Twenty-nine.

It was the last day before Easter vacation. A whole week off school! A whole week with Madison Bell. The class finished up a lab assignment in Biology. Of course, I was done in the first five minutes and Madison was still working on hers in the final five.

“That one’s wrong,” I said, and pointed to the word box. “Use this term and then the rest should be easy.”

“Oh.”

Madison was having an off day. She was bored and sullen and working with her head on her desk. But I had such great plans! Why did today have to be a Dark Day, anyway? I’d have to ask her about it after school.

“Hey Mads.” Amanda sat down at our lab table, on the other side of my girlfriend, and looked over her paper. “Isn’t that one mitosis?”

I shook my head.

“Oh. Got that one wrong then. How are you doing, Madison?”

Madison smiled up at Amanda with her charming fake smile and did something I definitely didn’t expect. She told the truth.

“Not great, actually.”

Well, if that didn’t shock the holiday excitement right out of Amanda Simmons.

“Uh, what’s up?” she asked.

Madison shrugged. “I don’t like school very much, but it’s better than being home alone all week.”

“Well,” Amanda trailed off, “I’m going to the mall tomorrow with Claire. Want to go?”

Madison didn’t know what to say; I could see it in her eyes. Had she never been invited to the mall before? So instead of coming up with one answer, Madison seemed to give them all.

“Uh. Yeah. Um. Yes. Sure. Okay. Yep. Let’s do that.”

Well, it was a start.

Amanda and Madison exchanged contact information. For years, I thought they were best friends and they didn’t even have each other’s phone numbers. When the bell rang and Amanda left with a promise to text, Madison beamed up at me with renewed joy. I patted her on the head and ruffled her hair.

“See?” I told her. “It’s always better to tell someone how you feel.”

Honestly, I didn’t know what Madison was so worried about. Did she honestly think I wouldn’t be spending every minute with her over vacation? She was so naive sometimes.

When we got to Madison’s house that afternoon, I was betting on her parents being as absent as ever. They didn’t disappoint. I went to the trunk of my car and opened it up, pulling out a large white box decorated in purple ribbon. Madison - who had been in the middle of a sentence about her renewed interest in soccer - froze in place when she saw it.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“A gift.”

“For me?”

“Maybe.”

I led the way up the steps and waited for her to unlock the front door. How she managed to do so without taking her eyes off the box, I’ll never understand. After we’d taken off our shoes, Madison continued to follow me around the living room like a kitten asking for food. It wouldn’t do any good to wait, would it? I sighed.

“Here.”

“I don’t want it.” But there was no hiding the awe on her face when I pushed the box into her arms.

“Of course you do. Open it.”

“I know what it is! It was too expensive and I don’t want it!”

“That’s not something for a five year old to worry about, is it?”

I took her by the hand and sat her down on the sofa before giving her lips one soft, gentle kiss. Innocent, through and through. Then I put her hand - once in mine - on top of the bow.

“Open it.”

So Madison Bell opened her gift. Her cheeks filled up with rosy embarrassment and her eyes glittered like sand in sunlight. She knew what it was already, but that didn’t prepare her for holding the dress in her hands. It was a flowery pink with a round, flat collar. The sleeves puffed up and curled in on themselves and three small buttons decorated the chest. It was simple and boring and should have cost only a quarter of what it did. But it was perfect.

“Thank you,” Madison muttered under her breath, but I knew better than to take her volume as a show of her excitement.

“How about you try it on?” I asked her. “Let’s go up to your room.”

I took her hand before she could say anything at all and led the way upstairs. This was so different to the last time I’d treated Madison like a little girl. This time I knew what I was doing. This time I knew the words, I knew the actions to take. This time wasn’t guesswork, it was fact. But there was just one thing I was worried about…

I closed the door behind us and turned on her lamp in the corner. The blinds were still drawn and it gave the whole bedroom a warm glow. I took the dress from her - setting it on the bed - and ran my fingers along her cheeks, down her neck, and through the collar of her cardigan. With little more effort than that, I took it off for her.

She looked up at me with those same sparkling eyes, those same warm cheeks, those same glossy lips. I took a breath and kissed her on the forehead.

“You’re the prettiest girl in the whole world,” I told her in a whisper, and turned her around before I did something stupid.

I wondered sometimes who zipped up her sundresses in the morning. That day, though, there was no mystery as to who unzipped it. I thought it would be hard to avoid looking at Madison’s arms where little white lines intervened with her perfectly blended skin, but I found myself more distracted by the freckles on her shoulders and the lace on her bra straps.

“I can do it,” she told me, like I didn’t know. But this wasn’t about what she could and couldn’t do.

“Don’t be silly. Arms up.”

I lifted the hem of Madison’s dress without touching her thighs. I pulled it right up and over her head. I thought that would be the hard part, but it wasn’t. The hard part came after, when, for the first time, I saw my girlfriend in her underwear. I could only see her from the back, but she pulled her arms down over her chest all the same, covering the front of her bra. Her panties were decorated in stars, hugging her around the hips.

Oh damn…

I reached up and fiddled with the clasp on her bra, and hoped beyond hoped she didn’t feel the way my fingertips were shaking. I swear, these things were a lot easier to take off yourself than they were to take off someone else. Who designed bras anyway?

“Jamie, I can do this part.”

“Shush.” I had to whisper or my voice would quiver. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. The little hooks on the bra came undone and I reached for the dress on the bed. “Arms up.”

“Jamie, I—”

“Or you can stand around in your underwear.”

Neither of us would ever know who blushed deeper in that moment. Finally and reluctantly, Madison unfolded her arms and slid the straps off her shoulders, letting the bra fall to the floor. She put her hands up, level with her head, and I pulled the dress down over them. There was no zipper this time: just a bit of fussing and tugging, until, finally, the hem of the dress hid away Madison’s starry underwear. I could finally breathe again.

“Oh. My. God. Look at you!”

“Shut up!” Madison’s face burned like the sun. She puffed out her cheeks.

“You’re so cute!” The literal understatement of the year. Did she look like a five year old? Probably not. But she sure as hell didn’t look seventeen either. I fussed with the front of her dress and flattened it where it needed flattening. All my lust was immediately overwhelmed with satisfaction. Seeing her here, like this, and so happy… it was a more honest love than I could have ever imagined.

“I’m not cute,” Madison pouted.

“Are so,” I said simply, like there was no argument to be had. “Do you like the dress?”

She shrugged her shoulders, but the hints of a smile couldn't help but poke through. I watched them take her over, those hints, until it was a full on confession.

“Happy birthday, Maddie.”