Chance Encounters

“I like it when your face touches mine,” he whispered, right before the picture was taken. Her cheeks flushed with warmth.

She thanked the teenager while the stranger looked at the picture and deemed it worthy of keeping. “You look gorgeous. I look like a schmuck,” he told her with a scowl.

“Shut up! You look amazing. Your eyes—they’re gorgeous.” She ran her finger across his face on her camera screen and looked at the blue eyes staring back at her.

He gently took her face in his hands and looked into her soft green eyes. He moved his face toward hers as her heart pounded and her mind felt muddled. He kissed her softly above her ear. “You have beautiful eyes, too.”

Heat instantly rushed through every pore of her body. Clumsily, she grabbed her purse and shoved the camera back in before telling him, “Thank you,” for the compliment.

“Any time, babe.” He winked and she felt lost as she looked at him.

“Excuse me, sir, you have to turn your phone off,” the flight attendant told him.

“Yeah, hon, turn off your phone,” Caroline smirked. “I’m sorry. He always does this.” She rolled her eyes toward the attendant.

He gave her a quick glance and threw his arm around her waist, pulling her into him, “Oh I do, do I?”

His arms were muscular and his chest and shoulders were hard, but Caroline didn’t mind. She couldn’t remember the last time she was so intensely attracted to someone. Her entire body was aware of his. She briefly thought about Clay, but only to compare the differences between him and her new friend. She told hersel

f to stop touching this stranger, stop flirting, stop doing everything she wouldn’t want Clay to be doing. But her body and emotions had their own agenda. And on that agenda was a five-hour meeting with this new, attractive stranger.

When the plane started to take off, she realized immediately how tired she was. She yawned and fought to keep her eyelids from closing when she heard, “Did you want to sleep, babe?”

When he talked to her like they were a couple, she got a rush of jittery emotions. “Maybe just for a little. Don’t let me sleep too long, though.” She looked up at his seemingly chiseled features before her hand brushed down the side of his face. What was she doing? She didn’t know this guy; why the hell did she touch his face like that? This was inappropriate and she knew if Clay were doing this, she’d be livid.

But she couldn’t stop herself. Everything about this guy intrigued her. She wanted to be near his body. She wanted to touch him. Her hands wanted to be all over him. She had to fight the urge to kiss him every time she looked in his direction.

He bent down, reached into the black sport bag under the seat, and pulled out a faded gray sweatshirt. He folded it into a loose ball and placed it between his shoulder and her head. Then he gently pulled her body toward his and kissed the top of her head. As he stroked her long blonde hair, she reminded him, “Not too long. Promise me.”

“Sure…but why?”

“Because I don’t want to waste the whole flight with you sleeping.” She nuzzled into his neck and felt his cheek pressed against her head. Unable to keep her eyes open any longer, she stopped fighting the sleep that came for her. Her last waking thoughts were how the sweatshirt pillow smelled just like him and she drifted off while she breathed him in.

Caroline opened her eyes as the jarring movements of airplane turbulence forced her awake. She lifted her head slowly, but kept her arms wrapped around his body. She didn’t move her leg, either, which had somehow become intertwined with his.

“You okay?” he asked, without moving. She smiled and the attraction between them was like lightning in the night’s sky. He took a quick breath and confessed, “I want to kiss you so bad,” as he tucked a long blonde strand of hair behind her ear.

She wanted him to do it. Her lips screamed at her to let him. But the reality of her situation, and Clay, was something her conscious mind couldn’t get past.

“I…have a boyfriend,” she stuttered. It was the truth, but at that moment she wished it wasn’t. It was the first time she had spoken those words and felt nothing but disappointment. What was wrong with her? Clay was not the type of guy a girl was disappointed to have.

“I’m truly sorry to hear that. He’s one lucky guy,” he informed, still holding her.

Caroline’s mind drifted to thoughts of kissing this stranger. Touching him. Allowing her hands to roam all over his body. She wondered how bad could it be? She could kiss him and never speak of it again. It was the perfect scenario for a hookup—a plane flight across the country surrounded by strangers. No one would be the wiser. No one would ever know. She sighed softly and thought to herself, I would know. I could never live with myself if I did that to Clay.

She inched away from his secure arms and leaned her head into the seat. As they faced each other she said, “I’m so attracted to you. I really want to kiss you, but I can’t. It’s not right.”

“I understand. I respect you for that. But I’ve still got four hours or so to change your mind,” he teased.

“I’ll make you a deal. If this plane goes down, I’ll let you kiss me the whole way,” she told him laughing.

“I’ve never wanted a plane to crash so badly in my life.”

Caroline was keenly aware that this flight would come to an end, this guy would walk out of her life, and she’d be forever changed from it. She felt things stronger than most people. Sometimes she felt it was a curse to feel things so deeply, but other times she felt it was one of her best qualities.

The two of them talked for hours. She kept her legs tangled in his and he acted as if he wouldn’t take his arms off of her if someone paid him to.

“So what do you do?” she asked.