“Great, thank you.” Inside here is Addie and I cannot wait to find her.
“Would you like some coffee? I can make you a nice one, we have a great coffee machine…”
“Perfect.” I need her to leave now before I lose my freaking mind.
As soon as the door closes behind her, I hurry through the file that Hayley has given me to find the one and only profile that I want to see. Thankfully, she has small pictures attached to each one, not that I’d need it. As I run my eyes over what Hayley has written about Addie, I would know it’s her right away.
“Oh, Addie.” I run my eyes over the picture, my heart melting as I do. “I have missed you.”
Now that she’s so close to me, almost within touching distance, I realize that it isn’t closure I want. That isn’t what I really came here for. I can tell myself as much but it isn’t the truth. I want her back in my life. I want to go back to that wonderful place we were six years ago before she ran away.
“Ah, Jace,” Hayley says happily as she comes back in to the room. “You are working your way through the profiles. Do you have a list of people you would like me to set you up with?”
“Erm, just one actually. I hope that’s okay? Just for a start. While I… find my feet.”
“Right, sure. That sounds fine to me. However, you want to do it, Mr. Creek.” She winks at me. “Let me see… okay, I can send off an email to this young lady and let you know what she says.”
“Will she know who she’s going out with?”
Hayley giggles more girlishly than I ever thought possible. It seems like she’s coming over a little star struck with me. I should be used to this by now, but every so often it strikes me hard. This is why I would like a normal life. I would like to just be me without being recognize.
“No, I can keep it a secret. See if she will go in blind, sometimes our clients don’t mind that. I might send her a couple of details about you, just so she knows that you’re a good person. I won’t do anything identifiable.”
“Perfect, thank you. So, what do I do in the mean time?”
“Wait and I will let you know when we have something set up.”
We shake hands then and say our goodbyes. I manage to leave Hayley’s office feeling even better than when I went in. Somehow, by actually putting this plan in to action, it feels even less crazy. I will just happen to go on a date with Addie, neither of us need to have manipulated this, it can just be a chance meeting. Fate. A bit like the first time we met. That felt like destiny as well…
My heart stopped beating the first second I saw her. It was like the world had fallen out from underneath me and all I could see was her. My friend was by me at the time, I can’t even remember who it was now, he barely even features in the memory. I just know that someone was talking to me and I could barely hear him. There was a buzzing in my ears that was all about her. My heart pounded hot blood all through me.
The beautiful blonde, with hair spilling down her back, that wide smile that lit up the whole student bar, the eyes that twinkled as she talked to her friend. I think it was Luci, but again I can’t remember. The rest of the world had dissolved in to nothingness. All I could see was her gorgeous heart-shaped face, her pretty aura, all I could feel was the shift within me. I knew that nothing would ever be the same again.
That’s the one, I thought to myself. She’s the girl for me.
I was drawn to her. There was a powerful magnet between us, and it drew me to her. It wasn’t just me that felt it though, she turned like she was being pulled to me too and our eyes connected. A jolt shot through me, like a bolt of lightning, shaking me all over. I held out my hands to her and she just took them, like this was normal. We smiled at one another and something magical was born.
The touch of her skin sent electrical fizzles everywhere and I knew that she felt it too from the way that she nearly jumped backwards. We laughed together, sharing our very first joke.
I think I might have fallen in love with her there and then. I knew that she was different, that she was the one.
“My name is Jace,” I told her. “What’s yours?”
“Addie,” she replied with a blush in her cheeks. “Actually, Addison, no one calls me Addie. I don’t know why I said that. Sorry, I’m just…”
Her nerves were adorable. I just wanted to hold her, to comfort her, to love her. It took all of my strength not to grab her then and to squeeze her tight. I only resisted because I thought it might send her away. I didn’t want her to go anywhere. Ever again.
“Addie.” I laced my fingers through hers, interlocking the part of our body that’s acceptable for now. The rest would come, I knew it. I could sense that sizzling chemistry bubbling already. “I think I like Addie.”
“Then, Addie it is.”
“Right.” She nods and smiles. “Yes, Addie. You might be the only one to call me that, but it’s fine.”
We got to know one another quickly, mostly because it felt like we’d known one another all our lives. I lapped up every detail about her, I wanted to know every little part, it was incredible. And she wanted to know everything about me as well. I haven’t ever had anyone like that since. It seems that the bigger my fame gets and the more that people think they know about me, the less they care about the truth. She wanted to know about the real me.
And then we kissed. We kissed like there was no tomorrow. We kissed passionately, our hands all knotted up in one another’s hair, clutching at each other needily. It didn’t go any further than that, not on that night, but it didn’t have to. I was already head over heels.
I thought that feeling would last forever, I assumed that was just the start of our long and amazing love story. One that culminated in a happy ever after. I didn’t know that we would be cruelly torn apart by god knows what. If I can figure it out, then I can maybe make it right again. I’m willing to do whatever it takes.