This story will be broken into two parts due to the length, so if you like the first half, make sure you come back for the second half, which I think is a little better and will be published soon.
Prologue
Last week, my wife and I were cleaning out our attic and we came across a box with some of our old college stuff in it. Most of it was junk, but at the bottom were two different spiral-bound notebooks. After reading the first page, I quickly realized what it was. These were our journals about the first summer we lived together at the beach in North Carolina. We had both completely forgotten about these journals. It had been almost 20 years since that amazing summer. Maybe I should explain why we would have needed journals, as I'm sure you're wondering.
That summer, we had been dating for a little less than two years. We attended different colleges on the East Coast, but we were only two hours apart by car. We usually saw each other once a month, generally alternating who drove to the other. It was a long-distance relationship, which usually don't work, but in our case, it did. Maybe it worked because we both came from long-term relationships. I think we made a lot of our mistakes there, but we also learned some key ideas.
One of the main traits we both cherished was independence and trust. Which really meant we both valued our free time and trusted each other to make smart decisions. Both of our exes were very jealous people, so I think we made a very concerted effort not to be like that. The other very important trait that I believe was the real key to success was communication.
We were actually each other's second, regarding sex, which is how this story even came about. Being overly practical individuals, we openly talked and basically understood that we were going to get married at some point. It was less a question of if but more a question of when. We wanted to wait until at least our mid-20s. This led us to a very important discussion we had prior to heading down to the beach. I don't want to bore you with all the details, but it basically boiled down to us sowing our wild oats.
With great trepidation, I expressed my feelings about only having slept with two people my whole life. I explained that I was nervous, that in the future, that would get to me. I entirely expected Brook to lay into me about not loving her and wanting to break up with me. Instead, to my shock, she said she felt the same way. Brook was not overly sexual, so this blew me away. I never expected this response. This is why I say open communication is the key to life. You never know how someone else feels until you ask.
Once my head was put back together from blowing apart, I managed to keep my cool and ask her what she might think was a good plan to sow our oats.
"I was afraid to bring it up with you, but I was thinking maybe we can use this summer to fulfill some of our fantasies before we get older and more committed."
"I'm not going to lie; I was thinking the same thing, but realistically, I don't know how I'm going to feel about you being with other men. You also might not like me being with other women. How do you know this won't break us apart and end in disaster?"
"Honestly, I don't. However, if it does, doesn't it simply mean that we weren't meant to be together or that we had other problems? Perhaps even worse, we would do these things after we were married where it would be more damaging. I think it's best we do this now. Young and dumb exists for a reason," she said.
"How do you envision this working? I mean, we are going to be living together. Won't people be a little suspicious or turned off by that?"
"That's a good point. I don't think that many people will see us together, so I'm sure we can get away with saying we are friends from college. If we have separate rooms at the house, nobody will care. As long as we don't act like jealous lovers, nobody would have any reason to be suspicious."
"I think you're right. People will believe whatever they want, if it's plausible enough, they aren't going to analyze it in depth. It's the beach and everyone just wants to get laid," I laughed.
"I think it would be best if we wrote everything down in a journal and then at the end of the summer we'll swap journals, therefore we have no secrets. The journal should act like an inner monologue so we know what the person was thinking and feeling versus only what happened. Again, the intent isn't to hide things from each other during the summer either, but obviously we won't know everything and it'll be easier if we aren't constantly sharing every hookup. Plus, we'll get to know more about each other and it might be kind of hot to read," Brook said.
That's the conversation, as best I can remember it. The basic concept was that we were going to be single for the summer, while living together. We went into more detail, but there weren't really any rules other than don't emotionally fall for someone. I think we both knew this was technically impossible to ask, but we had to say it. All it really meant was that we shouldn't couple up with someone for the summer, as that kind of defeated the purpose. Repeat encounters were fine, but not with one person the whole time. We would each have our own rooms in the house to keep up the faΓ§ade, but we would still spend nights together if we were home alone.
I know many people will think this was a terrible idea or couldn't do it themselves and we totally get that. Although, I will add that I feel like we were trend-setters. This type of thing has become much more common over the years. Definitely not for everyone; however we are still married to each other, hence I think it was the right thing for us. I probably should've added a spoiler alert there in case anyone thought there was going to be drama. There is no drama and there are no losers if you were here for that.
We spent the evening reading our own journals and then the other's. I can't remember the last time Brook was so wet and horny. I forgot how much fun that summer was. We really wanted to turn our journals into something positive and long-lasting. Basically, not lost in an attic for another 20 years. We decided it would be fun to type them up and merge them into one story.
The following are excerpts from our journals and we added either context or extra material as we remembered it, plus current thoughts about the past. The conversations aren't always verbatim (just what we thought was said) and we did edit some stuff out that we felt wasn't important to the reader. If nothing else, Brook and I have had lots of sex as we reread our adventures. I honestly forgot about some of these and I'm now really glad we wrote stuff down. This was before cell phones, therefore we have very few pictures to remember anything by.
We decided to alternate our journal entries as best we could and arrange them in chronological order, alternating between the two of us. Brook is going to start things off. Again, these are not our exact journal entries, we've edited them to add thoughts we have now about what happened. The journals were mostly a reminder to us to fill in the story details for each other. As a result, the verb tense may change as if we're experiencing it in the present or talking about it in the past. Hopefully, that doesn't get confusing, as we aren't professional writers. Focus on the content is what I'm trying to say.
Journal entry, Brook, June 4th
I couldn't believe that Travis had suggested that we have a wild summer apart from each other. He always treated me so well that I assumed that he would be jealous of me being with another guy. I was shocked when he suggested we go single for the summer. Of course, a small part of me was a little disappointed that he was ok with that, but I couldn't be a hypocrite. I wanted the exact same thing and it didn't make me love him any less. I naturally assumed he felt the same way and that made everything ok for me. One big takeaway I had from my previous relationship was not to assume anyone else's feelings; therefore I had to take him at his word. No need to analyze if it was true or not.
It was very nice of Travis' parents to let us stay at the house that summer. We kind of lucked out, really. Originally, they were planning on living there for the summer, thus it wasn't rented out, nor were they expecting to get any money for rentals that summer. Remember, this was pre-internet app world. You couldn't simply last-minute rent your place like you can now. There were contracts and agents, not like Air BnB is now.
Travis' dad got hit with a last-minute work trip that sent him to California for six months. His mom was a personal trainer. She could technically work from anywhere and decided to go with him. That left us alone with a beach house, or maybe I should say bay house since we were on the bay side with a canal. Lucky for us, there was a ski boat that we could also use, which was great because I really wanted to learn how to wakeboard.