I Do Until I Don't

Chapter 3

 When I was little, I thought that Shooters was a place where we could shoot roosters. I have no idea why. I'd keep forgetting that it was only a restaurant even if my family and I went to Florida almost every year. It's only at fifteen that I started putting "Shooters" and "coolest restaurant ever" together. The outside terrace is illuminated by fairy lights and there's always a band playing soft but mood-lifting songs. Everyone is just so happy and the food is great. Julia and I always share a plate of sushi and a bowl of mac and cheese because why not. Melanie, who's always making the right decisions for her body, takes the salmon, and so does my mom. My father always asks for the recommendation of the waiter.

Today, though, since it's Melanie's engagement party, my parents are the ones paying for the meal of about fifty people. My sisters and I agreed on taking two of the cheapest meals and sharing them between us three. We're amazing daughters, I know.

Melanie is at the entrance of the restaurant, greeting everyone with Nia, her fiancée, hugging people and receiving gifts and taking pictures. With Nia by her side, she looks all-so-peaceful. They are in matching dresses. Melanie's is long and wavy and yellow while Nia's has the same cut but is light pink, contrasting wonderfully with her chocolate skin.

"They look so good together!" Julia tells me, catching me staring at Nia and Mélanie kissing.

"Yeah, they do." I nudge her in the arm. "Hey, it's been a while since you've been out on a date. When are you going to out again? It's been like, what?, two years?"

"I'm twenty. I've got the time. And, by the way, who's talking, Miss I've-Never-Been-On- A-Date?"

I'm about to protest that, unlike her, I don't want to date anyone (besides Alexander Hannah, but that's a totally different story) when Julia looks up and then acknowledges someone by the chin. "Look up. Mister Your Future Husband has just arrived."

I look at where Julia's eyes are shifting and spot Alexander Hannah making his way through the ocean of people drinking champagne and talking all over the restaurant. My mind is so used to the image of him popping in and out of my brain many, and I mean many, times a day that, for a second there, I think I might be imagining him. It's like everything goes in slow motion mode and all the fairy lights turn over to illuminate only him, like sunflowers turning towards the sun.

And then.

Our eyes meet.

My stomach drops to the floor. I can't believe it. He's actually here. After a year of imagining and waiting and wondering, Alexander is finally in the same room as me.

And he's smiling at me.

And he's waving at me.

And he's coming towards me.

And his cousin (and my best friend), Sabrina, jumped into his arms and now he's no longer looking at me. But he was looking at me so that counts for something. Gosh! Sometimes, I wish I could just read his mind to know what he thinks about when he looks at me. Yet, I don't want him to read into mine, because all there is when I look at him is ALEX! ALEX! ALEX! CAN YOU JUST LOVE ALREADY?

"Soooo...he's the guy you have a crush on," someone says behind me, making me jump. I turn around to come face-to-face with Nia.

"I really need to have a conversation with Melanie on privacy and the meaning of the word secret," I remind myself out loud.

"Don't blame it on Mel," Nia says, always so loyal to my sister. "Even if she hadn't told me, I would have figured it out. I bet everyone here knows you have a crush on him."

"It's that obvious?"

"Oh, Honey," Nia says, putting a comforting hand on my shoulder, "you could shout it and it would be less obvious."

"That's what I told her!" Julia says, high-fiving Nia.

I put my gaze back onto Alexander who's now in a heated conversation with his Sabrina. He's moving his strong arms in different directions, something he always does when he's talking. He cut his hair since the last time I've seen him. They used to be wavy and long. Now, they are short near his ears and longer on the top, but still are this wonderful shade of copper. He seems taller too, and more handsome. If that's even possible.

"You should totally ask him out!" Nia tells me.

I cover my burning face with my hands. "Are you crazy? I have you met me?"

"Why not?"

Nia doesn't get it. She's bold and confident and she can get one she wants; I, on the other hand, cannot. And it's not a self-esteem thing, I just can't.

Not that I tried dating someone else. When you meet someone as awesome and magical as Alex, you don't really want to look at anyone else. Besides, it's not like I can try to flirt with him; every time I try, my sentences sound like verbal diarrhea.

"Because... Because he's him," I answer instead. "And I'm me. And it's never gonna happen."

"Not with this attitude, it won't," Julia assures me.

"How did you guys meet anyway?" Nia asks.

I feel my cheeks flush. "Two years ago I went to Florida and he was there with Sabrina. So we hung out for the entire summer. And then I saw him again last year at Sabrina's Christmas party."

Obviously, that's not the whole story. But I can't just go into a ramble about how he walked into the room and it was like my soul started dancing and about how he protected me from that weird guy checking me out and how my heart skipped a beat and I just knew I was going to marry him someday. It might seem dramatic, but I swear it felt that way.

"Wait, wait!" Nia says. "You've had a crush on a guy for two years?"

"Pathetic, I know."

Nia smiles at me but doesn't disagree. I know! Liking a guy for two years and never acting on it, never even getting over it, never even looking at any other guy because I still secretly hope it's him and I in the end, pathetic.

"I have to go talk to Mel," Nia says. "You coming, Juju?"

"What? Oh yeah. Of course."

Nia is the most obvious person ever. She's obviously asking Julia to come with her to let me walk over to talk to Alexander. A part of me wants to walk to him and start a conversation, but the other part is terrified. Terrified that he will have changed, that we won't click the way we once did, that he won't remember me. No, that's nonsense. I have to think positive. He will remember me. He will because Life isn't cruel. I haven't lost sleep every day for the last two years to have Alexander not remember my name.

But what if he doesn't?

Oh! Shut up! He will!

I take in a deep breath and walk over to meet Alexander, still talking to Sabrina. He notices me when I'm a few feet away. He smiles brightly at me, and I swear my heart stops pumping blood for a second.

"Hi Em," he says, using the nickname he gave me last time we saw each other. He once said that Ella-Mae made him think of LMA, as in LMAO, which reminded him of slang and he hates slang: "It prevents people from being sophisticated." So he took the initials of my first name. It gave Em. "It's been a while," Present-Alex says.

"Hi, Buddy, what's up?"

...

What is wrong with me? Buddy? Really? How dumb can a person be?

Alex stretches out his hand for me to shake it. I tilt my head to the side and arch my brow.

"Really?" And I go in for a hug. He laughs and hugs me back. He smells like I remember. Pine and sunscreen and Abercrombie and Fitch cologne.

"You haven't changed."

I don't know if it's a compliment.

I'll take it as a compliment.

I just hope that he hasn't changed either.