Just Another Love Story

by Donnay Givens

Waking up to flowers and candy on his side of the bed, my mother always told me “Money can never

buy our love.” My father always told me, “be with someone who knows what they have, when they have

you.” But you’ll never know where love will take you. Him and I have been together for five years and never

left each other, we had our ups and downs but It’s Something about this love, it never dies.

We First met at a college Christmas party, he was in college I was in high school. He was with his boys, I was

with my girls. When we first walked in, all eyes were on us like we were Destiny Childs in 2003. His eyes and

mines connected the minute I walked in. I was a little scared because this was my first college party but I’ve

been to parties before in fact I think were the only high school kids there, but the college kids didn’t

know that. We gazed around looking at all these guys and girls getting wasted off of beer and alcohol. We

started walking around, this short geeky boy walked up to us with a desperate look on his face and asked us

how we were doing, the music in the party was drowning his voice, so he pointed us to the kitchen telling us

to help ourselves. We looked at each other and walked to the kitchen looking as if we were bugged out. We

didn’t want the boy to think any of us were feeling him. The girls were grabbing alcohol and drinking when I

was grabbing soda, I couldn’t drink alcohol because I was driving and plus I don’t like drinking in public

because anything can happen.

We were in the kitchen for like 30 minutes talking about how drunk all these college kids were,

promising each other we would never get that drunk. All of a sudden I hear this soft deep voice whispering in

my ear,

“Will you marry me?” I turned my head around slowly looking into his eyes, it was him the guy I was

staring at when I first walked in I never forgot those eyes.

“What?” I shouted at him because the music was loud as I looked at him like he was silly.

“Marry me!” he said, smiling with this cute smirk on his face.

“Are you serious?” I asked with a serious tone of voice.

“Yes, so can you answer my question, will you marry me?”

“What makes you think you can ask that to someone you barely even know?”

“Thought I should give it a try but you are going to become my wife sooner or later!” he said smiling.

“What makes you think that?” I said staring into his eyes.

“Because you are, in the future!” he said pulling me to the side to talk to me alone. I looked back at my

girls and I saw that they were talking to his friends.

“So where you from?” he asked.

“San Francisco, born and raised. What about you?”

“I’m from the south baby! Atlanta, Georgia!” he said proudly.

“Really? I want to go out there for college!”

“College? How old are you? You not in college?” he asked, looking surprised.

“I’m seventeen, I graduate this year!”

“Oh. When is your birthday? I thought you were in college.”

“No, my birthday is March 2^nd.”

“Okay, so you about to be eighteen soon,” he said with that smirk on his face I admired.

“Yeah, pretty soon. What college do you go to? I asked.

“UCLA, Can you put your number in my phone? If that’s okay with you?” he said looking at his friends.

“Yeah sure,” I said grabbing his phone out his hand. When I handed his phone back my friend came over

to me and whispered in my ear telling me we had to go because Stonie had too much to drink. As one of his

boys signaled to him for them to leave.

“I have to go, but I’m going to call you!” he said smiling.

“Okay, see you later!” I said. I walked away with a smile on my face. I told my friends to lets go

before Stonie start throwing up. We walked outside to the car, after dropping off all the girls I was thinking

about him so much I almost ran a red light. When I finally got home I realized I didn’t get his name.

11:48am.

The sound of my cell phone ringing woke me up, I looked over to my phone, it was Stonie calling.

“What’s up,” I asked yarning into the phone.

“Are you up? Get up, let’s go to the mall”

“Why?”

“I need to find something to wear for tonight”

“What’s tonight ? Wait. Hold on my mom is calling me on the other line, get dress I’ll be there in

a hour” I said rushing her off the phone to answer for my mom.

“Yes mom. Where you at? Are you here in the house?”

“No, I’m at work. Before you leave the house, fold the clothes that are in the laundry room” she

said with a serious tone of voice.

“Okay”. I went to the laundry room to fold the clothes. After folding the clothes I laid back

down. 15 minutes later, I rushed into the shower and got dressed. I almost forgot I had to pick up

Stonie. I looked at my phone and seen I had three missed calls, two was from stonie

and one was from a private caller. I was curious about who called me from a private number. I didn’t

bother calling Stonie back because at this point I was on my way to her house to pick her up

I was now pulling up in front of her house, honking the horn for her to come outside.

“So where are you going tonight? You never answered that question.

“That’s because you was rushing me off the phone earlier, but I’m going out with James.”

“Who is James?

“That boy at the party”

“Which one?” I asked anxiously.

“You remember the one you was talking to last night?”

“YES! Why ?” I asked, hoping she wasn’t talking about him.

“Well, his friend asked me out.”

“Did he ask you before or after you was drunk?” I asked laughing.

“Not funny, but you should come with us, Call his friend.

“ I don’t have his number. I have to wait until he contact me.

While we were in mall I got a text message from this unknown

number that said,

-How did you sleep last night? I assume that it was the guy from the party.

-Fine, who is this? I replied back.

- This is Anthony, your future husband. The guy from the party, I don’t think I told you my name.

- Oh. Hi Anthony!

-What are you doing tonight, do you want to go out tonight?

-Yes, sure where we going?

- It’ a surprise. I am going to call you at 7pm. For the rest of the time at the mall I was just

smiling and happy because he called me. So I decided to buy some new shoes. I didn’t need to buy a

whole new outfit because I had just went shopping another day. After we left the mall we went

let’s go get our nails done. After getting our nails done I dropped Stonie off at her house and went

home to take a nap until he called me.

