Chapter 3 – Blast from the Past

I crawled over to my bags and quickly picked them up, trying to look as put-together as possible. I straighten my pencil skirt and throw my sopping wet hair behind my back.

"You made it! I was going to tell Mr. Peller to sit and wait for you in your office." Derrick exclaimed.

My heart was racing and I could feel my face turning red. He looked almost exactly as he did the last time I saw him. Besides the few white strands of hair against the rich black, it was as if he hadn't age at all. This man must be 30 now but still looked 25. His shoulders bulked up a bit but the suit still clung on to him as comfortably as I had remembered. A striped blue tie, similar to one I had given him for Christmas that one year. His crooked smile, favoring the left, was spread across his face.

Damn, he still had his effect over me. I was speechless.

"Demeter this is Charles Peller. Mr. Peller, this is the Demeter Thompson we've been telling you about. She'll be meeting with you today to discuss the specifications."

He reached out for a handshake. My eyes widened as I stared at his arm and finally just realized what Derrick had just said.

"Derrick!" I said, sounding a little more frantic than I wanted, "You're not staying for the meeting?"

"Sorry Demeter, I actually have another meeting in 5 minutes." He must have sensed some urgency in my voice because he added looking at Charles, "She's one of our best engineers."

He glared back at me then to Charles' outstretched arm. I stepped forward and shook it. Derrick left as soon as I did. My brain was trying to refocus as my arms pointed to the small table, in my exponentially small office. I set my things down by my desk and pull out a notebook then move to go sit across from him.

Abruptly, Charles stands up and gives me a hug. My knees get weak as I take a whiff of his familiar scent.

It's really him.

"Dee, it's been too long." He whispered in my ear then sits back down and I follow his lead. "How are you? Small world huh?"

I fake a smile. "Yeah. I've been good. Busy with work and all. How's Annie?"

"She's good, I think. I haven't talked to her for a couple of years actually. Anyway, you look good. Refined, compared to what I'm used to, maybe except for the hair," he grinned.

I'm confused. They aren't together? His ring is still on his finger. Who cares anyway, I needed to collect my thoughts and refocused myself.

He's just another customer, just another customer, just another customer.

"So Mr. Peller, tell me a little about your organization and its vision."

"Please, just Charles," he gives me another sneaky grin, "Or Pelly if you want."

I couldn't help but let out a laugh.

"Pelly" was what I named him after we decided to go skinny dipping one night. This was after hitting up a bar of course. He tried to do a canon ball off the dock, tripped, and ended up doing a belly-flop instead. Needless to say, that this quickly ended our spontaneous decision. For months I tried to stick it in sentences as often as I could when he was around.

"Oh, thank you pelly much, I will then." I reply back habitually and let out another laugh. "Gosh, remember how red your stomach was? What did you trip over again? Wasn't it your own shoe?"

"I don't remember too well, but it was probably my dignity," he said with a straight face.

"Oh that's right! Because I think you lost it that night. Did you ever go back to find it?" I asked back, pretending to be concerned.

"Man, I had to buy a new one and it's damn expensive!"

We both then broke character and laughed. He definitely still had his humor, which makes it so much harder to keep that distance between us.

He's still the same as he was five years ago, except now it seems like he is the boss of his own nonprofit organization and was actually happy. He still had the same charm, laugh, even the same squint in his left eye, which was not quite a wink but not quite fully opened, when he had just told a joke.

After who-knows-how-long of a time of catching up, he took my left hand in his right, just like that night, and with all seriousness said, "I really missed you. I thought about you every single day for two years straight. I'm glad you're doing well." He strummed my hand for a few seconds while we sat in awkard silence.

I felt my face flush with heat. Hoping that I wasn't yet red, I slowly pulled my hand out of his hold and glanced at the clock. My eyes widened and I saw him crane his head towards the clock out of the corner of my eye.

"Oh no! We've just wasted an hour!" I exclaim.

He folded his notebook and gave me a huge smile.

"Well I actually have to run but here's my business card. Let's do a dinner meeting off the record so your boss doesn't find out you did absolutely no work." He wrote something on the card and then handed it to me. "Call my personal cell to set something up. It's still the same in case you're wondering, the 2315 number."

"Yeah, I know." I replied as he stood up.

He leaned in for a last hug before he left my office.