Page 39 of Secrets in Love
“I heard you were sick and thought…your baby.” She pointed to my belly. “I was wondering how far—”
“Yeah, I know what you’re wondering. I just can’t believe you’re asking.” Her meddlesome smile disappeared, and I went in for the kill. “Is hanging around restrooms and accosting ill women a hobby of yours, or did I just get lucky?”
She blushed from her giant boobs up. “There’s no need to be—”
“No need to be rude? No, you’re right. There is no need. There is no need at all. How do you know I didn’t just eat some bad Chinese? Or have the stomach flu? Imagine if I couldn’t have children, and you asked me that.”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t think—”
“No, you didn’t.” I threw my paper towel in the trash and charged away with my head held high. My feeling of righteousness lasted maybe ten steps before I realized I’d taken my nerves out on a silly but most likely harmless bystander. I saw her slink past me from the corner of my eye, and I moved to apologize. She saw me coming and squealed—actually squealed out loud—and ran. “I’m sorry!” I yelled after her, but she was gone, lost in a sea of nameless faces.
Okay, that was it. I had to get my shit together before Nate’s flight landed…if it ever bloody landed. Qantas flight number QF 4393 had been delayed three times. The ten pm arrival was initially pushed back to eleven, then eleven-thirty, and hopefully, finally, twelve forty-five. If you thought my yelling at the lady in the restroom was horrid, you should have seen me lose it at the insanely beautiful woman at the American Airlines desk.
“You cannot be serious! Twelve forty-five! You don’t understand. This guy has had the hots for me since I was a child!” She screwed up her face in disgust. “Oh, please. He was a child too. Don’t make it weird. So, tell me, what’s with the delay? Why are we all waiting around like a bunch of clowns?”
At that point, I was probably the fiftieth asshole to ask this, and the reply I received displayed the type of thinly veiled disdain you would expect if that was the case.
“Look, I’m very sorry one of our cabin crew becoming violently ill and requiring an emergency stop in West Virginia has affected your love life. I can assure you he’s not too happy about lying in a hospital bed on the wrong side of the country either. So, why don’t you calm down, sit, and wait like all the other adults. Thank you for flying American Airlines.”
She then waved me off dismissively and returned to her computer screen.
“Well…well…don’t thank me. I’m not the one flying. Am I?” Brilliant comeback.
Lillian completely ignored me as I continued to pointlessly stand at her desk. She was quite possibly the only person to escape telling me to calm down without copping an absolute mouthful. But as hard as it was to take, I deserved it.
That confrontation led me to wander the shops, then make a pit stop at the restroom to chuck. I resumed my seat in the waiting area and died a little on the inside when I realized the preggo-hair lady was cowering beside me.
We sat in uncomfortable silence for quite some time before her fidgeting and belly rubbing drew my eyes to her stomach.
“You’re shitting me,” I mumbled. Preggo-hair lady was herself pregnant. Free of the always-flattering, garish illumination of the world’s oldest working fluorescent lights in the restroom, I could see she was around my age, maybe even younger, and appeared to be in the later stages of pregnancy.
Bursting into tears was the only logical thing to do. “I’m so sorry!” I spat at her. She jumped six feet in the air, almost landing on the arm of her seat. “I am just a complete bundle of nerves. This guy is coming to see me, and he’s my brother’s best friend, and he likes me, and I don’t know what to do. Not to mention I got fired by HotBoss for not taking his shit while he made me eat testicles, and now my niece can’t do ballet, and then you said I was faaatttttttt!”
Thankfully, I was blinded by the acidic tears pouring from my eyes and missed the looks of horror and second-hand embarrassment that were indeed displayed by those surrounding me. Sobbing into my hands, feeling like the biggest loser to ever wander the earth, I felt a hand touch me on the shoulder.
“I’m nervous too. That may be why I asked if you were pregnant. I get all floofy and weird when stressed and just start rambling to complete strangers. My husband is a sergeant in the Army. He’s been gone for six months.” She looked down and rubbed her belly. “He didn’t even know I was pregnant when he left, and I didn’t want to tell him over the phone. So, when he walks through those doors tonight, he will find out he’s going to be a daddy. I’m terrified he’s not going to be happy and freak out or just run. God, I’m just babbling now.” She leaned forward, slowly rising from her seat. “Sorry, I’ll leave you in peace.”
“No!” I grabbed her hand and held it on the joint armrest and nodded for her to resume her seat. “Don’t go. Maybe we can wait together and talk. We both seem to need it. My name is Evie, by the way. Evie Austen.”
She wiped a tear from her eye and smiled, squeezing my hand as she sat. “That would be really nice, Evie. I’m Shannon. Shannon Morales. And you’re Australian? I’ve never met an Australian before.” A smirk spread, and she sat up straight like she had a rod up her ass, “Good day, mate. Let’s chuck another shrimp on the barbie.” Shannon laughed hard. I didn’t. “Sorry, I think I’m funny.” She cleared her throat and attempted to redeem herself. “Sit with me some more. Tell me all about it.”
So, I did just that. I told Shannon all about Byron and Sydney, Nate and Shelby, Finn, Iris, and Jocie, and the conundrum I found myself in. She told me to stress less and go for it, which she enthusiastically reiterated when I showed her Nate’s pictures on my phone. “Hell, maybe we can swap. I’ll take home Nate, and you take home the sergeant.”
At around midnight, we bitched about the same men we sat faithfully waiting for and gorged on Krispy Kreme’s and frappes so ridiculously large I could have fit my head in the cup. At twelve-thirty, we consoled each other when we both felt like vomiting. At one am, we started watchingLegendsoftheFallon her phone…big mistake. And at two, we exchanged numbers, both feeling like we may have found a kindred spirit, one we weren’t ready to leave behind that night.
Huddled over a shared screen, talking, laughing, and crying, we kept each other company until two seventeen in the morning when the doors finally swung open and weary bodies began shuffling through. Her husband, Ryan, was the second through the gate and found his wife waiting for him with a sign we made with stationery and paper donated by Lillian, the American Airlines lady. It simply read,WelcomeHome,Daddyand proudly rested on her bump. Watching the progression of relief, shock, joy, and elation on Sergeant Morales’ face was priceless, as was witnessing him bending down to kiss his wife’s sorely missed lips and then the baby she carried inside her. It also provided a distraction as the flow of people through the gate had ceased, and I still hadn’t seen Nate.
After saying farewell to my new friend and promising to stay in touch, I stood alone and panicked. “Where the bloody hell are you, Nathaniel?”
But then, a second, larger crowd of passengers began to roll out. “How many people were on that flight?” I stood on my tippy toes, trying to see over all the giant, big-headed freaks that all seemed to be waiting in front of me…and there he was.
Have you ever swum in the ocean on a cloudy day? Dove deep beneath the waves, then emerged at the very moment the sun popped out from behind the clouds? I have, and it’s magic.
One or two shards of light might pierce the surface even before you break through, and when you do, the world is bathed in a glistening glow that illuminates you as much as everything it touches.
Seeing Nate again, watching him purposefully stride toward me, impossibly beautiful, a picture of relief and determination, induced a feeling akin to—but far superior to—that.
Nate was my sun. The joy in his eyes as he saw me. The blinding beauty of his smile broke through hurried masses, singling me out like those rays had done, bursting through millions of layers of atmosphere to find me, a big-toothed, curly-haired drop in the ocean and warming me from within.
