Chapter 9
I reached for my pocket, but my key wasn’t there. Uh oh. I took off my jacket and searched all the pockets. This couldn’t be. No no no no no . I knocked on our door several times, but my call for help stayed unanswered. Jasmine also didn’t pick up the phone. In a desperate last attempt, I tried to open the door, even if you couldn’t unlock the door from the outside without a key. Why oh why did I have to forget my keys the night Jasmine had to go to bed earlier? I let myself glide to the floor. This was going to be such a long night. The cold of the floor seeped through my leggings, and I curled into a ball. I still knocked every now and then, hoping she would take out her earplugs and hear me. She never did. At one point, I must have fallen asleep. Something warm brushed my cheek, and a shiver ran down my spine. It was soft and felt nice. The feeling continued, stirring me from my sleep. I opened my eyes to find Danté looming over me.
“What are you doing?”
I looked up at him, not getting why he was there when I woke up. The light around him gave him a halo, and I beamed at the view. Then as I looked past him, it felt like the hallway looked back at me. Danté was frowning, his warm hand touching my cold forehead.
“Were you so drunk you couldn’t even get inside?”
“Of course not,” I mumbled, rubbing the sleep off my face.
“Then did something happen?”
A yawn escaped me, and as I stood, my whole body was aching. And cold. Danté’s brows knitted together in concern.
“No, I just forgot my keys inside. And my roommate always sleeps with earplugs.”
“Have you been there the whole night?”
Was it morning already? I glanced at my phone. Fuck . I had been here the whole night.
“Yep.”
Danté sighed loudly. It kind of felt like he wanted to scold me, but he didn’t.
“Why didn’t you come to me? I could at least let you crash on the couch rather than the floor.”
Well, that was a thought that hadn’t even crossed my mind. I avoided knocking on his door after 10 PM.
“I didn’t want to disturb you and your lady.”
I could still see the blonde, model-like girl tracing her fingers over his bare torso until the fingers were low enough to play with the waistband of his pants. And even though looking at Danté without a shirt on was a gorgeous sight, I preferred it much better if no one was touching him in front of me. He leaned back against the wall on his side of the building. He raised an amused eyebrow.
“There was no lady last night.”
“Look, I’ve already bothered you once when there was someone. I don’t want to do that again.”
Otherwise, I might need bleach for my eyes and my memories. It was one thing to know what was going on behind that door and another to see glimpses of it. Danté locked his gaze on mine. He couldn’t read my mind, right?
“It wouldn’t have bothered me,” he simply said.
That couldn’t be true. How many times would I have to give him blue balls before he actually admitted that I bothered him?
“You sure? Because last time, she stormed off because of me.”
“I didn’t mind. Now please come inside.”
He opened his door, and the warmth of his home seemed so inviting. And yet, I couldn’t bring myself to accept.
“Why? My roommate will wake up soon enough. I don’t need your couch anymore.”
“No, but you need a hot drink. Tea or coffee?”
How could I say no when he truly looked concerned about my well-being? I ended up nodding.
“A hot chocolate would be nice.”
“Perfect. Now get inside.”
His apartment was the mirror image of ours. The only difference was the layout. Where our home had lots of warm colours and mismatched pillows on the couch, everything here was toned down. With two guys living here, I guess that’s as good as it could get. Many papers on the salon table caught my attention. Some looked like travel brochures, so he hadn’t given up on his dream to travel. Was he going on holiday?
Before I could ask anything, Danté shot from the kitchen, “Are you team regular milk or oat milk?”
“I am a sucker for dairy,” I admitted while plopping down on one of his bar stools.
I couldn’t complain. Danté went all out. He took a saucepan out of his cabinet and put it on the stove, about to make hot chocolate milk from scratch. With dark chocolate. He ended up sprinkling some cinnamon on the hot beverage before handing it to me. He looked at me expectantly as I took a sip. It was so good. I wrapped my hands around the mug, enjoying the heat that crept back into my body.
