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I just want to find myCindy.
I finally spot her. She’s wearing her backpack and chatting with a few friends, but when I see her everything else meltsaway.
“Cindy,” I say, stopping short when I get to her. She’s surprised to see me as she grabs the straps of her backpack and tells her friends she’ll be a minute. Her hair is still a little ruffled from this morning, pulled back into a low ponytail. Her jeans are laying low on her curvy hips and she’s wearing a button-down plaid shirt pulled tight across her chest. I want to rip it off of her. I want the buttons to fly everywhere. I don’t care. I won’t feel right until I hold heragain.
“Hey,” she says with a smile as she walks up to me. I pull her in for a hug and she blushes as she pulls away. Her nose and cheeks are flushed and dewey, the deep blush competing with her freckles for the prettiest part of her face. She lowers her voice. “What are you doing? These are my friends. They know mydad.”
I take her hands inmine.
“I need to talk toyou.”
A smile spreads on herlips.
“It couldn’twait?”
“No.”
“You couldn’t callme?”
“No.” I hand her her purse as I pull her aside. “Can we go somewhere totalk?”
“Oh. Um, sure. There’s a coffeeshop.”
I get a stepcloser.
“I was thinking somewhere a little moreprivate.”
Her eyes glimmer as she pokes my chest but I don’t feel it. My heart is pounding so fast, so thickly in my ears and my chest, that nothing else registers. I can’t focus on anything but her eyes and I can barelythink.
“Private?” she whispers. She slides her eyes left and right before locking them on me. “I never, ever do this, but I could skip class to come back to your place before yourflight.”
I take herchin.
“That’s not what I’m talking about.” Her lips slip open and she gives me a funny little look. “Okay, coffeeshop.”
It’s a short walk across campus. My mouth is dry and I’m sweating as we getinside.
“What do you want?” she goes into her backpack and pulls out acard.
“Nothing,” I say as I scan the place for the most private table available and pull her toward a booth in the corner, weaving through tables filled with students. I sit her down and can see the concern in her eyes. That’s not what I want. That’s not what I want at all. I reach out and take her hands, rubbing my thumbs across her knuckles. “There’s nothing wrong. Everything’sokay.”
Her facefalls.
“Everything’s okay? That’s the kind of thing you say when there’s been some kind of big accident but no one’s gravely injured. You say everything’s okay when someone’s broken a leg but got lucky that they didn’t break both of their legs. Oh no.” She gets closer. “Was it someone at the jobsite?”
“No,” I say, finding some levity in the situation. The glimmer in her eye tells me she’s just playing around. “Listen, the reason I wanted to talk to youis…”
“What is it?” she says softly. She gives me a half-smile. “Just tellme.”
“I…” I blow out a shaky breath as I run my hand through my hair. “I need you to wait forme.”
I look her dead in the eye as her shoulders soften. She reaches out to push my hair behind my ear. I don’t think anyone’s ever been this tender with me. She smiles and lets out a littlelaugh.
“I’ve already waited, Eli.” Her eyes flicker between my lips and my eyes. “I’ve always beenyours.”
My heart finally stops pounding. I feel like I can finally breathe for the first time in my whole life, like I’ve been holding my breath since the day I was born and it’s only now that I know what it feels like for my lungs to be full of oxygen, for my veins to be filled withblood.
I reach out and slide my hand behind her head and we meet in the middle of the table, our lips brushing together softly. I kiss her slowly and deeply as our fingers intertwine. I don’t take my lips off of hers as I stand and pull her to my side of the table, slide her legs over my lap, and pull her soft little body against mine. She smiles against mylips.
