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Chapter 6

Noah

            What the hell was I thinking?  Actually, I couldn’t have been thinking at all because this is not going to end well.  There was no way I could let Leah stay in a hotel outside of town and try to get back and forth to classes.  I’m going to call the manager tomorrow and make sure they get a bed set up in here for her fast.  It’s the least they can do.  In the mean time, I am going to try hard to keep my distance.

            I lead Leah down the hall and towards my bedroom.  I stop along the way to grab a towel from the small linen closet in the hallway.  “Here, you’re welcome to take a shower and make yourself at home.  I’m sure they will get your place back to livable as soon as possible but in the mean time, you may as well get comfy.”

            Leah takes the towel from my hand and folds her arms around it, hugging it to her chest.  I finish our trip down the hall and drop her bag just inside the door.  “Thanks, Noah.  I don’t know what I would have done if I had to stay somewhere else.”  Her eyes meet mine and my heart melts a little at the vulnerability I see in them. 

            “No need to thank me.  I owe you big time for helping me with the study.  This is very small compared to how much your volunteering is going to help the project.  Without you, I would be dead in the water.”  She smiles shyly at me and nods her head once.

            “I’ll just take a quick shower then and we can get started.”  I nod my head and step out of the bedroom.  I turn back quickly when I remember that she might not have had dinner yet.

            “I could order Chinese.  Are you hungry?”  Her smile grows and she loosens her grip on the towel, letting it fall away from her body.  I sigh with the relief that she is opening up to me.  Other people might not pay attention to little things like this, but I have been studying subtle body movements for a long time now.  Knowing that she is relaxing around me puts my soul at ease.

            “I love Chinese.  I’ll take anything that is not spicy.”  The face she makes when she says that causes my heart to race.  She is so cute I feel like my cheeks will hurt forever from the workout they’re getting.

            “You’re missing out.  I’ll order a few of the specials.  We can try a little bit of everything.” 

            “Sounds great.” 

            I make my way to the kitchen and pull open the drawer at the edge of the counter.  It’s stuffed full of take-out menus and I dig around until I find the tattered menu to my favorite place down the street.  I order a few of my favorite dishes and try hard to stay away from anything spicy, opting for only one hot dish.  The man on the end of the line tells me it will be here in about twenty minutes so I decide to grab a beer and find something to watch on TV.

            I haven’t had a roommate in ages so waiting on someone feels a little rusty to me.  I hear the water running and I try hard to focus my attention back on the show I’ve found.  It’s a futile attempt.  I keep finding myself looking back over my shoulder to make sure I won’t miss her entrance into the room.  I shake my head and laugh a little before taking another swig of my beer.  I am not sure when I’ve felt this anxious about sharing take-out with someone. 

            There is a knock at the door and I jump to answer it.  Jason always delivers to my place.  I thank him and make sure to give him a little extra as a tip.  He has been their delivery guy for as long as I have been ordering from them and he always throws in a few extra fortune cookies.  “Hey Noah.”

            “What’s up, Jason?”  I bump knuckles with him as he hands over the bags of food.  The scent begins to fill the entry way and I suddenly feel like I haven’t eaten in days.

            “Nothing much, man.  Got a date tonight?”  He lifts an eyebrow and looks down at the extra bag, which is not usually part of my order.

            “I have a friend staying with me for a little while.” 

            “Cool.  Enjoy your dinner.  I’ll see you around.”  Sometimes I see him on campus and once we even sat and chatted a while over coffee.  He works for his parents and is also trying to be a full-time student.  I am very impressed that he manages to do both so well.  He also has been dating a woman for about two years.  His family and her family arranged their first date and they really hit it off.  I remember being envious of how happy he was talking about her.

            “Thanks.  See you around.”  He lifts the small wad of bills up in my direction and nods his head in thanks.  I close the door with my foot and step into the kitchen so I can put the bags down.  I don’t know if Leah can eat with chopsticks or if I should grab some utensils. 

            “It’s here already?” She says from behind me.  She is wearing a small pair of pajama shorts and a tank top.  Her hair is twisted up on top of her head and I notice how beautiful she looks with no make-up.  Her skin is a light pink from the heat of the water and I can catch the small scent of apples and cinnamon. 

            “They’re really fast.  Are chopsticks ok?”  I break a pair apart and begin to rub them together.

            “Of course,” she says, reaching into the bag and grabbing a pair for herself.  She grabs a small container and opens it, shoving the sticks in and walking over to the small table in the corner of my kitchen.  I take the container that has the small pepper on the top and make my way over to the seat beside her. 

