1. Claude Phoebe(ManxMan)

•Chapter 8✓

I remember each time he kissed me, like it had been yesterday, I secretly cherished each moment without having known why that was. Never really questioned it either. Sometimes feeling guilty for the feeling, for the memory.

The first time, we were five years old.

I remember playing in the garden with some of the pack kids when I saw him. Creamy cocoa skin, his cognac brown eyes were fixed on us, his thick curly hair was tied back in a bun. He looked so adorable, like a mini Corbin Bloom. He had his arms folded over his chest, stern almost and I approached.

This was just two weeks after I had declared us best friends.

"Where were you?" I began standing next to him. "Didn't see you in class."

He stared at me for the longest time. I stared back, my lips puckered and not in the 'kiss me' kinda way but more like 'you did something wrong and I'm waiting to hear your excuse' kinda way.

The motion was quick and sure, he stepped forward and my brows furrowed in confusion when his little hands grabbed my little arms. His face grew closer and without missing a beat his lips met mine. The act was quick but it left its mark.

I watched him blush and glare at the kids who played. I wondered as I reached up to touch my lips.

"What was that for?"

"Nothing." He sounded so stubborn and he stared at the ground.

"Well, you didn't do it properly." I told him matter of factly and he looked at me, I grabbed his shirt and pulled him to me. I remembered seeing my parents do it, I touched my lips to his, opening my own mouth I licked his lips, doing what I believed my parents did before pulling away.

His eyes were wide and a growl came from behind us. We had been caught, not that we had even been hiding, however, I remember my Papa being mad and my dad finding it cute if not funny.

Fast forward to the second kiss, we had become closer after that single kiss, inseparable almost.

We were ten years old, his brother had past away and the absolute pain he had been in, I could only imagine, however I tried to comfort him, tried to cheer him up. He had spent a few weeks with his head down, staring into space so often that I was worried he was thinking bad thoughts, worried that if he didn't find a reason to smile soon, I'd lose him forever.

I had convinced him to run with me. There we were in our wolves, running and for a moment I could see him coming out of his sadness, being the bright Ace I knew him to be. We had shifted and the bright laugh which left him after I let him win against me in a race was enough to calm my previous distress. I hadn't seen it coming, I wasn't sure how to go about it now that we were a little older and yes, it had only been five years since the last one but, this felt nice if not a little different.

He stepped closer, his smile bright and beautiful, his hair big and puffy and curly, some of it in his forehead, he grabbed my biceps, raising himself on his tiptoes since even then I had always been taller. His lips touched mine. I stared wide eyed at his closed eyes. The pressure of our lips on one another caused a shift in my chest. Like a flip of my heart which was both painful and comforting.

"Rule of three," I murmured to him once he stopped. "there shouldn't be a third."

"Well, I just wanted you to have my first real kiss."

"That was five years ago." He beamed up at me anyway and chuckled. "This is your second."

"Well, you think what you want, and I'll do the same." The sound of his laughter made it okay, he turned from me, shifting and running towards the pack. I touched my lips completely taken and knowing that while the pack went on about mates, I knew that if mine turned out to be anyone other than Ace, I would surely protest.

They say third time's the charm, that everything happens in threes and I think our story did the same thing because later, just shy of 16, Valentine's day, he did it again.

We had a tradition, him and I. Every year we would get each other a Valentine's day gift irrespective of getting a Valentine or not, it kept us both happy and ensured that one way or another we got a valentine even if it was each other.

We stood in Mrs. Applebee's class, she was marking papers and we were her favourite students so obviously we got to eat in her class at lunch. I held the box to his chest, one hand in my pocket as I stared at the window almost shyly.

"Happy Valentine's day." I murmured and glanced in the corner of my eye for his reaction. He smiled down at the box, taking it into his hand. Unlike the chocolates and cards and stuffed animals over the years this one was different for me, a little bit of a silent statement.

"My gift is a little... different." He pursed his lips, his cheeks a soft dust of pink on his cocoa skin. The sight was so beautiful, I hoped to capture it forever in my memory, to make it permanent somehow.

"What is it?" I eyed him suspiciously. "You aren't making me get another tattoo are you?"

He laughed, the sound of pure amusement as he set the box I'd given him down. He'd open it at home, in the middle of the night as he loved to do. He stepped forward shaking his head, his curls bouncing as he did.

"No...it's more for me than you, anyway."

I tilted my head when suddenly his hand cupped my cheek and he pushed up on his toes. I saw it with wide eyes as his face inches closer and his lips met mine. My response was almost too automatic, it was as though this happened on a regular basis, like I had no other way of responding especially to him.

My eyes fluttered closed and I leaned into him, our lips soft yet firmly against one another, our mouths opened and we kissed like grown ups as real grown ups. My hands found his waist and the familiar flip of my heart was there again, as it always was for him.

I pulled him closer, his tongue sweetly against mine, his hand sliding to my neck and squeezing gently before we pulled apart.

"You broke the rule." I murmured after a few moments of just being in each other's space.

"What?"

"The rule of three. Now, now you can't get away from me."

I grabbed his face with both my hands then just to further affirm the statement and kissed him again. His hands found my wrists, gentle and warm, I felt the twitch of his lip like he wanted to smile.

Truly I had claimed him then and there because who wouldn't? He was so adorable and sweet and forward. While we had the title of best friend to the world, to one another we were lovers unspoken and it was okay. Nobody needed to know, we didn't feel the need to be justified or labled.

That day he became my boyfriend wordlessly. Nothing changed because he was my best friend before anything else.

We still did things together. Studying, training, patrolling and partying. We didn't hold hands until after three months after that kiss and even then we never kissed again, well, not until recently, when it seemed like a kiss was what would make either of us feel better. One of most significance was when we were eighteen and we were in his room, he was working on his favourite hobby of writing lyrics and I was reading my comic books which I kept there on purpose.

We could hear the music downstairs, the pack celebrates my birthday without me, which was normal for I wasn't into the scene as much as I was into the one there, beside my mate.

His scent had always been special to me. Always stood out in a unique way but I never paid it any mind, never wondered because I didn't need to.

It grew stronger as the hour of my birth approached and my dreams were true, looking up from my comic with a soft sweet smile and seeing his brows furrowed in concentration as he scribbled quickly with all the inspiration he'd gathered.

I watched him silently, a silent soft murmur in my mind claiming him as mine, the feeling of butterflies going off in my stomach and my heart flipping constantly as it usually did when he was around.

Not as dramatic or exciting as most wolves or as forcefully dominating as one may have expected, however that was us.

Nice and easy and smooth. Mostly.

A/N
Written: 20 August 2020