“Wow!” he said, stepping back and standing at arm’s length. “I had no idea I was in the presence of such greatness. I knew I was dating the prettiest girl in school, but the smartest and most popular too?”
She smiled and stepped forward, closing the distance between them he had created. “Don’t worry, I always did go for the ones with the great smiles. All else is of little importance.”
He laughed. “I always told my mom, ‘This smile will get me anywhere,’ and so far it’s served me very well.”
“I believe that,” she said, looking up into his boyish face and feeling like she was seventeen again. She refused to break eye contact with him.
Okay, Michael. This is our third date; We’ve talked, we’ve flirted--no more excuses for not kissing me!
“You have a lovely smile,” he said.
She waited for him to either kiss her or say something else.
“Is there anything you want to know about me that I haven’t already told you?”
She couldn’t think of anything at the moment. “No. Is there anything you want to tell me?”
“Not that I can think of right now.”
Once again she waited for him to make the next move.
“Do you like me, Natalie? Have you had enough time with me to make that determination?”
“Yes. And yes, I like you. I think you are very sweet and easy to talk to. And I’m really glad you’re here this weekend. I was beginning to wonder if I was ever going to see you again.”
“I’m sorry I’ve been so busy. I haven’t been dating anyone for about two years now, so I didn’t realize how filled up my schedule had become, until I was desperate for some time with you and couldn’t find it.”
“You found some,” she said.
“I know, and I’m glad.”
He let go of her hands and put his arms around her waist. His eyes searched her face. “I’m incredibly nervous about this.”
“Why?” she asked, finding his behavior both curious and endearing.
“Because I know it’s going to be great.”
That wasn’t what she expected him to say, and she laughed nervously. “How do you know that?”
“Because I do,” he whispered, bringing his lips to within an inch of her own.
She closed her eyes. His lips touched hers with tenderness, and she drew in a deep breath. Her hands lifted instinctively to touch his arms that were holding her securely, and the intimate moment made her feel warm and treasured and safe. That wasn’t surprising, but she hadn’t thought about how he would make her feel until it was happening.
“See?” he whispered, remaining very close to her moist lips. “Told you so.”
She smiled, and he kissed her again, making it last longer and freely expressing a passion that she hadn’t expected from someone who had been so reserved thus far.
When he drew away from her slowly, he smiled. She felt speechless, and Michael’s words were limited but meant the world to her. “You’re very special, Natalie, and that was definitely worth the wait.”
Reaching for her hand once again, he interlaced his fingers with hers and began walking back toward the way they had come. She didn’t want their time together to end, but she admired his restraint and appreciated the fact that she didn’t have to be the one to stop a guy from moving too fast. And their time together didn’t end. Michael talked more as they walked and then kept her out on the back steps of the house for another hour, sharing more about himself and making her say things she never imagined saying until she was saying them.
The following morning Natalie woke early. Her watch said six-thirty, and she rolled over to go back to sleep inside her cozy flannel-lined sleeping bag. Until she remembered the previous evening. The memory of Michael’s kisses made her smile, and suddenly she felt wide awake.
Quietly she dressed in the same clothes she had been wearing on their walk and tiptoed out of the room with her camera bag over her shoulder. She stopped at the bottom of the stairs to put on her hiking boots, hearing voices of those preparing breakfast coming from the kitchen. She walked to the front door, stepped into the crisp morning air, and closed the door softly behind her.
The morning light was absolutely perfect, bathing everything in its warm glow, and she walked around the quaint little town that had not yet come to life. Feeling giddy and content with life, she let the shutter open time and time again, capturing everything from an old-fashioned Coca-Cola sign on the small town’s grocery store to seagulls resting on the top of an old produce stand.
Then she went down to the beach and continued delighting in everything that caught her eye, using up film like a ten-year-old spending her allowance on candy. Dozens of unbroken seashells were among her subjects that she also gathered in her front pocket to take home and add to her childhood collection. The complete sand dollar that she found, she first captured on film and then placed it into her pocket, deciding she would give it to Michael later today.
She returned to the house in time for breakfast and found an empty seat beside Allison. She had scanned the room for Michael first but didn’t see him.
“Just what time did you get up this morning?” Allison asked. “You were gone when I got up at seven to go for a run.”
“Not much before that. The morning light is magnificent.”
Allison smiled. “Uh-huh.”
Natalie tried to hide her blissful smile but wasn’t too successful. Jen noticed.
“Okay you two,” she said from across the table. “Something was going on last night that you didn’t let us in on, and now you’re at it again.”
“Come on, out with it,” Laurie joined in, looking right at her. “Where were you last night after the meeting, Natalie?”
Natalie decided to go ahead and tell them. She imagined she and Michael would be attracting attention soon anyway. Before she had a chance to speak, however, someone came and pulled out the chair beside her.
She glanced up and saw Michael lowering himself into the seat. He smiled and squeezed her shoulder briefly.
