*****
April fifteenth was a sunny Saturday afternoon. I was watching the news with my parents, some mindless story about people waiting until the last minute to file their taxes, and which post office in town was going to stay open for them until midnight. When the doorbell rang, I hopped up to answer it; yes, after two and a half months, I had become extremely agile, while keeping little if any pressure on my wounded leg. The mailman handed me a box, “Hi, Lauren, how’s the leg?”
“Doing great! Thanks for asking. I should be able to get rid of my crutches entirely in nine days. I can’t wait.”
“Glad to hear it! This is for you.”
He handed me a box and asked for my signature. There was no return address: the upper left corner simply read, “Max.” It startled me so much that I nearly dropped the box. My hand began to shake: I was so overjoyed at those three little letters. I tore the box open to find a letter accompanied by a cell phone.
Dear Lauren,
My training is just about over. I will be home on Saturday, Apr. 29th. If you are available, I would really like to see you.
I didn’t bring your number with me. I guess I didn’t trust myself not to call you. I would love to hear your voice. My numbers are already programmed in the phone. If I don’t hear from you, I’ll know that things worked out with you and Seth after all.
No matter if I never get a call from you, I wanted you to know that I will never forget you.
Max
I read the note ten, fifteen, twenty times. I hit the power button on the phone, selected the contacts list to see two numbers: “Max Cell” and “Max Hotel.” I called his hotel immediately and asked to be connected to his room.
“Hello,” was the answer on the other line.
“It’s you, it’s really you! I just got the box! How’ve you been?” I didn’t even try to mask the excitement in my voice.
“Lauren! Wow, I’m glad to hear your voice.”
“You’re coming back in two weeks? I was worried, that….that you weren’t.”
“I hafta ask, only for my sanity, so don’t take this the wrong way. Did you and Seth patch it up after I left?”
“No, we’re still friends, but we aren’t seeing each other.”
I could hear a loud sigh on the line, “I was worried that, well, that you might not be…available.”
I had forgotten just how beautiful his voice sounded, and he sounded genuinely happy to hear from me. “When do you fly in? When can I see you?”
“I fly in early. I could come by and pick you up for breakfast.”
The conversation continued for over two hours. He told me about the training he had been through, and I gave him a blow by blow of my last three months. He did know Gretchen, so he roared when I embellished some of her techniques. I never wanted the conversation to end, but after two hours we had both run out of things to say. He promised he’d call the next night, so I reluctantly hung up. I felt like I was floating the rest of the night.
The next night’s conversation turned a little more personal when I asked why he never returned any of my messages.
“I was trying to do right by you. I didn’t bring my phone with me ’cause I knew I’d cave and call you. By leaving it, I was giving you space to work out whatever you needed to.”
“But I told you, Seth and I weren’t an item anymore.”
“You also told me you two’d been a couple since puberty, which isn’t something you just turn off like a light switch. I didn’t want to get in the middle. If you broke up because you wanted to, that was one thing – but I didn’t want to be the reason you broke up.”
“So you didn’t hear any of my voicemails?”
“No way. If I’d heard your voice, it would’ve been over. I would’a just called. I took Missy to a friend’s house before I took off, and left my cell phone there.”
“Well, there’s probably over a hundred, so when you get back, if you wouldn’t mind, delete them. Most of them were pretty pathetic.”
“I’m glad I didn’t know - I probably would’ve had Julio overnight the phone to me so I could hear them.”
We talked every night for hours, until the twenty-eighth. It turned out that my imagination wasn’t all that far off. He was very athletic: most of his free time seemed to be consumed with a sport of some kind, and not as a spectator. His voice had a cadence to it, enough of a southern drawl to tell he was native, but not so much that he came off as a hick. It was such a relief to know that this wasn’t one-sided - he was just as in to me, as I was him. When we hung up Friday night, it felt like I would never be able to fall asleep.
Max was dead set on picking me up at my house Saturday morning, but after a great deal of convincing, I told him I could wait for him at his apartment building, not wanting to delay our reunion for one second longer than I had to. I was in front of his building thirty minutes before his plane even landed.
I saw a black truck setting by itself in the corner of the parking lot, looking as though it hadn’t moved in a while. I remembered the only other time I had seen it, speeding down my street, and the thought gave me shivers. I decided to wait for Max by his truck. I’m sure his neighbors must have thought me a stalker, because I stood in the parking lot and looked at my watch and the time on my cell every thirty seconds until I finally saw a yellow cab pulling into the parking lot. It was really him!
Max walked straight to me and gave me a huge hug, “I’m so glad you’re here. I’ve got the whole day planned.” He put his suitcase in the back of his truck where I had been leaning for over an hour.
