Chapter 4
Chloe stood there a moment, shocked down to her toes. Then she suddenly burst into speech, "You're going to have to explain that one, Mac! All this time, I thought you were hiding the hots for a certain blue-eyed flyboy!"
Mac sighed, "It was easier to let everyone think that rather than to have to deal with the mess the truth would put me in."
"But the Admiral? Don't get me wrong, he's cute and all for his age, and if I remember right, I thought the two of you would be great together when I first met him, but you never gave any indication at all that you felt the same way! In fact, I seem to remember you scolding me for mentioning that you should date him!"
"I know," Mac admitted. "But at that point you were still a little blabber mouth and if I had let you know you had hit the nail on the head, I could've been pretty sure you would have found a way to let him know that!"
"Well, yeah! Look at all the years I could have saved you if I had!" Rubbing her hands enthusiastically together, she eagerly asked, "Okay, so what do we do now to get the two of you together?"
"Nothing!" Mac stated firmly.
"But Mac! We have to!" Chloe protested.
"No!" Mac insisted.
"But…"
"Chloe Madison, you have to promise me that you are not going to tell him!"
"Mac!" Chloe whaled.
"No! Chloe, I mean it! You have to swear to me that you aren't going to try and contact him in any way!"
"But Mac!"
"You are not going to try and call him! Promise me!"
Very reluctantly Chloe agreed. "Alright!" 'There was always other ways,' she thought.
"Or email him!"
'Rats!' she mentally exclaimed. "Okay," she said out loud, frantically thinking of other ways.
"Or text him, or leave a message on his answering machine!" Mac added to the list.
With a defeated sigh Chloe conceded to Mac's demands.
They had to hurry to the station after that or Chloe would miss her train home. It was in the car on the way that Chloe realized Mac hadn't mentioned 'snail mail'! She could use the good old Post Office to send word to Admiral Chegwidden about Mac's wish.
As she hugged Chloe good-bye, Mac promised that she would work on being happier. Chloe decided to give her a couple of weeks to see if Mac was good to her word. If she didn't see improvement Chloe would write the letter to AJ.
A little over two weeks went by and although Mac tried to be more cheerful in her emails and phone calls Chloe could sense that nothing would work except to change the underlying problem. The only thing that would make Mac happy was to have the Admiral in her life. So she sat down and wrote a very carefully worded letter to him.
During the tour of the ballparks AJ had his mail held at the local post office in McLean. Since Bud Roberts had taught him how to pay his bills on line, he knew he had them taken care of. What he did for the rest of his mail was have it forwarded to him whenever he and Francesca would be staying in the same city for a few days.
After arriving in Italy, he had forgotten all about that until a week and a half before Christmas. Francesca complained that she was already getting Christmas cards in the mail, but that she hadn't even bought the ones she wanted to send yet. This reminded AJ to call about his mail. Five days later a large package arrived with almost two months accumulation of junk mail and letters.
It was Christmas Eve when he finally came across Chloe's letter three quarters of the way though the stack. He opened it wondering what reason Mac's little sister had to write him. As he read, his heart filled with dread and by the time he reached the end, his hands were trembling.
To be continued…..