“Good morning,” he said as if the others weren’t even there. “Did you sleep well?”
“Yes, I did,” she replied, feeling a bit shy at his sudden arrival. “You?”
“Very.”
He asked Jen to pass the orange juice, and Natalie met both her and Laurie’s curious stares. She smiled and passed the eggs and bacon Michael’s way. They both gave her a tell us everything later look but remained silent.
She and Michael were inseparable for the rest of the morning. Except for his time on stage to lead music, he sat beside her during the morning meeting and in the prayer time that followed. They took another walk down to the beach during the free time they had before lunch. She gave him the sand dollar she had found that morning.
“What’s this for?” he asked.
“My dad always said that when you want to hold a memory in your heart you should have something tangible to remember it by. I hope that whenever you see this in the future you will think of our time here.”
“I don’t imagine I’ll be forgetting any time soon,” he said. “But thank you. I’ll hang onto it just in case.”
They began walking back. “I don’t have anything for you,” he said. “I’ll have to find you something later.”
“I have about five rolls of film between last night and this morning.” She laughed. “I’m sure there will be at least one shot I can frame and have to look at as a reminder.”
They sat together during lunch, and Natalie wondered if he had plans for the afternoon. Her idea of a perfect afternoon would be to take a drive with him up the coast, do some shopping at Cannon Beach, take another walk, have dinner in town and not return until the evening meeting time. But Allison had other ideas.
“We were thinking we’d like to go shopping up in Seaside. Do you want to go?”
She glanced at Michael and tried to read his face. He didn’t seem bothered by Allison’s suggestion.
“I suppose you want me to drive,” she said.
“Well, yeah, if you want to go. But some other girls are going too and taking one of the vans.”
She glanced at Michael again. “What are you doing this afternoon?” she asked.
“The band is practicing at three,” he said. “Between that and the annual beach football game, I’ll be tied up most of the afternoon. You should get out of here and have some fun.”
She felt disappointed, but Michael’s actions and words helped. The others had already left the table. He kissed the back of her hand and spoke softly.
“Will you take another walk with me tonight after the concert?”
“Yes,” she replied, allowing a smile to emerge.
“Last night was nice,” he said. “Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For being who you are and letting me be a part of your world. I think you’re amazing, Natalie, and very, very special.”
“I think you’re special too, Michael,” she said.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
On the drive up the coast to the town of Seaside, Laurie and Allison peppered Natalie with questions about Michael. Jen had stayed behind to study. By some of the things Laurie said, Natalie got the feeling that Jen may have had a crush on Michael at some point. She hoped that wouldn’t be a problem between them, although she couldn’t imagine Jen holding a grudge. Natalie supposed many of the girls in the group had also had their eye on him at one time or another.
Natalie noticed Allison seemed quieter than usual as the afternoon wore on. At first she thought maybe Allison liked Michael too and was jealous, but she decided it must be something else. Just what, she had no idea.
The three of them, along with some other gals that had piled into one of the vans to join them, walked around Seaside going in and out of shops all afternoon. Natalie bought some souvenir items for herself and members of her family: A navy-blue hoodie with a lighthouse on it for Josie; a T-shirt and some shorts with surfboards on them for Tommy; a golf shirt with an Oregon Coast logo for her dad; hot pink and lime green swimsuits for her nieces; and a baby romper for her nephew, Ricky.
She also bought a new bathing suit for herself, a pair of black sandals, and a white hoodie with a blue sailboat on the front. By the time three o’clock rolled around and the others decided to go down to the beach, she hadn’t found anything for Michael. She had seen several items she thought he might like: T-shirts, shorts, key chains, pocket knives, watches. Everything seemed like too much or too little; He means more to me than some rinky-dink souvenir, but I don’t want to scare him off by giving him something really nice and make him feel like he has to get me something in return.
After they had taken their purchases to the car, they headed for the beach. A gentle breeze swirled around them but the temperature felt mild with a partly blue sky overhead. Despite being disappointed she wasn’t spending the afternoon with Michael, she found herself having a good time. Most of the gals were lots of fun to be around. She hadn’t had this many friends for a long time.
Something inside a window of another shop a block away from the sandy shore caught Natalie’s eye, and she told the others she’d catch up.
“I’ll come with you,” Allison said, breaking out of the cluster to follow her through the open door.
“You don’t have to,” Natalie said.
“I’m still looking for something to get for my sister,” she said. “I think she might like that teddy bear in the window display. She collects them.”
They both went to take a closer look at their respective possibilities. Natalie liked the kite that had lured her in, but the price was more than she had anticipated, and she had no idea if Michael even liked flying kites, so she discarded the idea. Allison, however, declared that the bear was “absolutely adorable” and decided to get it for her sister’s birthday that was coming up next month.
“When is her birthday?”
“May twenty-third.”
“No way! How old will she be?” Natalie asked, checking the price tag of a t-shirt from the rack in front of her.
