the bill was settled, Julie and Alan dragged her out to the beach, the three amigos walking with linked arms, kicking up sand, laughing too loud. Alan’s body was warm against her shoulder, his T-shirt wicking away the light sheen of humidity on her skin. He was slimmer than her taste, but not in a scrawny way. He had a nice laugh and beautiful eyes. That charming smile. There were fruity umbrella drinks, moonlight on the water, the sand between their toes and the scent of exotic flowers in the air. There was a lot of romantic material handy, basically, and she could work with it. She would work with it.
Then it happened again. A random stranger by the water’s edge turned toward them and, even in the moonlight, Amanda thought she saw Jeremy’s face. Was she doomed to see him everywhere she went, even when she knew he was thousands of miles away? Even when she was finally, possibly, just maybe, about to get naked with somebody for the first time in almost a year?
Fuck.
The stranger stopped in his tracks, mouth falling open in surprise for a moment before he snapped it shut. He started to cross his arms over his chest, then stopped himself and put his hands in his pockets instead.
He didn’t just look like Jeremy. He was Jeremy. Here. In Hawaii. On her vacation.
The world shifted under her feet, the surprise and the alcohol combining to knock her awry. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.
“Oh my God! He’s the mystery jogger!” Julie and Alan had stopped beside her, and now Julie’s words brought Amanda back to reality.
Alan sucked in a breath, a reverse hiss of awkwardness. “Whoa. This can’t be a coincidence.”
Amanda stepped away from him, feeling a chilly draft against the side of her body that he’d been keeping warm. She was suddenly disgusted with herself, with the idea that she’d been planning to use him for sex. With her own desperation, because one look at Jeremy was enough to prove that she wasn’t over him. Not even close. “Thank you, Captain Obvious.”
Jeremy waved, clearly not willing to cross the final distance over the sand. Maybe he just didn’t want to encounter her friends. He had probably been planning to approach her when she was alone, maybe to send a note or something. It was clear he hadn’t expected to see her there on the beach at that particular moment.
Damn, he looked good. She’d never seen him with a buzz cut before, and was surprised by how well it flattered him, gave him an almost military edge. Although that might have also been the muscles, which were also new and a surprise. Jesus, what were they feeding them in Seattle? How was she ever going to resist that? She’d had a hard enough time thinking straight around the old Jeremy, the one who was starting to develop a soft belly because he spent all his time in front of the computer. She’d found him hot enough back then, and got giddy from the attention he gave her. Now that he looked like a Daniel Craig body double, she was doomed. Doomed.
Because he hadn’t come all the way to Hawaii just to clear the air. He wouldn’t be doing this if he didn’t want her to reconsider, would he? Maybe he thought she would magically want to move to Seattle now that she’d had time to regret her decision. Because that had been the only solution he’d been able to accept to their location problem, and that was why they weren’t married right now. Why she hadn’t seen him in ten months. Fuck.
“So...are you gonna go talk to him?” Julie asked. “Or do we all just stand here looking at each other across the sand? Awkwardly? Like we’re doing right now...”
“Fuck. I just wanted a damn vacation.” Amanda was pleading, but she wasn’t sure with whom. Herself, maybe? Jeremy, who had taken a hesitant step toward their uncomfortable little group? “And maybe some action. Was that really too much to ask? Really?”
“Oh, he’s coming over here. Please go talk to him.”
“Fuck.” As much as she dreaded talking to Jeremy, she didn’t want her friends to be part of the conversation. He’d stopped again, so it was apparently up to her to close the distance. Probably that symbolized some deeper truth about their relationship, but her brain was too muddled to decide on a meaning.
She had to go talk to him. Even with no idea what might ensue, she had to. So she went.
What the fuck are you doing here?
Are you out of your damn mind?
Who the hell does something like this?
Amanda’s mind was full of things she might say, possible approaches to her problem. What came out when she and Jeremy were finally face-to-face was, “Hi.”
“I can explain.”
“Okay...” Should she really even be listening to an explanation? Shouldn’t she just kick him to the curb? The breakup itself hadn’t been so egregious, mostly cold and full of sickening disappointment followed by intense sadness. But him showing up uninvited to her vacation was way over the top, getting into creepy-stalker territory. Damn, he looks good.
“Wow. All right. I had a whole thing planned out for tomorrow morning but I guess I can wing it.”
“That’d be great, if it’s not too much trouble. Wouldn’t want to put you out or anything.”
“No, it’s not—”
“Far be it from me to deviate once again from whatever script you had in mind for me.” She wasn’t sure where the rush of indignation came from after so much time, but she didn’t care. It felt good. She should have unleashed all this months ago instead of retreating into herself.
“I didn’t. There was no script.”
“On my vacation. What the fuck are you doing here?” Oh, there it is. “Are you out of your damn mind?”
She reined herself back in, startled but oddly satisfied to have actually said, for once, the stuff she’d thought up to say beforehand. The only thing she left out was, Who the hell does something like this? It was obvious; Jeremy did.
“I think I am a little out of my mind, yeah.” He shoved his hands in his pockets and stared at the sand, scuffing a circle with one toe. No, not a circle. A question mark. “It all seemed like a much better idea before I actually got here.”
“How could this possibly seem like a good idea?” She knew how, though. Movies. Television. Novels, even the nonromantic kind. The hero swooped in with one big final gesture and rescued the heroine from a lifetime of loneliness. Their problems magically worked out, with a few minutes to spare at the end for a heartwarming final scene. “That was a rhetorical question.”
“Good, because I don’t have an answer.”
“I do. The grand gesture. The big finale where I realize how foolish I was to give up on love, then you sweep me off my feet and all is right with the world. Well, fuck that. This is not my finale, Jeremy. And all is most definitely not right with the fucking world. How did you even know...oh. God. Mom, right? Man, she’s lucky she’s a few thousand miles away right now.”
Her mother’s championship of Jeremy continued to baffle her. Of all people, Sandy ought to understand what it meant to Amanda to have a home base, to put down roots and not want to transplant herself. But to send him here on a fool’s errand was so many steps beyond too
