by Lucy Gage
And Charlie was right, she’d be honest with Em.
Eventually.
Chapter 19
Neil emailed her again before he shipped to Afghanistan.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
RE: Miss you
Hey, beautiful. The J is for Jameson. My dad loves Neil Young and Irish whiskey. My mom thought it was sufficiently Irish so she didn’t argue. What’s your middle name? I know your initial is E. I guess Edith. Just kidding. I bet it’s something beautiful like Elizabeth because you’re beautiful.
We ship out tomorrow. I probably won’t be able to email you at first. I don’t know for sure how long it will be, but at least a week, possibly more. So if you don’t hear anything after today for a while, don’t get worried. If it’s been too long, call Danny. He talks to my parents every week and he can tell you if they’ve heard anything, good or bad. Someday, you’ll be the first to get the news. For now, they’re next of kin. Don’t get scared. I can see you now, you’re biting your nails because you’re scared. You think I didn’t notice that you bite your nails when you’re nervous? I did. So stop biting them. I’m just telling you what you need to know.
Once I’m there, I’ll send you a paper letter so you have my mailing address, in case you want to send me anything. And by the way, I found them. Thanks. I think I’ve been smiling for days since then. I miss you. I love you.
xo Neil
PS What’s your favorite color? And check your phone.
On her phone, Meg found a picture message of Neil on the beach. He balanced a surfboard on his head, causing all his muscles to flex, water beading on and dripping from his skin, a huge grin on his face.
He looked delicious. It made her ache for him.
She composed a reply email, hoping he’d get it before he left.
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
RE: Beach photos
Hey, sexy. Are you trying to torture me with that picture? Now I miss you even more. I’m sending you a picture from my fishing trip with my dad this summer.
My middle name is Eve – didn’t you know I’m the mother of all things?
Favorite color is cobalt blue. Yes, I said cobalt blue. Generic navy won’t do. Unless it’s you in that uniform, and then it works for me. Be careful and stay safe. I love you.
xo Meg
She attached a picture her dad had snapped a few weeks earlier, on a fishing trip to Pine Point Beach in Scarborough. On the end of her hand hung a 22-inch striped bass she’d reeled in herself, which had been a feat. In the photo, she wore the cobalt blue bikini which she’d worn for Neil on their last full day together.
**********
Neil’s heart raced when he saw the image of Meghan, holding a fish, huge grin on her face and that sexy blue bikini accentuating her tan skin. Instantly hard, remembering that last day at the beach and the night at the club later, he adjusted himself.
Despite the fact that he had only hours left before departure, he knew he’d hate himself if he didn’t spend every spare second with her. Though one last good night of sleep seemed important on some level, he’d never fall into dreamland without saying goodbye to Meghan.
He composed an email reply, deciding a sexy Skype call – even if they just sat naked – trumped anything else previously on his agenda. He hoped she’d agree to more, but he’d take what he could get. Then again, when had she ever disappointed him?
To: [email protected]
From: [email protected]
RE: Are you trying to kill me?
Hey, beautiful. You sure know how to give a man a heart attack! Good God, that photo will get me through a lot of nights. I think cobalt blue is my new favorite color. I like chocolate brown, just like your eyes.
I’m going to Skype you, because I want to see you and hear your voice once more before I leave. Be at your computer in an hour with Skype on and make sure you’re alone. I’ll be thinking about you until then. I miss you. I love you.
xo Neil
**********
Meg’s heart galloped away. In an hour, she’d get to talk to him and see him – on a video screen, but that surpassed what she’d had since he left. And he’d said to be alone – not that she didn’t live alone, but you never know if someone might be visiting or something – and Meg hoped that meant they would be getting naked.
She had never done the long-distance thing, and certainly not in the age of video chat. Of course, their Skype calls couldn’t be like that again after this, but one more chance to see him naked before he left, she’d never pass on that.
An hour later, her computer alerted her to a call and her breathing became rapid as she answered it. She bit her lip.
There sat her sexy man, a huge grin on his face.
“Hi,” she said shyly.
“Hi, beautiful. How are you?”
“Better now. I’ve been missing you.”
“Me too. You ever done this before? I mean, you know…”
“No. Never. It feels a little…”
“Dirty?”
Meg nodded. “I don’t mind. Don’t get me wrong. I want to see you naked, but it…feels like I’m making a porn flick.” She laughed.
Neil laughed, too. “It does. If you don’t want to do it…”
Push past your fears. He’s not Toby. He isn’t trying to make porn with you. This isn’t about that.
“No. I want to. I know this is probably the last time I’ll get to see you naked until you’re home.”
“Yeah, I don’t expect privacy over there. I, uh, don’t know how to start, really. I mean, if I was there, I’d just kiss you…”
Further proof, Meg. He’s just as confounded by this as you are. Toby wouldn’t have been unsure.
A thought occurred to her. “What’s your favorite song?”
“Black by Pearl Jam. Why?”
“I don’t own that. Play it. I’ll get undressed for you and see where it takes us. Then every time you hear that song you’ll think of me.”
“I like how you think,” Neil said. “What’s your favorite song?”
“All I Want Is You by U2. Do you have that?”
