Comedic Timing

Chapter IV

IV

The following week, I’m standing in the middle of my room next to a pile of clothes I’ve deemed “unwearable.”

“Wait.” Jordan’s face reappears on my phone screen. “Sorry, I was peeing—so wait, you’re going over to this guy’s apartment ? For dinner ?”

“Yes,” I say. “And now I’m struggling to find something to wear, so please tell me if this outfit looks okay.”

“Eh,” he comments after a quick look. I sigh and pull the sweater over my head.

“This is such a waste of time,” I whine. I tilt my phone away from Jordan to give myself some privacy. “I hate this. My brain space should be reserved for... other things. Not fashion.”

“Who do you think you are? Steve Jobs?”

I peel off the jeans I tried on. “Fuck. What’s that Margaret Atwood quote again? A man watches you... or something?”

“A man inside a woman,” Jordan states.

“No, no. That’s not it.”

“You’re right; that’s so off . Especially for you, who’s never had a man inside of you,” Jordan teases.

“ Hey! ” I shriek, fake angry. We howl with laughter.

Once we recover, I remember the quote. “It’s ‘You are a woman with a man inside watching a woman. You are your own voyeur.’”

“Ah. So you think your nerves are all because of male validation?”

“Definitely,” I reply. “Caring about my outfit has political undertones. I am not fully sure I can trust what I’m feeling.”

“You like him, right?” Jordan asks. I “eh” him back, and he laughs.

“I don’t know him,” I finally say. “I’m still getting to know him. I think I’m into him, but I’m not sure why, and for some reason, I feel... bad about it.”

“Stop intellectualizing your feelings. It won’t help you,” Jordan says.

I always care about what I look like, to some degree. But for me, getting ready is usually more about being presentable—patting the baby hairs down, making sure there isn’t anything in my teeth, washing my face—than it is about dressing to be desired. Is that what this is? I try to think back to getting ready for dates with Sofia, in the early days of our relationship. Then anxiety strikes.

I tell Jordan, “Please just make sure this doesn’t get to Sofia. I don’t want her spinning some sort of narrative about me, off whatever this is.”

“What, that you’re going on dates with men? That narrative?”

“Jordan...”

“I won’t, Naina. But cut Sofia some slack. She’s not heartless. Or biphobic.”

“You’re right.”

“I know.”

“What do you think of this?” I pose, jutting out a hip, to present my outfit—a big button-down and loose, wide-leg pants absurdly accessorized with oversized hoop earrings. I’ve worn myself out, quite literally.

“Um, cute,” Jordan replies half-heartedly. “Do you feel confident? That’s what matters.”

I laugh. “What?” Jordan says with a confused grin.

“I think I have a crush. That’s why I feel so off ,” I admit. “Like, is it possible to ever be fully confident when you’re into someone? Regardless of gender.”

“I think the hope is that over time, you get to know someone, and you don’t put them on a pedestal anymore,” Jordan reasons. “And once they’re off that pedestal, if you still want them, then you know it’s more than a crush. Regardless of gender. ”

I examine myself in the mirror. “I mean, there’s always the black dress.” I snort, and Jordan cackles.

I’m ten minutes early. David insisted I not bring anything, but I feel strange showing up empty-handed. I circle David’s block twice, stopping by a bodega to grab a six-pack of beer. I buzz his apartment and travel back up those creaky steps, trying not to think too much of my last entrance and exit. He’s waiting for me at the top of the stairs, his front door open, a kitchen towel draped on his left shoulder.

“So glad you’re here!” he says, reaching toward me with outstretched arms.

“Thanks for having me.” I hug him back and let myself consider the experience of it and of him.

He smells ridiculous, a mix of sautéed garlic and sandalwood. He’s wearing a T-shirt, gray, and it seems a bit too small on him. I glance down at his feet: house shoes.

“Your apartment looks different without a hundred people inside of it,” I announce. Tonight, the lights are low. Music—something I haven’t heard before—plays softly from a speaker. I notice, for the first time, a small, round kitchen table. It must have been buried underneath half-empty bottles and cans. Polaroid photos cover his fridge. The last time I was here, someone’s back had been pressed up against it.

I hand David the beer—“Of course you did, even though I told you not to”—and he stows it away before returning to the stove. He gestures for me to sit.

As he settles back into his cooking, adjusting knobs on the stove where a pot of pasta waits to boil and sauce gleams in a sizable pan, his watch chirps, and he glances at it. His movement around his kitchen is competent, assured.

“I hope you’re hungry,” he says, scanning the counter for the kitchen towel before remembering it on his shoulder.

“I’m starving.”

“How’s the internet-sleuthing piece coming along?” he asks.

“It’s marinating in my brain.” He stirs the sauce and sets the spoon down. He leans against the counter, arms crossed, his full focus now on me. I suddenly feel very self-conscious. I liked observing him without him reciprocating.

