Kissing Todd started this summer. I’ve known him since we were in diapers. We’ve grown up together in the same building. I’m often 12C’s lone inhabitant since Dad travels too much for his job with the Army Corps of Engineers. Todd’s across the hall in 12B with his mother, Margo. She’s Editor-in-Chief at a small publishing company founded by her parents that’s always in danger of being devoured by larger publishing houses.
This first paragraph feels very choppy and jarring. It also feels like an info dump. You're giving us all the details about the characters without really letting us meet the characters. You're telling us about your characters, rather than showing us.
This summer we volunteered at Safe Haven, a no-kill animal shelter. I’d love to say I’m filled with compassion for all God’s unwanted creatures but I graduate in nine months and community service is required. True to form, I started my hundred hours in June. Todd, always much smarter than me, showed up for his last twenty expertly filling the roles of moral support, comic relief and dog breed expert.
Still info dumping. Show us, don't tell us.
The Kiss (deserving of a capital ‘K’, it was that good) seemed like an accident. We’d just cleaned our last kennel. The August sun beat down deathly hot, both of us dirty and sweating like pigs, and this complete euphoria overtook me. I grabbed Todd in a big hug like I’ve done a thousand times since we’ve been alive and for some reason, we didn’t break apart so quickly.
Backed by a symphony of barking dogs, we kissed. And kissed some more. Until my lips were raw and my knees like melted butter.
We don’t talk about what made it happen.
We just keep doing it.
I feel like you're starting in the wrong place. (And starting with a flashback is cliche). I think this opening would be stronger if you started out with the kiss scene. The emotions, the feelings, the situation. Make us feel that first kiss with her. THEN bring us forward to where you are now. Intersperse the details of their past rather than throwing it all on the table on the first page.
That said, your writing is clean and I love your voice once you get to the kiss. But it's the telling vs showing and back story that loses me before you have a chance to hook me with your voice in that scene.
I agree with Shelley's comments. Your voice doesn't kick in until the kiss, but from there it's great. In the first 2 paragraphs the MC sounds too old, and I think the info you've got there could be spliced in elsewhere. The Kiss is definitely your hook in this first section!
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