Back to December

Part 1

            The plastic chair was cold under my legs as I waited for him in his office; I knew it would be a while. Yes, he had agreed to see me, but I knew Huck well enough to know that he would pace the floor outside the door for a few minutes before he worked up the courage to face me again. I could almost hear his footsteps on the other side of the oak door separating us, after all this time it was hard to believe that any moment now he would be walking through those doors.

            His hazel eyes would watch me carefully, peeking out from beneath his messy brown hair; I smiled even though my heart was racing. He'd probably reach out to shake my hand in an awkward attempt to greet me though he would be confused as to why I was here; I wondered if his skin would still feel the same under my finger tips.

            Closing my eyes I could suddenly feel his warm skin against mine again, the familiar tingles racing through me as he held me tight. His lips pressing against my temple as we watched the sun setting from the little picnic blanket he's set out.

            My mind drifted to the last time those lips had touched mine. December. I shook my head and let my eyes flutter open to take in my surroundings. I was not eighteen again, sitting in his truck on that hill top where we shared our first kiss telling him that I was leaving. I was twenty two now, sitting in his construction trailer office, waiting for him to come walking through the door.

            His desk sat in front of me in disarray. Papers littered every inch of his desk, a lap top peeking out from under the mess. Only one picture frame sat on the desk and, as much as I wanted to, I did not dare let myself walk around the other side to find out who it was of.  His current girlfriend? His wife? No, I shook my head again, someone would have mentioned if he had gotten married. I would have known, but the girlfriend was a definite possibility.

            Maybe this was a bad idea, I pursed my lips at the back of the picture frame, hoping that somehow the little leg holding it up would break and it would fall flat on the desk. The sound it would make smacking into his desk would give me every right to jump, I was in fact female. Standing in front of the chair I would be able to just look down and see what the photo held.

            Glaring at the back of the photo was obviously not going to get me anywhere, so I let my eyes wander to the walls. Certificates littered the wall announcing his achievements, but I knew someone else must have hung them. Huck was never one to toot his own horn. His company name graced the one closets to me, "SpawGlass congratulates you on your success for the past three years with us," was what it read. His name written across the bottom in scratchy hand writing: Huckleberry Collins.

            My eyes flitted back to the picture atop his desk of their own accord. I could just reach out with one hand, as if to demonstrate how close I was my hand lifted off my lap, and pick the picture up, but just as I was about to lean forward and give in to my curiosity I heard the trailer door open followed by a shrill voice.

            "Huck you have a visitor," Margo, his secretary informed him from just outside the door. My spine went a little straighter as I smoothed down the blouse I was wearing until my hands were back in my lap, giving me the appearance of being calm; even if I was anything but.

            "Thank you Margo," his voice rang out, deep and rumbling. That voice, I closed my eyes as December flooded back to me again.        

            "I don't understand," his sad voice flitted through my ears, even in my memory I could see the sadness in his hazel eyes as I broke his heart.

            "I'm leaving this town," I repeated, trying to keep my own voice from breaking.

            "Why?" he took a step toward me, but I retreated.