Alberta

Chapter Forty Three: Revelations

I feel the tears behind my eyes threatening to fall as Willa rounds the car with our cases. The sounds of the airport fill the air, and I must admit I could see myself getting anxiety at airports. The sounds, they would eventually remind me of constantly having to leave the love of my life behind.

"Thanks Aunty Willa" Harper says, reaching for her luggage.

Willa reaches out and hugs her "it was so good having you for the summer Little bird... maybe next year?" She asked with one eyebrow cocked.

Harper laughed "oh if you will have me I am there" she said delighted.

Willa squeezed her shoulders "I will always have you... don't tell the other two hundred nieces but you are by far my favourite" Willa announced jovially, which humoured Harper.

"You still don't know all of their names do you" she asked her.

Willa looked at me guiltily "no I confess I don't... but to my credit I never did get a birth announcement for each new Jameson, so I'm not sure how I could ever keep in the loop when ten became twenty and twenty became almost thirty... in a decade"

"I only just know them all, and I've not been anywhere..." I confess.  Especially Brams children as they lived further away and had so many. "And I may know names but I certainly couldn't pick them out of a line up" I confessed.

My side of the family only had Harper so far, she was the only grandchild, and it gave her some freedom and attention that perhaps she wouldn't have had if both sides were saturated with kids. Harper was wiser than most fourteen year olds, and I often wondered if it was because she spent her life with adults on my side. Her uncle Hyrum being closest in age, and her Grandpa, my father, being one of her closest friends, or so she always told me. Grandpa, Merrit and Harper ... the Anderson trio we would call them. Merrit and Augusta had been only eight when Harper had arrived, and so they had treated her like a real live doll. They had a wonderful bond, and Merrit and Gus quite often saw and treated Harper like a kid sister. They were close. I guess all of us Anderson's were.

Harper takes her case and wheels it to the doors, waiting for me, but I can't move my feet because I don't want to go. I don't want to leave Willa, each parting leaving a scar, and my body seemed covered in them, almost fifteen years later.

Willa looks at me, frowning, reading me exactly because she felt it too. "Come here" she said softly holding open her arms.

I take two steps and collapse into her embrace, my head against her chest.

"I don't want to miss you" I whisper.

She leans her chin on my head, and rubs my back completely aware of Harper watching,l. There could be no loving kiss goodbye.

"I know" she replies "but we have new year in the diary, and that's a dot Allie, a dot in the distance we can move toward, and it will come sooner than we think. It always does. Four months. We can do this. Allie... we are so close now..."

"I know. I just can't stand leaving you" I say, as a tear finds its way down my cheek. Her fingers squeeze me a little tighter at my back.

"When you miss me... call me... and video call me too. Now that you have your own place we have so much more freedom in how we can communicate. I expect a video call every night. Put me on the pillow beside you and we can have our nightly chats" she says warmly.

I smile and try and hold back the tears, wiping my eyes "that actually sounds perfect. I'm going to do that tonight.I love you Willa ... I love you so much"

"Perhaps too much" she finishes knowingly, and I nod.

"Perhaps" I add, and I smile affectionately at her and release myself from her arms. "I will call you tonight" I say taking my luggage handle and extending it before walking away. I make frequent turns to look back and admire the beauty that was Willa Jameson. I would commit the sight of her stood there to memory, her long hair pulled up, black SnapBack, white t shirt rolled up at the sleeves revealing her tanned shoulders, her short black shorts showing off her long tanned legs, bronzed from her summer outdoors. I sighed "so beautiful" I whisper, before turning back to Harper and smiling as I approached. We waved back to Willa one more time before disappearing from sight, down to our terminal.