Have you ever forgotten how loud the sound of silence could be? Like when the world finally shuts up, the silence feels incredibly loud? That was what it felt like walking through the museum with Aiden. The sounds of steps and breathing were the only thing to interrupt the moments of silence that filled each room.

I had missed quiet. The kind of quiet that cleared your head and left no room for anything other than bare, vulnerable honesty. The world filled us with distractions. With noise. And normally I leaned into the noise, not wishing to hear my own thoughts. Afraid of what they would say. But with silence, I felt a new type of peace wash over me as I walked in silence with Aiden, soaking in the beauty that had been brought in from around the world.

It was a comfortable silence that fell between us as we moved from room to room. Taking in all the pieces. Statues, paintings, and pieces of history covered every inch of free space, throwing us into different parts of the world.

"Have you always lived in Los Angeles?" Aiden asked, surprising me as we walked up to a large Sauropod dinosaur skeleton.

I stared up at the overwhelmingly large dinosaur skeleton on display, taking a beat to organize my words. The personal question felt out of character for him. "No."

I paused, trying to decide how much to share. "I lived in LA until my parents died." I traced the nameplate below the dinosaur, deep in thought. "I moved in with my aunt in Newport Beach after that. She wasn't very... maternal. So when the school year ended, and it was time to go into my senior year, she sent me off to boarding school in Northern California in the middle of the woods."

I moved to stare up at a skeleton of a Theropod, thinking about how if it came to life, it would look just like a zombie dinosaur straight out of Night at the Museum. "I wrote a lot while I was there. Everyone had been there for years, so..." Flashes of sitting alone in the forest, writing a very messy first draft of Seapunk Princess filled my mind. "I got a lot of writing done."

I continued to one end of the display room, taking in a large Jurrasic period tapestry. Angry dinosaurs fought, each baring teeth and claws, desperate to become the dominant ruler of them all.

A small animal stood in the center of the image, terrified. "Some of the students from my previous school sent my short story assignment into a magazine... and they published it. That's how Sanders found me. So I had something to focus on. It kept me focused and helped me get through that final year of school."

I turned and offered up an awkward shrug to Aiden who stood watching me. "When I graduated I moved back to Los Angeles and got four roommates. Three of them were some of the girls from my first high school who moved in together, hoping to make it as actresses."

I laughed, remembering how loud, boisterous and nosey they were. "It was hard to get anything done so once my book was out and the publisher wanted to buy the second two books, I got my own place. I needed room to write and the rest is history. Being back in Los Angeles made me feel close to my parents. So I've been there ever since..."

I suddenly stopped talking, realizing he had asked a very simple question and I had just talked for the past five minutes without taking a breath. "Um... so no, I haven't always lived in Los Angeles." Great job Laliana, gold star.

"Tell me about your parents," Aiden replied, unfazed by my monologue.

We moved into an observatory. Stars were painted on the ceiling, glistening brightly in the otherwise dim room. A large display of planets filled the room, giving the illusion of walking across the galaxy. Twinkle lights and mirrors filled the walls, making the room feel vast and endless.

"My dad was a professor. He taught Shakespeare and poetry," I said, thinking of my father's kind dark eyes that always seemed to twinkle with delight when he quoted his favorite poem to my mother. William Shakespeare's Sonnet 116.

I closed my eyes, quoting the words along with my father, remembering how he would look directly at my mother and say them to her, a promise to love her forever. A promise he had taken and put into his wedding vows.

"Let me not to the marriage of true minds

Admit impediments. Love is not love

Which alters when it alteration finds,

Or bends with the remover to remove—"

Aiden joined me, quoting the sonnet from memory, his words in sync with mine.

"O no! it is an ever-fixed mark

That looks on tempests and is never shaken;

It is the star to every wand'ring bark,

Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks

Within his bending sickle's compass come;

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,

But bears it out even to the edge of doom.

If this be error and upon me prov'd,

I never writ, nor no man ever lov'd."

We stared at each other for a beat, the silence deafening in the quiet darkness. Aiden looked away first, staring up at the painted ceiling, his eyes distant as he swallowed. "One of the best poems Shakespeare ever wrote."

I looked down at the ground and smiled to myself as I thought of my parents. "It was my father's favorite. He met my mom when he walked into his local library and saw her behind the counter. He went back every day for two months, checking out every type of book imaginable until he gained the courage to ask her out."

"How'd they die?"

I sighed, the memory crashing into the tapestry of happy memories I had woven in my mind moments before and sending the shards flying into the darkness. My words felt too loud in the museum. "A car crash."

I traced a pattern with my boot. "It was instant. They were a block away from home when a guy pulled out of a parking lot, T-boning their car... when my school bus went by the police cars... I had no idea it was them."

I wrapped my arms around myself, "Why are you asking me all these questions?"

Aiden shoved his hands into his dark jean pockets. "I'm not your bodyguard anymore." The words sounded heavy. Final. Full of purpose and promise. A strange energy woven into the sentence. A meaning I couldn't quite grasp.

I raised a brow. "So?"

"So..." he continued. "You mentioned that you didn't like how little I talk to you. And since this is supposed to be a date... I thought I would work on that."

I tried to ignore the happy cheering butterflies that threatened to overtake my body and make me beam. I refused to let them control me even though his words made it very tempting to do so. "If you actually want to work on that, then shouldn't you be the one doing the talking?" I laughed. "You've listened to me talk for the last half hour."

"Okay," Aiden said, his eyes serious, taking on a dark air of mystery and determination. "Ask me anything Laliana Summers."

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If you had to tell someone you loved them, where would be the perfect place to do it?