The Wheels on the Bus

"We're kind of the Odd Couple," Garrett told her. "We get along okay except where it comes to keeping the place clean."

"Ah, okay. So...you're Felix, right?" she teased.

"That'd be me," Garrett told her. "Well, I'm not that anal about cleanliness. But he's pretty close to being Oscar Madison."

"As long as his door stays closed, I think I can deal with that," Jessica said sweetly with a bright, happy smile. "Besides, you'll be finished with school soon, and I'm assuming you won't be staying here."

"That's a safe bet," he told her.

"Any idea where you'll live or work yet?" she asked as he got ready to order some Chinese food online.

"That kind of depends," he replied.

"On?"

"Well, you see, there's this really amazing woman I recently met, and I've got it pretty bad for her," Garrett replied.

"Oh. Lucky girl," Jessica said, her heart racing again.

"No. Lucky me," he insisted.

Jessica smiled but didn't reply.

"I'm from Spokane, and that's where my parents live. I've always just assumed I'd move back there when I graduate. I've even sent out some resumes to a handful of pharmacies in the area."

"And does this...girl...fit into your plans?" she asked.

"I don't know yet. As I said, we only recently met, but I can tell you I'm absolutely crazy about her."

"I see," Jessica replied sweetly with a happy smile.

"Yeah, so if, let's say, I was lucky enough to you know, win her heart, I'd be willing to live pretty much anywhere that made her happy."

"Wow. She really is a lucky girl. But how do you know she wouldn't be willing to live anywhere that made you happy?" Jessica countered.

"Oh, well, in that case, she'd be even more amazing, and that's kinda hard to imagine."

"A woman in love will do many things for the man she adores," Jessica told him.

"Interesting. I uh, I'd be willing to do pretty much anything for her, too."

"So Spokane, huh?" Jessica said as he finished placing their order.

"Uh-huh. Have you been there?" he asked.

"Yes. A couple of times. It's very nice. It's also very different from Seattle."

"As in night and day different," Garrett said, agreeing with her completely.

"Does it ever rain there?" Jessica asked.

"The annual average is about 16 inches whereas Seattle gets around 38, so, yes, it does rain."

"I like the green over here on the west side of the state, but I'm not wild about the gray. Or the rain," she said as he offered her a seat on the old-but-mostly-clean couch.

"I agree. It's depressing, at least to me, to have gray skies so much of the year. Even the nicer days are still mostly cloudy whereas it's bright and sunny much of the time on the eastern side of the state."

"I like sunny," Jessica said as Garrett put his arm around her.

"Yeah?"

"Uh-huh. And...I like you, too," she told him.

"What a coincidence. I like you, too. A lot."

"A lot, huh?"

"Uh-huh. A whole lot."

"That makes me very happy," she said quietly as she moved closer to kiss him.

A single kiss became two and then three, and at some points tongues began touching then tangling and had it not been for a knock on the door a few minutes later...

Both of them were hungry, and Jessica was famished. Again, they ate and talked and laughed, and after dinner, she offered to leave—just in case.

"I uh, I'd prefer watching a romantic movie with you instead," Garrett countered.

"I could probably be persuaded to stay in that case," she told him. "But I really could stand to brush my teeth."

"Ha! No worries. I just went to the dentist a couple of weeks ago, and they gave me a free toothbrush. And floss."

"Well, If you could show me where they are, you could choose a movie while I brush my teeth."

"Don't you want to help me decide?"

"Uh-uh. I want you to choose," she told him.

There were many things Jessica loved about being a woman, and letting the right man make some decisions for her was one of them. Being controlled, however, was not.

When she came back, Garrett let her know it was his turn, and as he got up to go brush his teeth, he asked her if his choice was acceptable, as he pointed to an empty DVD case on the coffee table.

"You like Love Actually?" she asked, barely able to believe her eyes.

"I do...actually," he told her. "And for the record, you remind me of Keira Knightly in the scene where she's wearing the white sweater."

"Get out of here!" Jessica said. She knew the scene and didn't think she was anywhere near that pretty.

