The Tender Time: A Story of First Love

Denise Cass Brookman

Stephanie Rodgers is not beautiful, yet there is something special about her. She is tomboyish yet feminine. She is not interested in boys, and her first date has to be "arranged" by her family. The boy is Scott Parker. He is charmed by the sparkling transformation that takes place when Stephanie appears in her first formal.
And so it begins - the wonderful business of growing up, of leaving the tomboy behind and settling into the exciting routine of being Scott's girl...of Coke dates and pep rallies and wearing Scott's ring on a chain around her neck. If everything hadn't been so new, Stephanie would have realized that there is really nothing routine about romance. It is mostly up and down, pain and laughter, and always unpredictable. Her loyalty to Scott makes it difficult to see the unsettling truth but all the while it can be read in the quiet, patient eyes of Jim Stuart. For it is Jim, and her own level-headed judgment, that sustains Stephanie in the oftimes lonely process of growing up.