Chapter 196: Big Investment
** Harper **
Davenshire was a world away. Both in the physical sense and in how different everything felt as soon as the plane landed.
Harper watched the harbor slowly gliding out of view from the airport runway. The northern sea looked so different from the tropical ocean, darker and rougher, circled busily by squealing seagulls that were nowhere to be found in Hawaii. Even the trees were no longer the same, and her eyes had gotten so used to palms and plumerias that she was already starting to miss the sight of them.
Well, what she missed the most was Eli’s constant presence by her side, of course.
She wondered if his plane had also landed. Before their departure, he had offered to change her flight so that they could fly together, but she opted for the original travel plan, including the airport pickup that Chelsea had generously agreed to two weeks ago. Not that she was intentionally trying to create absence to make the heart grow fonder ... but she didn’t want to repeat her mistake last month and become one of those people who kept ditching their best friends for relationships. Especially not when Chelsea was always being exceptionally supportive and helpful.
On that note, the exceptionally supportive and helpful Chelsea proved herself yet again by having arrived quite early at the airport, waiting right at the security exit when Harper made her way through.
"Oh my, look at that amazing tan you got!" The girl turned their greeting hug into a wide-eyed beauty assessment, in an utterly Chelsea’s-signature way. "It looks so good on you!"
Harper was surprised by the comment. "Really?" She hadn’t noticed any changes herself, either because she was too used to looking at her own image every day or because she was too distracted by looking at someone else’s image. "That’s rare, I always tend to get sunburns before tans. Guess the Hawaiian sun must really suit me somehow!"
"Or being in love really suits you. Makes you glow from the inside and naturally look like a bronze goddess without a sunburn."
Harper laughed. Now, this comment was no surprise. She had been sharing every major step of her new relationship with her guru friend during the trip, and it was only expected that the girl wouldn’t miss the earliest opportunity to bring up the topic. "I think you’re right," she agreed. "And a huge part of it is thanks to you. Here, I brought you a little gift as a token of thanks."
She handed over the shopping bag she had packed in her limited time alone in Hawaii: chocolate covered macadamias, local pineapple rum, and a pair of shell earrings.
"Wait, is this the real sunrise shell that only exists in Hawaii?" Chelsea’s eagle sharp eyes recognized the earring ornament immediately. "Holy shit! You must really be madly in love if you think you need to thank me with something this nice." Then the look on her face quickly changed to the relationship-guru-mode-activated version. "So let’s hear it then, what kind of juicy bonus stories do I get today as my driver’s tip?"