“It’s perfect. Thank you.”
While I sipped my hot cocoa, he put together a protein shake and grabbed a banana from the fruit basket. I stayed silent as I watched him. He was wearing his gym attire. Then I glanced back at the disgusting-looking shake.
“Please tell me you’ve already eaten something else this morning.”
“No, why?”
“You mean to tell me that this sorry excuse of a meal is supposed to be your breakfast?”
Danté sat in front of me, still not touching his shake. As if he was scared of what I would do. I knew it wasn’t my place to make comments on what he did with his life, and what he did to his body. And yet my instincts were screaming.
“Bitch, are you dumb?” I cried out, getting up from my chair. “What the fuck?”
“Did you just call me a dumb bitch?”
“Yes! And I’ll do worse! If you don’t start eating healthy stuff, I’ll throw a butternut at your head!”
“That sounds oddly specific, and premeditated. Was that something you already had in mind?”
“Not really. I thought about throwing melons at people once, but never butternuts. Until now, it seems.”
Danté looked at his “breakfast”.
“I can’t believe she called me a dumb bitch…”
“Well, you’re blond, tall and skinny. So the profile kind of fits anyway, unfortunately.”
“And she keeps insulting me. Dude, I let you in and gave you a hot drink. Can’t you be a bit more thankful?”
There was no bite in his words. If anything, Danté seemed to find the whole situation rather amusing. My lips twitched towards a smile.
“I don’t do uselessly polite, and you know that. Do you have to be somewhere in the next hour?”
“No,” he dragged with a sceptical voice. “Do you?”
“I had planned to go to the gym, but it can wait.”
“Will you survive if you stray from your plan?”
I glared at him from over my hot chocolate. He had a point. I didn’t like to stray from my plan, not that I would give him the satisfaction of admitting that. I quickly glanced at my phone. Jasmine was last seen a few minutes ago. Perfect.
“I’ll live. Now throw that shake away and follow me.”
I grabbed his mug and went to the door of my apartment. Danté followed silently.
“Jasmine, open the door!” I yelled, fist pounding on our front door.
There was some shuffling inside, then the door was thrown open. Jasmine glared at me, her toothbrush still in her mouth.
“What are you doing outside?”
Her eyes landed on our neighbour.
“I forgot my keys inside,” I explained.
She shrugged before going back to the bathroom. Danté sat down at our kitchen table as I got everything out of the fridge.
“Do you need help with something?” he tried.
“I am good. Don’t worry.”
It was easier for me to do everything in the order I had in mind, rather than having to wait for someone to do things in their own way. And he was my guest. Sort of.
“Just for your information, carbohydrates are actually a primordial part of our diet. Why would you cut them off?”
“I dated a nutritionist a while back. She told me it was better to cut those off and pack up the protein.”
That explained a lot. Wait, when did he date someone?
“Let me guess. She also told you it was healthy to drink water with lemon juice?”
“How’d you know?”
My eyes rolled so far up it almost gave me a headache. I bit back a salty comeback and went for the educational explanation instead.
“Lemon water doesn’t do anything for you except destroy your tooth enamel.”
Danté leaned back in the chair, arms crossed. There was a small, knowing smirk on his face.
“Alright Squirrel, tell me what I need to know. I know you’re dying to tell me.”
I let out a breathy laugh, shaking my head. And here I was trying to not be a know-it-all, as Chloe often called me. I quickly blanched the bean sprouts and spinach before turning back to him.
“Our bodies need carbohydrates to function properly. If you stop eating them, your body will find its needed energy in the lipids it has stocked, which isn’t bad, as long as you have some extra weight. If you don’t, your body will suck the energy out of its own proteins, which are your muscles. Do you see where I am going?”
“Which is the reason why I don’t bulk up, I imagine?”
“Exactly. Tell me you haven’t been doing this for a long time.”
“Not religiously, no.”
