My father nodded. His nod was for me. Different. But not different at all. My father understood. Maybe he had known. Maybe he hadn't. It didn't matter anymore. He understood. I knew he understood, just from his nod, just from his eyes on mine, making his eyes kind for me, and the wave of pain went away for a moment.

Like the line of love, I thought. Once crossed you can't go back. Like the line between past and future. Or maybe really the line between past and now. The now my father spoke of. When I raced ... I would cross the line and there was no more thinking about what was going to be because it was. It happened that fast.

He stopped walking. I stopped walking. He moved his face to mine. I stayed there. He put his mouth on mine, soft. We kissed like that, lips on lips, and I could feel the softness of his mouth and the rougher line where his lip was chapped. The shiver in my stomach was there. The way I knew it would be, only more. It was real.