"Okay. You're right. You're much better looking," he told her causing to smile at him in a way that causing his body to react.

Jessica loved that movie, and it was in her top three favorite romantic comedies of all time right behind The Notebook and The Wedding Planner. Pretty Woman was also a favorite, but she loved this movie, and knew each of the nine interconnected stories it told by heart.

What she didn't know—yet—was that Garrett did, too, and that this was his personal favorite. But by the time it ended, both of them had said so many lines together, mostly the romantic lines, that she couldn't help but know.

Through the first half they'd held hands, and then she curled up with him after he put his arm around her. All in all, it may have been the most romantic experience of her life. Or would that be their time at the museum? Or maybe the birthday card?

For the first time ever, Jessica managed not to cry through the entire movie. And when it ended, she mentioned that to Garrett.

"That's a good thing, right? It means you're not nervous around me anymore."

"Something like that," she replied sweetly.

She was still curled up with him, and Garrett said, as he looked into her eyes, "Please don't go."

Her heart had calmed down during dinner and did okay during the movie. But when he asked her stay it immediately went into overdrive.

"I...are you...does this mean you..." she said.

"It means I can't stand the thought of letting you go," he told her. "I know we just met and all, so if you need to go home, I'll completely understand. It's just that I've never met anyone like you before in my life, Jessica. I've never felt like this about anyone, and I'd very much like you to stay."

"You had me at 'please don't go'," she told him, the corny-but-sincere words spilling out on their own.

Jessica didn't go home. In fact, she stayed the entire night; a night in which this handsome, romantic, younger man made love to her several times. To her delight, Garrett made love the way he spoke. It was slow and romantic and possibly even...heavenly.

Jessica couldn't ever remember a more wonderful time in her life until around eight in the morning when she heard the front door open.

"Garrett! Wake up!" she said quietly in a frantic voice as she shook him.

"Hey there, beautiful," he said.

"Someone's here!" she said. "The door. I..."

"Yoo-hoo! Anyone home?" a male voice called out.

"Oh, my God! Who is that?" Jessica asked as she pulled the covers up as far as she could.

"That would be my roommate," he told her in an annoyed tone of voice.

"I thought you said he was gone for the weekend!" she said with more desperation than anger.

"Sorry. I didn't expect him back until this afternoon."

"Well, he's here now! Garrett...do something!"

"Yo, Kev," he called out.

"You're not alone, are you, dude?" the voice called back.

"Why do you say that?" Garrett called out as Jessica 'hid' under the covers.

"Because I just know," he said. "That and the bra laying out here."

"Oh...my...GOD!" Jessica said. "Do you do this all the time?"

The 'voice' evidently heard her in spite of her attempt to be quiet and said, "No, he doesn't. In fact, you're the first girl he's had um...sleep over...or even in his bed in maybe a year. Does that help?"

Garrett shrugged his shoulders and Jessica realized two things. Garrett didn't sleep around in spite of his 'gorgeousness', and...it was 'walk of shame' time; something she hadn't experienced since she was in college.

"I'll step out for a while if you like," the voice said.

Garrett turned to Jessica who said, "That's okay."

"Nah, it's cool," Garrett called out.

"You sure? Cuz I can like...go have another cup of coffee."

Jessica was dressed in less than a minute while Garrett pulled on a pair of shorts and a tee-shirt in seconds.

"So...I guess I'll go meet your roommate now," Jessica said, making Garrett wonder just how angry she was.

She grabbed the brush from her purse, and ran it through her hair several times, then turned toward him and said, "Okay."

Garrett opened the door slowly, found his roommate, then let Jessica walk by as he said, "Kev? This is uh...this is..."

"Jessica," she said as she smiled at him.

Garrett's roommate looked nothing like him. He was anything but attractive and had a thick, black mop of hair on top of his head. He also wore black-rimmed glasses and was a good twenty pounds overweight.

"Holy mother of God!" Kevin said when he saw her.

"I'm sorry?" Jessica said not sure what to make of the comment.

"I think Kevin is trying to express his belief that you're very attractive."

Kevin couldn't even look at her, and Jessica suddenly felt sympathy rather than resentment.

