In retrospect, falling in love helped me to discover who I am. I found myself, lost in the continually growing, dense forest of emotion, that her love has wrapped around my soul. Falling for Savannah Reneé was completely and totally uncontrollably consuming. She’s beautiful like sunshine and lightning bugs. She struck such a chord in me that you could have caught me humming to the tune of her laugh any given day. She started this forest fire deep within the crevices of who I am and every single day no matter what was thrown at it, this fire refused to be extinguished. I can't imagine a life without this fire, burning deep inside of who I am. Love is composed of a single soul, inhabiting two bodies. I truly believe that young love is love in its purest, rawest, most intense, most passionate form. There is nothing more explosive than when you fall in love with someone for the microscopic details of who they are. The way her overgrown bangs fall against her cheeks, the noises she makes as she falls asleep, the miniscule things. Every aspect of who she is, that no one, including herself, notices, but I could write novels about them and never do these details justice.

    Looking into her eyes, I subconsciously began debating whether they were a deep mahogany, or a luscious velvety caramel color. She wasn’t paying attention, but I was absorbing every detail of her and her surroundings. Her shirt was violet and had diamond shapes overlapping one another the way layers tend to do. She developed this melancholy look on her face, the one she gets when she concentrates and it felt as if the world stopped moving. In such a way that her facial expression had the capability to depict how rapid the earth shifts. Then, what

came next was remarkable. The way her lips lifted upward, and her dimple poked its way out, like a squirrel poking through the melting snow after a long hibernation. The warm glow her happiness gave. Her smile was a ray of sunshine, and I was a sunburn. Her smile was intoxicating and I have always been undeniably intoxicated by it.

     "Hey, baby?" I spoke softly, afraid of squandering away at the intoxication.

"Yes?" Her voice was fragile yet somehow strong.

"I'm in love with you, Savannah Reneé Woodward." I said, completely confident in my feelings for her. The smile I got in return, I wish I could have captured a million photographs of. Her cheeks immediately started to redden, she was radiating such an innocent happiness.

"Really?" She asked, high pitched, as tears were forming in the corners of her eyes. "Yes, baby. I always have been." She in turn, hid her face in her overgrown bangs. Trying to hide the monumental smile bestowed upon her face.

"I'm in love with you, too." She said, fast, as if taking her time would ruin the moment. It was my turn to obtain my own gigantic smile. Something inside me let go that day.

     In an instant I had let her love quilt itself into my skin and seep into my veins. Creep into the forgotten corners of my soul, and overcome any danger that was locked inside of who I was. Who I was, and who I am, are different people. Because of one thing; Savannah Reneé.