Making it my mission to drive to the airport first thing in the morning made it that much easier to leave the house. My mom offered to drive me, but after all the chatting and reminiscing about the past that we had done the night before, I needed a little breather without her tagging along. She brought out old photo albums and keepsakes from my childhood and while it was nice to relive everything, after a while I was bored out of my mind. That was, until she brought out the album that contained pictures of Dean and Baylor. My heart shattered even more seeing how happy the three of us were at the time. We were unstoppable and nothing could’ve come between us, or so I thought.
I was ready to have a shower and a set of clean clothes to change into and that wouldn’t be possible until I had my luggage in my grasp. Mom told me that I could borrow an outfit of hers but even her jogging suits seemed a little before my time. So I forewent freshly laundered, outdated clothing for the wrinkly t-shirt and jeans that I had worn on the plane, threw my hair up in a messy bun on top of my head, grabbed a set of car keys from my dad and jetted out the door before my mother was any the wiser.
After double parking at the airport entrance, I rushed inside to see if my prayers had been answered and my luggage had made it to the correct airport. I really hoped for the airline’s sake that it would be there. After having to wait in a monstrous line, while having to pee, no less, I was eventually able to speed-walk to the bathroom with my hot pink rolling suitcase trailing behind me.
The first bathroom, which was the closest, was inevitably closed for repairs so I picked up my speed while hearing the wheels of my suitcase fall into each little divot of the concrete tiled floor beneath me. When I finally found a bathroom which was open for business I breathed a major sigh of relief.
Leaving the stall, I walked up to the sink to wash my hands. I briefly chanced a glance at my unruly hair as it was falling down from the messy bun I had placed it in and my makeup less face, disgusted at what was staring back at me. I seriously hoped for my sanity and lack of embarrassment that I didn’t run into anyone I knew, but I should’ve known that the one day you look a fright you will run into everyone you know, including the least expected.
I tossed my used paper towel into the trash bin on my way out of the restroom and cut directly in front of a crowd as I tried to make my way to the front doors. I didn’t falter my pace until an extremely large frame stopped right smack dab in front of me causing me to halt in place, my sneakers making a squeaking sound on the floor.
Huffing with annoyance, I blew a stray hair out of my face and looked up to the rude stranger only to be graced with a huge smile of someone who wasn’t a stranger at all.
“Dean?” I exclaimed with disbelief and excitement.
“In the fucking flesh,” he boasted with almost as much enthusiasm. His voice was deeper than I remembered and his stature and height had changed drastically in 15 years. He was a giant then, even though he was always on the skinny side, but he had gotten even taller and filled out his shirt extremely well.
His smile faltered as he crossed his arms in front of his chest and wrinkled a brow, “Eden Richardt, is it really you or a figment of my imagination? Hell must’ve definitely frozen over for you to step foot back in Oregon after fifteen long years.” His rudeness was well deserved but it stung more than I anticipated. I knew I shouldn’t have expected open arms when I came strolling back into town but it was a nice thought. From the look on his face, I’d hurt him deeply and that wasn’t at all my intention.
“Dean…The only thing I can say is I’m sorry and even then that won’t be nearly enough. I was young and naïve and with what happened all those years ago, I couldn’t stick around.”
“Eden, what did happen?”
“It really doesn’t matter now. It’s so great to see you though.” I lifted up an edge of my mouth in a small smile. I wasn’t expecting him to return it but it took me completely by surprise when his arms engulfed my small frame and he squeezed me tightly in an all-encompassing hug.
“Even though I don’t know what happened, I can’t stay mad at you for long. It’s too damn good to see you, babe,” he spoke into my hair which made me remember that I looked like a downright mess which made me tense up a bit before relaxing into his embrace. The magnitude of how much I had missed him didn’t hit me until that very moment.
“Listen, I have to go. I just now got my luggage even though I landed yesterday. But I’m sure I’ll see you around and definitely at the reunion.”
He looked like a kid who had lost his puppy and I could tell that he was on the verge of dredging up things from the past that I didn’t want to rehash in my disheveled state. Or more like a person from the past.
I pulled my cellphone out of my back pocket as I quickly walked off and scrolled down to Julia’s name. She answered after a few rings.
“Hey! I wasn’t expecting to hear from you so soon, how’s it going?”
“Well my plane ride sucked and then the airline lost my luggage. So I had to come back today and of course I look like junk and ran right into one of my old best friends, Dean.”
“Oh shit,” she said, knowing just exactly my meaning behind my freak-out. “Well at least it was just Dean and not Baylor.”
“Too true,” I replied. I was still walking towards the exit doors at the front of the airport and ended up walking along one of those moving sidewalks that was headed in the opposite direction. There were several people on it, quickly passing by me and I tried to keep my head down so I didn’t have to make eye contact while I was chatting with Julia. After a break in people I briefly looked up and was looking directly into a pair of incandescent green eyes which had been featured in more dreams in my lifetime than I cared to admit.
“Uh, Jules, I gotta let you go,” I said faintly as I began lowering my phone from my ear.
I could hear her yelling into the phone, “You better not hang up on me!”
I was transformed back into that naïve girl from fifteen years ago with a crush on her best friend. My heart was beating wildly in my chest as his eyes never strayed from mine. All my movement had ceased and I was standing in place, but he was still coming towards me on that moving walkway. Raising my hand which still had my phone in its clutch, I did a simple wave and smiled. Although it wasn’t how I had wanted our reunion to play out, I would take what I could get. I mouthed his name, “Baylor,” but he still seemed to be in a trance, almost like he wasn’t expecting me to be in this airport, or even to be in Oregon. Somehow he managed to look the same as he had all those years before, yet all grown up at the same time. His brown hair was neatly gelled and styled and he had the slightest hint of scruff on his chin. I felt my stomach tighten as I looked at him and remembered the feel of his lips on mine.
The walkway moved past me and he pivoted to keep looking in my direction. Since my life revolved around music, I was instantly hit with the feeling that the song ”Don’t You Forget About Me” by Simple Minds should have been playing throughout the airport at that moment.
Would he call out my name?
Did he even recognize me?
I started out with the biggest smile plastered on my face only to end up with a feeling of utter despair, all while he looked dumfounded as if I were the last person on earth he wanted to see.
At the end of the walkway a girl with bright blonde hair yelled, “Daddy!” which made his attention waver from me to her and there was no doubt in my mind that she was his daughter.
I was severely confused and hurt. I just couldn’t understand his lack of emotion from seeing me; he was the one who sought me out wanting to reconnect. It wasn’t as if my beauty stunned him into silence; I was dirty and wearing the same wrinkled mess for the second day in a row. I sighed deeply in resignation and continued on to my father’s car out in the drop-off lanes. I wasn’t so sure that my decision to come back home was the best option.