I hadn’t seen or talked to him in nine months that summer, and as you do when you’re young and insecure and unaware that crushes fade but true love lasts a lifetime, I had convinced myself he wasn’t interested in me. And so, when I found out the boy I had been dating for the past two months was going to be in Peachtree Bluff for the first week of summer, sure, Jack crossed my mind. But I scolded myself for thinking he would still want to be with me. So, there I was, walking down the boardwalk to a local seafood restaurant, holding the hand of Stan whose last name I can’t even remember, when I caught a glimpse of Jack. My blood ran cold, and I dropped Stan’s hand. But it was too late. Jack had seen me. I couldn’t walk away. So I smiled and said, demurely, “Hi, Jack.”
Time stopped as I looked into his eyes. Something had happened to him in the nine months since I had last seen him. He had grown into himself, transformed from an awkward teenager with limbs too long for his frame to a tall, broad, handsome man. He looked from Stan to me and back to Stan, and it wasn’t so much that I saw his jaw set; I felt it. “Hello, Ansley,” he said, without venturing a smile. He turned his cold expression to Stan, who took a step back. He wasn’t wrong to be afraid. Stan was, after all, a good five inches shorter than Jack.
Something broke inside of me as I realized the boy I had kissed good-bye through tears and promises of next summer only months earlier hated me. When he said, “Looks like your summer plans were different from mine,” and walked away, I could scarcely breathe. I realized then, knew in my head what my heart had felt all along: his summer plans had been me.
It took me a moment to catch my breath before Stan and I continued walking down the boardwalk in silence. As we reached the door of the restaurant, I looked at him and said, “I’m so sorry. You’re very nice, but I don’t think I can do this anymore.”
I slipped off my sandals and took off running down the boardwalk. I could hear Stan calling behind me, “Don’t you at least want to get some shrimp?” But I was already gone. In fact, I realized, I’d never really been with Stan to begin with.
I still remember how rough the wood felt underneath my feet that night, the warmth of the boards that had spent all spring sunning themselves. I didn’t know where Jack had gone, but I felt like if I ran fast enough, I would catch up to him. At the end of the boardwalk, my gut told me to turn right, and when I did, I could barely make out his tall frame in the setting sun. I sprinted down the sidewalk, the crowd parting like seagulls so I could get through.
Someone called, “Hey, where’s the fire?” and, if I hadn’t been so out of breath, I would have replied, though it was intolerably cheesy, “In my heart!”
When I got close enough, I managed to eke out, “Jack!”
He turned, and I stopped running, gasping for breath. I was sweating and sure my hair was a mess. The spaghetti straps of my sundress had slipped down my shoulders, but I didn’t care. I jumped into Jack’s arms, and I kissed him like I would never stop.
He laughed and, putting me down on the ground and pushing my disheveled hair out of my face, said, “So you missed me after all?”
I smiled, so relieved to hear his laugh.
“Hey, Ansley?”
“Yeah?”
“I know I haven’t seen you in nine months. But I think it puts me in a pretty good position to be able to say I love you.”
I felt my jaw drop. All those nights I had lain awake, pained over the loss of this boy, wanting to say those very words to him, I hadn’t been alone in my feelings. I kissed him again and said, “Really?”
He nodded.
“Well, I hope you know I love you too.”
The mere memory of that night made me want to cry all over again, standing on Jack’s new lawn. But I didn’t. Instead, I said, “It was so nice of you to let the girls take your boat. I don’t know how I can ever repay you.”
“Well,” he said dully, “two of them are mine even if they don’t know it. Seemed like the least I could do.”
I looked around and hissed, “Jack!”
He shrugged and whispered, “OK, OK. It’s not like anyone can hear me.”
A silver BMW convertible with the top down pulled into the driveway, a foot from where I was standing. The car stopped, and squinting in the sunlight, I watched the driver get out. A woman. Not a sister or an aunt or a harmless friend. A beautiful woman with a tight skirt, well-highlighted hair, and far fewer wrinkles than I would have liked.
Jack waved. And smiled. He smiled at her. Couldn’t muster more than a grimace for me, his first love, the mother of his two secret children, the woman who, not five weeks ago, he had wanted to marry. Now here he was giving my smile to a woman in Valentino pumps. Who wore Valentino pumps in Peachtree Bluff? Well, except for me. I did,
