"And so I'm just sitting there, bleeding from this open wound, and all they can do is yell at me for jepordizing the team," I said, finishing the story of the first time I went airsofting.

        "Awww," Amanda wined, turning her head to look at me. We sat on the blue couch, my arm thrown around her shoulders while she leaned up against my side, her legs propped up in front of her to support a sketchbook. I liked the position; though I didn't get to see her face while we talked, it gave me a front row seat to watch her work. Currently she was doing a hair study, and I watched her turn searching lines into curly, strait, shiny, and dull strands that looked as if they were taken from a photograph. I revered her for it; I could never do anything like that, even something that simple.

        After the first initial awkwardness, a comfortable familiarity settled in and we acting as if we really had been dating for 11 months. I was still extremely nervous, and I was sure she could feel my pounding heart through her back like I could feel hers, but  surprisingly we found ourselves talking in an easy, pleasant conversation. The topics seemed to flow and mix together, and even when there was only the quiet of her scratching pencil, I never felt panicked and desperate to say anything.

        "Though, maybe you shouldn't have tried to climb down a sheer cliff," she pointed out. 

     "I was thinking outside of the box," I shrugged, chuckling when she turned to give me a questioning look. 

       "I wouldn't exactly call falling off a cliff resourceful," she asserted, "and shouldn't you have probably cornered them against the wall instead of..."

        "yeah, alright," I cut her off, laughing as I stopped her from pointing out my stupidity, "And the worst thing was that they asked me if I was coming back next weekend."

        She laughed along with me. "What'd you say to that?" she scoffed.

        "I was like, 'Thanks mate, I think I'll just cry instead.'," I told her, "I mean, I eventually went back... obviously." I told her, thinking back to all the weekends I had spent camping in the woods with my mates. I thought absently about bringing her at some point; she was pretty small but she was a runner and alright with a gun.

        "And when I do you'd better hide all the girls, I'm gonna break their hearts all 'round the world," she sang, breaking out into a recognizably Beatles tune. "Yes, I'm gonna break them in two, and show you what your loving man can do, Until then I'll cry instead," she giggled, happy with her vague reference. I liked listening to her sing, but it was what she was singing that was off putting to me.

        I grimaced and gave an over exaggerated groan. "Amanda, I'm so ashamed," I told her.

        "What did I do?" she asked, genuinely afraid that she had offended me. She set down her sketchbook and swung her legs over the couch so she could give me a concerned look.

        "I hate the Beatles!" I emphasized, laughing to assure her that I wasn't actually that bothered by her song. I readjusted my arm around her shoulder, but she twisted onto her knees and crossed her arms, now facing me fully. 

        "How can you hate the Beatles?" she asked incredulously, as if I had insulted her, "They're like... the only good thing that's come out of England!"

        "Woah!" I cautioned, "That's not true. England is known for plenty of things!" 

        She placed her hands on her hips leaning in towards me. I think she was trying to be intimidating, but the ridiculous way that she was sitting on her knees, her backside resting on her heals, suggested an excited child rather than something to be feared. Still, she had the audacity to give me a smug look and say, "Oh yeah? Like loosing the Civil War to a bunch of dirty drunkards hiding in trees?" There was a beat as she tried to keep her face serious, but then failed as the corners of her mouth twitched up into a smile and she gave a huff of a laugh.

        "You're really going to bring that up?" I scoffed, faking anger when I was really amused by the whole thing. I returned the gesture, getting up in her face and saying, "Slavery. Trail of Tears. Obamacare."

        She opened her mouth to give a reply but then clamped shut it again, her lips twisting into a pout. "You know what Smiffy? Shut up," she said bluntly, breaking into an annoyed smile as she settled back under my arm and into the hollow it made with my shoulder. I only laughed, knowing that I had clearly won.

        I rested my cheek on the back of her head lightly as she continued her drawing. I had so much planned for this week, but right now I wouldn't have minded doing this the entire time. Words couldn't describe how happy I was; I felt like my heart was actually swelling with the love I had for her and excitement that our relationship was finally going to go somewhere. I even had the moment planned when I would first tell her I loved her. Call me cheesy, but I enjoyed those kind of romantic gestures; I was always pretty dramatic anyway.

        "Hey Amanda?" I asked, turning serious once again.

        "Mm?" she asked, reaching for a pencil that stuck out of her case on the arm of the couch.

        I didn't know how to say it. There was no way I could accurately describe what she did to me. It was like being drunk all the time without feeling the dizziness or the confusion. She was like a drug without the negative side effects. "I'm... I'm really glad you're here..." I stammered, feeling blood rushing to my face.

        She turned to me, having to tilt her head up from her position on my chest. "I'm glad I'm here too," she giggled quietly, giving me a tiny smile.

        I felt my smile fade as I looked at her, my breathing speeding up as I looked into her eyes. There was no discernible emotion in them, they were too complex and hard to understand, but I only needed to notice her physical cues to see that she was thinking the same thing as me. She bite her lip and furrowed her eyebrows, her gaze flickering between my eyes and lips. She turned and sat up straighter so I wouldn't have to lean down as far, and she grabbed at my shoulder, her thumb tracing across my collarbone.

        I raised a hand to cup her chin as I simultaneously began to lean in and close my eyes. Her lips parted ever so slightly and I felt her hand tighten on my shoulder as she pulled me closer, her other hand now making it's way through my beard to send shivers down my spine. her skin was soft under my palm, the warmth radiating off of it making me feel comfortable and relaxed, even as her chin brushed my beard and my mind was short circuiting with her lips being so close.

