"What are you doing on Valentine's day?" Landon asked on the phone.
"Nothing ... same as every other year," she laughed at herself.
"Oh ... don't sound so sad, I'm sure you'll find things to do with your friends?" he comforted her. She laid on her bed, pulled the telephone cords closer.
"They all have their boyfriends this year, so I'll be staying home with Charlotte and my mom ... my dad's in Gastonburry," her voice sounded even gloomier.
"I'm sure he has business to attend to," he tried to instill reasonable doubt.
"Yeah, right, haven't you seen him yet? He's staying at your house, isn't he?"
Landon doubted for a second, there was a commotion in the background, and then the sound of a car door slammed. "No, I haven't seen him actually, but yeah ... he's probably at my house already."
Charlene sat up on the bed, "That's weird ... you mean, you're not home right now?"
Landon laughed, "No ... I'm not, you know what, Charlene? I kinda have to go now, but I've sent you a gift and I think the delivery guy just called to tell me that he's right at your door," he said.
"Okay ...?" she was puzzled. "Thanks for the gift, I guess I'll talk to you later, then," she said.
"Bye, Charlene." They hung up. She walked down the stairs to the front door and opened it. Landon was standing on her porch with a wide smile, he was holding a black device that looked like a TV remote, it was a cordless phone.
She was so bummed out for having to spend Valentine's day at home, the sight of Landon sent her jumping over to hug him. "Oh my God! How did you do that?" Landon showed her the phone he was using, it was the latest technology called the cellular phone.
"I guess you have something to do on Valentine's day after all?" he said while his arm was still hooked around her waist.
"What are you doing here?" she still couldn't believe it.
"I'm taking you out on a date ... and I'm not taking 'no' for an answer," he said.
She took his arm off her waist and lead him inside the house. "Where are we going?"
"Dinner, a movie, and whatever you want."
"Okay ... but I gotta go change first." She ran upstairs to get ready.
She came down 30 minutes later. She looked stunning in a dark blue dress, the skirt was floating elegantly and sexy at the same time. She wore strapped shoes that goes up to her knees. She let her hair down and put on soft make-up. He had a satisfied smile on his face. "You look perfect," he said. "Thanks," she replied.
"Are you staying for the night, Landon?" Catherine asked as she came down from her daughter's room.
"Oh, that's okay, Mrs. Ludlow ... I don't want to be a bother, I can drive back later after I drop Charlene home," he said.
"Don't be silly, of course you can stay here, I'll have someone prepare the guest room for you." And just like that, Landon had invited himself to stay the night at the Ludlow's after fixing himself a Valentine's date with Charlene.
**********
She hadn't been thinking about Tommy lately. She had busied herself with school, hanging out with her friends. Landon had pretty much occupied her weekends with hours and hours of phone calls. They have grown a lot closer since the New Year. They enjoyed the dinner at The Papillon, the only French bistro in town.
Afterwards, they went to the movie theatre to see romance movies that played all day for Valentine's day. The five studios in the theatre were looping romantic movies all day from the oldest to the most recent. They randomly selected the studio to see whatever was playing at the time. She could stay there all night if she didn't think Landon was bored out of his wits after the second movie. She held his hand to comfort him for the last ten minutes of "Gone With The Wind". He thought it was an invitation to lean over and kissed her, it wasn't, but she didn't mind the kiss.
He didn't want to let her hand go after that. As they walked to the car, he squeezed on her delicate hand and swung back and forth. "Do you want to go somewhere else?" he asked.
She looked at her watch, it was 9.30 P.M. "It's still early ... do you want to go up the hill and see the town from up there?" she suggested.
"Sure," he said. She took him to the spot where she used to go with Tommy to spend late night conversations and kisses.
They parked the car at the edge of the hill, they went down from the car and leaned on the warm hood. There wasn't much to look at since Bluebridge was a very small town with very little view. She thought for awhile, how could she had remembered it differently? When she was with Tommy, the place felt so much prettier than how it looked like that night. It felt plain, quiet and dull. Thankfully, Landon came back from opening his trunk with a bottle of red wine. Sharing a bottle of wine, drinking it straight from the bottle definitely made the place more interesting.
