La Réunion

By S. Mack

“Aaron!”

He couldn’t hear her. He stood there, just outside the security gates, watching the people on the platform hailing taxis and boarding airport buses to take them away. Victoria found it amazing, how much she’d missed him. She wouldn’t have thought it possible, to be so happy to see someone again. The occasional bouts of homesickness she’d been holding back for three months hit her like a sledgehammer, and she had to remind herself that she didn’t need to be homesick anymore—she was home, despite the sickly stale smell that engulfed airplanes wafting through the terminal.

She called his name again. “Aaron!” This time he heard her and turned in her direction with a mildly confused look. The second he spotted her, his brows relaxed from the small frown they always contracted into when he was concentrating, and he grinned and waved. “Victoria!” he bellowed, just for her benefit, and she laughed as people stopped to watch him make a fool of himself. He was always doing things like that, as if to say he’d do anything for her and didn’t care who saw him do it. When they’d first started going out, she found his uninhibited exuberance uncomfortable, but now, after not seeing him for so long, it was just another little thing that endeared him to her.

She slung her carryon over her shoulder, and began jogging as best she could with all her luggage. He laughed, and she knew she must look absolutely ridiculous, but she didn’t particularly care.

He jogged over to meet her halfway, and she dropped her bags, laughing, and jumped on him, wrapping her arms around his neck. "I missed you,” he murmured, his face tantalizingly close to her own. But she ignored the subtle hint, grinning all the while, and instead kissed him once on each cheek.

“That’s how they do it in France,” she informed him impishly, and his eyes darkened in silent laughter.

“Oh, really?” he retorted, and leaned in and kissed her fiercely. When they’d both run out of breath, he pulled back, smiling roguishly. “That’s how we do it in America.”

God, she’d missed him. “Zut alors,” she murmured, smiling deliriously.