the best thing i can think to do right now is leave it alone, just scream my name one more time...
Six years…six years since they’ve said two words to one another. Emily was in shock just seeing him. Chase remained the same but at the same time looked as if he had changed in so many ways that she couldn’t see. They stood there for a good three minutes before saying anything. In those few minutes, Chase couldn’t help remembering every conversation the two of them had had .Every word she’d ever said , every smile she’d ever given him, every laugh she’d let out at one of his corniest jokes, they all came rushing back into his mind. Her time was spent recollecting the same moments that ran through his head. And some how they both knew they were remembering the same thing but refused to put any of the past memories to words, God forbid it scare the other away.
So instead they exchanged “Hellos” and asked how the other was doing , the usual small talk that never satisfied them before now. “So, how are you?”, Emily asked apprehensively wanting to know all the best and worst of the past six years. As for Chase, he wondered why that was all she had to say. So he answered as generically as possible, “Good, good, and yourself?”.
There was so much they wanted to say to each other that they just couldn’t put into words, for now this was all that could come of there past friendship.
She would have liked to sit and look at him all day but realized she had a psychology class to get to in twenty minutes and really didn’t have the time to take a trip down memory lane right now. She took a deep breath, pushed all the fears back down to the pit of her stomach and suggested they exchanged numbers and have lunch sometime. They wrote the numbers down on the Starbucks napkin from the bag she carried her blueberry muffin in. After fumbling with her books trying to stick the number into her coat pocket he decided to help and took her books from her hands as she placed it gently in the top left pocket. He walked her to her car and placed her books in the passenger seat of her car. They ended their short reunion with a hug that felt both awkward and at the same time exactly what they needed after all the years they had spent together and apart. Every emotion she ever felt for him came rushing back to her and before she knew it tears had formed. Her head rested on his shoulder and the smell of lavender engulfed his senses to the point where he didn’t want to let go.
Neither one of them wanted the moment to end but both knew it had to, so when he made a slight adjustment to his left shoe she pulled away thinking he wanted away from their long awaited embrace. They looked at each other for another moment, her still in his arms, and said goodbye yet again. He opened her door and shut it for her as she put the keys in the ignition. She waved holding back six years of tears and drove off with the rest of the morning traffic. As she peeled off, he said out loud, for the first time in years, that he loved her.
Chase sat in his car for a good fifteen minutes after pulling up to his parents house. He was home from school for the weekend to visit with his friends and family that he’d left behind four years ago. He knew they were holding some kind of “Welcome Home” party for him and after the morning he’d had, he just wasn’t up to it.
After seeing Emily outside of the cafe he took a ride past their old high school, then to his friends to rehash his once completely adolescent sense of humor. He was happy to see his friendship with Max had not changed and it took his mind off of seeing Emily hours earlier. After an hour or two Chase brought up Emily. Max ’s eyes quickly glanced at him with that look they both knew to well. It was Max who told him to keep his distance from her all those years ago to avoid heartache and pain for the both of them. Of course Chase rejected the idea at first but after a few months of Max drilling into his mind what pain he was causing her in the long run, Chase decided to take Max ’s advice. He just didn’t know how much pain it would cause for the both of them to not have each other around. Max apologized for misleading his friend in his choices. They were the best of friends growing up and would never want either to hurt as bad as Chase had.
He soon realized it was already five o’clock and was expected back at his parents house at five thirty. He picked up his car keys off the coffee table passed down from Max ‘s parents that was now littered with dirty magazines and an empty bag of Lays. He couldn’t help but think to himself that of the two of them Max was the one who was supposed to really make something of himself and that he would be the one sitting here, miserable at how his life was already unfolding, but somewhere along the years the roles had switched and he was suddenly thrilled at the fact he had gotten out this town when he had the chance. They said goodbye, both well aware that this would most likely be the last time they saw one another, but still acted as though they would be sitting with one another again sometime soon. When he got in his car he took a final look at his old friend’s once elegant and lively home that now looked as if it had been in a coma for twenty somewhat years and thought about Emily again and where she was at this moment.
Emily had just finished her last exam for the year and was off for winter break. She breathed a sigh of relief when the test was lifted from her desk that read the names of so many students that had been seated there before her, Todd, Amy, Patrick, and so many more. She said the names to herself and wrote unimaginable stories of their owners in her mind.
The bell rang on time for once, and she decided to take a ride down by her old house. She had a lot of memories down there and missed that part of her life most. The old place was deserted now, with moss hanging like garland from the oak trees surrounding the house. The once fresh yellow paint was now drab and darkened from all the years of neglect, but Emily still saw the beauty the house once held and saw past the minor faults the home now possessed.
She pulled into the drive way, all the way up to the porch and sat in her car to think the day over. She came here quite often to think but today was different. Instead of analyzing her conversations with her mother, professors, or even her friends, Emily focused on the few minutes she spent with him. She’d put the run-in towards the back of her mind all day knowing that sooner or later she’d get the time to think it over in peace. She took his number out of her coat pocket where it had stayed in hibernation since around 9:30 and examined it thoroughly. Looking at each number and each letter that spelled out his name, each wrinkle in the napkin and the tiny dots of green that made up the logo in bold letters. She sat there for a long time just looking at it. Another twenty minutes or so went by before she pulled out of the drive way that was so littered with leaves you could barely see the pavement.
