"I get it. And, I hate to tell you this... but I might not make it to the graduation party either."
"What?!"
"Well... if I, or we, do good enough these next couple of days, we will be golfing at the end of the month for the title," I replied.
She sighed a very disappointed and long sigh. I could feel the hurt even without words.
"Listen," I started and tried to soften the blow. "Let me call your dad and talk it over with him. I'll convince him to move your party until I can be there. Is that ok with you? I don't want to miss being there, but if we make it into the championships, I have to go. I don't have a choice."
"Don't act like you don't want to go," she hissed a little.
"No, I do. But I want to be there to see you celebrate everything you worked so hard for. I know your dad has all these things planned but if I talk to him and he agrees to move it, are you willing to wait?"
"Well yeah. If it gets you home for it then yes. I'll wait until next year if I have to. I want you to be there."
"It won't be that long of a wait," I assured her. "Let me call him later and we can figure it out. In the meantime, tell me when you want to come to see me."
"You sound like you have a lot going on," she said. "It's a dumb idea anyway. I shouldn't have said that."
"Emma," I said firmly. "For you, I don't have anything else that's more important. It's a small window but next Friday and Saturday I will, for sure, be on campus. I can't promise anything beyond that."
"If you can't then you can't," she said with an undertone to it. "I don't have to come. It's just... it's been a while and I miss... you. I miss talking to you, seeing you, being around you... and, I miss sex."
"There's nothing else I'd rather do right now then hang out with you. I miss you too."
"Right," she said sarcastically.
"I do," I responded quickly. "Why do you say it like that?"
"Because," she said carefully. "I know I'm not the only girl. But..."
"You're right," I cut her off now. "You're not. But... you are the only one that I really do care about. And, I don't need to be the only guy for you either."
"I was going to say that I have to learn to get over that," she continued. "And I'm not trying to make you my only guy, but you know how I feel. Two more weeks and my internship will be done and I will be going home. Maybe I'll find a hot guy there."
"But I won't be home yet," I joked.
She giggled now. "I said a hot guy."
"Wow," I laughed. "Ouch. I have to go patch up my bruised ego now."
"You, please?"
"Alright," I said and turned the conversation back to her coming to visit me. "I'll buy you a plane ticket in for Friday afternoon after my exam. I'll pick you up and we can hang out together and do whatever. The rest gets kind of confusing. If we win this week, we will be in the championships. I'm assuming we will leave for California on Sunday morning, so you would have to leave Saturday evening or Sunday morning on your own."
"If we lose, you can fly in on Friday as planned, I can pack my room up and we can go wherever you want to go. School will be over and I won't have anything to do until the following week when regional qualifying starts."
"That's not confusing at all," she sighed. "That doesn't even sound worth it."
"It's worth it. To see you, an hour would be worth it. I'm buying you a ticket, are you going to get on the plane or not?"
"Yeah," she finally agreed after a moments pause. I could feel the smile through the phone.
"See how easy that was?"
"Yeah-yeah," she laughed now.
"Like pulling teeth with you sometimes," I joked.
She laughed again. "Ok, I have to go back inside. The manager is outside yelling at me to get back inside."
"Why do you still work there?" I asked. "Just quit and be done with it already."
"I did. I just put in my two weeks' notice. I'm taking the summer internship closer to home. I was keeping the job just in case but I decided that I'd get a job at home, intern, and save money so I can have a little something to fall back on if I have to go interview for teaching jobs."
"Where are you planning to go and teach?" I asked.
"I don't know," she sighed. "Jason, I have to go. She's yelling still."
"Alright," I laughed. "We can talk later. Call me."
"Bye, Jay."
I set the phone down and sighed long and hard before nodding and thinking about how good this day had turned out. I made it through the local qualifying and was heading on to the regional one in a few weeks. That would be the harder one to get through. I'd be facing tour pros who weren't already included in the field for the Open and the top amateurs from around the world. The last time I was there two years ago was where the dream died by one stroke.
I knew better now and knew what it took to get over the hump. Between college this year and playing in a few invitation only amateur events, I was a different golfer than I was two years ago. I just had to get out there and put two more good rounds together and I'd be playing in my second ever pro event and my first really big event.
Now Emma was coming into town in ten days. We hadn't been together since spring break almost two months ago. We had been calling each other every couple of days to see how we were doing. There would be some dirty talk in most of them followed by some pics and dirty texts. A few times she had sent me a video clip of her with pinky or her fingers. She was even nice enough to send a pair of panties that she had on in one of the pics.
I knew she was getting lonely by the past few conversations we had had, so her wanting to come see me wasn't a big surprise. I would have already left to go see her, but golf was the dominant thing in my life right now. We were at the end of the year and the team kept winning which meant we kept going. In two days, we would be in a regional tournament that would send us to the national one if we played well.
Regardless of how we played, I still needed to call Uncle Ronnie and talk to him about changing Emma's graduation party date. It would be better to do it now so he would have a chance to call family and let them know things were changing. It probably wasn't going to be the most pleasant conversation as I'd have to listen to him panic about calling everyone and making changes. It was that or let Emma down by not being there for that either. I'd leave that up to him though, he could change the date to after I was done with golf or keep it the same and run the risk of me not being there. Emma wouldn't be happy if I wasn't there.
I took a bite of food and thought about Emma again. That week with her was probably the best week of my life that I had spent with any female. Not just the sex, that was great, but just the time and the experiences and the relationship building. I learned things about her that I never knew about her and I shared things with her that nobody else knew about me.
I wondered what it would be like when she got here. Would it be odd? Would we have to feel each other out again before doing what we both were looking forward to? The more I thought about it the more nervous I was getting. I had to shake it off and not worry about it. It was Emma and we would be fine.
--------------------------------------- Friday, the fourth week of May ------------------------------------
The frosted security slider opened as another couple stepped through. I looked over them and just made out Emma as she walked along the exit corridor towards me. My heart started to race as my palms were sweating as the doors shut. She was almost here. The doors opened again as she stepped out and looked ahead before she finally spotted me.
She smiled that huge smile of hers as she started pushing her bag faster. I had to wait for her as I could go no further into the corridor or I'd risk being tackled by security. She gave the bag a push then let go of it as she called my name with excitement. It rolled along for a second before it toppled over and rolled on the floor.
She leapt into the air and into my arms. I caught her and hugged her tightly as we spun around a couple of times. Her arms and legs wrapped around my body as I squeezed her and held her. Everything about her flooded my senses and came back fresh in my mind. Her scent, her warmth, her laugh, her touch, her smile, her kiss as she looked at me and planted a quick kiss on my lips before hugging me again. It felt so right to be holding her right now. Any of the fears and worries I had vanished as she looked at me and leaned in for another tender kiss.
We kissed these little kisses as her and I both laughed and held each other. I now realized how much I had missed her and everything about her. Holding her right now was lifting the weight of the world off my shoulders and I felt so relaxed as I squeezed her tightly again.
"I've missed you, Jason," she finally spoke with her big smile as she looked into my eyes.
"You have no idea how much I've missed you," I said. "These past couple of days have been rough. I'm glad you are here."
"Me too," she growled a little.
"You ready?" I asked.