Ella, Lizzie, and I were scattered around Lizzie’s living room. It was November, but Lizzie’s condo was a sauna, and her cats struggled for ventilation by lying against the front door. I was curled up in the couch by the bay window, and Lizzie was across from me in a rocking chair she stole from an abandoned school in Indiana on a trip with her father. The floor moaned beneath the chair with each forward movement. Ella was almost asleep on the hardwood floor with Lizzie’s cats. The fingers on her left hand would barely rise every few moments to stroke the thick, brindle fur of Bandit, the morbidly obese and suspiciously gentle cat Lizzie rescued from an alley years prior.
“Do you want another glass of wine?” Lizzie asked, rocking back and forth slowly with a goofy smile on her face. Her curly hair delicately danced around her face with each movement. I shook my head, still giggling from our triplicate buzz and subsequent lethargy. Our girls’ nights were the most fulfilling hours of nothingness: time spent doing entirely nothing, but in the delightfully comfortable company of our tripod friendship.
Ella moaned from the floor, “Never. I am so full I might explode.”
“What time is it?” I questioned, mindlessly braiding my hair.
Lizzie looked at the flashing clock on the fireplace mantle. “One-thirty.”
“I’m going to sleep,” Ella mumbled. She struggled to peel herself from the floor as she grabbed Bandit with her left arm but managed to make it safely into Lizzie’s second bedroom. Lizzie and I watched, waiting for the sounds that signaled Ella safely settled into the bed.
“I guess that’s our cue, Ave.” Lizzie stood up from her rocking chair and smiled at me. “Don’t go anywhere. Stay on the couch. In the morning, we can make eggs and get coffee.”
“Sure.” I exhaled. “Goodnight.”
Lizzie’s voice sung with the bubble of pink moscato as she kissed the top of my head and glided to her bedroom in the back of her condo. I was alone in Lizzie’s living room, still attached to the couch in the bay window. I pulled a quilt from the arm of the couch, sniffling at the tickled itch of my nose from Bandit and Tom’s furry reminder of their occupancy. I punched some of the throw pillows into the perfect position and settled in for the night, pulling the furry quilt over my side. Although I didn’t feel I was entirely ready for sleep, I attempted to drift off with my eyes sealed. I could hear Tom purring beneath the couch. His vibrating hum was shortly accompanied by the dim buzz of my phone. I reached behind me with one arm, attempting to grab the phone from the side table. I almost knocked over a vase and Lizzie’s remote in the process. I opened the inappropriately late text message, and butterflies stormed my chest when I saw it was from Sean.
Sean: Where are you?
Me: At Lizzie’s. She and Ella are asleep.
Sean: Come out.
Me: You’re home?
Sean: Come out.
Me: Can’t. Where are you?
Sean: I can come and get you.
Me: You’re nuts. Where are you?
Sean: I know. On my way.
I felt nauseous with juvenile excitement as my heart skipped beats and my fingers shook. I didn’t know how to respond because the friend part of me wouldn’t have cared and easily said no, but the other part of me was exploding.
I set my phone down and struggled to reverse the smile pulling apart my mouth. It had been weeks, years overall, and in a blink my heart pounded through my chest. I wasn’t thinking of me, the dates I shared with Declan, or anyone else while I hauled my coat and purse from Lizzie’s closet and quietly crept out of her condo. Maybe I could make it back in time for breakfast or maybe I’d just tell her I went home. Either way, I found myself waiting in the snow for Sean at one forty-five in the morning.
My lips felt blue, and I was beginning to lose the feeling in my legs as time passed. I didn’t want to appear so eager, but when he turned the corner ten minutes later, I felt my legs shake. I expected him to drive, but he was walking. The cuffs of his jeans were folded over his brown-laced boots. My fingers nearly fell off as I waited in the cold, but Sean arrived in only a thermal shirt and jeans. I walked away from Lizzie’s front step to meet him on the sidewalk. I could see the outline of his tense muscles through his shirt, rigid and cool as marble.
“Hey, you.” He greeted me with a kiss on the forehead. “Cold, huh?” His lips spread the dark stubble that formed from weeks of neglect, parting into a smile as bright as the moonlight. He shook his hands before pulling them from his pockets and enveloping me in a hug.
