First Kiss Age 13

It was a national holiday and we decided to drive back to my husband's hometown to spend the holidays. One day before we left, my husband's childhood crush came crying to him that she had not managed to buy train tickets home. My husband immediately decided to let her have my seat in the car and insisted that I take the train instead. I looked at him in disbelief. There was shock in my eyes. Even my son insisted I take the train. "Mommy, Aunt Rosie is so pretty. How could you make her take the train?" I did not argue. I booked my train ticket right in front of them. However, it was to my own hometown. I no longer wanted a biased husband and a disloyal son.

When the yacht was sinking, and only one spot was left on the lifeboat, Hendrix Zuckerman chose me. I was rescued, but Yana Bridgeton didn’t make it. She couldn’t wait for the second lifeboat and drowned in the ocean, her body lost forever. Hendrix pretended not to care and went through with our wedding as planned. For five years after our marriage, he trampled me into the dirt, blaming me for Yana's death. When I couldn't take it any longer and wanted a divorce, he decided to die with me. When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day the yacht accident happened. This time, I’ve decided to give the chance to survive to the one he loves most.

When I had only three months left to live after taking the cursed blade meant for my husband Lucian, his first love Lily returned. When I endured the pain and prepared a dinner to commemorate our anniversary, he did not come back, he was having a steamy car session with Lily. When I went to the hospital alone to buy medicine, he was accompanying Lili for her pregnancy check-up. I pretended not to have noticed, I just silently played the role of a perfect wife, and wrote him four letters as a gift for our anniversary. After I die, he saw the gifts I left behind and went completely insane.

The emergency center I worked in went haywire as the typhoon closed in on our town. That night, my husband’s first love made seven emergency calls in a row to me. However, she did not say anything when I picked up. By the eighth call, I thought it was a prank caller, so I gave them a piece of my mind. Then, I heard my husband’s angry voice. “Melinda! This is the eighth time Sadie's called you for help! Haven’t you made her suffer enough?!” After that fiasco, he decided to avenge Sadie by taping my mouth, tying my wrists and legs up, and throwing me into our basement for three whole days, despite it being flooded with seawater, I begged for mercy, but it was to no avail. “You knew Sadie couldn’t talk because she hurt her throat, yet you still hung up on her! I'm going to make sure you feel the same hopelessness she felt!" Those three days left me with a collection of severe infections. I ended up having to remove my kidney. Even after all that, that man still had the gall to kneel by my bed and beg me to give him another chance.

My husband, Mark Thompson, and I went hiking. After eating some wild berries I picked, he was poisoned and died. When I got home, a woman named Sarah Miller and her son, Tommy Miller, showed up at my door. It turned out Mark had given them our house and car. On top of that, he owed them a huge amount of money. I ended up giving them all the savings I had. To care for my sick mother-in-law, Judith Thompson, I worked three jobs. I was surviving on basic meals like bread and butter. After years of exhausting work, I collapsed in the hospital. Judith told the doctors to stop my treatment. Just as I was about to die, Mark walked into the ward with Sarah and Tommy in his arms. He tossed five dollars at me. “Thanks for taking care of my mom all these years.” That was when I realized Mark had faked his death just to be with Sarah and their love child. When I opened my eyes again, I was back to the day we went hiking together.

Age is just a number. Or at least that's what Maxwell Cooper thinks whenever he hits on his best friend's mother, Amanda, who is very much divorced and extremely attractive in his eyes. Amanda, highly aware of the obvious infatuation that Maxwell has on her, tries to avoid his advances towards her given their conflicting age differences. She speculates that Maxwell's attraction towards older women is deeply rooted to fact that he might just have some 'Mommy issues'. Maxwell refutes the hypothesis by claiming that he's only attracted to her , not older women in general. Both are put to the test when Amanda , returning from yet another failed date one night, runs into Maxwell who notices the tears in her eyes and proceeds to comfort her. This leads to her inviting her to her house which would be a convenient move seeing as Zac, Maxwell's best friend and Amanda's son, had gone to visit his father in New York for the weekend, leaving her alone for the weekend. They end up sharing a bottle of wine, getting drunk while reminiscing on the simpler days. A kiss is shared during the vulnerable moment between these two, which would lead to regrets and broken friendships.

"Can I kiss you?" Asked Mr. Harold, the Mathematics teacher who has been the subject of lusty daydreaming of my best friend, Zetta, and other female students. “Eh? Nooooo!” I answered nervously. We are in the gym. "Why?" He asked he dared to ask?! Duh! "You are a teacher and I am your student...duh." I take it as my way out of the gym. He asked me to talk inside the building?! Huh... I should know better, than not trusting any human with a penis! Why? Because they are the real pervert. That teacher dared to ask for a kiss? He is granted for a great punch, kicks or maybe slap? That was the very first time of my nightmare in high school, he stole my first kiss and stole my great-teen-life.

My life was about to be complicated. Meeting a stupidly hot guy after a missed flight, and a kiss that left me dizzy. We agreed: no names, no numbers. Just a hot make out session and goodbye. But when I start my dream job the next week, guess who’s sitting behind the Managers desk? Yep. The airport stranger. Now he’s Mr. Thatcher… aka my boss. Worse? He’s older and engaged. I know I’m not supposed to be thinking about that kiss especially when I’m supposed to be working, but my brain still hasn’t gotten the memo. Office meetings just got a lot more complicated…..

Empty vessels make the most noise, and men who fit that description to a tee hardly make for suitable partners. When Corinne had to go on a blind date with someone like that, she did the unthinkable simply to show her disinterest in him—she kissed a handsome older man whom she had never met before. "I hereby pledge myself to you," the older man vowed. If a single kiss from her was all it took for him to devote himself to her, would a second kiss entail much more? There was only one way for Corinne to find out…

She's an outcast, thrown away by the only people she's ever known. Rejected, humiliated, destined to be sold to monsters. He's a loner. Bounty Hunter. Determined to never mate, never feel, never love. But fate has other plans for the two of them.