Hope beat so hard in my chest, like a captured bird struggling to break free. I was both scared and excited at the same time, and it had been a while since I’d felt that way.
The theater was empty, and I made my way over to the seat, waiting.
I didn’t have to wait long.
Noah sat down in the seat next to me.
“Noah, I—”
He stopped me. “You’re not supposed to talk to the audience members unless they talk to you first, remember?”
I was about to tell him that he’d just spoken, but he was doing something and I didn’t want to ruin it.
He held out his hand. “I’m Noah Douglas. Nice to meet you.”
“Juliet Nolan.” I shook his hand, and it was such a relief to touch him again, even briefly.
“I’m not going to jump to any conclusions about why you’re here, and instead I’ll let you tell me. You’re in this seat because . . .”
For a second I couldn’t speak, because I realized what he was doing. What he’d said couldn’t be done. He was taking us back in time and letting us redo this night. “I’m a seat filler. There can’t be any empty seats. I’ll get up when your date gets back.”
He looked thoroughly confused. “I don’t have a date. I guess you’ll have to stay put.”
There was no place on earth I’d rather be.
“I’m an actor. You may know me from some of my more famous roles,” he went on. “I played Felix Morrison. And Malec Shadowfire.”
“Yes, I know. I know exactly who you are. I had a huge crush on you in middle school, and the Duel of the Fae trilogy is my favorite, even if they did screw up the ending. I think you are so talented and gifted, and I’m excited to meet you.”
He grinned at me, and in that moment I knew—absolutely knew—that everything was going to be okay. “And what is it you do for a living?”
“I have my own dog-grooming service.”
“That is very ambitious and entrepreneurial of you. I happen to have a dog I think you might like. You should come over and clean him up. He got really dirty recently.”
My heart was in my throat. “I would love to.”
“But only if you promise to wear those shoes.” Of course I had on my pink Converse, because I wore them all the time. “I love your shoes.”
He had on a pair of ratty Nikes, but I said, “I love yours, too. You have excellent taste.”
“I brought you something. Look under your seat.” He sounded like my Noah again, and I couldn’t believe how much I’d missed him.
Under my chair was a huge box of Snickers. Like the kinds grocery stores got and put out on their shelves. I picked it up and put it in my lap, fingering the edges. “Thank you.”
“It’s in case you get hungry,” he told me.
“You’re really thoughtful.”
“I try.” He shifted in his seat, putting his arm across the back of my chair. “So, is there any chance you might want to go out with me?”
“Pretty big chance,” I said. “But I have this thing about kissing, and you might need to help me through it.”
“It would be my pleasure.”
“But,” I added, “only if you understand that I’m going to fall in love with you. I can’t just be your friend.”
There was so much softness in his eyes that I melted into my chair. Seriously, someone was going to have to scrape me off this thing. Then he made the melting worse by saying, “I can’t just be your friend, either. And I will definitely fall in love with you.”
It was all I could do not to throw myself against his chest and sob.
He took his phone out. “Can I show you some pictures?”
“Sure.”
He opened his gallery and showed me a middle-aged couple. “These are my parents. You may not know this, but I’d cut off contact with them. I had dinner with them three days ago. It went better than I’d expected. Someone I adore told me that I should give people second chances, so I decided to start there. I think I’m going to try and find a way for them to be in my life.”
I couldn’t believe that had happened. I’d never thought Noah would try to repair things with his parents, but I was so glad that he had, because I knew he’d missed them.
The next one was of a fence being put up around his house. “My neighbor Gladys told me that she was going to let me have a fence for my yard. My dog tends to run away, and now I won’t have to worry. She told me that I would be, and I quote, ‘a doddering fool’ if I didn’t fix things with the woman I love. That my girlfriend was the only reason she was doing any of this and that I needed to man up and make things right.”
Gladys was the absolute best, and she was getting free dog grooming for the rest of her life. I was also going to buy Sunshine a dozen teddy bears.
The picture he showed me next was him with a mother and daughter. “Reina set up a quick charity auction, and I agreed to take a picture with the highest bidder. It’s not how I want my charity to grow, but a very smart woman told me to stop being so precious about this fame thing and use it to help other people.”
My heart swelled at the idea that he had taken my words to heart that way and was going to help a lot more people moving forward.
The next screen showed a guy in his midtwenties with a buzz cut and in combat fatigues. “This is Ferguson. He’s my other battle buddy, and he and I talked recently because I was having some issues in my love life. He told me I was stupid to throw away the only real happiness I’ve ever known. That I tended toward the dramatic and could be oversensitive. And that as my friend, while I had a right to my feelings, he thought I was overreacting and was a total idiot. That I had been given multiple do-overs in my life and I should do the same for the woman I love. That the army had trained me to fight for the things I believed in and cared about.”
I was going to name my firstborn child after Ferguson. After I found out his first name.
The next picture was of a house surrounded by greenery. “I bought this ranch just outside town. It won’t be much more of a commute than I’m doing now. It means I don’t really need the fence at my old house, but this one sits on twenty acres. It has a barn and a lot of pens. It’s the perfect place for an animal rescue, don’t you think? If I can find someone who would want to marry me and live there with me. And have babies, both the fur and human kind.”
Joy engulfed my heart. “Oh, Noah.” I was choked up, and my chin was trembling. That was my dream. He had bought my dream.
He put his phone down. “Juliet, I told you I’d always have your back, and I didn’t. I’m sorry.”
I wanted to throw my arms around his neck, but it was difficult to reach him with this armrest between us. “You have nothing to apologize for. I know why you were upset. You were protecting yourself.”
He leaned in to kiss me on the tip of my nose, in that way that I now recognized as a signal to me of how much he cared. “I should have been protecting you. I promise you that I’ll try not to fall into that overly-sensitive-artist stereotype and will talk to you about everything. I will always give you the benefit of the doubt, because I know how much you love me. You’re my whole world and it’s like . . . everything is just gray without you.”