“Why aren’t you wearing a coat?” I fell into his hug and stepped back from my tiptoes. “You’re going to get sick.”
Sean motioned with his finger for me to come closer to him once more so I stepped in, gnawing on my bottom lip as his mouth curled into a mischievously inviting grin. I inhaled his cologne as his face lowered to mine, his mouth an inch away from my ear as he spoke. He smelled like a distillery, which explained his foolish ability to walk in the snow. I waited for the crackle of his voice, hearing his mouth open next to my ear and sending a shiver across my skin. It was painfully slow to wait for his words. Goosebumps tickled the surface of my skin beneath the rough stubble on his handsome face.
“Shh,” his whisper was somewhere between a laugh and serious, “I already am.”
“What are you talking about?” I reluctantly pulled back from our close posture. Sean grinned and put his arm around my shoulders, turning us away from Lizzie’s house on the sidewalk.
He tightened his hold around me, the hum of his voice debilitating. “Let’s take a walk.”
I followed his lead, clinging to myself beneath his embrace. Sean kept a sluggish pace, as though not in a hurry to escape the cold. He was unusually silent until we reached the next block, when he started to chuckle. I missed this sound.
“What’s so funny?”
“It’s freezing,” he continued. “I left my coat in Jesse’s car.”
“You have to tell me why I’m out in the cold at two in the morning, Sean,” I prompted once his arm fell from around my back.
We were about to turn the corner onto State Street from Gorham, the curbs of which were lined with stale pubs and cocktail lounges all too eager to cater to the wallets of wealthy college students. Sean’s right arm clung to my body like an anchor, pulling me into his hold again.
“I missed you. I wanted to see my best gal.” He reached for my hand and lightly kissed the frozen skin of my knuckles. I wanted to knock him in the shin for being such a flirt. He was a painfully beautiful, brutal flirt. Sean stuffed his hands into the pocket of his dark jeans and eyed me warily. I studied him with the same expression, apprehensive and uneasy. What were we doing out here? I considered his words, trying to calm my heart.
“What do you mean you’re already sick, Sean? Like a cold or something?” I cut to the chase, as much as I wished he had taken my other hand and kissed that as well. It was torture. Distillery Sean and Moscato Avery could not be a good mix; at least in my mind they were not. His expression fell. The lines around his eyes that echoed his insanely mischievous smile flattened with the impassive line of his mouth. He reached for my right hand and guided me further down the block in silence. He must have been freezing, but we continued in his route. The pubs emptied, their doors spewing the waste of twenty-somethings heading home after another evening of debauchery.
We walked a few more feet before Sean pushed me into the shaded doorway of an apartment building. It startled me, and I almost tripped, not being an expert in walking backwards at two in the morning after romancing wine with my girlfriends. Sean’s head wilted onto my shoulder, burying itself under my hair and into my neck. My bones froze, stilled by the feeling of Sean against me. His breathing slowed, almost as though he were asleep.
“Sean?”
Slowly, his head lifted from my shoulder and his forehead rested against mine. His smile returned but had the company of a sparkling tear in the corner of his right eye. “I thought I saw Jesse,” he whispered, “and I need to talk to you first.”
“First?”
Sean lifted his hands from around my back and pinned me in the prison of his aura as his palms pressed against the wall behind me. My heart pounded three miles per second within his cage, my eyes flicking between his and the lone tear against his cheek. Why is he crying? How much has he had to drink? I’m freezing.
“Do you want my rehearsed poetic version or should I cut to the chase?” His forehead still pressed against mine. I knew he could sense my pulse race, my breathing change, and the way my knees gave way.
“Cut,” I breathed, my voice barely clinging to the raspy sound as it poured from my throat. He smiled at me again, but it was patient and paternal, and it looked so lonely. I studied his eyes, the emerald glow fading in darkness, the lines echoing past smiles softening, and his brows met. I didn’t know if it was concern or contemplation; I couldn’t tell the difference. I couldn’t read his mind. I wished I could because then it would have been easier to hear what he was struggling to say.
Sean inhaled sharply before the words fell from his tongue. “I’m really sick, Ave.”
