She pulled in to the driveway, but before she went inside to the chaos of Ben and her mom, she pulled out her phone and his card.
Made it home. Hope I wasn’t too much a bother. Thanks again.
She tapped her fingers against the steering wheel and waited.
JL and I are home, too. Not a bother. At all. Talk soon.
She clutched the phone to her chest, the nerves and excitement not brand new, but like a bear coming out of torpor, she felt clumsy and out of practice.
Chapter 12
Past
Harper smoothed her hair and tugged at her sweater. The bustle of travelers coming off the escalator in the airport broke around her like she was the rock in their stream. It had been six months since she’d seen Noah. He was a phase away from completing SEAL training in California, and she was on winter break, her first semester at UNC in the books.
The last time she’d seen Noah had been at the end of five magical days and nights before he’d left for BUD/S. They’d said their good-byes standing on the end of the pier, the summer air superheating her out-of-control emotions. That’s how he’d wanted it even though she’d offered to see him off at the airport.
She’d girded herself to never hear from him again and brushed away tears on her walk back home, but only an hour of moping had passed before an email from him popped into her in-box. The thrill was like nothing she’d ever experienced. Not love, but something beyond infatuation.
Now six months later, her hair was longer and she no longer sported her summer tan. She was in jeans and a sweater instead of shorts and tank tops. Between her part-time job in the campus library and studying, she basically lived in the reference section. It had paid off. She’d made the dean’s list with all As and had saved enough to put off needing a loan.
Basically, she worried she wasn’t the same girl Noah remembered from the summer. But that’s not all. What if she had idealized Noah? What if he wasn’t as cute and funny and nice as she remembered? Because of their insane schedules, they’d only communicated through emails and letters since the summer.
The flow of people trickled to a handful. Had he seen her and hidden? Was he waiting for her to give up and leave so he wouldn’t have to face her? Her stomach felt worse than it had before her statistics final.
She checked the clock and stared at the top of the escalator. If he didn’t show up in five more minutes, she would leave. A man appeared. Broad shouldered and blond headed and even more handsome than she remembered.
Her breath hitched and her knees wobbled her a step closer. He didn’t wait for the escalator to carry him down but took the steps two at a time. A military-issue rucksack hung over one shoulder, but he was in civilian clothes—jeans and a long-sleeve T-shirt in dark blue.
She didn’t move to meet him. More accurately, she couldn’t move, because he had changed too. Although his hair was the same blond and his eyes blue, he’d turned from a lanky Georgia farm boy into a man. His face was leaner, but his body had filled in with what appeared to be all muscle.
Now not only was she fighting nerves but shyness too. Not something that had affected her while she’d been writing him endless emails and letters over the fall.
He stopped in front of her and dropped his bag but didn’t touch her. “I’ve missed you, Harper Lee.” His voice, too, had matured, reflecting a vastness of experiences.
He’d sketched out hardship and challenges to her through his words in the vaguest terms. Faced with him, she understood he had come through a crucible and emerged forever changed.
“You’re different.” She wanted to stuff the words back in her mouth.
“Yeah.” He fingered the ends of her hair and a shock buzzed through her as if her hair contained millions of nerve endings. “Your hair is longer.”
“Didn’t have time to get it cut.”
“I like it. Did they post your grades?”
“All As.”
“Babe. That’s amazing. Not that I had any doubt you’d kill it.” It was his smile that burned away all her nerves and shyness. One corner of his mouth hitched a little higher than the other and his blue eyes crinkled with the force of his happiness. This was the Noah who’d populated her dreams and fantasies.
She took a step into his chest, wrapped her arms around him, and laid her cheek against his neck. A deep breath reassured her further. His scent fired memories of lying on the beach in his arms and making out until the sun edged over the horizon signaling the dawn.
His arms came around her as he nosed the hair at her temple, kissing her where her heartbeat pulsed.
“I missed you, too, Noah.”
“For a second there coming down the escalator, I thought you were going to bolt like a wild turkey at Thanksgiving.”
“For a second, I thought I was, too.”
He pulled back and met her eyes, his smile diminished by worry. “Why?”
“Because you’re not the same Noah who left this summer.”
He flexed his arm. The fabric stretched and outlined his impressive biceps. “BUD/S has whipped my sorry butt in shape.”
“I mean, yes. You look … God, you look amazing.” Verbalizing her thoughts was difficult when her hormones were making a case for dragging him somewhere private to let her hands do the talking. “But it goes beyond your abs. You seem older.”
Thankfully, he didn’t make a joke. “I feel older. Or more mature, I guess. The training is more than physical. It’s testing and building our mental strength, if that makes sense.”
“Will you tell me about it?”
“Later, I will.” He reached for her hand and linked their fingers. “Right now, though, I’m dying for some sweet tea and fried chicken.”
“Mom is making all that and more.”
“Your mom is a saint.”
“She’s shooting more for sinner than saint now that her retirement is in sight. I caught her setting up an online dating profile last week.”
His laugh was cut short when they stepped outside. While an endless blue sky stretched itself around the bright sun, the breeze held a bite of winter. “Damn, it’s cold.”
Harper poked him playfully in his solid stomach. “One part of you has gone soft. Has your blood gotten thin from living out there in California?”
“When the instructors aren’t torturing us, it’s as close to paradise as I’ve ever seen.”
She led him to her used Honda. It had been a present from her mom. The only caveat of accepting it had been a promise to make the drive back to Nags Head when she could. While she had grudgingly agreed, once at college Harper hadn’t found coming home a hardship. Homesickness had hit her hard once the realities of college had set in.
She popped the trunk for Noah to store his rucksack and then they were off for the drive from Norfolk to Nags Head. The conversation ebbed and flowed with the comforting rhythm of the ocean.
Harper stole glances at him throughout the drive, not quite believing he was there in the flesh and blood. Her stream-of-consciousness emails had sometimes seemed like diary entries. His replies were never as detailed or revealing.
God, she’d told him about walking into the bathroom and interrupting her roommate and her boyfriend mid-coitus. And the time she’d woken up late for class and run across campus still in her penguin pajama pants. A sudden burst of embarrassment had her patting her forehead and turning the air down in the car.
She cleared her throat and clutched the steering wheel so tight her palms squeaked against the plastic. “By the way, I’m not as crazy as my emails might have implied.”
“Crazy? You kept me sane.”
“I did?”
“Knowing I might have one of your stories waiting on me kept me from giving up more than once.”
“They weren’t actually made up. All that stuff happened.”
He slipped his hand onto her leg, and her foot jerked, sending the Honda ten miles over the speed limit to match her heart rate. “I know, but it was the way you told it that was so entertaining. Everyone thought so.”