© Copyright 2020. All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. All characters depicted are 18 years and over.
For as long as I can remember I have been on a path. You know the feeling. You feel like your destinations are predetermined. The path has no exits and you just have to keep walking, forging ahead because that is the only way to go. This description is what my life feels like, only for me, I would not trade this path for anything. I guess that makes me different from most people in my situation. They would give anything to get out of the rut they are in. Me, I would not trade it for anything.
You see, I love my life. I do not walk down my path, I skip along with a huge smile on my face. That is because the companion on my journey is the person I love most in this world. She has been with me on this journey for almost as long as I can remember. I know everything about her that there is to know because we have known each other since we were six years old. We lived across the street from each other and grew up together. Our parents were best friends and were about as close as neighbors could be. When they were together, we were together.
But I guess I should start at the beginning. When I was six we moved to a new house at the end of a dead end street. We were the last house on the right. Within a day of us moving in, the new house across the street was sold and a family moved in. I was the first one to meet them from my family. They had a daughter named Val (short for Valentina) who was just one month younger than me. At the time, I did not think much about her as I was too young to know anything about girls.
Val's parents were very nice people just about the same age as my parents. About that time my mom came out and greeted them. At the time it was not obvious that the parents would become fast friends. But once everything settled down from the move it was as if they were old friends. They spent a lot of time together playing cards, games, watching movies, and making lunch or dinner for each other. Of course, when the parents were together, Val and I were sort of forced together. The word "forced" might be a little strong because after a few weeks of this I discovered that she and I actually had a lot in common. In fact, I came to look forward to when she would come over with her parents because we would play games and watch TV together.
One of the reasons we became close it that we were the only kids our age on the block. All the other kids were at least five years older and did not want much to do with us. The age difference was too much as they had different interests than we did. That changed as we got older as we adopted their interests, but they also moved on to new interests, leaving us behind again.
It was during the summer when I met Val and we started the first grade in September. We walked to and from school together (a whole three blocks), and actually we were even in the same class.
A lot of boys at that age go through a phase where they hate girls. I guess I am weird because I never went through that phase. I always liked girls. Maybe it was because my closest friend was a girl. In any case, I was never teasing girls at that age.
I don't remember too much about the first few years of school. But I do remember almost every summer in between. As time went by I found that Val and I had many interests in common. For instance, during that time I loved butterflies and used a net to catch them. Val was surprised that we had that in common. They were so beautiful and I knew the common names for most of the species that passed through our neighborhood during the spring and summer. I never was cruel to them and always let them go. Val liked that about me.
One of the things I liked about Val was she did not play with dolls. She did like stuffed animals, but then so did I at that age. Another thing I liked was that she was athletic even in those days. She could run almost as fast as me and loved climbing the trees around the neighborhood. Later on, she would continue that athletic streak, but that comes later in the story.
The years passed and when we got to be around twelve I began to notice just how pretty she was. She wore her brunette hair long and her face was almost angelic. She smiled almost all the time and was growing up just as fast as I was.
Our parents were still fast friends and we had no problem occupying ourselves when they got together. This was especially true during the summer because they always had outdoor picnics, both during the day and at night. Val and I never had trouble finding something to do. By that time we became interested in games and spent a lot of time doing that. She was always fun to be with and we never had problems finding something to talk about.
When we entered middle school puberty began to rear it's head for both of us. Our bodies began to change and the change was more dramatic in Val than me. Suddenly her boobs were getting bigger along with her hips. I was sprouting hair in a few places and was noticing her more and more. When I figured out what was going on I was afraid that our parents would separate us, but that never happened. We continued being together almost all the time, but I noticed that we were under the watchful eye of at least one parent almost all the time. I did not mind that. Val was my friend and I would never do anything to hurt her.
By this time we both felt like we were no longer children, but getting along to be young adults. We were not there yet, but it would only be a matter of time. Our conversations changed during this period to topics of a more adult nature.
As we started high school Val became more and more beautiful to me. My parents got me a game console for Christmas and Val and I played the heck out of a few games. She was not attracted to the shooting games, but WoW or FOE were her favorites. And since I liked them as well we spent a lot of time in front of the TV playing them. She was actually a little better than me with these kind of strategy games while I was better at the shooting games. We had a lot of fun with these.
I do remember a conversation we had between games when we were sixteen. We had discussed some topics around sex before but this was different.
"Jimmie, do you think I am pretty?"
I was stunned, but I answered truthfully. "Of course I do. You are one of the prettiest girls in school. Why do you ask?"
She smiled at me. "Have you ever thought about taking me out on a date?"
"Why would I need to do that? We see each other all the time."
I could see she was having a little trouble with the next question.
"Yeah, I know that. Don't you want to be with me in private?"
Now that question I was just not sure how to answer. On the one hand, I did want to be alone with her. On the other, I did not want to do anything that would come between us.