5:30pm.

It was two in a half hour until I see him, I started to get dress because I know it

takes me very long to get dress. It was going on 7:30pm I was wondering if he was going to

call me at all. I didn’t want to call him to make it seem like I was bugging. So I waited for his call.

7:45pm He finally called and told me that he’s on his way and sorry it took him so long to call me and

for me to be outside in a 5 minutes, I was thinking to myself how he know I was still waiting on him it

was almost 8:00pm I could of left i was thinking he wasn’t coming no more.

I started to get butterflies just the thought of us being together gets me so excited, I wondered if

he felt the same way.

He finally arrived, I walked outside into his car, he told me he missed me and he also apologized

again for taking so long. He told me I looked pretty. No wait, he told me I was beautiful. I

remember every word he said to me on that first date of ours. I was so shy that my favorite

song came on and I didn’t even sing along with the radio that was playing in the car like I usually

do. We pulled up in front of this nice looking restaurant with fire sticks that was use for lights

outside at night and big and small round marble tables with all different types of colors. He

stepped out of the car before I was even able to open the door to let myself out he ran to my

side to open the door for me. He guided me to the doors holding my hands and told me the real

reason he took long is because he was trying to make us reservations here. This man walked up

to us and said,

“Hello Anthony, right this way follow me.” He showed us to our table, when we got to our table

he pulled the chair out for me to seat in it as the waiter gave us our menus to choose our food.

He started smiling and asked me,

“Do you like it?”

“Yes it’s very nice,” I replied.

“So what do you like to do?” he asked.

“Well, when I get out of school I go to work and when I don’t have to work I kick it with my

friends, going to parties and going to the mall I also like to watch football with my family.”

“Where do you work? Didn’t know you work,” he asked.

“ I work at this clothes store called Bebe, what do you like do?”

“Well, I go to school and I work part time at home depot. I like to play football and go to

Parties,” he said.

“Why don’t you have a boyfriend? Or do you?”

“No I don’t, because I’m too busy for one.”

“Well, you are going to make time for me,” he said smiling.

“When do you go back to L.A?” I asked curiously.”

“Jan. 11^th, that is when our winter break is over.”

“We go back to school on the 5^th of January,” I said.

“Well we have time to kick it together, he said. We ordered our food, after we were

done eating we sat there and talked for hours we realized we were almost the only couple there so we

got ready to go he took me home and walked me to my door. He stared into my eyes I felt this filling in

my stomach that I never felt before he said to me this he feel like I been knowing forever, It was like he

took the feelings right off my body, because I felt the same way like I been knowing him or like I been

waiting on this feeling he gives me for a long time. He walked away and told me he will call me when he

get home. As he pulled off I walked into the house and close the door. He was all I could think about.

He called me that night we talked until we both fell asleep on the phone. We spent every day

with one another until it was almost time for him to go back to college.

After 3weeks of dating It was almost time for him to leave, I decided to let him meet my

parents for the first time, the most important people in my life I just knew my dad was going to have a

hard time of accepted him because my dad is so over protected it was been so hard for me to talk to my

dad about relationship because he know how hurt a man can do to a woman. He always told me and my

sister that he want us to be with man that’s like himself because he treated my mommy like a queen

always spent time with her got her everything she wanted never ask for anything in return (but of course

my mommy treated him like a king.) they been together since middle school, teenage years. Every time I

mention a boyfriend to my dad he always say “I will kill him!” meaning if he hurts me he will kill him,”

with a serious face expression.

My mom cooks big dinner every other Sunday and Anthony was leaving that Tuesday after. He

agreed to meeting my parents he was a little scared but we both knew he’ll have to do it one day.

When Sunday came I cleaned up the house over and over again, because I was so nervous for him to

meet my daddy. When Anthony got here my dad wasn’t here at that moment so got to talk to my mom

first, they got along great just like I thought. When my dad finally arrived, his plate of food was already

hot and ready. When my dad walked in it became completely silent all you can hear was my daddy voice,

“Hello, you must be Anthony, my name is Kenneth?” my dad said with a deep voice.

“Yes I am”

“So you really like my daughter?”

“Yes, I do,” he answered quickly.

“Come walk and talk with me,” my dad said walking out the front door and Anthony followed.

Soon as the door shut behind them I ran to the window to see where they going. My mom told me not

to worried about it and come eat at the dinner table and wait until they get back. I paced back and forth

for like 10 minutes then finally sat down and made me a plate after 30mins Anthony and my dad came

walking in laughing. Me and my mom looked at each other as if something was wrong I pulled Anthony

to the side and asked him what did him and my dad talk about he told me “nothing and everything is

okay and whispered in my ear and said, “you are going to be my wife.” He walked to the dinner

table and sat down to ate. For the rest of the night him and my parents laughed and joked, at that

moment there I just knew I loved him because I never felt this way about someone when he hurt I’m

hurt he takes the pain away just by him smiling he know how to make me smile and laugh. We made it

through everything all arguments, our distance relationship. When I graduated from high school and

went to college he was there. We moved in together in my junior year of college. He told me I’m his

everything, his world, his air he breathe and he can’t be without me. Nothing or nobody came between

us. Were like bonnie and Clyde of 2010. He did everything for me he sent me flowers to my job every

day to make me smile. It was something about this love it never dies.