Already home. (Aaron Tveit fanfiction)

4.-

West Harlem Piers was Amy's favorite place to go when she had free time between classes, since it was only 15 minutes away from the university. Sit facing the river reading was one of the few quiet moments she had in the week after the chaos of the office.

Since she had come to Manhattan, for some reason, the Hudson River have the power of make her calm. She did not know if it was the sound of water or how far the city seemed even for just a while, but since she had discovered that place, she used to be there by the water.

Like Pocahontas in her movie, she loves the river and the ocean although she did not have much time to spend outdoors. That was one of the things she missed about not having concerns, a job and a career: the free time to sit outdoors feeling the wind hitting her face and the sound of water in her ears.

With her nose stuck in her book, Amy had lost track of time, but she knew she had time to finish the fifteenth chapter. The problem of when Amy was busy reading was not only lost track of time, but the notion of all that was happening around her. People could go or stop near her and she was not going to pay attention to be stuck in one of her imaginary worlds that mysteriously did not contain numbers or words related to economics or finance. Ian had always told her that she looked like Belle, but definitely it could be a mixture of all the princesses that could exist in Disney.

Every time she heard footsteps walking near her, she occasionally only looked up the words of the book under her black Ray Ban and looked who it was, but that time she just saw a guy with dark blue jeans and sneakers approaching and standing next to the seat she was occupying. "Hey, sorry, you mind if I sit here?" the boy said, and Amy could not see his face for the sun reflecting and the black sunglasses that he was wearing. "Sure, no problem" she said with a little smile and almost shy. It was rare that someone wanted to sat there considering how many seats were free throughout the park, but that was not her bench so she had to be politically correct.

Amy continued to read about the history of Hazel and Gus, and the boy sat on the opposite end of the bench, also looking to the Hudson River. Amy did not even paid attention to what he was doing. After a few minutes she saw on the sly if he kept looking towards the river and she started to look at him, at least what she could get to see. He was wearing a white plaid shirt, jeans, those damn sunglasses, and a blue Yankees cap that she had seen before when he asked her if he could take sit there. Probably he was just a normal t-shirt and jeans guy sit in front of the river like the other people in the park.

The girl was finishing the chapter 16, when inadvertently (and like Amy did whenever she was entertaining with something) she started singing to herself one of the verses of "So Long, Astoria" by The Ataris, her brother's favorite song. Ian always said that he wanna live in Astoria just because he loved the song. When finally came to her mind the verse that says "So long, Astoria / I found a map to buried treasure / And even if we come home empty-handed / We'll still have our stories and battle scars / Pirate ships and wounded hearts / Broken bones and all the best of friendships / And when this hourglass has filtered out its final grain of sand / I'll raise my glass to the memories we own" she realize that she was singing out loud because she hear someone smirking really softly in the other side sit. Why the hell he was paying attention to what she was singing?

She kept with her eyes and her head lost in the book and Amy felt that she had eyes practically on her, but she did not dare turn around to see if it was he. "You know, there are like more than 8 million people in New York and more than 1 million of those people are in Manhattan but who could have imagined it would be so hard to find a single person here" he spoke suddenly.

In that moment she clearly doesn't understand anything of what had happened, so she left her book aside and took off her glasses to look at him. "Dude, what the hell do you want? I'm trying to read here!" she ranted. "You have to take your nose off of the books a little bit" he joked making her get angrier.

He was a complete stranger and he really was saying her that? "Okay, this is insane." She added trying to put her book in her bag to go back to the campus. "You will always get angry so fast with a joke? What happened to your sense of humor?" he asked taking off his sunglasses with a smile in his face.

In that moment she saw him and her bag fell from her hand to the bench, and if she had not been sitting she had fallen too. When Amy saw his face, she understood why he was laughing when she was singing, and the brunette felt her heart stopping for a second. "Aaron..." was all that she could mutter, putting her right hand on her mouth. "Hey Amy" he said with a smirk of satisfaction on his face. "What-what are you doing here?" she asked, trying to control herself of every emotion that was taking her trembling body. "You know, it take me almost two years but I finally found you" Aaron said casually as he was moving next to her. He was acting like if search for someone two years was something that the people do every day like a hobby. "I can't believe it's you. I thought that would never see you again" she said still trembling.

She really thought that she would never see him again because it's been ten years since the last time. The people normally don't try to find someone after ten years. They just give up or simple forget and maybe live with the memories of the good times like she did.

Seeing him right next to her was like a dream and she even wanted to touch him to see if it was real. "You know why they say, never say never" he said but he start to talk again before she can say something. "Hey, I have an hour free, you want some lunch to catch up? My treat!" he said touching her hand trying to convince her and then she know that it wasn't a dream. He was real. "Yeah, why not? I think that I know a good place near. I mean, it's been years, I have an hour to waste with you after all" she said with a smile in her face. "Okay, let's go then" Aaron said as they leave the park.