~

"... So years later, after they met for the first time, he finally held her hand and asked if she thought their timing was right yet and waited for her yes before finally kissing her.

Now, she lets him hold her because now he is the man who has always loved her for her hurricanes rather than like her in spite of them, and she has learned to love his.

Because she doesn’t realize that he remembers the way she had made a forever promise to him when she was sixteen and writing poems in the old worn-out notebook during the day and he was eighteen and failing to control his need to call her at night.

They don’t know that when she was sixteen and a junior in high school, she used to change the way she was in an effort to catch a glimpse of him, only to miss him.

And when he was eighteen, he never kissed her, never dared to hold her hand, hardly allowed himself to hug her because he knew how dangerous letting himself touch her would be.

And she remembers when she was sixteen and a half and told him she was crazy about him and he was eighteen and trying not to get swept up into her by reminding her about the things that keep them apart.

And she still thinks of the time when she was sixteen and three quarters and he let his walls fall down in front of her and showed her his insecurities and she really knew what it meant to feel special.

And he recalls when he was eighteen and four months and she was sixteen and ten months and he told her he hoped their timing would work out someday.

~ Years after this, he held her hand after dinner and got down on one knee and told her he wanted their timing to always be right, and she told him she did too.

So when she was twenty-nine and a half and he was thirty-one, they exchanged official forever promises in front of their closest friends and family and she cried because she had fulfilled the promise she made when she was sixteen and writing poems that made his heart implode, and he had allowed himself to have his dream.

And when she was thirty and he was thirty-one and a half, he dreamt of a little girl with her eyes and his smile and she dreamt of a little boy with his hair and her words and so by the time she was thirty-three and he was thirty-four and a half, they had both.

And so when the little girl with his smile and her eyes was seven, and the little boy with her words and his hair was five, they asked their parents about storybooks and fairytales and she told them about a sixteen year old girl and her forever promise and he told them that with real love, the timing will always turn out right. ~ "

This is for you to read, my one true love, <V.