Chapter 36 Adam
Currently playing: I Believe In a Thing Called Love by The Darkness
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Every fiber of my being felt like it was electrified.
I was going to see my wife today. I was going to be able to hold her and kiss her and tell her every ridiculous thing I’d been harboring in my mind for the last four weeks. I was going to smell her, tangle my hands in her hair, and squeeze her tight against me until there was nothing left.
The ride back to Philly had been nothing short of a nightmare. The kid behind me kicking my seat, a young girl on my right asking for my zodiac sign, the guy on my left telling me his entire life story about losing his job as a zookeeper for “unscrupulous behavior.” I didn’t ask for details, but I was forcefully fed them anyway. For three hours.
None of that mattered, though. Not a single second of it, because I was finally going to reach my wife, my woman, and look into those round doe eyes and tell her I loved her. No holding back, no stuttering, no waiting, no last-minute backing out. I had no choice now. She was in charge of my body and soul, taking up every inch of my heart, and I had nothing left anymore. I was physically drained from not having her. Another week, and my fist would have been through a wall.
Right on my tail, zoo guy followed me. I think he assumed we were going to share an Uber or something.
“So, yeah. Essentially, I am not allowed within twenty feet of any petting zoos, regular zoos, or safari drive thr—”
I stopped dead in my tracks. “Look, my wife needs me, so I’m gonna pay you ten dollars to stop talking and go far, far away from me.”
The patchy-bearded man squinted at me until I pulled out a twenty and waved it in the air. Turns out that was all I had. He shrugged and reached for it, grabbing his bags and walking the other way. Would’ve paid a hundred if it meant rushing over there any faster.
I passed through baggage claim, then rode the escalator down, facing the front door where we’d agreed to meet up. Looking down at my watch, I realized I was earlier than I thought. My hand reached for my phone, ready to call Rachel.
“Adam!”
I lifted my head, and across the platform, with about twenty people between us, stood Rachel in those cut-off denim shorts with that old ratty military shirt of mine she knew I loved her in and braided hair cascading down her tanned summer skin. Overall, she looked the same. It wasn’t like I’d been gone long enough for either of us to change that much, and yet my heart started picking up pace, my blood pounding beneath my fingertips. She reached a hand up and waved excitedly at me. Me. My smile was slow, starting at the corners and pulling into a full cheesing grin as wide as I could. No sense in holding it back. The excitement I had to see her outweighed any care of staying emotionless.
We ran to each other at the same time, parting through the crowd like the red sea, forcing bystanders to step around us. Ten feet apart, she squealed and ran full speed, arms wide, at me. I set down my bags and opened my arms as she jumped toward me, her legs wrapping around my waist.
“Hey baby.” Both of my arms swaddled around her body, squeezing her tight to me as her nose buried into my neck. I lifted one hand to the back of her head, my fingers pressing into her braided hair, kissing her temple.
She smelled like summer and rain and all things good in my life that I wanted to keep. And I was going to keep her. There was no doubt about it.
Rachel pulled back with a sniffle.
“Don’t ever leave me again.”
I chuckled, enjoying how the vibrations in my chest resonated against her.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“I’m serious. I don’t think I can go that long without you again. I might kill someone if they try to take you out there again anytime soon.”
I smiled down at her, a swell of pride forming in my chest. “Yeah, that’s my wife.”
If only she knew. I wasn’t going to tell her that I only had another two months here before I had to go again. She probably already knew in the back of her head. But this was a happy moment. One I never wanted to look back on with dread. So I kept quiet and held her as long as I could.
“Let’s go home. I’ve made way too much food, and I need to feed you.” She wrapped an arm around my waist, and I put my spare one around her shoulders, leaning in to kiss her temple.
She was right. My counter was covered in every kind of baked good, lasagna, and sourdough recipe you could dream of.
“I was anxious for you to get home yesterday and went a little overboard.” I didn’t think I’d ever seen Rachel look sheepish before. At most, her cheeks may get a little pink, but this whole hands-wringing-together, ducked-chin, and anxious-eyes thing was entirely new to me.
I set my duffel bag on the ground and took my shoes off, not bothering to straighten them at the door. I popped my fingers and cracked my neck.
She continued, not looking my way. “Myrtle’s really been put into overdrive lately. Is there really such a thing as too much sourdough, you know? Probably good for your gut health. Not that your gut is bad. I mean, look at you—”
I cut her off with a hand to her jaw, tilting her up to press my lips to hers in a firm kiss. A silent promise of love and longing fulfilled lying between us. It was a kiss that spoke of the countless nights spent apart, of fears faced and battles fought, and this sort of unbreakable bond that held us together through it all.
In that moment, nothing else mattered. We were no longer separated by miles or duty. No longer wondering how much longer till I could lift her up and show the world she was mine. No more voicemails and texts. No more FaceTime calls that kept dropping when my signal was out. No. With our lips moving in tandem, biting, pulling, we were simply two souls reunited, finding solace and joy in each other’s arms.
Rachel bit my lip and tugged before pulling back, breathless, chest heaving, her lips wet and eyes weighted.
“Adam. Do you love me?”
I put a piece of hair behind her ear. “You’re my wife. Of course I do.”
Rachel’s head shook. “No. I mean are you in love with me?”
“I wouldn’t have married you if I wasn’t.”
Her eyes rolled. “You know what I mean.”
I smiled down at her. Yeah, I did. “You tell me. You are the one thing in my life that feels steady. You’re the first thing I think of when I wake up and the last when I go to sleep. Everything I see reminds me of you, from the sunset to a pack of sour candy. It’s like you moved into my head without my permission. I don’t even know when it happened, but one day, I looked around me, and you were all I could see. You’re like my little squatter.”
She snorted in an attempt to cover her tiny sniffles. “All right, big guy.” She planted a quick kiss on the corner of my mouth. “You know I love you too, right?”
A few months ago, my answer would have been a swift impossible, but that was then. Now? Yeah, I knew she loved me. I knew it in the way she left me sticky notes on my packed lunches, or how she tried her best to pick up after herself for me—somehow still always leaving a little Rachel trail. Or how she kissed me with no holding back, no barriers, no fuzzy unknowns. Just 100 percent her, and she gave it all to me, a guy who didn’t deserve to ever call her his.
I pressed a kiss to her temple, pulling her into my chest. “Yeah, I know, honey.”