Chapter 1 - Main characters meet

“There's not a word yet, for old friends who've just met.”

― Jim Henson

POV: 20 year-old Claudia Chiametti

“You remember Toby, don’t you?” Mrs. Faye asked.

“Of course.” I replied, quickly doing the math in my head. Four years of high school and two of college. “It’s been at least six years, though. I’m sure I wouldn’t even recognize him if I saw him.”

I tried to move back to my seat without breaking our eye contact. Out of the corner of my eye I became aware of motion, but too late to stop myself, I bumped into a solid wall of body.

“Oh!” I gasped, surprised as I hit a warm, immoveable mass with my shoulder and bounced off. A pair of hands caught me around the waist and kept me from tumbling over.

The collision brought me eye-level with the angular chin of a guy’s face. His windswept, tawny brown hair was streaked with multi-hued highlights. The untamed waves softly framed a tan, handsome face.

“Excuse me,” I mumbled, looking up into a pair of almond shaped, blue-grey eyes.

By his expression, he seemed just as stunned by our impact as I. We stood there, staring at each other for what felt like an eternity while the warmth of his hands on me spread like a blaze up my torso and flamed my face. The spell was broken when his full lips parted and he said, “Claudia?”

That he knew my name set off alarms in my head. I struggled to reassemble my disjointed thoughts and it took a moment to put it back together — where I was, who I was with.

Toby Faye.

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