“Love you too, Mom.” I end the call before I cave and spill everything, staring at the dark screen and contemplating my next move. Wanting to put off calling Jack for a little longer, I order an Uber and wait out front. I take a second to admire the scenery around me—while the airport is the typical concrete hustle-and-bustle of a major transportation hub, it’s still surrounded by impossibly tall palm trees that stretch toward the cornflower-blue sky. There’s not a cloud smeared across it at all, just an endless expanse of blue, blue, blue and the gentle kiss of the breeze on my cheeks. It’s paradise personified.
If this place is already taking my breath away at the exit from theairport,I can only imagine what the rest of the island has in store for me.
Once I’m settled into the back seat of the car and coasting along toward the University of Hawai?i, I decide that I can’t put it off any longer. I pull up Jack’s contact in my phone and hit the call button, heart hammering in my chest as it rings and rings.
And rings.
And rings.
And rings. And—
“Hi, you’ve reached Jack Cameron. Leave a message and I’ll get back to you. Thanks!”The voicemail tone beeps, and I open and close my mouth a few times, wondering what the hell to say.
“H-hey, Jack,” I stammer.Already off to a crappy start.“Not sure if you’re busy right now or anything, but I have a surprise for you. Give me a call when you can, okay?” I end the call and lean back against the headrest, taking a few steadying breaths.It’s 2:00p.m. Maybe he’s still sleeping. Although Jack never sleepslate. Maybe he’s studying, or he’s in a class, or he’s lost in the woods somewhere—
Just to be safe, I also shoot him a text.Hi. Have a surprise for you—call me when you can?
The driver brakes sharply, startling me out of my mental spiral and nearly sending my phone skittering underneath the seat. “Sorry, Miss Olive,” he apologizes empathetically. “The traffic on the Kamehameha Highway can be brutal this time of day.” He continues to apologize at least three more times, which is four times more than a New York City cabdriver ever would.
Meanwhile, I’m still running through the address book on my phone, checking the dorm building and number of Jack’s new school mailing address. As we near the campus and pull into the front entrance, I call one more time, hoping that this will finally be the one he picks up.
No such luck.Hi, you’ve reached Jack Cameron. Leave a message—
I don’t even let the message finish this time, hitting end in frustration.Guess this is going to be even more of a surprise than I bargained for.The plan was to surprise Jack by telling him that I landed at the airport, but clearly things have changed. Now the new and improved plan seems to be that I’ll knock on his dorm room door and surprise him that way.
Any other time, this would be the kind of surprise that excited me. Not the kind that filled me with dread, unsure of what I was going to find when—or if, honestly—he opens that door.
Enough, Olive,my brain chides me.You’re being crazy. Jack is incollege—he has busy college things to do, like classes and projects and study groups. He’s busy.
But is he too busy for me?
Would I be too busy for him if the roles were reversed?
“It’s just a snag that comes with long distance,” I murmur to myself as I stare out the window, earning a concerned look from the driver up front. I pretend I don’t see him and study the leafy green trees and lush mountains in the distance instead, approaching our destination with a mix of both excitement and a little bit of dread in my stomach. However, part of the dread is lessened by the beauty of the University of Hawai?i at Manoa. Tall, leafy green trees stretch up toward the endless blue, making the entire campus look like the bottom level of a rainforest. All around me, students mill about, some in pajamas or hoodies, others in board shorts and flip-flops, all laughing and talking and joking and likely making plans for later that night. The curved stone pathways snake in and out of the various entrances to the stone-faced classroom buildings, many with tall stone columns snaking up toward the sky. It would take my breath away if I wasn’t already short of breath from panicking about whatever the worst-case scenario is about to be.
I thank the Uber driver as we pull up to the dorm, one of a cluster of towers nestled on the campus and overlooking the volcano—Diamond Head, that sleeping giant keeping watch over the island of O?ahu. Around us, more tall tropical trees stretch into the sky, and there are even a few stray chickens clucking around on the street, pecking at crumbs on the ground and seemingly unbothered by all the students milling out. The air smells like salt and a freshness that we don’t have on the East Coast, but no amount of beauty could cure the dread curdling in my stomach. Not even the warm beams of sun caressing my cheeks as I study my surroundings.
I check my phone for Jack’s address again and look up at thecorresponding tower, making sure I’m in the right place. Students are clustered everywhere, some with backpacks slung over their shoulders as they head off to class, others shuffling past in more pajama pants and hoodies, undoubtedly heading to averylate breakfast. There are even a few striding past in athletic gear, armed with water bottles or yoga mats, ready to get some sweat sessions in. The campus itself is its own tiny ecosystem of a million different personalities and voices and students.
And somewhere in that building in front of me, one of them may be about to break my heart.
The only snag I can see is that the front door looks like you have to scan in to enter. A student occasionally strides up to the door and taps a plastic card against the reader, the lobby door clicking open in response. I clutch my phone in my sweaty palm as another pajama-clad guy scans in and holds the door open for a petite girl with a messenger bag behind him. It strikes me that, if Jack ignores my final call, this is how I’ll have to get into the building—trespassing.
I cross the fingers on my free hand as the line rings and rings and rings, feeling all sorts of awkward and embarrassed to be hanging around the front of the building but not going in, like a total weirdo.
Hi, you’ve reached Jack Cameron—
“Ugh!” I let out a frustrated shriek of annoyance and consider hurling my phone into the cluster of bushes across the path but think better of it in case Jack decides to call me back. I stamp the rubber sole of my sneaker on the pavement instead to expel the anger.
“Are you waiting for someone?” The inquiry comes from behind me.
I spin on my heel, mortification seeping into my pores. The tall, golden boy in front of me definitely witnessed my mini temper tantrum. He has long, loose curls, lit gold by the sun, and mossy green eyes that study me curiously. It takes me a second to register the large, waxy thing he has propped up against his cargo shorts and fitted white tank top—a surfboard.
“I…” My mouth opens and closes, refusing to form words. “Yes?”
The corners of his eyes crinkle playfully at my squeaky voice. “That sounds more like a question than an answer.” He’s noticeably taller than me, the surfboard only making him look more like a giant. Or a sea god. Or Poseidon himself.
While part of me can’t stop ogling this golden boy right in front of me, I can practically hear Tyler’s relentless teasing in my head.You’re on your way to reunite with Mr.Two First Names, crossing the entire continent with turbulence and your ex-boyfriend, and it’sPoseidonthat ends up being the roadblock?