“Don’t you want to put that in your apartment?”
“No, I’d rather not waste the time.”
I climbed up into the truck and saw Max still standing at the passenger side door. He was looking just as nervous as I felt. Just when I thought he was going to shut it, he nervously added, “Lauren, I’m glad you’re spending the day with me. In case I forget to tell you tonight when I bring you back, I had a really good time.” He closed the door and walked around to the driver’s side.
My cheeks felt so warm that I knew I was blushing. I could hardly contain my excitement - one whole day of Max. Since that night in the hospital, I wasn’t sure if I would ever get to be with him, yet the recurring memory of those few incredible minutes with him had replayed over and over in my mind. As time passed, my mind had likely embellished our moment.
I tried to lower my expectations for today, confident that no one could be that perfect. I convinced myself that I never really felt an electric shock from his touch. Although my mind had reviewed and reasoned the moment over and over, a part of me, however small, still believed it had happened.
He sat in his seat, put the keys in the ignition, and the truck quickly turned over. His right hand moved to the gear shift, then hesitated, then his hands moved back to the steering wheel. Max looked straight ahead. A sense of panic came over me, worry that his hesitation meant that he had changed his mind about spending the day with me. After enough of a pause for my imagination to start running through all the worst case scenarios, he looked at me, “I know this is supposed to be a day where we can get to know each other better, and believe me, this is all I’ve thought about since that night in your hospital room, but…” He didn’t finish his sentence. I braced for the absolute worst: that he didn’t care at all for me, that he was just being kind to a girl who was overly infatuated with him.
Max leaned all the way over to my seat, moved one hand behind my headrest, while his other gently went to my cheek. “I hope this is okay, but I can’t wait one more second.” Max’s eyes closed, his head tilted, and his lips were on mine. His lips parted and I received the most passionate kiss of my entire life. The longing that I had felt since the last night we saw each other made this moment that much more unbelievable.
The electric shock that I had nearly convinced myself had
been a figment of my imagination wasn’t. Electricity coursed through me the second his hand touched my cheek, and the little tingles I had felt during our first kiss were replaced by massive electric pulses through my entire body.
In this moment, I knew no matter what I learned about him, there would never be any man in my life but Max. It wouldn’t matter if he turned out to be a serial killer, my certainty that he was definitely the man of my dreams was cemented, and I was undeniably destined to be with him.
After several minutes, Max and I ended our embrace and distanced our lips by a few inches from one another.
“I haven’t been able to get you out of my head. I didn’t know if I’d get a chance to kiss you again.” His gaze burrowed into me, “It was definitely worth the wait.”
The rosy blush I felt a minute ago was replaced by a brilliant red.
Max’s hand continued to caress my cheek. “I planned to take you somewhere special today, but at this point it’s up to you. Today’s already the best day of my life, and I could sit right here with no regrets.”
I found myself not caring much if we ever got out of the truck. My heart was racing like crazy. I had to take in a deep breath to keep my voice from sounding all giddy. Let’s see, hang out in the parking lot all day with the man I’ve fantasized about for four years, or go on an adventure with the fantasy man? “If you’d told me where this road trip was taking us, it might help me decide.”
Max nodded at me, “You’re right, this was my choice, and I really do want to take you… somewhere. How’s your leg feeling? Are you going to be up for a day outdoors?”
A little nervous of what his day outdoors might entail, I did my best to sound excited, “I don’t know that I can climb a mountain or anything, but I’m up for it.”
“Okay, it’s settled then, we won’t stay in the parking lot. It’ll take about forty-five minutes to get where we’re going.”
Max put the truck in gear and pulled out onto the street. I tried to think of places forty-five minutes away. He confessed it was one of his favorite places in the world: maybe a park that he liked, or a lake, or a favorite restaurant? I sat silently turning over all the possibilities, and then it hit me that none of them really mattered. I was finally with Max.
Conversation in the truck while we drove was sparse at best. It wasn’t uncomfortable, it just didn’t seem to be a priority for either of us.
Max had a strange idea of a first date. Although at twenty-two years old, never having actually gone on a first date until today, I guess I was not an expert. The girly part of me thought of a walk on the beach, a chartered boat on the harbor, a stroll through an old plantation; all of these options we had talked about the last couple weeks, and all seemed like a picture perfect first date. In my mind I was picturing the warm sunshine, green foliage, quiet moments together. These were my ideal first dates with Max. As I looked at the building in front of us, I wondered how this could possibly be his choice.
Then the reality of today grabbed me, and I asked myself whether it really mattered what we did with our time. I just wanted to spend time with him. This might not be the most romantic choice, but it was bound to be a blast, literally.