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Nando’s standing at the curb holding the back door open while a skycap lugs my bags onto a cart.
And it’s now that I realize I’ve spent the remainder of the drive to Burbank airport with my phone pressed against my heart.
ChapterFive
Cian
I am a bundle of nerves as I stand in front of the mirror in my hotel room.
Everything is wrong.
My hair, my suit, this room.
None of this is worthy of a date with Serenity.
I booked a room at the hotel where the reunion is taking place, with the thought that maybe, just maybe, she’d ask to come up to my room afterward.
Presumptuous? Yes, but hotel rooms are like condoms. Better to be prepared. Yeah, I bought some of those after noticing my old, reliable stash was expired. And covered in dust to add insult to injury.
But, looking in the mirror, I decide there’s no way she’s coming home with this guy.
Downstairs, familiar faces mill around in the Buckeye Ballroom. No one seems to remember me until I open my mouth.
“Pardon me, could you direct me to the bar?” I ask one benign-seeming group of women crowding around a chocolate fountain. “Oh! You! You’re the Irish guy! I remember you!”
Here we go.
“Yes, yes, it’s me. Cian O’Connor. I’m very sorry, I don’t recall your name—”
No one cares that I don’t remember them, as they’re already quite tipsy.
“I was just telling Anna how you used to say the words for parking lot so cute. What was it again?”
“Uh, car park?”
Everyone squeals.
“Now say the word for sweater.”
“Jumper?”
They are too easily entertained by me. “So cute!”
Someone shouts, “Now say ‘thirty-three and a third!”
This could go on all night. I look down and check my phone. “I’m five minutes away!” Serenity texts.
Suddenly, my mood lightens.
“I’d better be off before your husbands all wonder what we’re doing over here,” I say to the chocolate fountain gang, nodding politely and backing away.
I make my way out into the hallway that separates the six large ballrooms. There appear to be at least three other events simultaneously, including two weddings and some motivational seminar.
I move to the grand lobby and wait by the fountain, pacing the tile floor like a groom waiting on his bride.
Finally, an unassuming, dad-like sedan pulls up. A man in his late fifties with the same hair color and skin tone as Serenity gets out, walks around, and holds open the back door. I remember him. He looks older and wizened but has the same kind eyes that I remember.
I’m so beside myself I can’t stand still. Like an out-of-body experience, I watch myself go outside and offer her my hand.
