Chapter Six

                                    

                                          

I think normal is overrated.  I mean, what is normal anyway?  Is it normal to hang out with your ex-boyfriend and to silently endure his passive-aggressive verbal attacks? Is it normal to be obsessed with a boy you'd talked to briefly, over two months before?   Is it normal to daydream about getting married to a virtual stranger?  If these things are normal, then yes, things went back to normal.  
The two weeks before Gregg came home were torturously slow.  My mom's friend uses the expression waiting with baited breath, which means great anticipation.  That's what those two weeks felt like to  me - like I was holding my breath and waiting for something monumental to occur.  The anticipation nearly drove me mad.   
I had a million different scenarios about how our reunion would play out but I'll only tell you a couple.  Scenario #one:  Gregg sees me across the room and his eyes widen, probably because he hadn't been sure I would remember him.  Then he smiles and slowly makes his way over to me – never once taking his eyes off of my face.  Scenario #two:  late one night, the sound of rocks pinging off my window awakens me.  I drag myself out of bed and peer, groggily, outside.  I look appropriately appealing with my mussed up hair and sleepy eyes.   There is Gregg, flowers in hand, standing in my driveway and gazing up at me with adoration.  All of the other scenarios were equally cheesy and none came even close to what really happened.
I knew when the big day was to finally arrive because Fred told Nicky everything and she, of course, kept me informed.  Gregg was coming home on Thursday, August 12, and Fred was throwing him a welcome-home barbeque.  I was finally going to see my soulmate again.  Just thinking about it made me want to crawl out of my skin.  The waiting was just too much.
  However annoying the wait, it gave me plenty of time to prepare.   I didn't want Gregg to know I'd been pining over him in his absence.  I didn't want him to know I could already envision what our future children would look like.  I didn't want him to know I would gladly take his last name in marriage, despite the fact that he, himself, had never even told me his last name.   
As I got ready for the barbeque, I wondered if Jake would be there. I didn't expect him to miss the return of one of his closest friends, but I knew the situation would be awkward, to say the least.  I felt bad.  Jake was such a nice guy and he didn't deserve what had happened.  I hoped that he would be okay, seeing Gregg and I together.  And if, as I hoped, Gregg and I picked things up where we left off, I would make sure we were discreet about things. The last thing I wanted was to hurt Jake any more than I already had. 
I peered into my closet and tried to figure out what I was going to wear. Thinking back to the night I'd met Gregg, I remembered feeling too plain in my wholesome skater sundress. This time, I didn't want to feel plain - I wanted to grab his attention.   I wanted him to look at me and think wow.  Since I don't feel comfortable revealing too much or wearing too little, I do not own any typical wow clothing - no tube tops for this girl. However, staring at my eclectic wardrobe, I thought I could improvise.  If I couldn't do wow, I could at least do original.  
I settled on an acid-washed jean mini-skirt, a peasant top and brown leather sandals.  Staring at my reflection, I thought I looked more college than high school, which was a good thing.  The next thing I considered was my hair.  If I wore it down I knew I'd be playing with it all night long – worrying that it looked too flat, too fine, too blah.  So I tied it up in a knot at the top of my head, secured it with a black scrunchie and allowed a few strands to fall free and frame my face.  This whimsical style was featured a lot in Teen Magazine and the models always managed to look natural and, at the same time, seductive.  I didn't think for a second that I belonged anywhere inside the pages of a magazine but one could always be hopeful.