A Year to Remember(64)

I couldn’t help myself. I might never get the opportunity again. I let my hand wander into his hair and found it just as soft as I imagined.

The flight attendant’s voice announced we’d be landing, and that’s all it took to bring on one of my anxiety attacks. I closed my eyes and tried counting backward from one hundred, breathing deeply, and imagining a happy place. Nothing worked.

Adam woke and realized where his head had been resting. “Sorry. I didn’t mean ...” He noticed my obvious fear. “Sara, are you okay?”

“No. Don’t worry about me.” There was nothing he could do to help anyway.

“You told me you had a fear of flying, but I didn’t realize ...”

He put his arm around my back and had me lean into him. He took my hand. “Squeeze as hard as you need to.”

I pulled my hand away. “I almost broke Caleb’s hand. I better not.”

He muttered something I couldn’t make out under his breath and grasped my hand again. “I won’t break. Don’t worry about me. I can handle it.”

“Now, do you know how a plane flies?” He didn’t wait for an answer. By the time we landed, he had taught me a lesson on aeronautics, identifying and explaining each of the plane’s mysterious noises. Although I doubt I would remember it all, listening to his voice soothed me through the remainder of the flight, even if he made everything up.

“Better now?”

He kept my hand in his and it no longer felt comforting to me. Each finger touching mine sent electric currents throughout my body, and I shivered in response. My heart no longer raced from fear of flying or fear of crashing. My heart raced in sexual awareness of Adam.

I had a feeling I’d be soaring high and crashing low before my vacation ended, but not from an airplane. From the one man who could turn my life upside-down if I let him.





CHAPTER 25




JUNE 30, 2012

TEL AVIV, ISRAEL



WEIGHT: 188

STATUS: IT’S COMPLICATED



My first impression of Israel was it was too hot to be seven in the morning. As we lined up at passport control, my second impression was Israel was much more organized than the United States.

An hour later, we all had our suitcases and we boarded a luxury bus, complete with a bathroom. I sat with Adam, and Alison and Hannah sat in the row behind us.

“You know, we may not want to spend all of our time together. People might think we’re, um, a couple,” I said.

“Would that be so bad?”

“You don’t want to pass up an opportunity to meet someone. You know, like, a girl,” I chattered.

“What if I told you the only girl I want to get to know on this trip is you?”

I couldn’t tell if he was flirting or playing me. The Adam I knew would have me admit to being attracted to him just so he could turn me down. He had sworn they were starting anew, the past to stay in the past. Could I trust him?

I opened my mouth to clarify his statement, but someone pulled out a guitar and everyone started singing a song I hadn’t heard since summer camp in the eighth grade. In fact, riding in a bus with everyone reminded me of camp, except at camp we didn’t have an armed Israeli guard sitting in the last row of a bullet proof bus.

Personally, if some psychopath wanted to blow us up with a bomb, I don’t think one guard with a gun could prevent it.

After singing for a few minutes, the tour guide introduced himself as Moshe Mandelbaum and began a safety orientation. As per Israeli regulation, an armed guard and medic would accompany us throughout the tour. We were not to leave the group for any reason at any time or accept any gifts or packages from unknown people. He also cautioned against leaving a bag or purse unattended because apparently the Israeli army would blow it up before we even realized we had left it. Our bus had a GPS, which was monitored by the tour’s security team and each of our locations had to be cleared by the Israeli government.

When he finished his spiel, three others stood to introduce themselves as the organizers of the trip from Jewish Federation. I had never met any of them before, but I often saw their pictures in the Jewish News. Craig, Lanie, and Brian had been to Israel three times already and promised us an “amazing time.”

We had a short drive to our first stop of the day. After the introductions and orientation, I closed my eyes to get some sleep. Adam had other ideas.

“Why didn’t Missy come on this trip?”

I still hadn’t told anyone about my fight with Missy, but it seemed silly to lie to him, so I told him the truth. “She and I haven’t talked in a couple of months.”

My response had caught him by surprise. “What happened?”

“We got into a fight. I don’t want to talk about it.” I crossed my arms in front of my chest and choked down the sorrow of Missy’s absence.