Chapter 3 #2
“Nope, they don’t,” she agreed, remembering the stories her father and all of his bachelor friends had told of their time in the Navy. The fact remained that if you wanted a relationship, you needed to care and nurture it. Some folks were better at distance than others.
“And you were just engaged this morning,” he said, chuckling. Truly, it was absurd. If anyone had told her she’d be hugging this wall of a man she’d met at a bar who just drove her home on a motorcycle after she’d broken up with her fiancé, she wouldn’t have believed it. No way, no how.
Yet, she couldn’t recall a time she’d been happier than tonight.
“Do me a favor,” he said, tightening his grip slightly on her before he relaxed back.
“Promise me you’re going to take some time for yourself.
Rediscover what it is to be just Kelsey, the fantastic, fun woman I met tonight.
Take a look at what makes your heart happy, and what drives your dreams. Then, run full-force in those directions. ”
“I will,” she said, nodding into his chest as she felt sadness well up in her eyes. “But you have to promise me something too.”
“Anything,” he said, pulling back from their embrace so that he could see her face. She smiled up at him, sadly, palming his cheek and holding his gaze.
“Promise me you’re going to be careful, wherever you’re going.” Her father, while dialing down a lot of his missions, did have to travel from time to time. Some trips were more worrying than others. “You’ve got a lot of people back here who care about you.”
Sev broke into an endearing smile, fully grasping her sentiment. He covered her hand with his, turning his head quickly and dropping a sweet kiss on her palm. “Does that mean you’ll give me your number?”
“Only if you promise you’ll take care.”
“Done,” he said, without hesitation. They let go of one another to fish out their respective phones, Kelsey punching in his number so that she could send him a text with her own.
She hated hearing his phone vibrate upon receiving it. It meant they really had run out of reasons to linger in one another’s company any longer. Sev had to go be with his family, and she had a lot of explaining to do with her own.
“Alright, I’d better be off,” Sev finally said, pocketing his phone, still not moving away.
“Thank you again,” she said, tossing all reason to the wind and wrapping her arms around his neck. He pulled her in tight for a hug that spoke what she couldn’t seem to verbalize. How grateful she was to him. How glad she’d gotten to know him. How she feared for him.
How she wished they could have met any other time than right now.
Funny enough, his hug back seemed to reflect the same.
Releasing him, he gave her a quick, sad smile before moving to his bike. He donned his helmet as she took a few steps back, giving him space to leave. When his gloves were pulled on, he started up the bike, a rumbling that broke the peaceful silence of a wintry night.
But as he put up his kickstand and began to walk the machine backward, she could feel panic crawl up her throat.
He was leaving!
While she knew she hadn’t been a crack shot at listening to her gut over the past few years, she’d gotten a crash course in trusting her instincts tonight. And right now, her insides were screaming at her to do something.
Do not let him go!
“Sev!” she called out to him over the motorcycle’s engine, running toward him.
He snapped his head up as he caught sight of her moving toward him, where he turned off the engine completely.
“Meet me back here in a year,” she said, the words tumbling out of her mouth, swirling around them in a fog as her warm breath hit the cold air.
“What?”
“Next Christmas Eve. If you aren’t… attached to anyone, or you’re not deployed or… whatever…” She struggled to get her thoughts out. “Meet me back at the Second Call. There’s a bench right outside that overlooks Main Street.”
He stared back at her as her confusing words landed one by one. “You want to meet up again?”
“Yes!” she said, sounding desperately enthusiastic to be in this man’s presence. But again, this was Sev, and she knew she could be herself completely unfiltered. “Maybe we can have dinner? Like we did tonight? Maybe even do some catching up. Evaluate if we’ve made good on our promises or not.”
The reference to the joke from the bar got him smiling once more, though she noticed that he never really ever stopped smiling. Not that she had seen.
“Let’s do it.”
Suddenly, the sun broke through the clouds over her heart, lighting up the world in hope. She smiled widely at him as he fired up the bike once more.
“Take care of yourself, Kels,” he shouted. “I’ll see you next year.”
“See you next year!” she called back, waving to him as he gunned the engine and roared out of the driveway.
It took just a few moments before he disappeared from sight down the street, and a little bit longer before the sound of his motorcycle disappeared.
But as Kelsey stood alone in the dark driveway under a canopy of bright shining stars, she knew for the first time in a long time that she was going to be okay.
Reaching into her pocket and clutching tightly at her purse, which held her roses, she realized that she’d let her true self out to play tonight, and she had missed that person terribly.
She knew that Sev was the reason for that.
If she hadn’t run into him, she knew she would have just drowned her sorrows in a drink or two, overthought the entire situation, and come home with her tail between her legs, feeling as if she was responsible for Chip’s cheating in the first place.
Instead, Sev had become a friend to her in her time of need. He kept her smiling. Laughing. And when Chip decided he was going to try to force himself back into her life? Sev took the helm and got her out of harm’s way.
She couldn’t recall the last time she’d felt so cared for.
Sighing to herself, she smiled as she took in the quiet that now surrounded her again. Taking delicate steps up to the front door, she realized that even though she may have lost her fiancé tonight, she’d also managed to find herself again.
Best Christmas Eve ever.