It had been so long since Linda had seen that face. She almost hadn't recognized it. Could it have really been an entire year since she and Julian DeVries had graduated from Lake Point High School?
Throughout their high school career, the other students couldn't stifle their own gossip about how the two were an item, but they never were. Not really, anyway. Sure, Linda and Julian were always together, but they were never alone together. It was always Linda, Julian, and Loren Meadows and Susan McMillan. Or Linda, Julian, and Laura Ferguson and Anne Drullers and Alan Brewer. It was always four or five of them together, but wherever Linda went, Julian followed. And wherever Julian went, Linda followed.
But they never seen alone, and indeed they never were.
At least, not while they were in high school. But now it was their summer break of college, freshman final exams a not-so-distant, but constantly fading memory. And, Linda decided, freshman year had been very kind to Julian.
So, drawing upon an instinct that she hadn't felt through four years of high school but seemed so very insistent right in that moment, Linda Gibson greeted Julian DeVries with as tight a hug as she could manage, followed by a very firm kiss, planted right on Julian's lips.
The boy tensed at first, but soon realized that this was what he wanted, as well. And after several minutes of close embrace, the two entered the house where Julian had grown up and the bedroom where Julian had grown up. Not for the first time, but for the first time without any other companions.
