It’s just like a scenefrom the movies.
The crowd parts, the smoke clears, and there he is.
I see him first, of course, because it always happens like that. He’s talking animatedly with his friends, laughing. The collared shirt he’s wearing is unbuttoned two more than normal and his chest is all dewy from the stickiness of the room and bronze from the five-day head start he’s gotten here in southern Italy. His light linen pants are fitted and cuffed.
Damn.
He looks good.
Better than he’s ever looked. His hair is short on the sides but longer on top, golden with streaks of white from the sun, slicked haphazardly like he just tossed it back on his way out of a pool. Every time I see him it feels like a miracle that he hasn’t yet been plucked to be onLove Island.
A miracle that he doesn’t belong to anyone but me.
Wes and I are… complicated. We consist of almost two years of lore, complete with edge-of-your-seat twistsand turns, gripping suspense, passionate romance, and crippling heartbreak, all culminating in the night of my junior prom. A night I intentionally never think about. A night that ended with me pinkie-promising Mari and Anya that I’d never talk to Wes ever again, sealing the sacred oath by kissing the fleshy part of my palm.
I kept the promise for a while. When Wes left for college, I sat for months in the pain of his silence. When he eventually reached out, I let him sit in mine. But I’m a year older, and I see now what I couldn’t see then: the timing had been all wrong. Back then, it hadn’t been reasonable to try to lock him down when I had a year of school left and he was about to graduate. But this time will be different. This timeweare different. This time, Wes will ask me to officially be his girlfriend. He’d practically promised. And the timing isfinallyexactly right.
He turns through the white haze of the nightclub like he can sense my presence. He grins when he sees me. Even after so long, it’s fireworks. That has to meansomething.
We walk toward each other, getting bumped by dancing bodies and smacked by wayward limbs, until I’m there, right in front of him, in the cloud of his smoky cologne. From a hundred feet away he’s a sight to be seen, but from six inches away he’s flawless: full lips, poreless skin, and a lone freckle under his right eye that could hypnotize you right into oblivion. I waste no time crushing my body into his chest.
“What took you so long!” he shouts over the music when we break apart.
“Had to cross an entire ocean to get here.”
“I meant tonight.” He bops my nose with his index finger.
I know what he meant.
Wes pulls back slightly. “Hmm.” He scrunches his lips together as he pinches my chin, turning my head from side to side to drink in every contour of my face. “Yep, still as gorgeous as ever, Soraya Soltani,” he says, his voice velvet as his face breaks into a lopsided smile, planting a warm kiss on my left cheekbone. “God, I missed you.”
I laugh nervously. “I missed you too.”
Wes takes a seat on a nearby ledge, pulling me between his legs. His arms hang on my hips and soon the heat from my cheeks is pulsing through my entire body as he runs a finger down my bare forearm. “The travel was good?”
“It was great.” Suddenly I’ve forgotten it all—the delay, the lost bag, our death-defying bus ride. Wes has that superpower.
“All day I thought about how I get to see you tonight.” Wes stares at me and I have to zero in on his freckle to keep my balance, just how they instruct you to pick a spot on the wall to stare at in yoga to keep from toppling over during tree pose.
“Is that right?” My throat is suddenly dry.
“Sure is.” Wes leans in like he is about to tell me a secret. “There’s no one like you, I’ll have you know.Searched this whole country for anyone who could compare. And guess what? No one does.”
“Searched the whole country? Door to door? This sounds extremely time-consuming.”
“It was. I have the war wounds to prove it.” Wes holds up his hands. “Blisters—hundreds of them—from knocking. So thank you for showing up. I can finally start the healing process. I have a long road ahead of me.” Wes grins, revealing a perfect line of white teeth. “Come on—I want to introduce you to everyone. They’re all dying to meet you. I talk about you nonstop.” He grabs me and leads me through clusters of sweaty people.
We wind up at a table in the far corner of the nightclub. It’s cluttered with stacks of glasses, a row of flutes, and a bucket of ice with a magnum of champagne stuck in it. The surrounding bench is packed with Wes’s friends and their companions, and I feel a dozen sets of eyes on me, assessing me.
“Sora, this is Freddy,” Wes yells our introductions over the music, pointing to a guy with a mop of brown hair and droopy eyes. “He is the beer pong champion of the southeastern United States, our reigning king of barbecue, and campus sports bookie. Freddy, this is Soraya. She is literally the smartest and funniest person I know, but also the culprit for the mirror massacre of ’24, because her terrible driving skills resulted in the sideswipe amputations of eighteen car door mirrors on our high school campus.” Wes winks at me. “But as they say, perfection is overrated.”
“None of that is true.” I roll my eyes and lightly smack Wes in the side. “Hi!” I stick my hand out like we are fortyfive years old and at a board meeting because I have no chill whatsoever.
“Quite the list of accolades.” Freddy turns to me. “Nice to meet you, Soraya.” His clammy, sweaty hand meets mine, but he is quickly back talking to the girl next to him with such ferocity that I wonder if he believes the future of the human race depends on getting her number.
Wes spits out, “Sora, Graham. Graham, Sora,” and I’m pleased his next friend shows a little more enthusiasm.
“Finally, Sora!” Graham throws his hands up before wrapping me in a sticky hug. It feels good, knowing Wes’s friends knew about me. That they’re excited to get a glimpse into this portion of his life. It makes me wonder what exactly it is Wes says. How he describes me. How much he talks about me when I’m not around.
