He sat up and said, "Well, I know that if I tell you, it'll hurt you more than help you, please believe me when I say it. It's going to take a lot more than words to make you believe me as far as my changing my ways goes."

I looked at him quizzically, "What do you mean?"

His shoulders dropped and he realized that I really had to know: if he wanted it to be right and honest and for it to mean something, he had to tell me, no matter what. "I have this thing where I think that people need to be…saved…from themselves, like." I nodded for him to go on and he closed his eyes, continuing, "It's like, I can see that they're just…bad people. They harm other people, themselves - they just can't live anymore. So I take it upon myself to end their lives."

I didn't quite get it, so I asked, "Like a mercy killing? Angel of death, like those people in the hospital who give dying people shots to kill them?"

He nodded, like no one had ever understood him and it was like a ray of hope. "Exactly. But they just don't see it coming, I guess."

"So you kill people who deserve to die. By whose standards?" I asked. It made sense to me, but it was, I admitted to myself, a little creepy. He was a murderer. But it seemed justified.

He shrugged, "Mine, mostly. But I think about it like this: if I were this person, would I want to be like this? Does the world need another thief or another mugger, or another asshole who makes his waitresses work way more hours than they should," he looked at me for a kind of approval, afraid of my reaction.

I gasped and stood up from the bed, tearing my hand away from his, "You killed Don?"

He stood up and put his hands out before him and rushed, "No, well…yeah. But he deserved it. He was a dishonest, bad person. The world shouldn't have someone like that in it. People don't deserve to be treated like how he treated them. You know that, he treated you like a slave, Jessica," he softened and actually made sense to me.

As crazy as it felt to believe him, I believed him. People who put dogs to sleep because they were trained to be violent, like those fighting pit bulls: they weren't murderers; they were just doing a job. What made it different if it were people? Convicted thieves and murderers and rapists were being executed all the time, and the executioners weren't killers by the public's standards. They were simply executioners.

Looking back at him, I saw the desperation in his eyes, and he spoke in the same manner, "Please… that's why I say it's going to take a lot more for you to believe me. When I say that you make me want to change, it's going to be difficult to prove it to you. It's not my place to judge these people and decide who should live and who should die. That's not my decision."

I looked back at him and saw an honest man, a man who, yes, had some problems, but didn't I have problems too?

"I know that I need help, and I just started seeing a therapist last week, but it's going to be difficult to find a therapist that will believe me and not just turn me in to the police. So it's like, I know I have problems, I am getting help, the doctor prescribed me some medicine, and that's all I can do. That's the only proof I have for you." He spoke like he'd been planning this out, and I thought that maybe he had been. He was quiet the whole day, at IHOP, he just listened to me, to my stories about moving all around the state and traveling and what not.

He was right about being able to prove it to me: that would take a lot more than him saying a few words. Anyone can say something and not mean it, that's easy. But he admitted to having a problem, and not a lot of people could do that. Hell, it took me at least 10 years to realize there was something wrong with me, then another 3 to say the words "I have a problem" and get actual therapy.

I looked him in the eyes and sat down on the bed, motioning for him to follow. When he sat down and looked down at his shoes, I replied, "Vann, I know you think it's going to take more than just words to prove it to me, but I believe you. My heart tells me to believe you, and so I do."

He looked up and his eyes lit up with his new smile, "Are you serious? God, that's great, Jess, thank you, that's amazing!"

I reached out my hand to his and he took it carefully in his, studying our hands as I went on, "I have emotional baggage too. Granted, I've never hurt anyone to the point of killing them, but I've had my own problems. You just make me feel like those problems are a thing of the past."

He covered my bandaged hand with his and I felt warm rays of happiness seep through my body, starting at my hands and working all the way to my feet and my head, making me a slight bit woozy. "Since you came into my life, you've made me realize this isn't the way I want to be. I want to be a regular person. I want to have a girlfriend and I want to rent an apartment, I want to have a dog and a steady job. You make me want to be a part of your life."

I looked into his eyes as he met mine and said, "Well, I want you to be a part of my life. I believe you, Vann." He smiled like I'd never seen him smile before and I finished, "I believe you."

**

So it was later on that evening, and the sun was beginning to set by the time we'd gotten to this point (it was about 6 or so at night). Vann asked me if he would go out with him later on that night to celebrate the fact that we'd both broken out of our vicious cycles of instability, and I wanted nothing more in the world than to do just that: celebrate.

He came back at around 9, and when I answered the door, I was amazed to see that he was holding a handful of wildflowers and dressed nicely, topped with the most amazing smile across his lips. He wore a dark blue button up shirt with khaki pants and a pair of nice dressy boots… Very handsome in my opinion. But then again, he'd looked stunning to me when I'd first met him when he was wearing just a t-shirt and old jeans. I wanted to impress him, so I had put on a deep red sweater with beige and white stripes, along with my black skirt, black sandals and my beige shawl that my grandmother had crocheted for me when I was younger. It was May in New Jersey, so it was still a little chilly when the sun went down.

"You look gorgeous," he said, wide eyed as he took me in. I blushed as he handed the flowers to me, saying, "I got these for you, they were growing off the highway there by the office to the motel here…They just looked so nice and I realized that you're supposed to have flowers for the girl on a first date, so…"

I took in their scent and smiled up at him, saying, "You're too much…thank you so much, Vann, they're beautiful. And you look so handsome tonight too." I reached out and touched his sleeve, feeling the sparks right through the soft cotton. He stuttered in his step and moved almost awkwardly towards me as he placed both hands on my waist.

His touch was like electricity, and I knew that he was leaning in to kiss me, but what I didn't know was how to react. I hadn't been this close, physically and emotionally, with a man in forever. I had been afraid to up until now. It was like a whole world was being opened up for me and I was almost afraid to explore it.

But as he looked down into my eyes (I was a few inches shorter than he was, perfect height to kiss, it seemed), I smiled and leaned into him, closing my eyes with him and just resting my lips against his. Fireworks shot off, shooting crazy colors all over my mind as he fell into familiarity and deepened the kiss slowly, exploring my mouth with his tongue.

Without even realizing it, I let out a small sigh of ecstasy and melted into his arms as he wrapped them around my back and tangled his fingers in my hair softly. He made the same sound, and I found it to be such a turn on that my hands moved without my even thinking about it to his cheek, where I brushed his soft skin with the fingertips of my good hand, feeling us dive deeper still into the kiss.

It was like there was no one else in the world at that moment, just the two of us, standing in that doorway, my shawl drooping off one shoulder, wildflowers dangling from my free hand and dropping to the floor to give me another arm to hold him with. The world could have ended right there and I would have been the most ecstatic person in the world. But it just seemed to get better still.

Just as I was about to pull away, Vann did so first, reluctantly but slowly, to say, "That was the most amazing thing I've ever felt." And with that, a smile spread across his lips that made me smile with him.

"It wasn't so bad on this end, either, Vann," I said, wrapping both arms around his waist and sighing in content.

He looked down and a little laugh escaped his lips as we made eye contact again: we'd shared our first kiss on our first date and we hadn't even left my room yet.

"Well, would you care to join me on a trip to Gianna's? It's this little Italian restaurant down the road a ways, it's great," he said, stroking my cheek gently and bringing another smile out of me.

"I would love that, Vann," I said, picking up the flowers and putting them on my table, "Lead the way." And as I straightened my shawl and grabbed my key, he offered his hand to me and I took it, being led down to his truck.

And so began our first date!