Life as I Know It

Chapter 8

Previously...

"What? I can't have a memory for my second-born, one-pound baby girl going on her first date?" she gushed. Alice cried fake tears behind her.

I gagged. "Mom, please stop. No one needs to know that." I grabbed my jacket behind the front door and turned back to Edward. "Can we go, now?"

"Yeah, sure," he chortled, leading us out.

"You two have a great time watching Tom Cruise kill people!" Alice yelled back, and I almost ran to Edward's car, my face burning with total embarrassment.

~oOo~

Edward helped me into the passenger seat and he ran around the car to the driver's side. While starting the car, he asked curiously, "You were born one-pound?"

I cringed. "Yeah...my mom loves to tell that story. It's so annoying."

"Oh, no." He smiled. "How did that happen?"

"My mom was really sick when she had me. I think she had a really bad flu or something. And it was during a snowstorm, too. But yeah, I was born a few months early, all tiny and bald and small. But every time something comes up in my life, like for the first time, she always brings that up. It's ridiculous." I rolled my eyes as we both laughed.

"So wait, your name has a special meaning to it?"

"Yeah, I guess. It's Hebrew and Italian for 'My God is an oath.' Which is weird, since we aren't really religious like that anymore."

"Oh, why?"

I shrugged, saying, "I don't know. The whole religion thing seems so far-fetched in a way. Not that there's anything wrong with being religious. It's so heightened to a point that I don't even have a set religion anymore. I grew up in the church with my parents, but when they split up, my mom stopped believing in a castle in the sky, and a man in the clouds judging everybody."

He nodded as he made a turn. "Yeah, I see what you're saying. I'm not very religious myself, nor is my family. We're more spiritual than anything we have to read in a Bible or Torah or Quaran, if you're Muslim."

"Yeah, exactly." I smiled.

"I don't even know where my name comes from. All I know is that I was named after my grandfather."

I pulled out my phone and looked up his name on Safari. "Your name means 'The name Edward is an English baby name. In English the meaning of the name Edward is: Wealthy guardian. From the Old English name Eadweard, meaning rich or happy, and guardian.'" I giggled.

"So I'm your special guardian." He smirked.

I blushed happily. "Yeah, looks like it."

"The Lord is my Shepard." He spoke in a Priest-like voice, and I burst out laughing.

It was so easy to talk to him. It was like time didn't even exist with the both of us, which was why we were such good friends over the years. Before I knew it, we were at the dine-in movie theater. Edward parked in a space near the entrance, and he helped me out of the car. I felt his hand slide into mine as we got closer to the theater entrance, and I looked down.

"Is this okay?" he asked, nerves creeping in his voice.

Lost for words, I nodded and smiled. "My palms are sweaty, though."

"It's okay. Mine are too." He wiped his hand on his pants and took my hand again.

"It still feels sweaty." I giggled. "But it's okay. We're both nervous."