I was expecting to see him. I was hoping to see him. But I thought I’d be at the back of the crowd and I’d just watch from there. I thought I’d get a chance to hear him speak, but from a distance.

Maybe I got the time wrong. There doesn’t seem to be anyone here.

He stares at me. His expression is unreadable.

But I can tell he recognizes me.

We don’t say anything for a moment. It’s as if we’re both frozen.

It’s still Noah Strong. That’s for sure. He’s instantly recognizable. But he’s different, very different.

His face has matured. The lines of his chin are stronger. He looks incredibly strong, his muscles even larger and denser than before. He looks powerful and intense. Almost frightening.

His head is almost shaved, in military style.

He’s clean shaven. He always used to have a bit of stubble. But the clean shaven look just accentuates the masculine lines of his face… that jaw.

He stands tall and stares at me.

“Hi,” I say, my voice sounding timid and strange, as if it’s coming from some faraway place.

I’ve matured a lot in the years since I last saw Noah. I’m no longer the shy virgin I once was. That’s what it’s so strange to find myself feeling this way again. It’s strange to be speaking timidly and softly, as if I’m unsure of myself.

“Hi,” says Noah. His voice is deeper than I remember. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“Oh,” I say. “Yeah… I saw your name in some advertisement and I thought I’d come. You know, support the new book and everything. I must have gotten the time wrong. I thought it started at nine.”

“Nine thirty,” says Noah.

I don’t say anything. I don’t know what to say.

I could ask some dumb question, like: so what was being a Navy Seal like? Or: what have you been up to all these years?

That panicky feeling is bubbling up inside me.

And it’s not because I’m a shy virgin, like I once was.

No, it’s because Noah is James’s father.

And he has no idea.

Noah doesn’t say anything for a moment. He looks me up and down.

“You look great,” he says.

Is that a smile creeping onto his face? Or am I just imagining it? Is it just wishful thinking on my part?

I just nod vaguely. I know I’m acting weird but I can’t help it. There’s too much on my mind.

After all, I’ve not only never told Noah that he has a son, I’ve never told James anything about his father.

What kind of a person am I? A horrible person, I guess. For so many years, I’ve managed to push it all to the back of my mind. I’ve told myself that I’ll do it at some point, that today’s not the day. But the day never came. And how could it, when Noah was away on secret missions all the time? I didn’t know where he was, and I never heard from him. When he walked out on me that night of the party, it was like he was walking out of my life for good.

“So you saw my book in the paper?” says Noah.

“Yeah,” I say.

In truth, I saw him on TV, in an interview. Leah called me and told me that it was on and I rushed to the nearest TV and frantically tried to find the channel. I missed the first minute of the interview, so I searched for it online later that night. I must have watched it three times.

I saw then how much he had changed, how he matured, his body as well as his mind. But of course, it’s different seeing him in person.

And I didn’t just watch that one interview. I searched all over the internet and found him in radio interviews and I listened to all of those. I found a print interview he did when his book first came out and I must have read that a hundred times.

Of course, I can’t tell him any of that.

The conversation is quickly becoming stranger and more awkward. I have no idea what to say, but there’s so much I need to tell him. I just don’t know how.

A very tall, thin man rapidly approaches us, coming up behind Noah.

Noah seems to sense him. Maybe it’s his military training. Noah turns to greet the man.

“The famous Noah Strong, may I welcome you to our humble store.” The man speaks in a weird highfalutin’ way. “I imagine it must be grand to be back in your home town. We’re more than excited to have you here with us, you should know. A writer from our home town! And a war hero!” I’m not sure, but I think I see Noah cringe subtly when the phrase “war hero” comes up. “Now, if you’d just follow me, please, we have some things we need to arrange before people arrive for the talk.”

The shop owner completely ignores me for some reason. He stares at Noah like he’s in complete awe of him.

But that’s just the kind of effect Noah Strong has on people. I saw it in the interview he gave. Noah just has that kind of presence.

“I’ll catch up to you later,” says Noah, turning back to me. “I’d like to talk to you. Could you wait for me after the talk and the signing?”

“Uh, sure,” I say.

Damnit. Now I’ve got to tell him about James. I won’t have any more excuses left.

I watch as the store owner leads Noah away.

I spend the next fifteen minutes trying not to appear conspicuous. I pretend to hunt through the books on the shelves, but the reality is that many of them are old and stained. And most of them aren’t books I have much interest in reading. These days, with James and my job, I tend to go for something that I can understand immediately. I tend to go for books that pull me out of my own overworked little reality and take me somewhere else. I’ve become a huge fan of romance books, but not the types you can get in stores like this one, where they’re all old fashioned and a few decades old.

