Lexi made a true effort to finish packing, but she couldn’t. All she could do was pace around her room replaying the fight she had with JC on the phone before finally falling asleep on the sofa.
The next morning, at about 6 AM, Richard was knocking impatiently on Lexi’s door. She wearily got up and answered it.
“Lexi, it’s 6 o’clock! We’ve got to go!”
“Omigawd!” she yelled looking at her watch. “I fell asleep before I could finish packing!”
Richard helped Lexi throw the remainder of her clothes into the two opened bags on the bed. She put on a Boston Redsox hat as they flew out the door.
There was a huge accident on the highway on the way to the airport. Their limo was stuck in traffic for almost thirty minutes, and by the time they reached LAX it was 7:05.
Richard and Lexi ran to the American Airlines ticket counter, and Richard asked quickly, “Has the seven o’clock flight for Orlando left already?”
“Yes, Sir, it has.”
Lexi sighed. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s ok,” Richard smiled. “We’ll just have to catch a later flight.” He turned to the woman behind the counter. “Is there another flight to Orlando today?”
“I’ll check for you,” she answered as she typed into the computer. “Yes there is another flight…”
“Great!”
“…but it’s full. The next flight I can put you on is tomorrow morning at 8:15.”
Richard turned to Lexi. “I know you wanted to be home for Valentine’s Day. Do you want to try a different airline?”
“No, it’s ok. I don’t think I really have anything to look forward to for Valentine’s Day anyway.”
The ride back to the hotel was quiet. Lexi was obviously tired, and Richard was on his cell phone for a few minutes making new hotel reservations. At one point, Richard thought that Lexi was sleeping, but he then realized that she was only staring out the window in a daze.
“Is everything ok?”
“Yeah. I’m just tired.”
“Lexi, something’s wrong. I know you.”
“I talked to Josh last night…I guess you could say that we’re not on the best of terms right now.”
“What happened?”
“I told him what you said. I told him that I thought about what you said, and he got mad.”
“Well, he had no reason to get upset. You’ve only been seeing each other for what, a few days plus however long we’ve been in California?”
“No, Rich. We’ve been together since the end of December.”
“What? That long?”
“It hasn’t been that long…”
“No, it’s not that long, but I didn’t think that it was at all serious…”
“No! Rich, this might sound corny but whatever we have, or had, is something really special. I mean, I…” she stopped.
“You what, Lexi?”
“…”
Richard looked at her with care. “Do you love him?” Tears began to well up in Lexi’s eyes behind her dark sunglasses, and she began to nod. “Yeah. I guess I do.”
Richard felt awful. He only said those things before because he thought that whatever they had just started. He had no idea how she felt or that they were over a month into a relationship. He definitely should have asked Lexi instead of assuming.
“It’s all going to be ok.”
“I don’t know,” she said wiping a tear away. “I don’t even know what to think. I’m not sure if I’m mad at him or myself…I guess I’m mad at both of us.”