Heal my heart.

34

Gracie
I stuff the last of my belongings in the bag and sigh heavily. I look at my phone vibrating. Ivy.
"Yes Ivy."
"You sound so tired. Is everything alright?"
"Don't ask such questions. You know things."
"Okay I'm sorry. But listen, Alastair called me up."
"For?" My heart still doesn't beat faster.
"To ask about you?"
"And you told him everything?" I still don't know what to feel.
"Yes. He asked about your timings, like when you will reach the airport, the flight and everything."
"Hmm."
"Do you think he'll come to meet you?" She asks with excitement tinging her voice.
"No. It's his wedding today." I respond flatly, trying to pretend that it doesn't affect me.
"Oh yeah I remember." She says, voice hinting at pity.
"Okay I've to go to the airport. I'll leave now. Bye."
"Take care Grace. And I apologize again for not being able to come to the airport."
"Oh don't apologize. You're meeting Nate's parents today, even I'm sorry I can't come for you. And it's not like I'm settling over there, I'll come back to you." I say over the phone, hoping that I don't actually have to shift to Seattle.

I sit in the waiting area. The flight has been delayed to two hours. I've completed half a book, checked my laptop and talked to my family in the time, and they've still not ushered us inside.
The loudspeaker crackles and there's an announcement. Oh, they're asking us to come for our boarding passes. Finally. I get up and head towards the counter. I'm standing in the line, looking around at the posters and smiling at unknown people when I hear someone yell loudly behind me.
"Gracie!" I turn back. It's unmistakably, Alastair's voice. How can I forget the voice which healed my heart and then drowned me in it's absence? My heart has begun to race and my mind is filled with thoughts. He's standing there arguing with the security guards and he says something to them and gives them something by which they allow him to come to me. He comes running to me. Why is he here? It was his wedding right? Did he leave the reception? Did something happen? Or is, is he not marrying Paige?
He looks haggard, messy, but still so sexy. Somewhat like me. For the past few days, that is what has happened.
Messy: Hair, bed, room, life.
His eyes gleam despite the fatigue and he walks confidently upto me as everyone in the terminal looks at him. He looks nervous but then he starts speaking,"Gracie, I don't know how to speak, I don't know what to, what I feel for you can never be described in words. But let me try, you're the sunshine of my life. The only person I've loved more than myself. And there's nothing better that I could as for, and that is spending the rest of my life without you. I need you, I want you and most importantly, I love you." He says all of this with a twinkle in his eye and in one breathe. He goes down on one knee and pulls out a red rose. "Gracie Hyde, will you marry me?" He asks.
I'm breathless, speechless and every other less except for joyless. Tears prick my eyes and this is the happiest moment of my life. People all around wait in anticipation and my heart beats out of my chest. My hands which had moved to my mouth slowly take the rose from his hands.
"Yes." Is all I can whisper. The joy on his face is incomparable to anything I've seen before. He shouldn't be so happy, it was obvious that I would say yes. He looks like someone who has conquered the whole world. I haven't seen him this joyous before. People all around us start hooting and clapping. It's a true merging, made by God himself.
He gets up and hugs me tighter than ever before. I'm suffocating by then but he's breathing life into me.
"I love you so much." He mutters near my ear.
He holds my hand and we walk by as people click photographs and some ladies wipe their eyes.
"So what's the plan for now?" He asks me.
"Your bed or mine?"
"Yours will do just fine." He winks.

Three hours later...
"When will we marry?" I ask him as he circles a love bite near my collarbone. My hair ruffles with every rapid rise of breathe he takes as my head rests on his chest.
"Next month. The engagement will happen in two weeks and the wedding will be a month later. You know how crazy I am about you right?"
"I do. We'll settle in California."
"Our careers are here, of course."
"How come Mr. Roberts agreed without a fight?"
"He looked defeated, yeah defeated is the word. Maybe he knew of her ways. I also think that she might be having a lot of boyfriends, and he wanted her to marry his CEO, a responsible man."
"A responsible man? Yeah right." I grin at him from under my lashes.
"I love you."
"I love you more."
"Why more? Why not just 'I love you too' ?"
"Life is a competition and I must win it."
He laughs. A beautiful sound. The same one I loved when I heard it passing out in the corridor outside my class. It feels like so long ago. I can't even imagine life before him.
"We're marrying okay." He says, as if confirming.
"Yes we are."