A few days had passed and we were now halfway through our dreamy vacation. We had spent the past few days relaxing in the pool and on the beach and surprisingly hadn't relied on sex to fill our time. We hadn't done it for a while simply because we'd been so engrossed in other activities or simply exhausted. Aiden had been a little off today, I asked him what was wrong occasionally but he would assure me he was fine. I was excited for later though as Aiden said he had planned something special for dinner. He told me to dress smart but casual so I slipped on a casual blue, plain backless maxi dress and some heels. Aiden put on his long denim shorts that were incredibly tight and a shirt.
"I'll be back in 20 minutes okay, stay here? I just need to go downstairs and make sure everything's reserved." I gave him a quick kiss and he was gone. Downstairs? That must of meant he had a table ready in the downstairs restaurant, it was lovely but I didn't think it was something Aiden would class as 'special'. On my own in the room, I decided to step onto the balcony and feel the warm evening breeze, the sun was just starting to set and the beach was empty. It was soothing and for once in a long time I felt butterflies in my stomach. I was nervous? I didn't understand why, Aiden and I had always been together, but we had never had a proper date. As he said, 20 minutes later Aiden walked through the door greeting me on the balcony with a large red rose.
Great, I was blushing already.
"Oh my god, this is gorgeous" I was stunned at Aiden's thought towards tonight, he took my hand and began to lead me out the door. As we reached the entrance of the restaurant, I was even more confused when Aiden started pulling me out of the hotel. 'Okay?' I thought, a smile appearing on my face. This really was a surprise evening.
He led me out of the hotel and we began to walk along the promenade along the beach.
"Where are we going?" I asked nudging Aiden's side.
"Somewhere" He grinned, proud of himself but he seemed nervous too.
"Stop, I'm getting really nervous" I giggled. I was trying to act playful but inside I was crapping myself. We walked for another 10 minutes, until we reached a pier. I stood frozen in amazement as before me was the most romantic scene I could ever imagine. The pier was only half a mile long and right at the end I could see a flickering scene.
"Come on" Aiden whispered in my ear as he lead me up the pier, it was incredibly stable as it looked so old, beneath us I could see school's of fish swimming around, it was stunning. When we finally reached the end there was about 50 candles lit around the edge of the pier and in the centre was a large blanket with a picnic basket placed there. Aiden sat me down then sat down himself and for a moment he was gazing out behind me. With the touch of his hand he brushed my chin, turning my head. I had been so amazed and preoccupied with the amazing picnic that I hadn't noticed that we were on a pier, half a mile out to sea and behind me was the most amazing, the largest sunset I had ever seen. The sun shot red, pink and yellow rays through the sky that surrounded us and the rest of Florida. We watched for a few moments in silence until Aiden leaned over and kissed my bare back shocking me, I turned round and in his hand was a ring.
"What's this?" I asked, I was shaking now, so many thoughts were going through my mind. Was he asking me to marry him?
"A promise ring." Aiden looked lovingly at me as I gave him my hand and he slipped it on my wedding finger.
"A what?" I asked, I was confused but relieved he wasn't asking for my early hand in marriage.
"It's like a pre-engagement ring, it's a promise that I make to you that I will always be with you and that someday I hope I will marry you" Aiden looked to the ground clearly embarrassed when expressing his feelings. He had never said something so deep.
"I love it!" I hadn't taken my eyes off of it yet. It looked exactly like an engagement ring. It had one beautiful diamond in the centre and it looked like it was made out of white gold.
When I finally released my gaze from it, I looked up to Aiden's smiling face, getting up I pounced on him pushing him onto his back in surprise so I was on top. We laughed between kisses. As the sun began to set more sending now purple's throughout the sky, we blew out all the candles so we were now in complete darkness apart from the slowly disappearing sunlight and appearing moonlight. After a few minutes of kissing we continued to roll over switching who was on top. Clearly not realising how close we were to the edge, with one final rotation we fell off the pier and into the water a metre below.
We swam to the surface gasping for breath and clung onto the pier. We shared a look before bursting into laughter, we were so clumsy. My dress was pulling me down so I slipped it down my body and threw it onto the pier, Aiden did the same. We swum around for a while before heading back to the pier. It was dark but the closer we got it looked like a couple of people were standing on the pier near our setup.
"Aiden, who's that?" I breathed.
"I don't know, come on" Aiden began swimming ahead of me.
When we reached the pier there was an elderly couple looking around the pier and into the water where we were entering, suddenly the elderly woman noticed us.
"George, over there" She said pointing at us.
"Hello" The man called out to us, we reached the pier and Aiden, whilst treading water grabbed my waist and hoisted me up onto the pier, where the elderly man helped me up, the woman standing concerned. Aiden lifted himself up with ease and stood looking at the couple.
"Is something wrong?" Aiden broke the silence.
"We were walking along the beach and we saw you two fall in, we got here as fast as we could, although that's difficult at our age" She giggled, at that moment I realised that she had noticed that Aiden and I were in our underwear, I instantly covered myself by stepping behind Aiden, our clothes were soaked and in a heavy state so putting them on wasn't an option.
"Were fine thank-you, just an accident" Aiden chuckled.
"Is that a ring?" The elderly woman grinned as she noticed me fiddling with the promise ring Aiden had given me moments earlier.
"Oh, yes" I laughed as she took my hand to admire it, she was sweet and gentle. I noticed her ring too, she had obviously been married for a long time as the ring was a 1940's style ring, vintage. We briefly chatted about the ring while she summed up her amazing marriage to her husband for 50 years, George, who was halfway down the pier talking to Aiden, they looked like they were having a good time, laughing together in a manly style.
After saying goodbye Aiden and I packed up the candles and un-eaten food into the basket along with our clothes and began to walk back to the hotel. On the way we passed several boys, one of them was on the floor curled into a ball while the others shouted at him. Aiden stopped and held me tighter and all of a sudden one of the standing boys kicked the boy on the floor who appeared smaller than the rest. I gasped and Aiden let go of me and jogged towards the boys, I followed feeling the same desperation to stop them.
"Hey" I yelled when we reached them, then I recognised them, they were the boys from the lobby and the breakfast hall again, apart from half of the group was missing. Aiden pushed the boys chest, away from the boy on the ground who I was helping to his feet and I pushed behind me in a protective manor.
"Get out of my face" The boy growled at Aiden, he was slightly smaller so Aiden was more intimidating.
"No, you're hurting this poor guy and I don't even know who the hell you are or who the hell you think you are."
"I'll hurt you in a minute" The boy stepped closer, their faces were only millimetres apart.
I ran over and pushed them apart, keeping my eyes on Aiden the whole time who was getting really angry.
"I'll rip you apart before you hurt me" Aiden threatened. The boy looked at me and pulled my arm towards him, Aiden lashed and punched him straight in the nose, the boy crumbled and Aiden pulled me back behind him. The boy now had a broken nose. I had forgotten about the second boy this whole time, I turned around and he was just watching the whole scene. He had no balls, clearly. I walked over to the injured boy who only looked about 16 years old.
"Come on" I comforted, walking him to the sea where I knelt him down and washed his wounds with the warm salt water. I looked behind me and Aiden was walking over to us, leaving the second boy to nurse his friends nose. The injured boy looked more upset then angry, clearly regretting his actions.
I was hoping more than anything that the boy wouldn't want revenge.