“What?” I probed as his eyes closed, still pressing his forehead against mine.
“Can-cer.” The syllables, broken and heavy, tumbled out of his inebriated mouth and into my ears, chilling my nerves beyond repair. That explained his tear. Wait. What? I held his face, pushing it away from mine in an attempt to look into his eyes, to see into him as I waited for the joke or the part where he said he was fine.
“Yep,” he whispered when his eyes were back on mine. “Don’t do that. Don’t make your face angry. Stop.” He lifted a finger to my face, trying to flatten the wrinkles of concern plastered on my forehead.
“What the hell, Sean?” I demanded of him, all sense of flirtation leaving my system and now switching to protective mode; protective and peeved, protective and heartbroken. I wiggled free of the space against the doorway and caught my breath on the sidewalk.
“I don’t even…what does this…oh my god.” I couldn’t speak. “Sean Aidan Alexander, what is going on?”
I clutched my thighs as I caught my breath. My body ached as if we’d just finished a marathon sprint, heart and lungs pounding through the wall of my chest. Sean’s hands curled around my shoulders as he pulled me against his chest, wrapping his arms around me like a heavy blanket.
“I’m sorry.” His slow, muffled whisper drifted around my ears like the swirling flow of smoke. “I’m so sorry, Ave.”
“Why are you apologizing to me?”
“I don’t know.” His laugh rumbled against me. “Because it’s a lot to take in. Because you’re my friend. Because I am going to die and not have done so much in my life.” I shivered, falling closer against Sean, seeking reassurance and warmth. I’m going to throw up.
“Because I am going to die,” his long fingers pulled my face away from his chest and into the raw air, “and not have done so many important things. I’m sorry that our first kiss is right now, right here, after I tell you I’m dying, and against this nasty door in the middle of the night.”
“Sean.” I tried to shake my head, despite the fruitless attempts of my heart to give in, but he held my chin so tightly in his hand that I couldn’t move. I don’t want to move.
“Please,” he urged, grazing his lips against mine. They were so warm, surprisingly so in the freezing air. He pressed and my lips obeyed, giving in to the years of flirting, succumbing to the grief. My knees melted, pulling me away from Sean’s mouth.
“Sean,” I tore myself away from him, “we need to talk about all of this.”
He tugged my arms back into his possession, and I didn’t resist. Our foreheads balanced our weight as Sean slowly exhaled, a mumbled lament escaping his throat. Huddled masses of drunks continued to pass us along the sidewalk, invading the moment.
“Talk, talk, talk.” Sean flapped his fingers and thumb together in a mockery. His forehead still pressed against mine, his eyes sealed in denial. I lifted my hands to his face, the stubble scratching beneath my frozen fingers, and peeled my head inches away from his. The faded emerald glow returned my gaze, his pupils gaping holes into the despair lingering in his soul. I couldn’t stop the tears that bubbled to the surface and froze on my cheeks as I studied Sean’s eyes. My sweet Sean.
“You must be freezing.”
“A little.” His smile returned, empty of flirtation and filled with reprieve. I pressed into the snow on my tiptoes to peck Sean’s forehead, reaching for his right hand and weaving our fingers together.
“I’ll walk you home,” I whispered, guiding us from the doorway and into the subsiding bevy of people.
We ambled in silence through the snow for the eight blocks of distance between that doorway and the apartment Sean shared with Jesse. My heart and lungs continued to throb, but they now competed with my skin for a blood supply in the bitter air. The insignificant antique apartment building sandwiched between monstrous castles of wealth looked empty and desolate when we approached the front door. I wondered if Jesse was home or at Ella’s while Sean pulled his keys and wallet from his rear pocket. He fumbled with the key, dropping it three times on the snow-covered step.
“Let me.” I bent to collect the key and opened the exterior door. It felt like my night faded, but Sean’s state of intemperance increased with our walk. We stumbled up the flight of stairs to the apartment door, the keys still in my possession.
“Ave,” Sean slurred, “I hate being this out of control.”
