Parker 
THE SHALLOW END
AS THE DOUBLE SLIDING DOORS of the airport opened, I tapped my Fly Delta app and clicked “ticket change.” I don’t know what it was about that moment that convinced me, but I knew I couldn’t go back to Palm Beach. At least, not without Amelia.
I had been so sure that she would come talk to me before she left, that she felt what I felt, that we were finally on the same page. But she hadn’t. I had decided this morning to let it go, to move forward. Now, I had undecided.
The next flight to New York wasn’t until five p.m., which would put me in the city about eight. Amelia and Harris would arrive back in the city by two. That gave her six hours to forget about Cape Carolina and me and that kiss. It gave her six hours to start packing, to put wheels in motion toward a new life, a life that didn’t include me. What if I was too late?
I sighed. Maybe it was fate. I almost gave up, decided that it wasn’t meant to be.
But then it was like I could actually hear Greer in my head, telling me that she wanted me to be happy.
So, what the hell? Amelia might reject me. I might fall flat on my face. But I’d lived through worse.
I raced to the ticket counter and said breathlessly to a stern-looking woman with orange-red chin-length hair and a Delta-blue uniform, “Have you ever seen Love Actually?”
She raised her eyebrow. I would take that as a yes.
After an hour of infuriating, nearly stopped traffic, six blocks from Amelia’s apartment, I said, “Just let me out here, please.”
“No, no, a few more blocks,” the cabbie replied.
“Yeah, man, I know. But I want to get out here.” I tossed him cash and jumped out, running down the sidewalk, my wheeled carry-on behind me, everyone on the street looking.
My heart was pounding both from the fact that I hadn’t actually run in far too long and because I was panicking. I was doing my dead-level best to get there, but what if I was too late? Not that moving in with someone was saying marriage vows or anything, but it was big. And it was messy.
It wasn’t until I got to Amelia’s door, out of breath and, I’m sure, red-faced, that I realized I didn’t have a clue what I was going to say. Certainly, some grand profession of love would scare her off. But a lukewarm I know you’re moving in with a man you love, but I think I might like you probably wasn’t going to be compelling enough to make her want to walk away from the future she was creating with him.
Before I could decide, the door opened, and I was face-to-face with Martin. As I leaned over, my hands on my knees, trying to catch my breath, he said, “Ew. You’re so sweaty.”
I looked past him into the living room and stood up again. “No boxes?” I practically panted.
“Lord. Come inside and sit down,” he said. “What is going on with you? You are a mess.” As I sat down, he said, “Ohhhhhh. You’re a mess because your second one true love is moving in with another man. Poor baby.”
“Where is she?” I was finally catching my breath, and the room was coming into focus. Amelia wasn’t here. I had Love Actuallyed my heart out, but I had still been too late. Well, actually, as Sharon, my new BFF at Delta, had informed me, it was less Love Actually and more The Parent Trap, because I was trying to beat the woman I loved home. It didn’t seem nearly as romantic to me, but I had acquiesced because I thought doing so would get me on an earlier flight. I was right.
“Her flight was delayed. She isn’t even home yet.”
I sank back on the sofa.
But then the door flew open and Amelia walked through it in jeans and a T-shirt, which she looked amazing in, I might add. She looked from Martin to me and said casually, “Whatcha doin’?”
Now I looked at Martin, like he was going to help me out of this situation.
“Where is my boss?” Martin asked, throwing daggers out his eyes at Amelia.
“Oh, um, home, I presume. Or, if he is to be believed, at a bar somewhere, trying to forget that I exist.”
Martin sighed dramatically and stood up. “This is why you don’t set your boss up.” He waved his hand, pulled out his phone, and said, “Well, I’d better get on Find My Friends and fix this mess you’ve made. Thank God I’m a fixer for a living.” He pointed at Amelia and said, his voice laced with annoyance, “I’ll deal with you later.”
She smiled weakly and looked at me again, a little nervously. I wouldn’t say that I necessarily knew Amelia better than anyone else in the world, but I knew her well enough to know that that face meant she was scared that I was here to make a grand confession of love. Which I was not.
I stood up and took her bag from her. She stepped inside her living room, and I said, “Are you okay?”
She nodded. “I just didn’t see any point in moving in when we want different things.”
I stepped closer to her. “And what do you want?”
“I don’t want marriage or babies or any of that, but I also don’t love the idea of it being completely taken off the table. It feels so… final.” She shrugged. “Park, what are you doing here?”
I weighed my options. I could tell her. Or I could be cool. And she had likely had a very emotional day. So I decided on cool. “Well, we never discussed that article I sent you.”
She crossed her arms and smirked. “Uh-huh. You flew to New York to talk about an article?”
“You know how serious I am about literature.”
“I read it,” she said. “I thought it was fascinating. I love that the couple adopted their embryos out to friends. I have an interview scheduled with them next week, so thank you for that. I think I can finally put this story to bed.”
I smiled. I knew she would like that. “What was your favorite part?” I asked.
A slow grin spread across her face. “When they introduced their children to their new biological siblings, who had different parents but would grow up right down the street.”
Now it was my turn to grin. “I love that line where she says something about how when she looks back on her life, that’s how she’ll always remember her children. Her son and daughter meeting these new baby twins, the awe of that moment, the serendipity of it all.”
Amelia looked at me for a long moment. I couldn’t quite read her expression.
“When I think of you,” she finally said, “it isn’t as a baby in a bassinet or as the annoying neighbor kid who squirted me with the water gun. I mean, I can think of you all those ways, of course, and I love that I can. But it’s that day when you were lying over me on the beach and the water was dripping off your chest onto me, and all of a sudden you were grown-up. And you said—”
“ ‘You’re okay, Amelia,’ ” I interjected softly. “ ‘I’m not going to let anything happen to you.’ ”
If only she knew how many times I had thought about that moment. I moved closer, my eyes on her eyes, testing the waters. I touched her cheek, dipping my toe into the shallow end. I was in that moment all over again, all those years ago, my face so close to hers, our breaths in time.
It’d be the simplest thing to lean into her, let my lips touch her lips. But I didn’t. Not now. Not yet.
“Hey, Lia?”
“Yeah?”
“Want to go to dinner with me?”
She smiled and nodded. I reached out my hand to her, and she took it. It was perfect. It was a start. And if anyone needed a fresh start, it was us.