"Um...yeah," Kevin said. "She's like...way hot."

Garrett was going to chide his friend until he saw Jessica smile.

"Thank you, Kevin. That's very sweet of you to say."

"It's totally true," he said as he glanced over at her.

They talked for a minute or so then Garrett offered to walk her out, but Jessica had to use the bathroom first and brush her teeth again first. After that, Garrett not only walked her outside but went to the bus stop with her.

"I am so sorry," he finally said. "I swear I didn't know he'd back so early."

"I'm not upset," she told him.

"Really?" he asked.

"I was startled and surprised, but not angry," she said sweetly.

"I'm really glad," he said. "Are you not angry enough to see me again?"

He took her hands in his as he asked and she looked at him and said, "When I said you had me at 'please don't go', I meant it."

"Thank God. I can't tell you how relieved I am. If you were angry or upset or...anything. If you walked away and never came back..."

"I won't walk away, Garrett," she told him, that look back in her eyes.

"No?" he asked as he moved closer.

"No," she assured him. "I have no idea why you...like me...so much. All I know is I have never been so happy in my entire life, and I'll keep coming back as long as you ask me to."

He put his arms around her, smiled, then said, "Promise?"

"Yes. I promise," she told him just before he kissed her.

Jessica kept her promise and kept coming back. In fact, she was either at his place or he was at hers every day from that moment on until he graduated from pharmacy school the last week of May.

Neither of them had ever experienced a whirlwind romance, but it had happened to them. Garrett and Jessica them knew the very first time they kissed that they'd fallen in love. They'd finally met a fellow hopeless romantic who was everything they'd ever dreamed of finding where love and romance were concerned.

Garrett had virtually no money, but he continually found new and creative ways to show Jessica how he felt about her; ways that made her smile or laugh or on occasion—cry. She did her best to be everything her handsome, young boyfriend wanted or desired and found her happiness in doing so. That was possible because there was very little he wanted beyond her love. In fact, she'd had to pull things out of him because he was concerned she might think he expected this or that, when all she wanted was to do them for him. But doing them wasn't a burden. Doing them was a joy.

He, in turn, kept the romance coming each and every day. A month before graduation, Garrett asked her to go home to Spokane with him and meet his family during the last three-day weekend before he finished school.

His parents knew how old she was, but they also knew how happy she made their 25-year old son. That he'd given this older woman his heart was all they needed to know about her. And once they met her, they understood why he had.

They came out to Seattle the end of May for his graduation, and that evening at dinner, Garrett asked her to marry him. He did so while reciting the most romantic poem Jessica had ever heard as he knelt on one knee before her with the ring in hand.

Through tears of joy she said, "Yes!" and accepted the modest diamond he'd bought having borrowed even more money to do so.

Jessica also said 'yes' immediately when he asked her if she'd consider moving to Spokane with him where he had a job lined up that paid quite well; a job that would allow her to stay home and raise children—should she want to.

She told her handsome fiancé how much she wanted children and that nothing would make her happier. They spend a week at his parents' home as they looked for a place of their own, and once they found one, Garrett began working full-time.

They married in August, then began trying to start a family. By the middle of November, a seed had been planted, and Jessica cried with joy when the results of her pregnancy test came back positive.

She was 41 when their first child was born, and 43 when they had their second.

There was nothing Jessica Weiland loved more on earth than her two babies, except for the very handsome, younger man she'd married and whom she loved and adored with all her heart; the man who still did some little romantic thing for her every day. A man who continued doing so every single day she was alive; a man who embodied everything she'd ever wanted in life and more.

Erica had been so right. The wheels on the bus continued going round and round, and would have whether or not she'd ever taken a chance and let Garrett know how she felt. Her best friend had happily flown to Spokane to be her Maid of Honor, and she was the one who'd reminded Jessica about those wheels.

They were still going round and round all over the Seattle area, but Jessica had stopped moving and settled down with the man of her dreams and two beautiful children who provided her with all the love and happiness any woman could ever want.

She smiled when, one day as she sat looking at her handsome husband playing with their two children, she realized that sometimes wishes really do come true.