Goodbyes- September Challenge 2006
Hollyjp

Challenge 2006 lines for September.
Mac: Did you think you'd sneak away without saying goodbye?
Harm: Goodbye? Why not good luck?
Mac: Didn't I say that to you once? When I was stupid enough to leave?
(Goodbyes)


Harm waited to board the commercial flight taking him to London and his new duty assignment. He couldn’t stop thinking about all the changes in his life, personally and professionally, that he had encounter in the past seventy-one hours. He was lost in thought reliving some of the recent memories that would have to carry him for awhile.

Last night had been...indescribable. He knew it had been cowardly the way he left this morning, but he was afraid he wouldn’t have been able to walk away if he hadn’t left while Mac was still asleep. He was patting himself on the back for satisfying the self-proclaimed insomniac to such a degree that he had kissed her and said good-bye without waking her this morning. He had set the alarm clock for her, left a note, and called a taxi to take him to the airport.

“Did you think you'd sneak away without saying goodbye?”

Harm spun around at the sound of that voice, “Mac! Goodbye? Technically this is not good-bye...not after last night.” Harm grinned at Mac knowing a few things about his Marine now that he hadn’t know even twelve hours ago. “Why not good luck?”

“Didn't I say that to you once? When I was stupid enough to leave?”

“Mac, this isn’t about me being stupid enough to leave. This is about me trying to do my duty when I really want to be wrapped up in you in our own home working on our own family.”

“I got your note...but I had to see you one more time before you left.” Tears shimmered in Mac’s eyes and her hands trembled. She had something to say to him that she had never said to him before. She had kept it such a guarded secret with only one slip in nine years, that now when she wanted to say the words, needed to say the words in fact, they hadn’t come. Words she had found so easy to say in the past.

Harm watched her, his sense of alarm growing. “What is it Mac?” When she still didn’t speak, he led her into a somewhat secluded alcove and pulled her into his arms and held her. He rested his chin on the top of her head and waited. “Mac, what ever you’re going to say can’t be that bad...that hard to say.”

“I know...I’m beginning to understand a lot of things right now...why you never said those words that I wanted you to say first...why they were so easy to say before to others...when they didn’t mean anything by comparison.”

“Mac, please...” he tipped her chin up so their eyes could meet. “I love you and nothing can change that.”

Harm saw a smile brighten her eyes, as her headed nodded. “I know...that’s what I’m trying to tell you...I love you too.”

Harm could have said, “I know,” and let it go...but it had bothered him that even after he had declared his love for her, made his intentions to marry her clear, assuring words had not been forth coming from Mac...until this very moment. “How am I suppose to let you go and get on my flight now?” he asked in a husky whisper that told Mac how much he wanted her at that very moment.

“If you don’t, they’ll put you in the brig and then we won’t get to spend any more nights like last night for a long, long time.”

“Good point. I’m glad you caught me Mac...but they’re calling my flight for boarding.”

“Call my cell phone when you get there?”

“Yes.”

It would be at least three months before they would see each other again, but email and phone calls would be exchanged daily until they were together again.

The End (for now)