            “If you’re too tired tonight to get started, we can wait until later this week.”  I’m not sure why, but I feel a large amount of concern about pushing her too far after she has just found about her stuff being ruined.  “It’s not a big deal at all.”

            She looks at me skeptically and then gives me a sly look.  “That’s such bologna.  You are just itching to get this finished.  I can see it on your face.”  She smiles at me and captures a few noodles between her sticks.  In a mocking tone she continues, “This relationship is never going to work out if you can’t be honest with me.”  I smile at the way she sounds just like many of the women I have taped during my study.

            Without thinking it through too long I say, “You are just so emotional.  I can’t seem to make you happy.  You say you’re ‘fine,’ but really you’re angry.”  She tries hard to fight back a smile before pretending to be angry.

            “You don’t understand me.  You will never understand me because you don’t listen.  Don’t you care enough to listen to me?”

            I scoop up a clump of rice and very hot chicken, giving myself a minute to retaliate.  She’s good at mock fighting and it makes me wonder if she is playing from her own experience.  “I would listen more if you would ever stop demanding I tell you how I feel or what I’m thinking.  Sometimes I wish you would just say what you feel so we could move on.”  This earns a small snort from her and I can’t help but to laugh as she covers her mouth in horror.  “Yep, I heard it.  You totally just snorted.”

            Playfully she pinches me with her chopsticks before spitting her tongue out at me.  “It was totally your fault!  You sound like such a typical male.”  She returns her sticks to her carton but I can see that she is still thinking about our little game.  “Are we all that predictable?”  Her voice trails off as if she is asking a rhetorical question but at the last second her eyes lift to mine. 

            I wipe at my mouth with a napkin and then crumple it up in my fist.  I want to hold back and not taint her hopeful mind with the ugly things I have learned about couples.  Even if I wanted to, and there is a huge part of me that does, I can’t protect her from the truth forever.  “Yes.  We are that predictable.  Not just as men and women, but as couples.  We break down all the time over small matters of communication. We are so focused on our own happiness we forget that there is another person in the relationship.” 

            Leah stabs at the food but doesn’t lift it to her mouth.  I continue when I see that she still has more questions, “If it ends there consider yourself lucky.  If you try to make it work, it moves into this territory where you desperately want to make your partner happy.  It’s as if some switch is flipped and you go from being self-absorbed to recognizing with such clarity that your partner isn’t happy.  That recognition causes a fear at such a deep level you over compensate.  Your whole life becomes about making them happy above your own happiness.”

            She looks at me and with sadness in her eyes.  Pushing the food away, she sighs. “I’ve been there.  I’d still be there if he’d let me.”

            I grab a small piece of spicy chicken with my chopsticks.  “I’ve been there myself.  You might not be able to see it now, but he’s doing you a favor cutting you free.  By letting you go—forcing a break-up, he’s stopping you from living your life for him when he doesn’t feel the same way.  He may not be in love with you, but letting you go after seeing you flip that switch tells me he still loves you.”  I watch her take that in before reaching for her food again.

            “It stings.”  Her honesty is like a punch to the gut.  I know how bad that hurts and hearing that slight crack in her voice breaks my heart and sends me back to a time I felt that same way.

            “It will.”  I take a bite and try not to look at her face.  I’m afraid I am going to break if I see her hurting.

            “How long?  How do you get over it?” 

            “A long time and I don’t know if you ever truly get over it.  You learn from it.  You learn to live with the sting until it stops hurting, but the wound is always there.  Get up everyday and live your life.  Try new things and rebuild a life without that person until all the little moments in your life that were filled with that person, become filled with something else.”  It’s the most honest answer I’ve ever given anyone. 

            We sit for a minute, both of us playing with our food but not really eating it.  As I gather up another bite, Leah reaches across the table and steals the bite I was preparing.  “Maybe some spice will fill the space.”  She brings the food to her mouth and I watch her lips slide along the sticks.  Her eyes close for a minute as she seems to study the flavor.  A smile stretches across her face and her eyes pop open again.  “That’s really good,” she says and reaches for another bite.

            I tip the carton in her direction and latch my foot around the leg of her chair, pulling her along side me.  I put my arm around her and pull her into my chest.  With a small kiss to the top of her head I say, “I won’t promise you that you will forget him, but I can promise you that eventually thinking about him won’t hurt.  There isn’t a lot of fanfare.  One day you’ll think of him and find yourself surprised that the memory no longer comes with the sting.”  I can’t help but to press another kiss to her head as she rests her hand lightly along my thigh. 

            I’m not sure what’s happening between us, but being around her feels like being home.  

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