LB, Chapter 9

(To read Chapter 8, click HERE.)

"It's that time of year, when the world falls in love,

Every song you hear seems to say,

'Merry Christmas, may your New Year dreams come true!'

And this song of mine, in 3/4 time,

Wishes you and yours the same thing, too."

~From "Christmas Waltz"

(Natalie Cole's version is my favorite!)

We sat snuggled on the couch, basking in the glow of the Christmas lights, as it got later and later. And yet, every time I would express my concern about him driving back over the pass in December in the middle of the night, he would just smile and say, "I told you I could stay another half hour!"

Well, one half hour bled into another and another until it was 1:30 AM! As much as I didn't want him to go, we both knew it was time. With a kiss and a promise to be careful and call me when he finally made it home, he headed back to Yakima, while I floated off to bed. I laid on my bed, stupid grin back with a vengeance, and thought back on the night and the last few months. It was almost Christmas, and I'd already gotten the gift I'd been begging God to send me. With a last text to my sweet Lieutenant, I drifted off to sleep.

Somewhere around 5 AM, I awoke with my phone clutched in my hand to the "I'm home safe and sound" text. Phew! My mind at ease about his safety, I slept a few more hours before getting up to go see my family, who were arriving from Utah that day.

On my way over to my sister's house, I stopped by the Post Office to pick up the mysterious package I'd been sent. I couldn't imagine what it could be or who it could be from. You can imagine my surprise when I saw the return address--Yakima, WA. I got back to my car and opened the box to find a Christmas gift carefully wrapped in red paper with a sweet note attached. I debated ripping it open right then, but exercising extreme self-control, opted to save it until Christmas. (If you missed the story of the mystery gift, click HERE.)

The next few days went by in a flurry of phone calls and texting (and MUCH teasing by my silly family--except for Sterling, who was my one and only family member to stand up for me! Thanks, bro!), and I couldn't wait to call him when I got home on Christmas night. We talked for a couple hours and I thanked him for the amazing and extraordinarily thoughtful gift. It was a perfect way to end the day.

After hanging up the phone with him, I jumped online to check my email...and had a message from facebook saying, "[LB] has updated his relationship status to say that you two are in a relationship. Please confirm this relationship status." I smiled, glad that he wanted to make it "public." For a few reasons (namely telling a few people about this new development myself before they discovered it on silly facebook), I hadn't wanted to post it yet, but when I clicked yes, there it was on my facebook page. I thought, "Well...I guess the cat's out of the bag!" But I didn't really mind. I was excited that he was the one who had instigated putting it out there (we all know it's usually the girl who updates the facebook status, right?), and I laughed about being "facebook official." (Yes, I work with middle school students!)

The next few days with my family were wonderful, but I was eager for Wednesday to roll around so I could head up to Seattle--we had decided to meet up there to spend a few days together. My friends Tana and Devin were conveniently headed to Colorado to see Devin's family the day after I would be arriving and needed someone to stay at their condo and take care of their cat, so I made plans to housesit for them. It was a perfect solution--I have loads of friends and family in Seattle, but this way I didn't have to feel guilty not spending time with them...because let's be honest, I really just wanted to spend as much time as possible with LB.

We talked on the phone about our plans and I told him I'd be housesitting for my friends. As we were making plans, I said, "By the way, I don't presume to have a monopoly on your time. I know you are there with your family and you have friends to see, etc., so just let me know when you're available, and I'll work around it." He replied, "Jen, I was planning on you monopolizing my time." :) I was THRILLED. He asked if he could see me Wednesday night when I got there, and I told him I had made plans to have dinner with some college friends, but he was welcome to join us if he was interested. He said, "Of course I want to meet your friends!"

If you know anything about how relationships have gone for me in the past, you know that this was a big deal to me. Everything just continued to seem more and more perfect, and I couldn't wait to spend five days in a row with this amazing man.

To be continued...

(To continue to Chapter 10, click HERE.)