Hiding from his parents and the rest of the guests at the “party”, chase lay in the bed in which he’d spent many of his adolescent nights, glaring at her number as he held it between his thumb and index fingers. He contemplated calling her and after running through what he might say to her for the fifteenth time he picked up the phone to his house and dialed the numbers 954-368-4741 with excitement and apprehension. On the second ring he heard the phone pick up and he took a breath. He seemed to go blank but the words quickly came to his lips.
“Hello…” Emily answered her phone, as she always does. “Hi,” he answered quickly, “What’s going on?”. She wasn’t sure of the voice but the familiarity of it quickly came to her. “Hi” she said eagerly, “umm…not much, you?” she wasn’t sure why he was calling but at this point all she cared was that he thought of her enough to call. He wasn’t sure how to go about asking her out, seeing as how it was something he had intended on doing six years ago but never quite could find the words to do it with. In his head, he ran through all the cheesy pick up lines he’d used so many times before but knew she was worth more than that and decided honesty would be the best way to go about this. “Do you have any plans for tomorrow night?” he asked praying she wouldn't say no. “Well,” she said preparing her response, “I have a date with this guy, but I’m sure he won’t mind you coming along…” she figured a joke would get rid of some of the tension, little did she know that he was to nervous to play around at this point. “Oh,” he answered bleakly, “I guess maybe another night because I wouldn’t want to get in the way. I guess I’ll call ya when you’re not so busy..”. He felt like rolling into the fetal position and hiding under his bed. “No! No! I’m kidding, I have no plans what so ever.” She thought the joke was a good idea but it quickly proved not to be. “Oh, I knew that I was just going along with it to see what you might say.” They both knew well that he was being sarcastic because he had meant it to be, but that was one of the things she loved about him. “So, maybe you’d like to have dinner with me tomorrow night?”, he asked partially knowing the answer. “Of course.”, she answered instantaneously.
After that was out of the way they each seemed to take a sigh of relief and moved onto other things. They talked for nearly three and a half hours about things ranging from her psychology class to his bed room and how its has remained the same all these years. It was 11:17 when they got off the phone, they were both exhausted from what they had done throughout the day and from the replaying of past conversations between the two. When they got off the phone, they both had smiles across their faces and after that pulled the covers up over themselves and slept the soundest they’d slept in six years.
Coincidently they each woke up to their parents. Her mother was calling to assure their plans for dinner that night. She tries to go out to dinner once a week with her mother. They hung up shortly after taking a rain check due to her new set of plans for the evening, but her mother understood completely and set it up for another night. Just imagining him sleeping in his bed as the sun came up put her in a state of euphoria she’d felt not such a long time ago as she laid in her bed. Chase’s mother woke him up early with breakfast cooking in the kitchen the way she did on the weekends when he was younger. Although he was to thrilled about what had happened hours earlier that he barely ate, instead he played the night to come out in his mind as if it were a movie.
They both seemed to be in a state of pure happiness for the remainders of the morning. Emily spent a lot of the afternoon prepping for the dinner. Darcy and her went shopping as most girls do before a big date and Emily picked out an orange and white polka-dot sun dress that came down right below the knee and a cute pair of orange pumps to match. Orange is Emily’s favorite color, so it was only natural that she felt most comfortable wearing it. Chase on the other hand prepared for the night in a slightly different way. He laid in bed for the remainder of the morning and spent his afternoon looking for anything he could find of their past six years ago. His room was ransacked by the time he was through and the only item of memorabilia he could find was an overly signed senior year book with their pictures in it, but one signature that was not included in the many was Emily Webster’s. He suddenly realized that he couldn’t pull away like he had made in their sophomore year of high school.
Seeing as how Chase had not been home in some time Emily thought it be better if she picked him up. Emily had known his parents well so she wasn’t surprised by the greeting she received when she went to the door. warm hugs and butterfly kisses filled the atmosphere of the Darmody home. Chase, was not the slightest bit embarrassed by any of this, which made Emily even happier to be there.
By 7:30 they were out the door. Chase had pictured taking her to a fancy restaurant on one of the many lakes in Nantucket, but was shocked to see Emily pulling into a near by Checkers. She quickly ordered two combos and Chase paid willingly for their not so romantic dinner. Emily then asked Chase if he wouldn’t mind closing his eyes until she told him when to open them. Excitedly, he closed them s tightly as he cold not to ruin her surprise.
They drove for about twenty minutes or so while listening to a band Emily had been in love with so many years ago playing on the radio. All through the drive all Chase could see in his mind was Emily in her bright orange and white polka-dot dress, with matching scarf in her long brown hair. He couldn’t believe this was all happening after all these years.
Emily eventually stopped after what seemed like forever and told him to open his eyes. When he opened his eyes at first all he wanted to do was look into her dark green eyes and tell her how much he loved her, but was quickly silenced by the view he looked upon.
Emily had taken Chase back to the place where they had spent many of their evenings together during high school. They got out of the car and walked up the steps with a creak of each stair. they sat on the porch swing that was now darker than it had been years before and ate their food while talking between chews of their lives before this moment and what they wanted for themselves after tonight.
By eleven o’clock things ended as they always had in the past, her head placed gently on his shoulder and his arm wrapped tightly around her. They both knew what the other was thinking. Before Emily could drift off to sleep on the rickety swing, he told her for the fits time that he had loved her and that he had for all this time, and she replied an “I love you” and closed her eyes and went to sleep in his arms.
i followed daliey's advice.it's gonna take awhile though.....