“What?” I ask him.

“What’s wrong? Why’re you not writing it?”

“This is going to sound very cliché, but I don’t know where to start.”

He tongues the inside of his cheek. “Okay, well. For the sake of brainstorming: What about the story is interesting to you?”

“Before, it was, like, the phenomenon of love bombing and ghosting,” I start, trying not to censor my thoughts as they move from my brain to my mouth. “Then it slowly became about how gossip keeps us safe and the internet as a vehicle for gossip. Then it became about what I explained the other night—what happens when someone’s business goes viral, when comment sections act as juries. Deciding who’s guilty and who’s not guilty. And consequently—and I’m not saying this is the same thing—deciding who’s a good person and who’s a bad person.

“The court of public opinion, basically, but via short-form videos,” David interjects, returning to the stove. I watch his forearms as he stirs, seasons, tastes.

“Exactly. So, since we last talked, I’m thinking more about the implications of... I don’t know, having your mistakes and flaws on blast on the internet. The lifelong impact of internet mobs on one’s reputation and self-esteem. What it means to have your past define you.”

“Forever defined by your flaws and your past fuckups.” He nods.

“Totally. But at the same time, it’s kind of evil,” I add. “What he did. I don’t know if the punishment fits the crime, but...”

David knits his eyebrows together and squints. “That’s a pretty strong word. Why is it evil and not, I don’t know, a symptom of low self-esteem? Of being unhealed? We all hurt people when we’re not doing okay. Does that make us evil?”

“Sure.” I had thought about this and had fought my impulse to be quick to judge. “Maybe he’s just not doing okay. And you’re right—that doesn’t make him evil. But he actively took his frustrations out on women. Or, I don’t know, used women to fill the void. That’s not exactly good , is it?”

“No,” David agrees. He salts the sauce. “It’s just human.”

“So you don’t think humans are inherently good?” I ask.

“It’s the gray area of it all.” He turns to grin at me, like there’s something tender about us not being in agreement. “But your piece isn’t about my personal philosophy on humanity.”

“I think what he did was wrong,” David continues. “But random people are self-righteously deciding what kind of person he is based on this. It could impact his future, his morale. It could perpetuate a cycle of abuse. I think that’s something to consider. At least for the sake of your piece.”

“I don’t want this to be entirely a story about how he’s the victim in all of this,” I explain. “But you’re right—things avalanche, because of the internet. It’s mob mentality unleashed on some dude .”

David wipes his hands on the kitchen towel before tossing it to the side. He presses his palms to the counter, fingers splayed, and I catalog the shape of his knuckles and a faint scar along his left wrist.

After a moment of quiet, I look up at him and catch his gaze on my neck. He snaps back to the conversation. “Right. He’s just some dude. And likely a lonely man,” he finally says. “Who can’t be emotionally vulnerable. That seems sad.”

“Objection, your honor,” I retort, shifting my tone toward something more playful and less revealing. “Speculation. Lack of evidence. Show us proof of this emotionally invulnerable man. Show the court the proof.”

David shakes his head, laughing.

“Have you ever been ghosted?” he asks, but then scrunches his nose. “Oh, never mind. Long-term relationship—that’s right.”

“What about you?” I ask.

The pasta reaches a rolling boil, its starchy aroma filling the kitchen. “The best smell,” he remarks.

“I love it. This is very comforting.”

He rinses a bunch of parsley under the faucet before delicately plucking off the leaves one by one. He arranges them meticulously on a paper towel, drying them and preserving their shape. It seems overly precious to treat each leaf individually. I’m not sure what exactly he’s making.

“I’ve never been ghosted, but there have definitely been times when I’ve lost touch with people, you know?” he muses.

I squint. “It sounds like you ghost people.”

He chuckles. “I wasn’t the best in my mid-twenties. I had a difficult time forming emotional connections with people. Except maybe Christian, I guess. I look around, at my life, and I feel like I have very few people who really know me. For a long time, that was on purpose. But recently, I’m starting to realize it’s become almost habitual... even if I want to be vulnerable, it doesn’t mean I will be. The desire exists, but the actual practice of it is completely different.”

“I think it’s great,” I say. “That you’re paying attention to your life. You know it could be different.”

He nods. “I want to see people,” he says. “And I want them to see me . I think that is life.”

I don’t know what I thought this evening would be—less existential, definitely—but I’m brought back to the here and now when the third roommate, Rana, enters the kitchen sporting headphones, throwing a peace sign up at David and offering a brief wave to me. Just like at the party, not a single word from the woman. Instead, she noisily bites into an apple.

“She seems shyer when she’s not on Molly,” I joke.

“I think she’s fighting with her boyfriend,” he murmurs. David takes a contemplative bite of spaghetti, chewing it thoughtfully and visibly considering it, his brows furrowing, before draining the pasta through a colander. He reserves a bit of the water, streaming it into the sauce. The pan hisses.

