The Most Romantic Stories Of Your Teen Years: Finalist #1
This giveaway is sponsored by The Shape of My Heart by Ann Aguirre.
Some people wait decades to meet their soul mate. Courtney Kaufman suspects she met hers in high school—only to lose him at seventeen. Since then, Courtney’s social life has been a series of meaningless encounters, though she’s made a few close friends along the way. Especially her roommate, Max Cooper, who oozes damaged bad-boy vibes from every pore.
Max knows about feeling lost—he’s been on his own since he was sixteen. Now it’s time to find out if he can ever go home again, and Courtney’s the only one he trusts to go with him. But the trip to Providence could change everything….
It started out so simple. One misfit helping another. Now Max will do anything to show Courtney that for every heart that’s ever been broken, there’s another that can make it complete.
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In this giveaway, we asked you to submit the most romantic personal story of your own teenage love. We’ve narrowed the field down to three finalists, each of whom win a set of Ann Aguirre’s 2B Trilogy! Below is Finalist #1’s entry- go here to check out the other finalists and to vote on your fave. The winner will receive a $100 gift card to the Book Riot Store! Voting will end 11:59PM EST, Tuesday, December 16th.
Finalist #1: Taylor and Kyle
He sat behind me in English class my freshman year and played saxophone in the marching band in which I played flute. He was tall with hair and eyes the color of black coffee, with a gentle smile and a quiet (but vaguely dirty) sense of humor.
His name was Kyle and I was smitten with him. We’d flirt back and forth, making witty comments about A Tale of Two Cities and To Kill a Mockingbird. My best friend and I came up with code names for him so that we didn’t have to worry about my adoration being overheard. Adidas after his signature pair of blue striped shoes, Paris because we were reading Romeo and Juliet but we were smart enough to realize that Romeo was not boyfriend material.
I knew he was interested in me. Our band friends assured him again and again that I was interested in him. But alas, he was too shy to make a move and I was too insecure to force his hand. So as any self-respecting fifteen year old girl would do, I proceeded to date one of his best friends (a trumpet player) for the next three years.
Kyle never left my circle of friends, and I had always taken the fact that he and my boyfriend remained good buddies as evidence that he had never been too interested in me in the first place. But we had swam on the swim team together for two years, meaning that I had never quite been able to get his, you know, sense of humor out of my head.
We left high school and I left my boyfriend but Kyle and I managed to stay in the same group. One night I found myself looking at him across a plate of Italian nachos, just the two of us. And he paid.
Another night he wrapped his arm around me at a movie, both of us almost shaking, feeling like this wasn’t allowed but loving every moment.
And yet another night we entwined together on my lofted dorm bed. The credits for one of my favorite movies had ceased rolling over thirty minutes ago, but we stayed in silence, staring up at the ceiling and being joyously content to be touching each other and breathing. I felt his head turn down toward me and I tilted my chin up to meet his eyes before he softly pressed his lips against mine. It didn’t last more than a breath. He pulled away and looked at me with these eyes that were overflowing with wonder. His lips tugged up into a smile and he shook his head, almost in disbelief. Quietly, in my ear, he stated, “I have been wanting to do that for every second of the last four years.”
And I melted.
