Strawberry Wine (Winner of The Write Affair) | ✔️

Chapter 1

This is an older work and unedited.

*WARNING: If you're reading Strawberry Wine anywhere other than W A T T P A D, then the website you are on has stolen this manuscript from me and you are likely at risk of a malware attack. PLEASE REPORT! If you wish to read my story in its original, safe form, please go to Wattpad where you can find it (along with millions of others) for FREE.*         

Hello Wattpad friends! Wattpad and Kensington Publishing have invited me to re-post the original unedited first draft of Strawberry Wine, winner of the The Write Affair contest! You'll get to read Jake and Addy's love story as it first appeared on Wattpad. The much longer revised version is available now in bookstores and online! If you enjoyed this version you won't want to miss that! And please add this to your library so you can be notified of bonus chapters from Jake's POV!

Chapter 1

Jake... 

His name came to me again, this time as I shopped for wedding dresses with my soon to be matron-of-honor.

Always on my mind.

The slightest reminder of him still caused my heart to skip a beat. How is that possible after all these years?

The chiseled features, those eyes, that body... And enough charm to bewitch even the most seasoned female. Jake was the complete package--and then some. It's no wonder he had gotten under my skin.

Once again, Ruby and I began the task of searching through dresses. I wasn't entirely sure what I was searching for, but I trusted I would know the instant I found it.

"Oh, Addy! This one is absolutely gorgeous!" Ruby Sinclair-Matthews exclaimed, jarring me from my reflection and holding up an showy sheath with lots of built-in bling.

I wrinkled my nose. "That's more your style, Ruby. It would look silly on me." My best friend always did have a flare for flamboyant clothing, but that just wasn't my taste. I preferred something simple, something that felt good when I wore it, like an old pair of jeans. Above all, I wanted to feel beautiful on what would be the most important day of my life.

I continued to browse through dresses, distracted, as memories from the past played through my mind.

Jake Grady was every eighteen-year-old girl's wildest dream. Tall and broad shouldered, with dark wavy hair that toppled carelessly over his tanned forehead, and piercing blue eyes that crinkled at the corners every time his lips curved into that sexy smile. He had the easy confidence of a man who had grown up knowing he was attractive, yet modest enough to not come across as arrogant. Combine those swoon-worthy qualities with some well-developed muscles and a cowboy hat, and you've got the first guy I ever fell in love with.

Sounds like a heartbreak waiting to happen, right? Come to think of it, I don't know many who can say their first love didn't end in heartbreak. Other than my grandparents, but that's another story entirely.

Summer had just begun and I had plans to make it my best vacation ever. Come August, the chaos of college applications and essays would begin, along with researching scholarships and grants and the unending deadlines that would inevitably follow. I felt I owed it to myself to get in as much fun time as possible while I didn't have the responsibilities of higher education looming overhead. Basically, my summer agenda consisted of lazy days at the lake, bonfires at night, and a whole lot of living in between.

Jake spent the summer I turned eighteen employed at my family's farm. He was going to be starting his junior year at the University of Houston in the fall and was hoping to spend his time off working and saving money. Shoveling horse manure wasn't a glamorous job by any means, but it paid the bills, and his scholarships only went so far.