"There are spots like this in Gastonburry that I think you'd like ... they're a lot nicer," he couldn't help commenting.
She smiled, "I'm sure there are, this one is not as pretty as I remembered it," she took a sip from the bottle.
"You wanna go somewhere else?" he asked.
No ... there's really not a lot of places you can go around here except for the bridge, the lake ... the usual, it's very boring." It wasn't boring when Tommy was around, but now she couldn't bare to think about going to those places anymore.
Landon stepped in front of her, took both her hands, "I can't wait 'til you graduate and take you away from here." She couldn't wait to get out of there either, mostly because it was reminding her of that boy who changed her life completely, and left her. Her heart was racing, she knew Landon was trying to make a move on her. He stepped closer between her legs, their noses almost touched.
He had been stealing kisses from her since Christmas, and she had been letting him do that. As she felt his warm breath upon her face, she had a split second to decide whether she wanted their lips to touch, wanted him to put his tongue inside her and let his hands caressed her skin until she feels the fire that was put out when Tommy left. He brushed his nose against hers, she watched his lips splitting open, she inhaled nervously, he was lingering around her face, their cheeks touched. He leaned his head against hers, kissed her shoulder and then he was in front of her again. His eyes were different now, he's about to lose all sense of reality. She softly put her hand on the back of his neck, pulled him closer and kissed his mouth.
His tongue immediately found it's way in, she tasted like wine. He wrapped his arms around her back, they couldn't get any closer than that. He felt her legs were tensed on either side of his, but the kiss was slow and relaxed. He broke the kiss to see her, she opened her eyes. "We can't be just friends when you kiss me like that?" he said. She smiled, "You're silly, Landon, don't ruin the moment." He leaned closer, teased her lips with his. They kissed again.
He felt different, she liked it. His hands rubbing her skin felt warm and smooth. He reminded her how much she enjoyed kissing, but the fire she'd long for never emerged. Her mouth grew tired, her lips felt numb. It was a good kiss, she ended it when she felt it was enough. He was excited, of course. It was a big step in their relationship. He was holding her differently after that. They finished up the bottle and drove home. He held her hand all the way back to her house, not a word about the kiss.
"I had a really nice Valentine, Landon, thank you," she said when they stood in front of her bedroom door. Her cheeks blushed from the wine.
"It was my pleasure," he said with one hand leaning on the doorway.
She opened the door, "Good night, Landon." He approached her, and kissed her again. He pushed the door open with one hand and grabbed her waist with another. He lifted her and walked inside, closed the door behind him.
He laid her on the bed, she was overwhelmed, he was taking off his clothes as they were kissing. He pushed his face against hers, he was kissing hard. She felt his drive was different from the kiss before. His mouth was on her neck and shoulder, she took a peek and saw he was already naked from the waist down. His hands swiftly took off her underwear. "Landon," she called out softly, he was in another realm. His eyes were clouded with passion, he kept on kissing her. He pinned her hands above her, she felt him between her thighs. Before she could think, he was inside her, she moaned.
She wasn't sure that she wanted him to make love to her that night, but when he was inside her, she felt pleasure. He moved on top of her, he pulled down the top of her dress, revealing her breasts. He put them in his mouth and making gentle sucking motions. She felt exposed, somewhat violated because she didn't completely agreed to it, but her body felt good. It was confusing.
Landon, on the other hand, was in ecstasy. He'd been holding himself for so long, he'd been waiting for this moment for a long time and it was as good as he'd imagined it would be. It didn't take long for him to reach his release, he collapsed to her side, he turned to give her a peck on the lips. "That was so good!" he said, probably to himself. He was still catching his breath leaving Charlene flat on her back, confused and unsatisfied. She looked at the ceiling, tried to rewind what just happened. Her chest and dress was wet with sweat and cum. When she looked over at Landon, he had already fallen asleep.