Page 23 of Feels Like Coming Home

Please, we can meet when it’s good for you if you’re too busy now. I just really want to see you.

I miss you.

He sent the second text right after the first and I was hit immediately with the feeling I have been avoiding for so long.

The feeling of how much I missed him too.

I chewed on my cheek harder now, surely about to draw blood, when I decided on what I should do.

Do you have practice or training tomorrow?

It was the off-season so I didn’t think he did, but Cam sometimes put in extra practice even when he didn’t have to.

Not tomorrow no, what are ya thinkin’?

Meet me tomorrow after school at Haywards Park at 4PM. We’ll go for a walk.

It’s a date Jones.

It’s definitely not Johnson. Now leave me alone so I can finish this paper.

He didn’t answer, respecting my wishes to be left alone. I went back and reread all our messages. He called me Jones. He hadn’t called me Jones in a long time and even just reading it again made me smile.

He also called tomorrow adate. While I knew he had called it that to be funny, I knew that my heart wished it was one.

I pulledinto the parking lot a few minutes early and checked myself in the mirror. I had my hair pulled back into a ponytail and was wearing a long-sleeved striped top with plain black leggings and white sneakers.

I ran home after school to change into something better for a walk and let my mom know where I was going. She was ecstatic to hear Cam and I were speaking again and told me to have fun and make good choices. Her voice turned up as she finished the sentence as if to indicate something might happen on our walk.

My mom knew that I was in love with Cam even though I had never come out and said it. That’s why she was so surprised when I told her we weren’t speaking anymore a few months back. But true to form, she didn’t push it. That’s one thing I loved about my mother, she knew when to push and when to leave things alone. Cam was always a topic she left alone and I was grateful for it.

As I was pulling the strands of my ponytail apart to make it rise on my head, I saw a car pull up next to me in my periphery and looked into its driver’s side window.

A small gasp escaped my mouth when I saw him. It’s not that I hadn’t seen him at school the last few months, but every time I looked at him I was bogged down by sadness and disappointment, knowing I couldn’t walk up to him, call him Johnson, and say something smart.

Something about today felt like we were turning over a new leaf and things would be different. I was excited to see him and couldn’t wait to be with him. My cheeks flushed as I thought about it. I shook my head and rubbed my cheeks, hoping that doing so would dissipate the blood that had just rushed there, and stepped out of the car.

“Jones.”

“Johnson.” It was like no time had passed as we made our introductions just like we had for years. I looked at Cam from top to bottom and started laughing when I saw that he was wearing jeans.

“What are you laughing at?” He looked down at his clothes, checking to make sure his fly wasn’t down or he didn’t have toothpaste on his shirt.

“I’m laughing at the big idiot who worejeansto go for a walk in the middle of a warm spring afternoon! Aren’t you going to be uncomfortable in those?” I pointed to his pants and rolled my eyes.

“What’s wrong with jeans? They look good on me, don’t you think?” He gave me his signature smirk and I felt butterflies take flight in my belly and the urge to punch him all at once. He was being very cocky for a guy who had just iced me out the last four months.

Yes, they do look good on you and your ass looks amazing in them but I’m not going to tell you that.

“You look like you, Cam, just like you always have.”

He rolled his eyes and stuck his fingers in his front pockets.

“So, where we goin’? This was your idea, so you’re in charge.”I like the sound of that, I thought to myself as I walked toward the entrance of the park.

“We’re going for a walk. Come along now.” I walked away not even checking to see if he was going to follow me. When I heard the leaves crunching under his feet, I knew he was and smiled to myself. We walked in silence for almost twenty minutes before I heard him take a big inhale and then sigh loudly.

“Something wrong?” I kept moving, hardly glancing over my shoulder to look at him while also trying to watch where I was going so I didn’t trip and fall. I was trying to be cool and the last thing I wanted to do was bust my ass on an exposed root.

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