Starting with Thursday night (2/21) and my adventure to Norfolk... Brandon wanted me to have his truck while he was gone, so I started to walk the 2.5 miles from my apartment to the bus station that would take me into down town Raleigh and drop me off close to the greyhound station, which would the proceed to take me straight to Norfolk. Well, It good thing that first bus was 6 minutes late because I definitely underestimated how long it would take me to walk that far. I would not have made it down town in time if it had been running on time. I ran half of the way because I realized I was going to be late and ran up to the stop as the bus was pulling up! Talk about lucky (and maybe some divine intervention)!
Once I got to down town I got a little anxious about riding the greyhound by myself, but once I got in there, I put my headphones in (with no music playing so I could still be aware of my surroundings) so people would leave my alone. My plan worked, no one bothered me and my bus ride was actually quite pleasant. Brandon picked me up from the station and when we saw each other it was like we both knew it was going to be a bitter sweet weekend. Our first hug was both happy and sad.
The next couple of days we woke up and ran a bunch of errands he needed to get done and started going through his things. We got his truck's oil changed, picked up last minute items from Target, got him a new flight suit and got an operating system put onto his new hard drive. We were busy, but it was nice just hanging out and goofing off with him too.
All too quickly, Sunday rolled around and it was time to get packed. His flight left at 7:25 that night so we wanted to get to the airport around 5:30. The last few days we had been going through his room and setting aside everything he wanted to take. Packing wasn't too big of a deal since we had been pulling things out all weekend, but it was kind of fun to watch him pick what to take and what to leave.
4:45 rolled around and we threw everything into the truck and took off for the Norfolk airport. He was flying United Airlines to DC then to Kuwait and then finally to Bahrain. The drive to the airport was interesting. We didn't say much of anything, we held hands and only whispered the occasional 'I love you' and, of course, I cried.
Once we got to the airport, we parked the truck in short term parking and I followed him in and helped him with his bags. The lady at the counter checked him and and after some rearranging of weight in one of the bags we were about to walk off when the lady asked if I would like a gate pass! I didn't know that they did that anymore, but I was excited to find that they had recently started back! So I grabbed my ID out of the truck, got my pass, and went thru security with him. Those last couple hours together were nice, but still very hard. They started to board the plane and I gave him one last big hug and kiss. As I started to walk away, the tears started flowing. I'll never forget that walk out of the airport.
I got back in the truck and dried my eyes long enough to pay for parking and then headed toward Chesapeake. I cried the whole way back to Josh and Jelana's. Once I got in the house I started packing things up a little and then Jelana came to see how I was doing. I couldn't even say I was doing ok without choking up. She asked if I needed a hug and I am sure I sounded like a child when I broke down and said yes, but I didn't even care. Her hug was the exact comfort I needed at that moment, especially since she knew exactly how I felt. She just stood there and hugged me for a while and it was the first little comfort I had found.
After my minor break down I tried to focus on packing my things up. I knew I would hear from him one more time before he boarded the plane in DC. He landed in DC around 8:15 and we talked and texted back and forth a little more until that plane left at 9:50. He said that plane ride would be almost 12 hours long. Ugh, I can't imagine being on a plane that long. I would go crazy. After we said our goodbye and he left, I went to sleep early. I was so emotionally exhausted.
And that was our last weekend together before he left...
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