Matt leaves for football as I'm helping my mom make dinner. I open my kitchen window and shout out to him.

"Good luck, Matty!"

He gives me a wave and a smile. His dad looks over from the driver's side and gives me a quick wave too before he drives off.

"Kiersten!" My dad warns.

I shut the damn window and get back to dinner. My mom and I are cooking chicken tonight. My mom's not much of a cook, but I have a natural talent for it, so I help her out. I scoop out some butter and watch it sizzle in the hot pan. I throw a little somethin' somethin' and some chopped onions in, so it's good and ready for the veggies. The chicken's in the crockpot from this morning, so I don't have to worry about that. Just need the vegetables. Every good meal needs a vegetable. I pop open the freezer and see that we have nothing. Just a couple of ice pops from probably before I was born, a half-eaten carton of ice cream, and a whole lot of freezer crud. You know, that white stuff that grows on the side of the freezer. I should really take care of that. Maybe I'll ask Matt to do it. He'd enjoy that, I think. He likes to clean.

"Hey, Ma," I say to my mom who is studying the cookbook intently. I told her we don't need that for sautéing, but she still doesn't quite believe me.

"Ma?" I ask this time a little louder.

"Yeah, hon?" She asks without looking up from the book.

"Do we have any veggies?"

My mom looks up this time.

"Did you check the freezer?"

I sigh but I can't help but smile.

"I'm going to go down to the market. Can you watch the stove?"

"Oh no," my mom protests but I'm already grabbing my house keys and wallet. "I don't think I'm ready for that."

"Turn it on low and move the stuff around so it doesn't burn. I'll be right back."

My mom nods and does as she's told. I leave the house and head down the street a little way. I stop right outside the Peters' house, where their farm market sits patiently waiting for customers. Tending to the farm market is the not so patient Teddy Peters.

"Hi Teddy," I say and give him a smile. He raises his eyebrows.

"Hey," he says.

Manning the market is not Teddy's favorite job, but more often than not he has no choice. His family has owned Peters Paradise Orchards for five generations. It's one of many farms in Hutton, but in my totally unbiased opinion, by far the best. His grandmother's pies are seriously to die for. Like no joke, I would take a bullet for a slice of her pie.

"I need some veggies," I say.

"Well," Teddy says. He gets up from the stool he was sitting on and emerges from behind the counter. "It's your lucky day. Because green beans are half off, and if you act now I'll even throw in a pint of blueberries."

"Wow, that sounds like a great deal."

Teddy nods his head slowly and raises his eyebrows in that way again.

"All righty then."

Teddy moves towards the green beans and starts filling up a bag. It seems like it might take some time so I keep the conversation rolling.

"So, you excited to start school again?"

He lets out a short laugh.

"Yeah, I finally get to sleep in."

Like I said before, running the farm is a family affair and since Teddy is at the perfect age to do all sorts of manual labor, he gets to get up every morning over the summer before the sun and do just that. Work, work, work. Once school starts though, he's off the hook. Mostly, anyway. He still has to work after school and on the weekends, but he doesn't have to get up at 4 am anymore. At least not every day.

"You?" He asks as he spins my bag of green beans around, closing up the opening.

He pulls a little twisty tie from his cowboy hat and ties up my bag and tosses it on the counter. Now, he saunters over to the blueberries.

"I guess," I say with a shrug. "Should be fun."

"It always is," Teddy says dryly with a dash of sarcasm.

Teddy grabs the blueberries and makes his way behind the counter. He punches in a few numbers in an extremely outdated cash register.

"That'll be five-fifty."

I reach into my pocket and hand him a ten. I tell him to keep the change because he tends to get a little too generous with the friends and family discount. Their family works incredibly hard and I don't want them to get short-changed.

"Thanks, Teddy."

He tips his hat to me and off I go, veggies in hand. I make it back to my house only to be surrounded by a cloud of smoke as soon as I walk through the front door. I wave my hand around and cough as I make my way to the nearest window.

"Ma," I say and open the kitchen window to let some air in.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I tried."

I look at her and she looks back at me helplessly. The smoke alarm goes off and we both start laughing.

After dinner, I go upstairs to my room and turn on the radio. I dance around a little to some Shania Twain while I fold my laundry. Right as I pick up my favorite jeans I hear a thump against my window that makes me jump.  My jeans fly out of my hands and across the room. I turn around to see Matt lying back on his bed, laughing it up. I crank open my window so I can yell at him.

"What do you want, huh?"

Matt readjusts the pillow behind his head and shrugs.

"I'm bored. Keep me company."

I raise my eyebrows and he sighs.

"Please?"

I pretend like I'm thinking it over to make him sweat. In all honesty, I've really missed talking to him. Even if it's only been a few hours since I last saw him.

"All right," I say after I've waited long enough. "How were try-outs?"

Matt shakes his head and then rubs his eyes.

"Ugh," he says. "I'm dead."

"Maybe you should get some sleep then."

Matt groans and covers his face with his hands.

"I'm too tired to sleep."

"That doesn't seem possible."

"It is," he says and curls up into a ball like a kitten. He pulls his covers over his head. A few seconds go by and he doesn't say anything. A few more seconds go by and he stops moving. Maybe he really is dead.

"Matt?" I ask. Nothing. "Matty?" Still nothing. I smile to myself and close my window. Too tired to sleep. Yeah, right.

Hello again!

I hope you are all enjoying the story so far. Throughout this story, we'll be switching back and forth between Matt and Kiersten's perspective. Every three chapters or so, I plan on switching points of view. I think it's essential to see what they're both thinking and how they each perceive their friendship. Let me know what you think of dual POV stories:

Do you like stories with multiple points of view or do you prefer a single narrator?

Now that you've seen both their perspectives, do you have a preference for either Matt or Kiersten? Or do you enjoy both?

As always, thank you for your engagement!