        This was a knock on the door and I felt her jump back out of my arms, leaving me to relive that moment outside our hotel rooms. It wasn't as heart crushingly painful, because it wasn't actually her that had interrupted our would-be first kiss.

        "Ready to go?" Ross asked, poking his head around the door to look at the two of us.

        I was somewhat stunned into silence, but Amanda didn't miss a beat. "Sure!" she smiled, quickly putting away her sketchbook and pencils. Ross fully opened the door and Amanda grabbed my hand, bouncing out of the room and down the stairs without any acknowledgment of what had happened.

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        "And then there was this one time when we printed out three hundred and fifty 5 by 6 pictures of Sir Badon Powell, The Boy Scouts of America's founder, and posted them all over the other camp," she laughed, tossing a piece of popcorn into her mouth.

        "Wait really?" I asked, not realizing that there were actual camp rivalries like that; I thought it was just a thing they did in the movies.

        "Of course!" she giggled, "And we went at, like two in the morning and we were ducking through the woods and hiding behind benches and stuff in all black; We were like secret assassins or agents or something."

        "What did they do to retaliate?" I asked, taking a handful of popcorn from the bowl between us. We were sitting on the pull out, having gotten back from the pub about an hour ago. I had suggested watching a movie, but we had gotten talking and it seemed like we both preferred stories and jokes over sitting in silence and watching the tele. Right now she was recounting the numerous pranks that the Boy Scout camp she used to work at pulled on the larger and richer camp next door.

        "Oh, the just came over during the middle of the day and spelled out CYO, the name of their camp, in the pictures that they had found," she said, waving it away and rolling her eyes at the lack of style, "but it was only one hundred and twenty of all the ones we put up." She gave a proud smile at their accomplishment.

        I laughed at the ridiculousness of it all. "That is absurd," I noted, but she held her hands to silence me.

        "No no, that's not the best part!" she said, already laughing before she even told me the joke, "we found googly eyes in the crafts room and glued them to about half of them," she giggled.

        I let out a loud laugh, imagining what it would look like to put googly eyes on a serious portrait of this old man. Something was still bothering me though. "But..." I started, not wanting to offend her, "how can you be in Boy Scouts if you're... a girl?"

        She just smiled and said sweetly, "I was in Venture Crew, which is a coed branch of Boy Scouts."

        "Oh, right," I said, not really understanding but acting as if it made sense anyway. "So is that the only job you had as a teenager?" I asked, trying to keep the conversation going.

        "Yeah," she nodded, "I would live at five or six different camps all summer, life guarding or being a merit badge councilor for a few weeks before I went to a different camp." She smiled, remembering her seemingly wild summer. "What about you?" she asked.

        "Uh, I worked a lot of different jobs," I said, sheepish, "normally I didn't last long though..."

        She tilted her head and her eyebrows knitted together. "What do you mean?" she asked, concerned.

        I scratched at the back of my head, smiling at her guiltily as I thought of which story I should tell her. "Well, I worked at an accounting firm for a summer..." I began, "It was me and a few other interns from uni and...." I took a deep breath, letting it out in a laugh as I thought of how we had gotten fired.

        "What?" she asked excitedly, grabbing my arm and shaking it lightly, "Tell me!"

        I ran a hand through my hair. "Well there was this water cooler that had a hot and cold option..." I explained, Amanda eagerly nodding for me to continue, "so as a prank we brought in a kiddy pool and filled it up to make a hot tub..." Amanda started laughing, but I wasn't finished. "A cup at a time..."

        "Oh gosh," she laughed.

        "And when they told us we had only two weeks left before we were being let go," I continued, "we posted ads all over the university for our replacements and held mock interviews in the office as well."

        "I honestly don't feel bad for you," she giggled, "you obviously had it coming."

        I shrugged. "I hated that job anyway" I laughed, thinking back to the horribly long hours spent doing the things everyone else in the office didn't want to deal with.

        We talking for a while longer about our different jobs and reminisced all the time we had both gotten in trouble during our adolescence. At one point Amanda had announced that she had to take out her contacts and get ready to sleep, since it was about 1 in the morning. I took the chance to watch some tele and clean up the popcorn bits that littered her bed.

        Amanda wandered back in, now wearing a pair of flannel pajama pants that almost matched my red ones. Though what really caught my attention was the sweatshirt she wore; I had nearly forgotten that I had given it to her. "You still have that?" I asked, my face splitting into a huge grin. It looked well worn and a bit faded, but I couldn't be happier with the fact that she wore it now.

        She  looked a bit scared at my question before she saw my grin and seemed to relax. "Um, yeah," she laughed nervously, "I wear it to bed sometimes..." She blushed, embarrassed, even though it made me immensely happy that she was getting some use out of it.

        She smiled and padded over to the couch, curling up next to me and quietly watched the show that was on. I didn't pay attention to the tele; I was more focused on the pretty girl that was now nodding off in my arm. I pulled her closer and she happily buried her face into my shoulder and neck. The next thing I knew, my eyelids were drooping closed and the smell and feel of her enveloped me as I drifted off to sleep. 

A/N Just a little filler chapter to develop their relationship a bit more. Thanks for all the votes and views, happy reading.