Page 45 of Out of Office

“Okay.” He nodded and bolted out of the bed. “Come on. I want to take you to have some breakfast before the flight.”

The grumble in my stomach approved of that plan.

Two hours would never be enough to plan the rest of our life, and the minutes fell through my fingers like sand. After some quick debauchery in the shower, we headed out for breakfast. I continued to “project manage” the upcoming months while Adrián patiently let me spiral while holding my hand.

“Where should we get married?”

“Can we decide that when I am in Florida?”

“Fine, but we need to decide, because if we are doing a big wedding then I need to plan the event...”

“Do you want a big wedding?”

“Uh...” A few days ago I wasn’t even thinking of a wedding, how would I know what I wanted?

“So, let’s pencil that in as things to consider,” Adrián said gently, his sexy smile making me wish we’d just ordered breakfast in bed instead.

“What are you going to do about LasDell and Villa Bonita?”

“Any admin work I can help with remotely, and I do plan to find more work as soon as that permit arrives in the mail.”

“Do you want us to move? I have a nice apartment, but it might be too small.”

“Let’s live together first and decide if we need to change that.”

And so along we went, me in a slight panic while Adrián exhibited an annoying amount of patience. Not going to lie, it was very sexy to me. Maybe we could have a quickie in his apartment before the airport... I looked at the time and realized that wasn’t possible and almost wailed out loud. After stuffing my face with hojaldras and chorizo, I hopped back in his vehicle, forlorn to leave him behind.

“So, you feel comfortable with this plan? Are you moving as soon as you get the visa? Are you sure? And...”

“Breathe, Preciosa. One step at the time. This will work. Trust me.” And Adrián enveloped me in a hug calming all my nerves. Now if only I could calm my racing thoughts.

Twenty

Adrián

The sweltering heat surrounded me immediately when I stepped out of the airport in Miami.

Time had accelerated the instant Gen and I decided to move forward with our lives together. The visa process, from all we had gathered, could be a swift or lengthy one. Expecting months, we had filled out the paperwork, secure in the time we had to make the needed changes in our lives to join them successfully.

I hadn’t been expecting less than two months. I received the invitation to the embassy a month into the request, which set a chain of events that brought me to this hot Florida morning waiting for Gen to pick me up.

My chest vibrated with mixed emotions, just a tiny sample of the myriad of physical reactions since I got the visa. Pain to say goodbye to my family and Villa Bonita, and not sure when I would return. Chills with excitement as I packed, imagining placing my clothes next to Gen’s. Indigestion as I dealt with Julín’s cold shoulder. Nostalgia-filled goodbyes with my friends and family. When I traversed the security checkpoint to go to my gate, my throat closed up, and I could not look back to see them all waving one last time.

The exhaust of vehicles burned my nose, as droplets of sweat trickled down my back, and I tapped my feet to the invisible music in my head that had kept me together through the walk out of the airport.

A white car beeped loudly startling me out of my fog, blinding lights flashed in the darkened underground arrival area, and then a door popped open.

“Hey! We gotta move fast. Let me open the trunk.” Gen jumped out of the car in a whirl of cream clothes, sleek hair, and smiles. She threw her arms around me, immediately settling a question that had moved in, niggling in the back of my mind.

Was this the right move?

My chest expanded, taking in her familiar scent of cinnamon and honey and her softness soothing all the turmoil inside. Yes... this was the right move. I had left a crying Claudia and a pissed Julín behind for a worthy reason. This was why I had to trust that Villa Bonita would be okay and that Julín would thrive without me there. I had to trust because holding Gen close felt as right as I had felt in a long time.

“Okay, let’s go,” Gen whispered in my ear, and I entered her vehicle, finally excited for the future.

White, beige, and pink.

An abundance of the first, contrasted with the second with splashes of the third. I took in my new home, an apartment on the fourth floor of a small building in an area she had described as nice but not like “nice nice,” but that to me felt way more than what she described.

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