CHAPTER 1
Trinidad; Maraval
On her seventeenth birthday
Max looked at her sadly. He felt heartbroken for her. How can a guy treat a girl as beautiful as Kai like that? It was her birthday after all and any other day would have been fine to get rejected but not on a special day like this. And not when he and his family had filled her head with dreams and idiotic fantasy about how your seventeenth birthday is supposed to be like! He owed it to her to make it special since his brother, her best friend, Nate wasn't in the country.
Max couldn't believe that she was stood up. He changed his dress shirt and into a t-shirt and took his Riley khaki green jacket and three it into his car then made his way over to the Winter's house, after all, she only lived a few houses away. The families were very close and spoke of everything, the parents anyway.
He felt so sorry for her. Her parents often discussed her dates with them. A few times he saw her face almost red with embarrassment. It was another teenage phase he knew. His fiancé was appalled by their outspoken behavior but he guessed it was because she wasn't accustomed to it. But she adored Kailey still and she spoke of her being her maid of honor. She was looking forward to meeting her tomorrow.
But tonight - tonight was about Kailey. And she was going to have a perfect date.
He would show her how to expect to be treated on a proper "almost" date...not those popcorn and movies things. He smiled remembering his teenage years. His popcorn years.
Kailey looked at Max as he approached her. He was so tall and handsome. With his perfect height of six feet two inches and slim jawline. His lean body wasn't big and buffed but muscular and toned to perfection. His wavy, black hair was almost brown having spent so much time in the sun, beautiful, short at his neck but of medium length hairstyle, he seemed to prefer rather than the long-haired center-parted hair that was in style... his thick but well-shaped eyebrows, eyes that were hazel, his long prominent nose, and that mouth... his full lips. Red. She loved how his lips were almost blood red. How many hours she spent with fantasies of them? His dreamy eyes of hazel brown. She stared into the number printed on his grey-colored t-shirt.
He was bringing his girlfriend.
She felt so ashamed of her tears that were flowing still as he wiped them off. She always craved his touch. She missed him so much and looked forward to spending time with him as he's been in another country for years now with only the occasional visits to his family. And now she just found out he was leaving again!
She was sure she looked quite a mess with her five feet and four inches, with her almost everyday flats on her feet and runny mascara. Her black long hair was in a mess too! At least she knew the outfit she wore was still looking good. Jeans and a beautiful baby pink top under her blue shirt. She had that very slim but shapely body that boys seem to love to look at.
Tomboyish.
But she wanted one particular person and he never looked at her like that. She gave him a lopsided smile and he returned it. She broke down some more. She wrung her hands as he reached her. It was awkward for her to be seen by him like this. What a miserable day. She thought she would have met him later for dinner but her mother had just told her minutes before he was leaving to go to Cape Town. On the other side of the planet! What was he going to be doing in Africa anyway?
Maximilian had made up his mind moments before as he was making his way towards her. Feeling awkward himself as he knelt before her and give her a dashing smile...but he wanted to take away her sadness. With exaggerated humor, he opened his arms wide and said through his pearly white even teeth, "Kai will you be my date tonight?"
At first, she stood frozen starting to feel her heart speed up. It was her dream to be his date always! Since she met him but he was too old for her he had said. He should wait she remembered saying to him some eight years ago. He laughed at her then and rumpled her hair. "I'll be old and gray with ten children by then!" Max had said. She was nine and he was fifteen then. She remembered running home and crying and refused to eat until the next day.
She also remembered praying that night and asking God to make him wait. She was going to be a doctor like him one day! She hadn't chosen a path yet but it didn't matter as long as he was there.
Now at seventeen, she had a date with him? She was so nervous, she felt like throwing up. Could life get any better? She was so in love with him and he never knew. Sixteen was special. The seventeenth birthday was supposed to be special. Also, eighteen then the big twenty-one, he had said to her. He was right, after all, any day with him was special.
She made up her mind as she looked at him kneeling before her- she was going to confess her feelings to him! Suddenly she felt so happy that her heart swelled. Everything seemed brighter.
Max took an even more exaggerated bow as he waited for her to say yes. He even wore her favorite boots that she told him she liked best on him she thought.
It just so happened that it's also his favorite having bought it on his last year in college. His Clarkdale Gobi. Mahogany was just a good color he decided when he first saw it. He knew about her little girly crush on him and while flattered he was also irritated about it but he knew she would grow out of it eventually and he thought of the fiancé that was flying in to meet him in the morning.
The boy was mistaken clearly Max thought as he looked at Kailey when she took his hand. She looked stunning. Even her skin glowed! She had the most beautiful skin he thought while he watched her hand on his. Such a perfect shade of olive-brown. She smiled at him. Even her eyes were perfect and black. With her hoop earrings. He smiled at her. She had an obsession with hoops and wrist bands. She always wore a moonstone leather band or even the threaded ones, no matter what color. She looked so gorgeous in all her innocence.
He smiled at her as he wiped her tear-stained face and smeared lip gloss. She hardly wore makeup only mascara and lip gloss. Kailey always felt that it was too much of a hassle and too time-consuming. Jeans and sneakers suited her best she'd often say and he agreed.
She was so happy to be this close to him! She inhaled deeply at his scent and felt her eyes getting heavy...she was always giddy when he was near her. His cologne.
Chad had called her yesterday and cancelled their date for today but she was okay with it she told him. She was about to go back inside having been on the porch too long. It was almost an hour ago Chad had hung up after taking the notes from the classes he missed that day. He was a really good friend to her and they were supposed to watch a movie. She knew her parents had dinner plans with the Walkers later.
She was so looking forward to spending time with Max but last night was a disaster. She was as usual in her own world staring at him when some words had caught her ears.
Max had a late flight that evening so he won't be there most likely, for dinner. He was bringing his girlfriend to meet his parents. She cried. She really could have used Chad's company right now but he wasn't feeling well and she heard it in his voice so she wasn't going to call him. And Nate was visiting his relatives in New York, while he visited colleges, he was interested in attending.
She cried because she wanted to spend the day with Max and nobody else and he didn't want to be around her, and she had settled for dinner with her parents. Of course, he didn't say that but still... She was a child he had said... He didn't say it like that but still...Too many times she's felt it- he needed to see she had grown up. She was broken-hearted and he didn't even know it!
Tonight, her parents were with Max's parents having an evening dinner and drinks event which they do every month and she was expected to join them which she was not.
"Poor dear," her mother was loudly sympathetic as she was telling the Walkers about Chad's cancellation on her. In front of Max, last night. And it immediately became the conversation for dinner.
"and Max-" her voice became distorted as she spoke with the other person- " is flying out in a bit too-"
"What's that dear? -no... She said he canceled on her."
In fact, her words about Max saddened her young heart to the extent where she had blocked out the entire conversation.
And now- her heart did a million flips- he was taking her on a date?