Page 32 of Thanks for Coming Along

"I told you it was fun!" Ronan yelled out with a beaming smile. Eden let out an exhilarated laugh that transformed into a scream as they pummeled downwards again. The ride eventually slowed until it stopped, but Eden's heart was still racing. She was trying to catch her breath when she looked up at Ronan's eyes under the shimmering lights. Her breath almost caught in her throat. He looked so beautiful, his sculpted nose and the softness of his lips now bathed in flashing LED lights. She found herself entranced by the shadows created by the soft glow on his face.

His eyes studied her face for a few seconds. They touched her eyes and nose, and then his eyes seemed to caress the curve of her lips. His chest was lightly heaving from the ride's excitement, and his hand still held hers firmly.

"Wow," she whispered, the word seeming to weasel its way out of her mouth. She wasn't talking about the ride. He was nothing short of a masterpiece. It would be easy to just lean over and test the feeling of his lips, see if they were as soft as they looked. She poked her tongue out of her mouth as she wet her bottom lip. Ronan's eyes followed the movement with rapt attention.

"Yeah," Ronan replied breathlessly, his hand flexing against hers and his eyes scanning her face. He looked almost as tempted as her, and his eyes seemed unable to look away. Had his face somehow gotten closer to hers?

"Bar!" Her foggy brain took a second to realize a voice was coming from her right side. She turned her head towards the voice and found a man with a red vest standing in front of their bench.Bar?

"Come on, sweethearts! I got a line of antsy kids waiting for a turn!" Right, they needed to move off the ride. Her brain finally took the hint and dropped Ronan's hand like a hot potato. Had they almost just kissed? Maybe she had gotten caught up in the moment after all that adrenaline pumping through her veins.

Ronan didn't strike her as the type to be so impulsive, especially not with someone he was working with. He was a respected journalist, the kind who’d racked up awards and tackled serious, life-changing stories. He’d gone undercover with foreign paramilitaries. He had changed the lives of countless refugees, offering them a platform to share their experiences. She was flattering herself if she thought she wasthatintriguing to him.

He probably saw her as a spoiled musician with a messy past. Compared to the gravity of his work, her life must seem shallow. Filled with wealth, status, and a bit of fame. Some would trade their souls for far less.

The ride operator lifted the bar, and Eden stood on wobbly legs to exit the ride. She couldn't tell if the sea legs were from the ride or the moment that had just passed between her and Ronan. Man, she was indeep. Like the Mariana Trench deep.

As they continued to walk the pier, they shared a bag of warm, sugary funnel cake, sticky fingers and all. She timed her grab of the dough with expert-level planning to avoid their hands accidentally touching.

Eden deliberately slid as far from Ronan as the small Ferris wheel pod would let her when he insisted she ride with him. Not that it mattered—his long legs were bent at the knees, his feet somehow still reaching under her seat. Despite the warmth radiating from his legs, she focused on the view of the inky ocean and the stars above.

Their conversation meandered from his favorite music to her favorite movies, and though she noticed the intrigued glint in his eyes, she dismissed it as mere professionalism on his part. Eden had to admit he wasexcellentat his job. Although he hadn't brought his camera with him tonight. It seemed the more time they spent together, the less the camera came out.

After the Ferris wheel, they stopped at the boardwalk railing, looking out at the endless stretch of the Pacific. Eden felt like she was on the edge of something, like meeting Ronan might shift her life in ways she hadn’t expected. Their time together might’ve started as work, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t take something meaningful from it.

She knew this had a deadline. By the end of October, they’d both return to their own lives. Even so, meeting Ronan had already left a mark. He challenged her in ways she didn’t see coming, waking up a part of her she thought she’d outgrown.

With him, she felt young again. He made her want to run in the ocean like a kid. He had brought her to a carnival because she had never experienced one before. Ronan didn’t realize how much those moments meant to her, how deeply they resonated with a piece of herself she’d almost forgotten was there.

"Secret?" Eden said, her tone suggesting that she wasn't seeking an unknown fact from him this time but was ready to share one herself. Her voice was barely above a whisper, her eyes finding the stars in the shimmering sky.

"Thanks for bringing me here," she hesitated for a moment, then shifted her eyes toward him. "Growing up so fast, so young... I missed out on stuff like this. Doing things like this," she admitted. "It is like getting back some part of myself I thought was gone forever. A part of myself that I had never been given the space to let free."

"I'm glad we got to do it together," he confessed, his words a soft murmur carried on the night breeze. "I don't think I've allowed myself to have fun like this in a long time. I've felt.." he swallowed quickly. "I don't know, maybe guilty in some ways. Like I don't deserve to let myself enjoy things like this." His gaze, previously fixed on the vast ocean before them, shifted to meet hers, their eyes locking.

"I think we met each other at the perfect time," she admitted; as her words came out of her mouth, it felt like they carried a profound weight. Ronan nodded, the understanding in his gaze mirrored by the glint of starlight. "We both needed this in some way. I know I said it jokingly, but... thank you for coming along. Really. I didn't realize how much I needed... you." As his gaze bore into her, Eden felt a swell of emotion in her chest, a warmth that spread through her body.

"Yes," he affirmed, laden with unspoken emotions, his unwavering gaze never leaving hers. Then, another "Yes" escaped his lips, almost as if he were speaking to himself, lost in a moment of emotion.

A frustrated screech broke through the moment, making Eden snap her attention away from Ronan. She turned to see a little girl standing in front of the ring toss, her fists clenched in frustration, probably because she couldn’t land the ring on the bottle.

"Time for redemption!" Eden said eagerly as she pulled his arm towards the game. The ring toss game suddenly seemed critical to her for reasons even she couldn't quite put into words. In some weird way, winning this game was a way to express her gratitude to him.

She stood in front of the ring toss booth, watching Ronan try his best, tossing rings toward the glass bottles with a look of concentration while he chewed the inside of his mouth, but none landed on the narrow necks. With each unsuccessful attempt, she couldn't help but feel a bit of pressure building.

She gripped her rings tightly, took a deep breath, and focused on her target. She let the first ring go, and it sailed through the air.Her heart raced with hope as it closed in, but it bounced off the neck of a bottle and fell to the ground with a soft clink. She sighed and glanced at Ronan, who gave her an encouraging smile and a thumbs-up. Determined not to disappoint him, she lined up another shot. This time, the ring sailed perfectly, slipping over the top of a bottle and resting snugly on the glass.

A wave of elation washed over her, and she couldn't help but cheer. The carnival attendant, a man with few visible front teeth, congratulated her and handed over a large, fluffy seal. Holding it proudly, she turned to Ronan, who was smiling widely.

"My hero," he said with a hearty laugh as Eden handed the plush to Ronan. He accepted it with a grin.

"It's fitting," Eden remarked with a contented smile as she stared at the seal plush gripped in his left hand, their steps echoing on the boardwalk as they returned to her car.

"Why's that?" Ronan inquired, genuinely curious.

"Because your name means "little seal."

"Did you look up the origin of my name?" Ronan's lips curved into a slight grin at her admission.

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