Someone Like Jeff

Chapter 1- Jenny POV

My name is Jenny and I am an author, I specialise in romance books. I'm 23 years old and I've never been in love, and me writing romance books really takes its toll. That's just the entertainment I guess... 

I despised him. Yet still loved him. How could this be? I questioned myself while attempting to read my favourite books of all time. The After Series by Anna Todd. I'm sure you've all heard of it. "Hardin is like a drug; each time I take the tiniest bit of him, I crave more and more. He consumes my thoughts and invades my dreams." oh how I wished to be in that book. I feel like an outcast sometimes like Hardin does.

It was there I met my Hardin, in the old bookstore. The boy across the room with a smile like no other. I focused on his eyes, which were darting back and forth over the pages, shining in the sunlight. They were a deep, earthy brown - the colour of the earth after torrential rain. But there was something else in them, something glistening. Glistening like an old copper penny being examined in the warm glow of an old fireplace, powerful flames licking at the glass safety door. They held secrets, the same way a pot holds layers of deep soil- cradling- because it is essential to keep the plant safe. The roots are held in place the same way his dark, liquid eyes held so tightly onto his secrets.

His lips were a pale pink that reminded me of a rose bud. Top lip thinner, but not too thin, with a natural cupid's bow; the bottom one was larger and more plush. I stared at them when he bit his pencil in concentration, drank from his mug, or when he applied lip balm to keep them soft. I wanted to feel his lips against mine, though they are rough and thin - perhaps he wouldn't like them.

His hair, dark and lustrous, had a sheen like fine hardwood. But that comparison isn't entirely fair, I suppose. Hardwood doesn't swish gently like his hair does, swaying with the words he speaks. A shiny varnish merely catches light around it, but the depths of that deep chestnut brown reflected all the radiance of his smile.

I imagined him kissing me, wondered how it would feel. Would it be as if the world stops around us, leaving just the two of us to wander the earth together? I pictured him holding my face between his large hands, thought of how I might come completely undone underneath his touch, how he might hold me for eternity in his strong embrace. That is what falling in love is like, a story you never want to end. For so long I had longed for it, and from the moment I first saw him, I had known he was the one.

During my ogling I had been attempting to read an old and heavy book, the leather soft and delicate under my fingers as I ran them over the faded blue binding. Finally letting my gaze fall away from the mysterious man and back to the book at hand, I fingered the ornate gold lettering of the cover carefully before opening, paper rustling as I thumbed through the pages in search of the section I was looking for. Words appeared and disappeared as my eyes flitted across the pages, quickly picking out anything of importance from the jumble of sentences that littered the world I had become immersed in.

Just as the book had begun to drag me into its mesmerising pages, I was startled out of my concentration by a deep thud from the opposite end of the store. The beautiful man had let his book fall closed, making an exhausted sound -like a padded door shutting- that had caused all my attention to be pulled back to him. This time, as I raised my head, instead of being greeted by the profile of a far too handsome man, I was instead shocked to see him looking directly at me. It was as if every ounce of breath was taken from my lungs, floating into the air like midnight smoke. His intense gaze bore into my skin and I felt my cheeks flush at the thought of being caught staring. I could feel his eyes raking over my face as I just sat there, frozen, completely at a loss of what to do under the scrutinising gaze of such a gorgeous man. That was until he gestured lazily at the seat opposite him before bringing his steaming mug back to those perfectly plump lips, eyes never leaving mine.