Rachael, It's All or Nothing

15: It’s Just Us [Against] The World

It was raining on Sunday. I should’ve known. In moments like this, usually when the heroine (me) makes some kind of realization (in this case, that I missed Jon), the weather tends to mirror her mood. Pathetic fallacy, I believe it’s called.

So anyways, it’s raining. And when I say raining, I mean it’s like a torrential downpour. The rain is coming down so hard it’s practically white, and the storm clouds are so dark they’re practically black.

So, does this mean I’m in a bad mood, according to pathetic fallacy?

Well, I am, and I prefer to call it just a big coincidence. Or, rather, the bad weather is the reason I’m in a bad mood. When I got off the bus at the airport terminal, I didn’t step around the giant puddle – I stepped in it.

Then, I slipped, and I have a cut on my left elbow.

So, I look like a wet dog, since the torrential downpour didn’t start until I was out of my house; I’m bleeding, and I think I’m having heart palpitations.

Damn right I’m in a bad mood.

I checked the arrival of Jonathan’s airplane because I needed to figure some things out, which I couldn’t do if I had to wait for Jon to make his lazy-ass appearance at my apartment.

I was receiving odd looks from the people around me, but I wasn’t surprised. I had on a pair of my own jeans, the t-shirt Jon had left at my apartment all those months ago when we had a food fight, and I clutched my giant pink flamingo in my arms. Yes, I looked weird. No, I didn’t care. If my face was any kind of representation of what I felt inside at this particular moment, I probably looked a little spaced-out.

But then the hair stood on the back of my neck, and I somehow knew to look up. There he was, across the airport, a luggage bag trailing behind him. If my heart was beating irregularly before, I was probably in the process of having a heart attack right now.

Words jumbled incoherently in my head. If I said them out loud, no one would be able to understand me. So I took a couple of steps forward. I felt like I was seeing an apparition – no way could he be about fifteen feet away from me.

He gave a tight-lipped smile to the fan that stopped him for an autograph, and my heart flopped painfully. Jonathan the Flamingo dangled limply in my grasp, and as a crowd started to form around Jonathan (my Jonathan), I had to stand up on the uncomfortable chairs that lined the airport so I could keep him in my vision.

The closer I got, the more excited I became. Every part of me was tingling with anticipation, but I knew the second I caught his gaze, I would feel even better.

He was about ten feet away, but he still hadn’t seen me. I could hardly contain myself as I walked along the row of seats. When I was about five feet away, I let out an ear-splitting shriek. “Jonathan Fucking Toews, you better catch me!” And then I ran full tilt at him. It was a little awkward, as I was running on the connected seats, but he had just enough time to turn in my direction as I burst through the crowd and leapt at him.

I didn’t remember seeing him drop either of his bags, but I felt him stumble back and clutch at me, I knew he had. Everything faded around me as I locked onto his brown stare. A sense of overwhelming familiarity washed over me, the longer he held onto me. The people around us seemed to have gotten the message and backed off.

Then I promptly slapped him. His eyes glittered appreciatively, and I tried my best to keep my scowl from turning into a smile. “You left me alone for seven days. Now we’re even.”

Any normal person would’ve been outraged that I’d slapped him, but when has Jonathan Toews ever been normal? “I missed you too, Rachael.”

My scowl turned genuine. There was that arrogant little tone to his voice. “What do you mean, too? Who said I missed you?”

He got the message and set me on the ground. “You’re right, I apologize. You could’ve come here for any reason. Maybe you just like walking in public places with a fluorescent pink flamingo. That is coincidentally named after me, I might add.”

I turned on my heel and started walking. I had no idea where I was going, not that I cared. How dare he just assume I’d miss him! Besides the fact that I did miss every inch of him, but still! He’s supposed to let me say it! I was supposed to jump his bones and then our we-haven’t-seen-each-other-in-a-week make out session was supposed to occur. But no. He had to see right through me and know exactly what I was thinking.

Wait – wasn’t that a good thing? I stopped in my tracks and turned around when I felt the tingling sensation slowly leave my body. Jonathan was walking in an opposite direction, and for some reason, it scared me. Maybe I was just overly emotional because I was PMSing, I don’t know. Whatever the reason, I felt a sudden pang of desertion the further he got from me. I don’t think he meant it, but I got a little choked up. I chased him through the parking lot. “Jonathan!” I yelled, breaking his name up into syllables like I so often did.

He turned around. “What?”

I stopped just short of him. “I heard a guy that sounded like you on Michigan Ave, and I almost had a heart attack; I saw a kid wearing a Toews jersey and I almost cried; I saw a flock of pigeons and I almost died. I’m wearing your shirt because it smells like you.”

A funny look crossed his face – yeah, that did sound a bit weird. “I missed you,” I whispered, looking down at the wing of the flamingo I so desperately clutched to myself.

“Okay,” he replied simply.

I was no longer self conscious as I narrowed my eyes at him. “Okay?” I repeated shrilly, “way to be insensitive, you prick.”

He dodged my flailing fist, and calmly clutched at my jaw with both hands. He tilted my chin up and bent his head down so we were staring straight at each other. “Rachael, listen. I love you, but you have got to stop taking things so personally.”

I froze. The moment my eyes widened, his did too. That sounded completely sincere, and he knew it too.

I was the first to recover my voice. I shrieked, causing him to recoil, and pointed directly at him. “You love me. I knew it.” I couldn’t stop grinning. I put my hands on my hips (poor Jonathan the Flamingo – I was practically strangling him), and pouted good naturedly. “You’re a little old to be picking on girls you like.”

He leaned in. “You’re way too old to be so naïve.”

I rolled my eyes, but didn’t take offense. I could hear the joke in his tone. “Just more of me for you to corrupt, I guess.”

He chuckled. His breath fanned out across my lips, and as my shoulders stiffened, a tingle shot down my spine and to my toes. I liked that sound. His next words almost sent me into a hormonal coma. “I’m going to corrupt you so fucking badly.”

He kissed me so softly, that I almost didn’t feel it. The question burned in my mind… why did he stop? But like all the other times he’d read my mind, he sighed. “There are people here.”

Like I honestly cared, by this point, but I stepped away. “Fine,” I said hoarsely, if not a bit defensively.

“There’s no one in the back seat of my car, though.”

I looked at him sharply, but all he did was shrug and start walking. I willed my feet to move after him. Fuck yes I’d meet him in the back of his car.