The next day I had never been so scared in my life to open up an email. My heart was bursting through my chest and it took me about five minutes to finally get up enough nerve to open it. I don't remember a single thing that he said in his letter, except one important phrase that made me the happiest woman on earth.

"I'm in love with you too."

That's all I remember... that's all that mattered.

After that day it all became a blur except the most vital parts of what mattered between us... which was that we grew closer with each passing day, week, month, year.

Oh, we had our arguments, but most of all the times were happy.

I had never had with anyone before, what I had with him. He was my best friend, confidant, and most of all he was the first man I'd ever known that seemed to actually be different than most men most women had the misfortune of running into.

Here and there we briefly talked about meeting one another as we grew closer. Holidays came and went until eventually the day was set. We were to meet on July 31st, 2005.

Michael had purchased his plane ticket and I had decided to purchase one myself, rather than drive to New York to meet him, as it was more costly to drive rather than fly up there directly.

After that, the days seemed to go by relatively fast and the idea of finally meeting him after a four year bond we'd developed over the internet was thrilling and nerve-wrecking all at once.

It was a very exhausting week as the day began to approach. I had decided to move out of my studio apartment into a one bedroom because of an inconsiderate neighbor who played music at all hours without any respect for how it affected others.

I had spent a year dealing with that and I couldn't do it anymore.

So as circumstance would have it, I had to move all of my things the two days before we were to meet. So by the time I made it to the JFK airport I was exhausted, and the worst part was that I had about three more hours to wait before his flight made it in.

I kept watching the clock and my nerves started to get the best of me. An hour went by, then another... and then finally the time had arrived and I was sick to my stomach. And it was really crowded by then and I was way in the back.

I wondered if he would be able to see me past all of those people. I silently reprimanded myself for leaving my spot in the front.

I peeked past a congestion of head and shoulders as new passengers came out by the truck load. There was no sign of him. At least none that I could see.

"Oh god, I hope I haven't missed him." I thought to myself. "I hope he's not part of this large crowd and we somehow missed seeing one another. Oh... I wish I had a cell phone. Then at least I could call him."

Twenty minutes passed. Then an hour. Then finally I managed to salvage a place close to the front of the line where we would have no problems seeing one another.

The intensity of the moment had begun to takes its toll on me and I was convinced we missed one another and he got lost or something. Then finally, I heard several people in the crowd talking. They were waiting for passengers from the same plane.

Apparently the passengers had been delayed somehow, but darned if we knew why.

What a relief. Then suddenly, the passengers from his plane started coming out. My heart started racing again. "I can't take much more of this," I thought. Now, it was a matter of knowing he could be coming out at anytime and I had no idea when.

And then I thought... "Maybe he won't be attracted to me. Maybe he'll want to run back on the plane and head right back to England."

I had secured my place in the front... but now that I had it, did I really want it? I had no one to hide behind