Thankfully, other people start to arrive. There’s a small area where rows of folding chairs have been set up. People start to mill around, and some sit down.

I try to act like I’m not staring at Noah as I sit down. I try to act like I’m not following his every move.

But he just moves so sexily. I remembered that he had this effect on me before. But I thought I’d be over it by now. Instead, his body, his every movement, draw my eyes like a magnet. He’s only gotten sexier over the years.

The store owner approaches the microphone. “Is this thing working?” he says, tapping it.

This sends a horrible screeching noise through the amplifiers.

Everyone covers their ears, including me.

“Sorry about that, folks,” says the owner, chuckling to himself. “I suppose I’m just a little nervous, having such a celebrity here… So may I present to you, without any more formal ado, the great Noah Strong…”

But he doesn’t stop there. Instead, he drones on and on, talking in circles. It feels like he’s repeating the same thing over and over again, ad nauseum.

While he talks, I steal glances at Noah, who sits stoically and seems to be listening intently. I’d love to know what’s really going on in his head.

I pull my phone out of my purse and check it. Nothing. But that’s what I end up doing all the time.

James is staying with my parents today, while I ostensibly have to go to the doctor. I couldn’t very well tell them that I was going to see James’s father.

My parents are aging, and for them it would be impossible to mellow with age. They were already pretty mellow to begin with. They’ve continued being the same hippies as always. My dad keeps working on his art projects, never seeming to complete them. And my mom still gives lectures at the college, but she’s moved to just giving a class here and there. She’s no longer a full time lecturer. The only real difference, now that they’re older, and I’m older, is that they’re even more open with me than before. The biggest revelation is that they finally told me they smoke pot. “But only occasionally,” said my dad. “And never when you were around.”

I just shrugged. The news wasn’t that much of a surprise to me, honestly. I just asked them not to smoke around James, since they end up taking care of him a lot. Of course, they’re far too responsible to do anything like that.

I’m always checking my phone, but not because I’m worried about my parents’ ability to take care of James. They’re almost too responsible in a lot of ways. But I guess it’s just the motherly instincts kicking in or something.

While I’ve conquered anxiety in most aspects of my life, I do worry about James and his safety. Probably too much. After all, he’s four years old, and I feel like he could accidentally swallow something or eat something he shouldn’t. But I know that’s just my worrying.

My parents were a huge help. I couldn’t have gotten through college without them. I had James in my first year of college, right towards the end of the school year.

I managed to do what many consider the impossible, which is not drop out of school and not even take a semester off. I got a medical leave of absence during my final exams, and then had to go back and retake them in the summer.

The professors all thought I was some kind of bimbo or something. They thought I’d gotten knocked up in the first week of school, the first week away from home. I just kept my head held high and didn’t pay them or their attitudes any attention. I didn’t care what the other students said about me.

I stayed strong. I knew that I had to, for James.

James is my mother’s father’s name. I have fond memories of him. He would sit out on the porch smoking his pipe all day long, and I can still remember the smell of it.

“And now, the man you’ve all been waiting for.” The bookstore owner has been droning on for so long that I’ve gotten completely lost in my own thoughts.

But he steps aside, and Noah comes up to the microphone. He looks calm, cool, and collected.

All eyes are on him. He has not only an impressive physique, but an impressive, understated authority. He could command us all to do something, and we would do it. I would, at least. I’d do anything he told me to do. Even though he walked away from me that night.

“Today I want to talk about an important theme. It’s something that affects all of us, whether we’re aware of it or not.” Noah’s voice is rich and deep.

My phone rings.

Shit.

Everyone’s eyes turn to me. Heads spin, and chair legs scrape on the linoleum floor as people turn. They want to see who the idiot is who didn’t turn off her phone.

I see Noah staring straight at me. He’s paused in the middle of his sentence, waiting for me to do something about my phone.

I turn red in the face.

“Sorry,” I mutter.

So much for conquering my anxiety. So much for not caring what people think about me. I feel the intense embarrassment running through me.

I grab my purse and get out of my chair. Somehow, I manage to topple it over in my hurry. It falls to the floor in a crash.

I rush out of the bookstore with my phone still ringing.

I hear some laughter behind me. So much for making a good first impression with Noah.

“Hello?” I say, frantically answering my phone.

I notice I’m standing right in front of the bookstore window, and everyone’s eyes are still on me, including Noah’s.

