The two-and-a-half hour flight was two hours too long. She realized it in the blinding sunshine as she stepped away from the drab glass doors of the baggage claim. A bead of sweat formed on her forehead. She couldn’t tell if it was really that hot, or if she was, instead, that nervous.

Back home in the Windy City, seven inches of snow blanketed the ground. She was lucky to have gotten out at all. The slushy stuff kissed the wheels of her suitcase that morning while it was still white, fresh, untouched by Chicago’s rampant pollutants.

It had been six months since she’d seen him. Maybe she was crazy to do this all over again. Her right hand fussed with her hair, trying to get that too-short bang to stay put nicely behind her ear. Her left smoothed out the wrinkles that had accumulated in the cotton fabric of her bright red tank-top. Thank goodness the lace at the bust drew the eye up, she thought.