer could see and she ran away. We made our way to Merritt's and Chad ordered a strawberry scone for us to share.

He then asked me,

"Do you dye your hair?"

I was immediately offended. He was implying I was a blonde. I know I can be an airhead, but he didn't even know me! How rude.

I said,

"Um no, actually. This is my natural hair color, thank you very much. Are you implying I should be blonde?"

He responded by saying,

"No, its just that your eyes are so green. I've never seen such green eyes with such dark hair".

Oooooh, so once again, he was attempting to compliment me. He was trying, that was for sure. And although he wasn't as smooth with words as he thought he was being, I was falling for him. Hard.

We continued to chat and eat our delicious scones. Next thing we knew it was almost 3:00 in the morning. I knew it was time to go home but at the same time, I didn't want to be away from him. Never, in all my itty bitty 18 years of life had anyone had such an impact on me in such a short amount of time. When I got back to my car to drive home I had the most overwhelming feeling:

That's the boy I'm going to marry.

go here for part 1