The door moaned as I pushed it open and entered the living room. Sean clung to the doorway, watching me, as the whole of his eyes darkened with intensity. I tossed his keys on the coffee table and continued through the living room and kitchen into Sean’s room. I called for him as I opened his bedroom door. His room was immaculate, without even a mere dust bunny lingering on his computer screen. The double bed was shoved into the corner opposite the door and neatly made with white sheets and a white duvet. His closet door hung open, revealing the compulsively organized rows of clothes.
“Jesse’s not here,” Sean announced as he entered behind me. I turned around, clinging to shoulders as I tried to hold myself together. I stood at the foot of his perfectly manicured bed, expecting Sean to pass out so I could go home and process the last hour.
“I’m going to sleep.” He walked beyond me to the middle of his room, pulling his jeans from his waist and legs. He tossed the denim pile toward his closet door. His long, muscular legs were shaped into form by years of avid running and now dangled before me from below his black boxer-briefs. Don’t pass out, not right here.
“Avery Bean,” Sean hummed as he crawled into bed still wearing the thermal shirt. I stood silently, watching his head fall against the pillows as his hum faded before I moved. I sat on the edge of his mattress, studying his calm face. The wild outline of his bristly jaw seemed softened, weak even, as he drifted away from the outside world and me.
“You call me tomorrow,” I instructed while running my fingers through his bronzed hair, clinging for a second as if my memory tried to install that moment deep in the cellar of my heart.
“You should just stay.” He squinted at me, revealing a small line of emerald beneath his long eyelashes.
I wanted to climb in next to him and just hold him, telling him there would be a solution and all was not lost. Maybe I could tell him how much he meant to me. It was like he wanted me to but couldn’t ask me candidly. He wanted me to make the first move, to be the first one to seal whatever deal he constructed when he began texting me earlier. No. What about Kelly? Damn it, Sean.
“I’ll be fine,” I assured him, reluctantly lifting from the edge of his mattress. Sean grabbed my wrist, startling me, as I took a step away. I turned around, waiting for him to say something, to make the first move, but he simply looked at me. The emerald glow burned into me before his grasp weakened and he fell asleep. I quietly left his room, closing the door behind me. As the latch stuck, I fell to the floor in the hall as though I had waited to be free of Sean before my mind and body connected the thought that he was sick. The floodgates opened, and I was overpowered by tears.
My throat closed as I inhaled uncontrolled gulps of air, almost heaving, with none of it reaching my lungs. I clung to my chest, as if my heart had an answer or could offer salvation, yet there was nothing but my uneven, rapid pulse. My breathing slowed, quieting the shaking of my limbs. I tiptoed into the bathroom, scouring the drawers for something that would relieve the impending headache from which Sean was sure to suffer in the morning. I grabbed a bottle of ibuprofen from the top drawer and returned to Sean’s bedroom door.
I could hear his snores, muffled by pillows. I left the bottle outside of his door and shook out my hands, trying to get my nerves under control. I don’t remember walking through the apartment to the front door, which I locked behind me before leaving the building. I was numb and raw at the same time. I reached into my purse for my phone, hoping to call a cab so I could pass out in my own bed and pretend it was all just a dream. Except for our kiss.
I woke the following morning to three squirrels fighting in the oak tree outside of my window. Their squeaking laughter and the scratch of the branches against the glass forced my eyes to peel open earlier than desired. I rolled away from the window, hoping for more sleep, but it was futile with the flood of early morning light pouring through my corner unit.
What happened last night? Oh, right. Sean. I felt ill. Reluctantly climbing from my bed, I walked into the small kitchen and began making a large French press of the strongest coffee I owned. The oven taunted me with its clock. Seven-fifteen. Thanks, squirrels. I left the water to boil in a pot while I returned to my bed for my phone. My oversized pajama bottoms dragged beneath my feet as they barely lifted with each step. I could hear the bubbles slop over the side of the pot and sizzle as the water met the gas flame beneath. The chair opposite my bed screamed my name, but it waited patiently for me to pour the scalding liquid into my press. My phone sunk into the pocket of my pants as I carried the press and my blue mug across the room to the chair.
