Page 79 of A Beginner's Guide to Forever
He dips his chin. “I’ve missed you.”
The weight of his words breaks the last of my resolve. “Come on. It’s freezing.” I tug him by the hand and lead the way back to my hotel.
But a few steps in, I pitch sideways, stumbling, and feel Hart grab me before I topple. The combination of the uneven sidewalk and my very high heels.
“Are you okay?” he asks.
I grimace. “I think I twisted my ankle.”
He laces one hand around my waist. “Lean on me. I’ve got you.”
Hobbling now, we continue toward the hotel.
“Does it hurt?” he asks.
“It’s okay. I’ve always wanted a limp. It makes me feel like a pirate.”
Hart chuckles. “You know a pirate’s favorite letter of the alphabet?”
“Arrrgh,” I say, impersonating Jack Sparrow.
“Nope.Sea.” He draws out the word in his best pirate accent.
I dissolve into giggles, the pain in my ankle suddenly gone.
As we pass by a trash bin, I drop the bottle of whiskey inside, and it makes a loud thump.
“What was that?” he asks, looking at me quizzically.
“Nothing.”
I’m not brave enough to invite him up to my room, not when I don’t trust myself to make good decisions. So we sit at the bar in the hotel lobby and talk over a cocktail. I imagine how we must look—he looking dapper in a black custom-made tuxedo and crisp white shirt. I in a floor-length silver gown with a bag of ice on my ankle that Hart requested from the bartender.
“You were brilliant tonight. And that speech was incredible. It was funny, moving ... and very powerful.”
I almost admit that I could barely get through it when I spotted him sitting there in the crowd. “Thank you,” I say instead.
He fills me in on the work he’s done on his friend Monty’s app and that he’s been invited to deliver the commencement address at his former boarding school’s graduation ceremony this spring.
“That’s amazing.”
“How long are you in New York?” he asks, swirling the remnants of his old-fashioned around in his glass.
“I’m actually flying home in the morning.”
He frowns. “Home. California or Nairobi?”
“California,” I confirm. “My parents would kill me if I was in the States but didn’t visit. I haven’t seen them since Christmas. And Scarlet’s baby is being baptized, so I’ll stay for a long weekend.”
“Maybe I’ll see you there,” he says, watching for my reaction.
It was the same thing he said when I told him I was heading off for London all those months ago.
“Do you have some unfinished business in California that I’m not aware of?” My mouth twitches with a smile.
“Maybe I do.”
Standing on the front porch of Scarlet and Will’s house with Hart by my side is like an out-of-body experience. We sat through the church service, the lengthy Catholic mass this morning and baby Cullen’s baptism, and now we’re here for a small luncheon gathering. And based on the lack of cars on the street, we’re the first to arrive.
