I went on a first date with my now husband at 18. I'd been on dates before but they (being teenager dates) were always pretty awkward, even if we liked each other and we're doing fun things.
The thing about this date was that, it was kind of weird and seemed like it shouldn't go well. First, I was waiting outside for him to pick me up. He asked if he should introduce himself to my family, and I said no because I had a bad family situation and it wouldn't be beneficial for anyone to do that, but I thanked him for asking. He immediately was fine and we drove to the restaurant.
I complimented the stickers on his console, they were for some rock bands and looked cool. He thanked me and said normally people just compliment the car because it was a Corvette and didn't like his stickers. I had no idea what kind of car it was and apologized but he said it was fine, the car was a handmedown from his brother so he didn't care about it and liked that I liked them.
We get to the restaurant and I warn him, embarrassed, that I'm a messy eater. I don't mean to be, in fact I try very hard to be careful, but I've always a bit of a disconnect between my hands and mouth, and always end up with a bit of sauce on my shirt (I didn't know it then, but I know now I have ADHD). He said that was cool and wasn't judgy at all, even when my tomato fell off my BLT into my lap, and we laughed about it together.
After a bit of small talk, he said he likes to be direct and of it's ok if he asks more personal questions about what we want out of life and stuff. I was thrilled, I hate the "waiting several dates before talking about serious stuff" thing because it always felt like a waste of time. We talked about religion (none for both) marriage (maybe but not for a while), kids (no for both), life goals (both to find nice, relaxing jobs to make enough to focus on hobbies and some travel), politics (left leaning). We weren't the same in every way though, when it came to hobbies I like reading, movies and crafting. He liked video games, d&d and coding. We both were very interested in the others hobbies as well. I felt really at ease with him, even when I had answers he didn't quite agree with, he was very interested in what I had to say.
When we leave, we had planned to hang out at a park after but it was raining. As we were walking to the car, he paused and said "Ive never kissed someone in rain before". I was blown away at how romantic it felt and we had a perfect, sweet kiss.
We hang out in the car a bit longer before he dropped me back at home. He thanked me for a wonderful time and kissed me again (again sweet and not asking for more). I was giddy, once inside I immediately called my best friend to gush about it. She thought the date sounded weird, but was happy for me. I then said I really wanted to text him *right then* because I liked him so much. My friend was horrified, and said I couldn't text until at least tomorrow and to preferably wait for him, or else I would seem desperate. Literally not 5 minutes late while still talking to her, I get a text from him saying "I think I'm supposed to wait longer before texting, but I couldn't help it, I just wanted to tell you again what a good time I had".
It all felt so magical, not because it looked like something in a movie, but because it looked exactly how I would write a romance for me. 10 years later, we are still incredibly happy together.