The thoughtless squirrels continued to wrestle outside, scratching the branches against my windows. The tantalizing warm aroma of dark Kona swirled into my nostrils, beginning to comfort and wake me. I took my phone out and scanned my text messages, landing on my exchange with Sean. My nerves tingled when I reread his unapologetic demand for me to come out in the middle of the night. I didn’t want to be like the squirrels and wake someone before their time, but I couldn’t wait to message him.
Me: I made it home. Call me later.
I tapped my fingers around my mug, expecting an immediate response and restlessly waiting for one. I told myself Sean was tipsy and flirty, and it had nothing to do with me, but he didn’t tell Jesse about being sick. Did Kelly know? I felt imprisoned, immobilized by this knowledge, as though I carried the weight of a secret that wasn’t mine to keep, but everyone needed to know. After one cup of coffee, there was still no response to my message. I poured a second and started getting ready for the day.
The buzz of my intercom tore me from the warmth of my shower. I tied my fleece robe around me and pulled my dripping hair into a bun as I stepped out of the bathroom to silence the intruder.
“Yes?” I asked, pressing my index finger to the speaker. The crackle made Ella’s voice almost inaudible. My heart sank ever so slightly, hoping it would have been someone else.
“It’s Ella.” She was too cheerful for this early. “Can I come up? I have bagels.” I buzzed her in and unlocked my apartment door. I could hear the floor creak with her steps as I returned to the bathroom to dry my hair.
“Good morning,” she sang as she entered, placing her bagels on the small table near my bed. “Lizzie was still asleep when I woke up, so I figured I may as well get a start on the day. How are you feeling?”
“Fine.” I eyed her suspiciously from the sink in my bathroom. Ella pulled one of the dining chairs from beneath the wobbly wooden table and sat down, waiting for me as her fingers tapped along her bottom lip.
“Do you want blueberry or whole grain?”
“Whole grain. Please.” I stepped into my closet, quickly dressed in leggings and an oversized sweatshirt, then sat across from her at the small table. She began slicing the bagels and spreading blackberry preserves. She knows me so well.
“I got nervous when you weren’t on the couch this morning.” She continued with the preserves, not looking at me. “I went to the living room to toss out one of the cats and you were gone.”
“Oh.” I nodded. “I just came home.”
“That was at two.”
“I walked.”
“With whom?” She knows me too well. I reached for the bagel in her hand, the overloaded preserves oozing out, but she refused to release it to me. I looked up at her, an inquisitive sparkle in her eyes.
“What?”
“That’s a creepy walk alone at two in the morning. It’s full of drunks. Who took you home?”
I sighed, feeling defeated because I couldn’t kick out Ella, and I knew her persistence wouldn’t cease. “I ran into Kelly and Sean by State Street,” I partially lied. “They were heading this way, so I walked with them. It was not fun. I fell asleep, alone, and now you’re here.”
She eyed me expectantly, as if she anticipated a juicier rendition of the wee hours of the morning. “Oh.” She shrugged. “Okay then. Sean’s back?”
“He’s back.”
We ate our bagels, sharing a mutual disdain for Kelly, and Ella began spilling the details of her upcoming trip to New York with Jesse. He tried to keep the destination a surprise, but it was futile. Ella knew they were going, and for just the weekend, but she didn’t know how many outfits to pack, and that was why Jesse had to divulge the details of their destination.
“We’ll have to skip dinner on Sunday,” she concluded, “which is a huge bummer. Unless you and Lizzie want to just eat with Sean and Kelly. Eww.”
“I don’t know what their plans are.” Even though I fabricated the detail of Kelly joining us this morning, I didn’t want to think of their plans.
Ella restyled her ponytail, biting her hairband as she attempted to continue speaking. My phone buzzed from the window behind my bed, and I stepped away to get it, producing monosyllabic sounds to assure Ella I was paying attention to her. I searched my recent text messages, eagerly hoping this morning wasn’t all a dream. Just the nightmare part about Sean being sick. Crap. I know he’s sick, and I’m not supposed to tell Ella. How am I supposed to carry this secret?
Sean: My brain and I thank you for the ibuprofen.
Sean: I want to see you.
Maybe seeing each other and talking would be helpful, or maybe it would be a sobfest that I wasn’t ready to handle because I couldn’t yet wrap my mind around Sean being home…and being sick.