She waited nervously for his arrival. She had long since placed the CD player by the door and the food on the table. The sweet melodic sounds of Sara Brightman's voice filled the small room as she paced back and forth from the front door of the suite to the door leading outside to the patio. Thinking that it might be easier waiting outside, she took her magazine and went outside to the porch swing.
What a lovely setting. He could not have chosen a more perfect place for their first meeting! Even though it was late fall, there were still patches of color from several varieties of flowers clinging to life. They were all the more noticeable and spectacular against the stark bareness of the trees and bushes that had long since dropped their summer foliage. She sat on the wooden slats of the swing gazing at the beauty around her, but not truly seeing it as her mind kept wandering to thoughts of the man she was to soon meet.
She couldn't stop wondering what he would actually look like, smell like, feel like, taste like. She wondered if he was feeling the same butterflies she had fluttering within her mid section. She couldn't sit still...even the normally soothing rocking action of the swing could not quell the rising edginess. Okay, sitting wasn't helping, she thought, and besides it was quite colder outside than she had anticipated. Her nose was starting to get cold! Just what she needed...to greet him with a stuffy or drippy nose! Yikes! That would never do! She would be mortified! Definitely time to go back inside she decided.
Once inside their suite she again took inventory, making sure all was as she had planned. Nothing needed rearranging (drat, she thought, at least that would have given her something to do while awaiting his arrival!). She started the CD over and sat down on the couch with her cross stitch magazine. Making a concentrated effort to pay attention to the words and designs before her eyes, she tried to mentally catalogue the ornaments that she might stitch for family members this Christmas. Just as her anxiety was lessoning a bit, she heard voices in the hall. It must be him!