"I'm not sure how to answer that. You are very important to me and I don't want to do anything that would threaten our friendship."
"Even if I wanted to be with you in private?"
I hesitated. "Look, Val. Our friendship is the most important thing in my life. It's not that I do not want to be with you in private, because I do. I'm just not sure what your expectations are."
That seemed to relieve her somewhat. "To be honest, I'm not sure about my expectations either. But I would like to kiss you."
I looked around to see if we were alone. I did not see any eyes on us, the parents were all outside. I leaned into her a little and she willingly met me in the middle. Our lips met and we kissed like two teenagers would. We did not hold it in case someone came in.
I leaned back and looked at her. "I liked that, Jimmie." She looked around and leaned towards me again. We kissed and it was a little more intense this time and lasted a little longer. We heard some laughter outside and that broke the spell.
We leaned back and smiled at each other.
"Thanks, Jimmie. I have wanted to do that for a while now."
I did not know what to say. I was struck speechless. I could only smile at her. I finally regained my composure and said "I would like to do that again sometime."
Her smile got bigger. "I think we can manage that. We just have to find a time and place."
We returned to playing our game. When I got into bed that night I was awake for a long time. I needed to examine my feelings toward Val. Things were changing between us, but not in a bad way. In the end I had to make a decision to either keep our relationship the same, or jump off this cliff I had found not knowing how far the fall would be. What made me make up my mind was the discovery that no matter which choice I made, Val would be with me. That made up my mind and I decided to jump no matter the consequences.
I also realized that no matter the choice I made, the path had not changed. Instead, I was crossing a bridge that led to a new part of my journey through life. The other side of this bridge led to adulthood and I should remember it.
At about this same time Val and I discovered a new thing for us to do, tennis. The high school courts were not far from our houses and we could easily walk there and back. Neither of us had any formal training in the sport but we enjoyed those first steps into a new sport. When we moved on to high school we joined the tennis team and started to get some real training. Neither one of us was ever really great, but we were good enough to stay on the team. One reason for this was our mixed doubles play. The coach said he had never seen anything like it. It was as if we could read each others minds and almost no one could beat us at mixed doubles. That made it worth staying on the team for both of us.
Another thing happened when we started high school. Both of us got our first phones and laptops. The laptops were to be used mostly for school and the phones had restrictions on them from our parents. The phones were never to be used in school unless there was an emergency. But once school was done for the day we could use them as we pleased. We both felt like these were reasonable restrictions and they were never any problem for either of us. But these items gave us a new way to stay in touch with each other. We would text each other at night or have long chats via a messenger application.
One of the things I realized when using chat or messenger was that you were more likely to say things you would never say in person. You could open up without fear, and learn things about the person on the other end you might not expect or know about.
Val and I grew closer and closer as high school progressed. We still were not formally dating, but we were stealing time alone when we could. It was never for very long and nothing happened except some light petting and a lot of kissing. I guess we both knew we were falling in love, but there never seemed to be a need for either of us to say so. It was just a new step in our relationship. And neither of us ever dated anyone else. We always went to events together, had a lot of classes together, studied together, played tennis together, we were constant companions. Our high school friends never commented on this because this had been going on all through school. It was just a given that what ever was going on, we would be there together.
Our senior year was when things started to get intense between us. Val and I would tease each other during a texting session with sexual innuendos. Sometimes this happened in person as well, but only when we were assured of a little privacy. As we got closer to our birthdays, mine in January and hers in February, we began to look for more private time together. Neither of us had a car yet so finding places and times was really difficult. We were wanting more physical time with each other and that was hardest of all. There just were not that many opportunities for that kind of thing without a car.
And then, just as things were becoming desperate for us, COVID-19 hit us like a hammer in March. Suddenly every plan we had was out the window. There was now school at home, but there would be no graduation ceremony, no prom, no senior class trip, no more tennis, college was questionable, everything was in a turmoil for us. The only thing we could rely on was each other, at least that had not changed.
Both families had a conference concerning us. All the parents had the kind of jobs that were considered exempt from the stay at home order, so it looked like we would be home all day while the parents continued with their day jobs. It was decided we could be trusted during the day to do our school work and stay at home. We asked if we could be together during the day and they had no problem with that. They were putting a lot of trust in us in my opinion. Maybe too much. Both of us were good students and made good grades, but we were teenagers and temptation was always trying to lead us in the wrong direction.
I remember our first day at home alone like it was yesterday. I got up at my usual time, took a shower and shaved, and then had breakfast with my parents before they left for work that day. I volunteered to clean up after breakfast and they left after wishing me a good day. After cleaning up I went to my room and waited for Val to come over.
She rang the doorbell at eight thirty and I opened the door to let her in. She looked around to check things out.
"Are we alone?" she asked.