“Twenty-seven.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes,” Allison shrugged, heading for the front counter. “Why?”
“Your sister and I were born on the same day.”
“Really? The same year too?”
“Yes,” Natalie replied, trailing behind Allison. “Is that bizarre or what?”
“That is so--like wow!”
“Like wow? I think you’ve been watching too much Scooby-Doo.”
“Hey, I was a deprived MK. I’m making up for lost time.”
“MK?”
“Missionary kid,” Allison clarified.
“Oh.” Natalie turned a rack of postcards near the cash register as she waited for Allison to pay for the bear. She stared in disbelief when one of them jumped out at her like an old friend she hadn’t seen in years.
“Well, would you look at that,” she said, taking the postcard from its holder and examining the photograph: a sand dollar lying on the beach with a rust-colored heart-shaped rock beside it. The bright red script on the bottom right corner read, With love from the Oregon Coast.
Allison peered over her shoulder. “Cool postcard.”
“I took that picture,” she said, flipping it over to look at the photo credit. Sure enough, the name of the stock agency she had sold it to several years ago was written along the bottom margin.
“You did?”
“Yep,” Natalie said, taking the whole stack of the ones remaining and reaching into her pocket to pull out the small amount of cash she had left. The woman at the counter counted them out, and Natalie paid for them.
They stepped out of the shop and headed toward the beach. Natalie took one of the postcards out of her small paper sack and looked at it again.
“Did you really take that picture?”
“Yes. When I was sixteen.”
“Sixteen?”
“My dad and I had gone to Newport for the weekend during the summer. He was teaching me about special lighting techniques, and we did this as an experiment to see how the sand would affect the shot. We had taken several that morning, and then later in the day I found that rock and decided to place it beside the sand dollar when we took some more.”
“Looks like you got some good results,” Allison commented, taking the postcard from her hands to have a closer look.
“The best two--one with the rock and the other without--I sent to a stock photo agency about three years ago after I had a big enough selection of other shots to market. This was one of the ones they bought, but I’ve never seen it anywhere before now.”
“Like wow!” Allison laughed, handing it back to her. “That is so cool, really Natalie.”
Natalie told Allison to keep it. She had plenty more and decided she would give one to Michael and write a little note on the back, if she could think of something appropriate to say.
She didn’t find time until they returned to the beach house before dinner, but she had been thinking about it while she roamed the beach with the other girls and sat in the warm sand.
“Aren’t you coming?” Laurie asked when she climbed out of the back seat and Natalie didn’t close the door behind her.
“I’ll be there in a minute,” she said, sitting back down in the driver’s seat.
Laurie stepped away and Natalie reached for a pen in her glove box. Taking one of the cards from her sack she had slipped between the seat and the CD compartment, she felt her heart begin to beat faster in anticipation of giving Michael her note sometime that evening.
Trying to remember the exact phrasing she had decided upon, she tapped the pen on her bottom teeth for a moment before letting the ink flow onto the paper.
Michael, I took this photograph ten years ago and found it today when I least expected to. I’ve been looking for someone like you for about the same amount of time. Thanks for dropping into my life unexpectedly. I hope you know what
a rare treasure you are. ~ Natalie
She tucked the postcard into the front pocket of her fleece pullover and crossed the lawn to the front porch. Pushing open the door, she smelled lasagna and garlic bread baking and felt her mouth water. Several of the girls who had gone to Seaside were standing beside one of the couches in the large main room. They appeared to be talking to someone lying down, but she couldn’t see past the tight-knit group.
Allison noticed her and waved her over. Natalie crossed the room as the group began to disband. She heard a concerned voice murmur, “I hope it’s not serious,” and another, “I hope you feel better soon.”
Her gaze shifted from Allison to the figure on the couch. She saw the ice pack and elevated knee first, then his face.
“What happened?” she said, stepping past the remaining onlookers and kneeling beside Michael.
“It’s nothing,” he replied. “Just a bad sprain. I think I’m getting too old for tackle football.”
Natalie had never been the type to pamper a sick boyfriend, in fact she generally avoided any medical related condition. The sight of blood made her queasy. The thought of broken bones or torn ligaments made her cringe--she’d had her share of them growing up playing sports. A torn hamstring during the state track meet her junior year had been one of the most excruciating experiences of her life, and she avoided thinking about such things as much as possible.
And yet, reaching for the ice pack on Michael’s knee and lifting it momentarily to check the swelling for herself seemed like the most natural thing in the world.
“That doesn’t look good,” she said, laying the cold pack gently on his bare skin once again.
He reached for her hand and held her cool fingers in his own. “I’m glad you’re back.”
Natalie glanced around and saw that they were alone. She sat down beside him and smiled. “I missed you.”
He brought her fingers to his lips and kissed them, then held them over his chest. “I might have to take a rain check on the walk I promised you.”
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