“You know, if you really want to do it the right way, you should eat things such as wholegrain bread or pasta. They have lots of fibres, which help to evacuate the lipids you take in more easily. Just make sure to drink enough water if you eat wholegrain foods because otherwise, you’ll end up being constipated.”
A loud laugh escaped him as Jasmine walked inside the kitchen, a towel wrapped around her hair. Her olive skin glowed from the moisturizer.
“Why are you talking about him being constipated?”
I’ll admit that was probably not the sexiest conversation topic to have if you’re trying to impress someone. On the other hand, there was nothing I could do to impress this man. All my chances had flown out of the window when we met. And if there was still one teeny tiny chance left, I had thrown it out of the window myself by calling him a dumb bitch. Which made me question who the real dumb bitch was in this room.
“This genius thought it was wise to stop eating carbohydrates.”
“Bitch, are you stupid?” she yelled.
Danté shot me a questioning look as if to ask “Not her too?” I shrugged. Of course I had drilled my best friend. Jasmine had quickly followed my instructions without complaining and was now an advocate of my cause. Especially since she lost quite some fat tissues and gained some muscle instead. I finished the three bowls of bibimbap and put them on the table. Jasmine added a whole lot of gochujang to her food. Thanks to her Moroccan roots, she could handle way more spice than I could. Danté dug in his bowl and made an appreciative hum.
“Well, thanks for the life lesson, and the nice food.”
I nodded. We ate in a comfortable silence until we were all done. It was nice to have Danté over at our place. Then I remembered something.
“Are you going somewhere?” I asked.
Danté looked back up. He always watched people as if he was genuinely interested in what they had to say. Right now, his attention was solely fixed on me.
“What do you mean?”
“There were brochures on your salon table.”
“Oh right. I forgot to tell you. I’ll be going overseas to volunteer as a physical therapist. It’s something I’ve been wanting to do for years, and now seems like the perfect time to go.”
As if I couldn’t like him more than I already did. Of course that was something he’d be into. Jasmine hummed.
“That’s so cool! How long will you be gone?” I asked.
“I don’t know yet. Most volunteering programs are six months or a year. But since I want to travel a lot, I might go from one program to another. We’ll see where I end up, I guess.”
A year? The joy I felt was short-lived. It was selfish to even think such a thing, I know. But Danté being gone for a whole year was a long time. Jasmine must have sensed the shift in my behaviour because she asked the question for me.
“Oh, it will be weird without you here. Will someone be staying in your room while you’re overseas?”
Danté shook his head. The light-hearted openness in his eyes had subdued. “No, I’ll move out before going. I’m not from Brussels, so there’s no reason for me to come back after my trip.”
My heart rate spiked up painfully to the point it felt like I would faint. Danté is leaving. Danté is leaving. Danté is leaving. The words were spinning in my head, making me dizzy. As if he could feel my thoughts getting out of control, Danté looked back at me. He watched me as if he was waiting for me to say something. I just didn’t know what I could possibly say. This couldn’t be. In a few months, he would be gone, and there was nothing I could do about it. I swallowed down the sudden panic and showed him a wavering smile.
“That’s awesome.”
His jaw tightened, but he nodded. Danté kept looking at me, but his gaze was too strong. I dropped mine and looked at my hands. What else was I supposed to say? It didn’t matter anymore. He got up from his seat.
“Thank you for the delicious food, but I need to go to work.”
And then he was gone. Jasmine hit me in the shoulder. I glared at her.
“What was that for?”
“He is leaving, you dumbass!”
She hit me again, and I couldn’t muster the energy to fight back.
“Yes, I registered that.”
“Now was the perfect moment to ask him out!”
Was it though? It felt like my time had run out already. I got up on unsteady legs.
“Evy, are you alright?”
No. I wasn’t. How could I be? Part of me wanted to run after him and ask him out, or ask to stay in touch. Anything, as long as I could keep Danté in my life in some kind of way. I also knew that it wouldn’t be fair. He was about to live his dream, and I wasn’t a part of it. There was no point in pretending like I was.
“I will be.”