Pretending I don’t notice them, I continue to walk down the road, away from them.

“Hana! You picked up. I thought you’d never pick up.”

“Hi, Leah,” I say. “What’s up?”

“Where are you?” says Leah. “Did you go to that book signing with Noah?”

“Yeah,” I say. “And I forgot to turn off my phone and I had to leave. Everyone was staring at me. It was awful.”

“You should always turn off your phone,” scolds Leah.

“But then you wouldn’t have been able to reach me, and you’d ream me out about that, wouldn’t you?”

“Am I really that bad?”

“Sometimes,” I mutter.

“Anyway, I’m glad I got you on the phone. I have something really important to tell you.”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t know if I should even tell you…”

“Come on, Leah. You can’t do that to me. You just can’t.”

“OK, fine. I need to tell you anyway.”

“OK, what is it?”

“Well, you remember Tammy?”

“Tammy Smith? From high school?”

“Yeah, the same one. You know her?”

“I mean, I know who she is. She was supposedly the most popular girl in school, especially in the last year. I think everyone knew who she was.”

“Well, remember how she used to date Noah.”

“Yeah, I guess so. He never mentioned her. I think he dated her right before I… hooked up with him.”

“Yeah, and she never really got over it. She was always pissed. He never talked to her again. And apparently she’s just been pining away for him all these years.”

“OK,” I say. “I don’t mean this to sound the way it’s going to sound. But what’s this got to do with me?”

Leah’s the only one who knows that Noah is the father of James. That makes me worried. Not because I think she might talk and tell someone. She’s reliable, and my best friend, after all. But because every time she tells me some weird piece of gossip, I’m always wondering if it means she’s found out that someone else knows.

And I have a feeling my fears are about to come true. It’s a gut feeling.

But I never could have predicted the way it’s going to happen.

“So I ran into her at the pharmacy. Apparently she’s a nurse at the hospital.”

“She’s a nurse? I can’t imagine her helping anyone.”

“I know. It’s weird. But that’s what happens at our age. People you remember from high school start filling real jobs. Really makes you wonder how competent everyone around you is.”

“Tell me about it,” I say. Inside, I’m just hoping she’ll get it over with and tell me the news quickly. I can’t take the suspense. But I know there’s something bad coming.

“So she… she let it drop that she knows James is Noah’s son.”

“What?” I say.

My worst fears have come true.

I mean, it’s not that I don’t want Noah to ever know. I know that I need to tell him. But I need to be the one to tell him. It can’t be someone else, and it especially can’t be Tammy the cheerleader turned nurse from high school.

“It sounds like she really blames you for taking Noah away from her.”

“That’s crazy,” I say. “Noah was with everyone in those days… And he asked me out.”

“I know, I know.”

“But wait,” I say. “How the hell does she know about it?”

“I guess she went digging through the hospital records or something. I don’t know. She was pretty vague about it.”

“The hospital records? I don’t get it.”

“She said Noah’s name was on James’s birth certificate.”

I groan.

I can’t believe I did that. But what was I supposed to do? They asked me for the father’s name, so I told them. I never would have thought anyone would see the birth certificate. I mean, I knew that someday it would come up. James would have to see it at some point when he’s older. But I figured that by that time, many years from now, I would have figured this whole mess out.

“She said she’s going to tell Noah,” says Leah.

I groan again.

This is the last thing I need.

“So she holds a grudge against me?”

“It sure sounds like it. I knew I needed to tell you, Hana. I’m really sorry. If there’s anything I can do to help…”

“Do you have her phone number?” I say.

“Yeah, I thought you might want it. Hang on a second, it’s in my phone.”

There’s scratching on the other end of the line as she fiddles with her phone. Finally, she reads me the phone number. I pull out a notepad form my purse and scribble it down.

“You think I’m screwed?” I say. “You think she’s going to tell Noah?”

“Honestly, yeah…”

“Wow, thanks,” I say.

“Sorry,” says Leah. “But I think the best thing you can do is tell him first.”

I say goodbye to her and we hang up. I’m pissed, anxious, and upset. But not at Leah. She’s only trying to help.

I can’t believe that fucking Tammy, going snooping around through my son’s records. She must have suspected something, but I have no idea how. How would she even come up with the idea that James was possibly Noah’s son?

I’m only a block away from the bookstore, and I can still see the people seated inside, listening to Noah talk. I need to tell him, and I need to do it before Tammy gets to him first. I take a deep gulp, and start walking towards the bookstore.