Sunshine and Blue Eyes

It was a rather slow Saturday afternoon.

My hair was still wet from my shower, and I was passing time by watching my notifications on Facebook ping away after uploading over a hundred photos from Younglife camp.

Then I heard a knock at the door.

First thing you should know about me: About half my daydreams involve someone wonderful showing up on my doorstep out of nowhere.
So each time I hear someone at the door, I have to prepare myself for the inevitable downfall of it being not a long-lost friend or mysterious stranger, but just the neighbor or the UPS guy.

So I opened the door.
And there, wearing denim shorts and the hugest grin I'd ever seen, was.....Bailey.

Bailey.

The same Bailey that came with me to the airport on that fateful July 15th a year ago. The same Bailey that wrote me a two-page letter that had me sobbing on the plane somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. The same Bailey that was by my side for my first two years of high school, and one of the only people during those last 3 months to ever see me cry.

I remember gasping, vaguely. Then I just clung to her forever as she did her wonderful belly-laugh of pure joy.

Honestly, I was surprised I wasn't crying, but I think I was so unprepared that I only had room for one emotion: pure excitement.

For so long, I'd walked around my neighborhood, wishing I had an Okinawa friend by my side to take it all in with, so I wouldn't have to be alone. And here she was, walking the sidewalks to the park with me and sitting on my bed and eating pudding in my kitchen and suddenly 370 days felt like five minutes.

It was so surreal I just couldn't.

But thank you, thank you, thank you Bailey for surprising me. People like you are the best surprises in the world.

My face pretty much all afternoon