Dishing Up Love

I make it halfway there.

And stop.

Because stepping between me and my destination is the most handsome man I’ve ever laid eyes on. Even more handsome in person than I remembered. Even more handsome than in the countless FaceTime calls we’ve had over the last month.

And that handsome, excited, smiling face takes me in for a moment before his expression falters, and he rushes forward just as my knees start to wobble. He somehow catches me right as they give out, and just as I was hoping, with one deep breath, my lungs fill with the comforting scent of him, and it makes half of all the terrible nerves rushing through my veins pump their brakes as I melt into him. Letting him take my weight. Allowing him to just hold me up while I relax against him.

“You all right, sugar?” he breathes against my hair at the crown of my head, and I bask in the rumble of his voice against my cheek as it presses to his chest.

“I am now,” I tell him, and we stay like that for I don’t know how long as I soak up his strength.

When I think I can finally stand on my own, I pull my head back enough to look up at him, and his eyes dart back and forth between mine, making his own assessment before he lowers his head and kisses me gently.

This isn’t the kiss I’d pictured thousands of times when I’d imagine what our reconnection would be like. I thought I’d spot him and run full-speed until I slammed into him, climbing up him like spider monkey, and latch onto his face with passion.

This though? This is a kiss of relief, of gratefulness, of love. This sweet, soft press of lips I feel in my heart, not my core. And ahhh, here comes that serotonin I was hoping for.

My eyes are still closed when we finally part, and when I look up at him, he’s staring at me intently. “What is it?” I whisper.

“You look awfully pale, sugar. You feeling okay?” he asks, and I step back to grab and pull my purse back up on my shoulder after it had fallen to the floor when I almost collapsed.

Big mistake.

Just as I bend over to pick up my bag and am about to tell him, yeah, I’m fine now, that terrible tingling feeling starts in my chest and creeps up the back of my throat. My skin grows hot just as a chill runs through me, and the sweat that had dried on my temples starts to bead once more.

“Oh fuck,” I hiss, glancing around frantically.

“Er—” Curtis doesn’t even get my name out before I take off, leaving my purse behind as I bolt to the tall black trashcan near the bench I’d been aiming for just minutes ago.

“I’m sorry!” I cry out to the people standing nearby waiting for their baggage to be loaded onto the conveyor belt, just as I take hold of the black metal, put my whole head inside the open lid, and proceed to empty my stomach.

I hear who I hope is Curtis hurry up behind me and feel his big hands start pulling my hair away from my face. His fingers are so gentle as he gathers it all at the back of my head and holds it there with one hand, using the other to rub my back.

“She okay?” I hear in a familiar male voice, but I don’t turn to figure out who it is.

“I’ve got her, bro. You mind running into the bathroom right there and getting some cold, wet paper towels?” Curtis asks quietly, and the guy must agree, because I hear his tennis shoes squeak against the floor as he walks briskly away from us.

Right when I think I’m done heaving—surely my stomach must be completely empty by now—I try to swallow and feel a chunk of my breakfast still hanging out. The feeling brings on another wave of bile until I’m dry-heaving, whimpering at the awful feeling and internally dying of embarrassment that this is how I greeted Curtis, literally the hottest man alive, after having a long-distance relationship with him for the past month.

“Here you go, man,” comes the voice again, and when I groan in relief at the feel of the coldness hitting the back of my neck and feel another press into my hand, which I use to wipe my mouth, I peek up, seeing it’s Carlos.

He waves at me sheepishly, the look of pity on his face as I try to give him a smile.

“Hey, Carlos. Thank you,” I say through a sniffle, blinking away tears that filled my eyes while I barfed my brains out.

“Hey, sweetheart. You feeling better?” he asks.

I take a moment, still bent over the trashcan, hair still pulled back in Curtis’s hand, and assess how I’m feeling before I attempt to stand up straight. When all I feel is emptiness in my gut, the queasiness gone, I nod and push up from the can, and Curtis lets go of my hair, wrapping his arms around my waist to keep me steady.