“I do. Remember, they’re one of my favorite bands, too. I’ll play that one second. Unless you want me to go first…” She could hear the mouse clicking.
“No. I’ll go first.” Neil nodded.
The first few chords of Black, the drum beat and crooning of a guitar, began to play and she unbuttoned her shirt as she swayed to the music. Ignoring the camera, she let her body react to the undulations in the song’s rhythm. Hips gyrating, she removed her clothes a little at a time. Neil’s visible arousal excited her and she segued into a strip tease without thinking.
Hands cupping her breasts, running over her body, toying with the lingerie she’d changed into earlier, it ignited her own fire. Her mind journeyed to Friday night, when they’d danced at a club in Portland. Neil’s hands had roamed her body, pressed her hips to his as he kissed her neck. In the dark, sweaty throng of bodies, he’d easily been able to palm her breast, his thumb teasing her nipple. She’d dared to cup his erection and with his dog tags safely hidden in his shirt, he’d let her. All the things he’d wanted to do at the wedding, things which were not appropriate at the time, he’d shown her on the dance floor of the club, where they were two anonymous people enjoying each other’s bodies.
At one point, he’d pressed her against the wall in a dark hallway and kissed her so hard and deep she thought she’d pass out from the lack of oxygen and the pleasure. She’d insisted they go home after that and between the groping in the car and the way he’d teased her until she nearly spontaneously combusted, both their orgasms that night launched into the stratosphere.
The memories rolled through her mind as she danced, and when the song ended with her naked, she said, “Now it’s your turn.”
He refrained from dancing, but he remo
ved his clothes slowly and seductively. She’d wondered how they’d build up to self-gratification, but as soon as Neil began to undress, Meg reached her hand between her legs and touched her aching folds, wet with desire from the memory of that sensual night on the dance floor. Leaning back in her chair, she splayed her legs for him so that he could see everything.
“Jesus, Meghan, I wish I could be there right now. You are the sexiest woman I’ve ever known,” he said, shoving his pants to the floor and stepping out of them, his erection straining against his boxers.
When he stroked a hand over his shorts, Meg said, “Show me. I want to see you.” And though he couldn’t be beside her, touching her, teasing her into a frenzy, he improvised. He tortured her by giving peeks of the head, then flashing her his tight, sexy ass before he finally dropped his boxers and turned to display the glorious manhood she missed having between her thighs and in her mouth.
Long, languid movements of his huge hand, from root to tip and over, caused Meg’s heart to beat faster, the tension to build. “I love watching you. You’re my greatest fantasy come to life. God, I wish you were here inside me,” she said as she slipped her own fingers into her opening.
“You’re dripping,” he panted, surely as close to climax as Meg.
“Yes. You do that to me. Every time. I’m close, Neil.”
“Me too. I wish you were here. I want to be inside you right now.”
“Imagine you are. I am.”
It overtook her, a wave of pleasure that rolled from her head to her toes, and she cried his name. He followed immediately after and said he loved her. After a few moments, she laughed.
“Oh, God. That was great. I needed that.”
He was still out of breath. “Yeah, me too. Damn, this sucks.”
“Tell me about it. Now I have to wait nine months.”
“You still sure you want to do that?”
“Positive. Now more than ever. How will I live without you?”
“One day at a time.”
Meg nodded, knowing she had no other option.
“Are you cold?” Neil asked.
“A little. Why?”
He laughed. “You could cut glass.” Meg blushed. “Go grab something comfortable to wear. I’ll wait. I want to talk to you as long as I can.”
Meg nodded and ran to her bedroom for her big, fluffy robe. It would keep her warm, but she could still flash him on occasion. She sat in her chair. “I’m back,” she said. He’d left the frame.
“Sorry,” Neil shouted from off camera. He sat back down a few seconds later. “I went to get a beer. I put my boxers back on so Owen doesn’t come home to me in the buff. He’s seen it all before, but I know if I was him, I’d be looking at me funny if I walked in and saw my roommate naked on the computer with his girlfriend.”
“Your roommate has seen you naked?”
“We’re guys and we’re in the Army. There’s no such thing as modesty. Doesn’t mean he wants to see me in the nude talking to you.”
“Is he being deployed to Afghanistan too?”
“No. We’ve been friends for a long time, but we’re not in the same unit. He did his stint a few years ago, in Iraq.”
“So you’re a sniper. Does that mean you won’t get shot at?”
“Nope. Means I’m a good shot at a long distance. It’s no guarantee I’ll be safe, but don’t let that scare you, okay?”
Her hand reflexively went to her mouth. She stopped short of biting her nails and crossed her arms over her chest.
“Neil, you’re going to a place where people want to kill you and you could be shot or blown to bits. How can I not worry or be scared?”
“Just try not to think about that part. You don’t want me to worry about you getting in a car accident when you drive to work, do you?”
“No. But just because lots of people die in auto accidents doesn’t mean that my chances of getting killed in a car are better than you dying at war.”
“You’re right, but I could still sit and worry about the worst happening. Instead, I try to think about the good things. Like kissing you. Or hearing you laugh. Or finding your panties sprayed with your perfume in my bag when I unpacked. Or getting to watch you one more time before I leave. Now every time I hear my favorite song, it will remind me of you and I’ll be happy.”
