It had been a hastily made plan. One born from missing Spencer and wanting to get away from everything that reminded me of him. To focus on me and learn how to deal with carrying on without him. But when the counselor in charge of arranging the study abroad programs had told me of the available slot for a trip I’d never even considered… I’d jumped on that whim. Decided to see what happens. Wing it.
Spencer chuckles. “Bet your dad was fucking thrilled when you told him.”
“He wants me to buy him a new kilt.”
Spencer stares at his hands in mine. Brow wrinkling as thoughts run through his head. Finally, he says, “So that’s, what, three months?”
“Give or take,” I say.
“And after?
“What about after?”
“What do I win?”
A smile blooms on my face, ear to ear. “You really think you can go that long?”
“Fuck yes,” he says in an instant. Cups my cheek in his hand and draws my lips closer to his. “Three months? That’s fucking nothing. Not if I get to share forever with you. Kennedy, I—”
There’s a loud, whining creak. A splitting crack from above. Air whooshes as our bodies and the swing plummet to the wooden porch with a bang. Liquid splashes over us.
Spencer holds me tight in his arms after our abrupt crash. A bitter caramelized scent drifts over us. When I look up, he wipes coffee from his eyes.
“Fucking talk about unexpected,” he says.
I collapse on his chest, I’m laughing so hard. Because, yes, it’s unexpected. And I can’t think of any better way to encapsulate right now. To always be sure I remember this moment, when Spencer Armstrong takes me in his arms, turns my face to his, and tells me, “Kennedy Fucking Walsh, I fucking love you.”
Then his lips cover mine, tasting of love and hope and unknown possibilities and sweet, delicious coffee.
And it is as good as it is possible to be.
Epilogue
“Where are you?” I ask, rolling my carry-on suitcase to the side of the aisle past security and craning my neck above the crowd of people hurrying past me.
“I told you, by the coffee shop.”
Glancing between the coffee shop on the left side of the hall, boasting the best java ever known to man, then the one directly opposite it, refuting that claim, I frown at my phone before holding it back up to my ear. “Spencer, this airport has a coffee shop every five feet. You need to be more specific.”
“Fine. If you go past the dick paintings, you’re too cold.”
What? I shake my head, then start walking where a sign hanging from the ceiling points towards more coffee for weary airline passengers.
“Just passed the mother’s room.”
“Warmer.”
“Anything else you can tell me about this particular shop?”
“Uh, it has a line?”
What coffee place doesn’t? I almost hang up in agitation. Especially when I see a wall ahead of me with a mural depicting a wild forest scene. Complete with woodland creatures and phallus-shaped mushrooms. I turn around and head the other way.
Spencer keeps up his ridiculous game. Frosty at the ice cream stand. Lukewarm around the row of souvenir gift shops. Toasty near the restaurant offering two-for-one beer deals. I roll my eyes, even as with each step that takes me from tepid to sizzling, excitement buzzes down my every nerve ending.
Three months, give or take. The amount of time since Spencer dropped me off at this very same airport. Our parting had been tearful—on my end—and I have no reservations that our reunion today will be the same. Because in all that time, so brief looking back but so terribly, terribly long in the thick of it, I’d only fallen more in love with him.
I’d planned a whole summer of phone calls and texts. Spencer did me one better. Several better, in fact. Because, yes, there’d been texts. Strings of conversations about our every little thought. And oh, the phone calls. Long and rambling and talking of nothing and everything for hours on end. But Spencer also surprised me with other forms of communication. Emails. Video messages. A collection of postcards, each one with a definition used in a detailed, dirty sentence that brought blushes to my face when I read them.
These past few months hadn’t all been easy, however. Especially on those days when nothing seemed to go right and all I wanted was to hear Spencer’s voice, only to never reach him. Between time zone differences, my classes, his football conditioning, keeping in touch with my family and friends, him visiting his siblings—whole days flew by where we never had a chance to do more than send a quick message saying we were too busy to chat.
Luckily, though, I am a master of organization. After one too many missed calls, I’d resurrected our shared calendar. Every spare moment we had, I blocked it off for Spencer and Kennedy time. And I’d added numbers to each day, counting down. Even if it didn’t completely eliminate the days where our schedules never meshed, seeing those numbers, hyping up when next we’d get to see each other in person, it helped alleviate some of the pain I’d felt, on those days where I could do nothing but miss him.
I round another corner. Say into my phone, “Is it before or after the pet relief room?”
“You’re freezing.”
“That doesn’t answer the question!”
“Practically arctic.”
And then I pause, because that voice came from both my phone and somewhere within my direct vicinity.
“Spencer—”
A family trying to find their gate moves out of my way, and there he is. Standing in front of a nondescript coffee stand. One hand at his ear, the other in the pocket of his leather jacket. Grinning at me when he says into the phone, though his voice echoes in the space between us, “Fucking burning cold.”
“Spencer,” I sigh.
“You are really bad at this game.”
I begin slowly wheeling my carry-on to where he stands. “It’d help if someone didn’t change the
