The Mountain Inn
May 10, 2008
After agreeing to rendezvous at the Mountain Inn, a rustic but popular tavern that Rhonda had heard about, they each got into their cars and traveled to their destination. Rhonda only had to drive for a couple of hours to get to the Inn, but it seemed like a lifetime to her as she relived the history of her and Michael’s relationship and pondered their imminent meeting. What if he doesn’t like me?, she fretted. Never did it occur to her that she might not like him; that was not even a possibility in her mind. She had made up her mind within a few days of meeting him in an internet forum that he was a keeper, and she was his to keep.
Meanwhile, Michael was on the last leg of his fourteen-hour journey from Miami to the mountains of Georgia, his mind on overdrive the entire time. Like Rhonda, he had no doubt that she would turn out to be everything he had imagined during their months of texts, chats, phone conversations and teasing pictures sent to each other, none of them revealing all the details but just enough to keep each other intrigued. And like Rhonda, he was more nervous about what she would think of him; his vision of her was so beatific that he feared that she would immediately be disappointed, and the thought of being rejected by her was more than he wanted to contemplate.
So when he walked into the Inn and saw the sweet-looking blonde in the corner booth nervously twirling the straw in her margarita, and she saw the tall, rumpled stranger straggle into the place and look furtively around, they both instantly knew that this was the one they were looking for, and all traces of doubt, self or otherwise, faded away like a long-forgotten childhood fear.
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“MOM, I DON’T HAVE ANY CLEAN CLOTHES FOR SCHOOL!”, wailed Abby, shocking Rhonda awake from her reveries about the guy she had met on the Natalee Holloway message board. He had seemed so sensitive and refined, not like the other loonies who frequented the boards, posting their vile comments about the most tragic of events. But he also had an air of confidence about him, almost bordering on cockiness, that Rhonda loved. She liked to read the comments he posted, and finally one day, summoning her courage, she emailed him a reply to one of his posts and waited for his response…
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“MOM, I DON’T HAVE ANY CLEAN CLOTHES FOR SCHOOL!”, wailed Abby, shocking Rhonda awake from her reveries about the guy she had met on the Natalee Holloway message board. He had seemed so sensitive and refined, not like the other loonies who frequented the boards, posting their vile comments about the most tragic of events. But he also had an air of confidence about him, almost bordering on cockiness, that Rhonda loved. She liked to read the comments he posted, and finally one day, summoning her courage, she emailed him a reply to one of his posts and waited for his response…