“Me too.” Meg sighed. “I miss you. I wish you could hug me.”
“I know. I wish I could hold you and make love to you. But I can’t. Let’s talk about happy things, okay? Did you really catch that fish?”
“I did. It was hard to reel it in, but I did it by myself. We were surf casting on Pine Point Beach.”
“You like to fish?”
She nodded. “It was something I always did with my dad. He traveled a lot when I was a kid, and that’s what we did when he was home. He used to take me on the ice, but now I only go ice fishing if there’s a shack, a wood stove and something alcoholic to drink.”
“Wuss.”
“Damn straight. It’s too cold to sit there and wait for a fish in the middle of the lake. I think I’d rather surf cast or fly fish in the Keys.”
“You fly fish?”
“Not that well, but yes…”
They talked for a while about fun memories from childhood. Meg promised to take Neil fly fishing in the Keys someday and to wear the cobalt blue bikini, too. Before long, she yawned.
“You’re tired, sweetheart. You need to go to bed.”
“But I don’t want to leave you.”
“Call me on my cell once you’re in bed. I’ll talk to you until you fall asleep. Okay?”
“Okay. Neil?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
She closed down her computer, then locked the doors and headed to bed with her phone. She lay down, naked, and called his cell.
“Hey, beautiful. You in bed now?”
“I am. I’m naked, still.”
“We going to have phone sex, now?”
“You want to have phone sex?”
“I wasn’t thinking that before, but now I’m excited…”
They talked for a long time, and as it neared midnight, Meg started to get sleepy again. She yawned reflexively.
“Sweetheart, you should go to sleep.”
“I don’t want to go. I want to keep talking to you. I won’t get to talk to you again for who knows how long. I need my fix.”
“I know. I wish we could talk forever. But we both need sleep. It isn’t as late here, but I have to be up at 0430. We leave at 0600 tomorrow. And I won’t get a decent night’s sleep again for probably at least a year, maybe more.”
Meg started to cry. He was finally going. For real, this time. By this time tomorrow, he’d be in Afghanistan, or at least on his way.
“Go. Get some rest. I don’t want you to be tired,” she sniffed.
“Sweetheart, don’t cry.”
“I miss you already. I can’t help it.”
“I miss you, too. Look for a package to arrive next week.”
“You sent me something?”
“Watch for it. When I get to where I’m going, you can send me something back.”
“Hold on.” She snapped a photo of herself making a kiss face. Then she sent it to his phone. “Did you get it?”
“I did. You read my mind.” Just then, a similar photo popped up on her own phone. “I love you, Meghan.”
“I love you too, Neil. Call or write as soon as you can. Promise?”
“I promise. The second I’m able, you’re the first one I’ll contact. Goodnight, sweetheart.”
“Goodnight, honey.”
They hung up the phone and though she’d been tired moments before, Meg couldn’t sleep. She cried and cried until the tears were dried and gone, then she lay there, so sad she couldn’t breathe. How did she finally find the most amazing man in the world only to lose him to a stupid war that should have long been over by now?
And so
began the longest year of her life.
Chapter 20
Emily, Rob and Liam – the bodyguard Nina was dating – traveled to Minnesota for a week, leaving Meg’s cousin free in the evenings. They’d hardly spoken since the wedding. One night, her cousin joined Meg for dinner and they talked for a while about Liam. Nina described Em and Rob’s house and revealed her opinion of Rob, with whom she’d spent a lot of time while they searched for houses. As expected, he made the perfect fiancé and shot holes in the idea of rarefied celebrities. Only the stupid photographers indicated Rob’s fame.
Unusually quiet, Nina knew something had to be bothering the typically vocal Meg.
“What’s going on, Meggie?”
“I, uh…” she stumbled, as the tears began to fall in big plops from her cheeks.
“Have you been talking to Justin again?”
She’d broken up with Justin twice before and he had begged her to take him back, so the question had logic behind it.
“No, Nin. He’s long since history. It’s just…I met someone.”
“Oh? What’s his name?”
“Neil Murphy.”
“Neil? You mean graduated-with-me-and-Charlie, Dan’s-best-friend, former scrawny geek Neil Murphy?”
“Yeah.” She told Nina the same story she’d told Charlie. “And now he’s gone. I can’t even talk to him until he contacts me again. I’ve been miserable for days. He sent me a package before he left the U.S. It came the other day, but I haven’t dared to open it yet.”
“I’m so sorry. This really sucks. I take it you haven’t told Em?”
Sniffling she asked, “Why do you say that?”
“Because she hasn’t hinted that she thinks you’re upset about anything. She’d have at least said something to see if I knew.”
“She’s…she’s happy. I don’t want to rain on her parade.”
“You know it’s not that. She’s your best friend and you rain on each other’s parades all the time. It’s what best friends do. So why aren’t you telling her that you met the love of your life?”
“I don’t want to be judged, okay? I don’t want her to doubt it’s real and make me feel like I’m less than. Neil makes me feel special. I don’t want anyone to question that.”
