What Love Is (on hold)

Chapter 1: This is Love

“If you want to accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior, I encourage you to take the big leap of faith, step forward and we will pray for you.”

 Blah blah blah. Whatever! Can’t you do this a little bit faster, Mr. Preacher?

 “..In Jesus’ Name we pray, Amen. God bless you all, see you next week!”

Finally! I can’t wait to get outside.

If it wasn’t for Grace Garcia, I wouldn’t even bother attending this stupid religious youth service. She is my best friend and schoolmate. Both of us are in our senior year in college. We’ve known each other for quite a long time. To tell you honestly, I’ve been planning to court her but I still haven’t told her about my feelings.

Grace is intelligent and beautiful. She has dark brown eyes, long black hair, long legs, red lips, perfect white teeth, slender body, tan skin, great attitude... Ahh! She’s the perfect girl anyone could ever imagine. Well, I’m not so bad myself. I’m good-looking, tall, cute, kind, and rich. Yeah, enough with that.

Let me tell you a secret, I’m a university heartthrob. Cool, huh? What’s not-so-cool is that Grace isn’t very much into me unlike all the other girls in the campus. She only treats me as her best friend, and I hate it.

“God really uses Pastor Joey to reach out to young people like us, don’t you think? Did you enjoy?” She beamed a really cute smile at me. I’m melting.

 Oh, I almost forgot. My name is Luke Christian Smith. People usually call me Luke, and Grace is the only person in the world who calls me by the name Christian.

“Uh, yes! I did enjoy,” only because you were seated beside me. Haha!

“Great! Will you come with me again next week?”

“Umm... I... I’m not quite sure.”

“Why not? Are you busy?”

“Uhh...”

“Okay, never mind,” she seemed disappointed, “but if you happen to be available by Saturday, please do come. It’ll be more fun in the next coming weeks. Pastor would most likely preach about love. I’m so excited!”

“Don’t worry, I promise to come whenever I have free time.” I smiled.

“Really? Okay!” Out of delight, she hugged me tightly for a few seconds. Didn’t see that one coming. My face turned red. But before I could turn my back on her, she noticed me and laughed really hard. “Hey! You look as if someone showered you with red paint! It was just a hug! I didn’t know that my hug could easily make a heartthrob blush. You look really cute, I should do that more often.”

“Stop it. Maybe I did turn red, but only because it’s very hot in here… Hey! Want some ice cream? I saw an ice cream parlor just a few blocks from here.” I said, trying to change the topic.

“Christian, you like me, don’t you?  Why don’t you just confess? It’s not like I’m going to reject you,” she said while giving me a teasing smile.

“…W-w-what are y-you talking...”

“Hey! I was joking, don’t take it so seriously. Look, you’re blushing again. Haha! Let’s go!” Whew! She almost gave me a heart attack.

After eating some ice cream and taking Grace home, I went to my friend’s house.

Dingdong! Dingdong!

“Hey, Ian. Happy birthday! Am I late?”

“Thanks, man. The party has just started. Come on in.”