“I don’t miss the fighting. With my ex,” I say before immediately regretting bringing up Sofia. Both because I don’t actually want to talk about her and because I don’t want thoughts of her in the room.

“Couples need to get good at fighting,” he says, his back to me. “That’s my hot take. Conflict is unavoidable, but if you learn how to do it, you can solve problems more quickly.”

“I’ve never thought of it like that.”

“I heard it on a podcast. Trust me, I never would’ve come up with something like that on my own.”

David’s concentrating now: tossing the noodles in the sauce, then twirling them into perfectly whorled heaps on our plates. He dusts parmesan over them and carefully dots the parsley leaves on top, like shells on a sandcastle. When he places mine in front of me—pasta in a glistening, golden-yellow sauce, embellished in bursts of green—I can’t help but marvel.

“It’s beautiful.”

“The sauce has saffron in it,” he explains. “That’s why the color.”

I intend to wait for him, but I don’t. I fork and twirl the pasta into my mouth. I go for a second taste immediately, reminding myself to chew and swallow.

“So good,” I moan, rolling my eyes back into my head. Earthy, sweet, bright. David smiles warmly with a humble shrug, but I can tell he is proud of himself.

“It’s okay,” I say. “You can be proud.”

“All right,” he replies, throwing his hands up. “I am definitely very proud of this one.”

He brushes his elbow against mine as he sits beside me, pulling his plate close.

As he takes his first bite, I work up the courage to ask him about his ex. “Tell me about the last person you dated,” I blurt.

David chuckles and shakes his head, chewing. “No. You first.”

I laugh nervously. “Fine. Well, her name is Sofia.”

“Sofia.”

“We met at the beginning of my second year in college. I had a very intense crush on her. Everyone around us knew, including her. It was so obvious. I thought she was really beautiful and powerful. She just was—is—a very confident person. She is five years older than me. She was in grad school when we met. She asked me out, and three years later, we moved in together as soon as I graduated. By then I had this, like, feeling, I guess.” I take another bite of pasta, allowing myself a moment before talking about the split.

I swallow. “I had this feeling, that we weren’t right for each other. Another year after that, I wanted to break up with her, but I couldn’t find the courage. Our relationship was the only thing I knew. It created a sense of certainty for me that I was afraid to lose. Until that became suffocating, too—more suffocating than feeling like I had no control over my life. Anyway, I needed an excuse to leave, so I applied for jobs out here without telling her. I got one, so we broke up. And now I’m here, and we’re eating pasta.” I suck a noodle into my mouth for emphasis.

“So, this is a new chapter for you,” he says, returning to his plate of pasta. I realize he’d stopped eating while I was talking.

“That’s what I call it, yes,” I reply. “A new chapter for many things.”

“You’re brave,” he says. “I moved here with my friends. Not by myself.”

I’m moved that David could see me that way—as brave. On my worst days, the decision to leave Chicago feels more like proof of weakness than courage. More giving up than taking a risk.

“Maybe I’m just an idiot. Not brave,” I respond. He squeezes his eyes and shakes his head, no way .

After we finish our dinner, I load the dishwasher while David scoops pistachio ice cream into bowls for us. “Don’t get freaked out,” he says, drizzling olive oil over it. “I promise it tastes good.” He sprinkles flaky salt on top and hands me a spoon. “Haven’t we had enough olive oil tonight?” I needle because it feels more natural than what I’m thinking: I can’t believe you planned dessert. He touches his heart, scandalized by my comment.

We transition to the couch. I put my feet on the coffee table and balance the bowl of ice cream on my thighs. He sits with his legs crossed, his shoulder leaning toward me, his knee inches away from me. I have a quiet hope that the distance between us could continue to shrink.

Keys rattle outside of the door, and Christian trudges into the living room, a gym bag slung over his shoulder. His T-shirt clings damply to his chest. “Naina!” he says. “I’ll spare you a hug. I just worked out. Hey, the other night was fun. How’s Chloe?”

“She’s good. Really busy with work,” I tell him, a little evasive. The morning after the solo show, Chloe texted me, clearly hungover and in a predicament: She liked Christian but wasn’t keen on dating a comedian.

He purses his lips. “Cool,” he says, clearly disappointed. “Well, I’ll leave you guys to it. Good night.” He plods upstairs to his bedroom.

I see David and me through Christian’s eyes, and I don’t know what to make of the visual. “I should get going,” I say, licking my spoon. I stand up to collect my things. “Thank you again for dinner. It was delicious.”

“It was a pleasure,” David replies, taking our bowls to the kitchen sink. I put my jacket on and untuck my hair from the collar.

While I tug up my zipper, he stands in front of me, rubbing his hands together, his forearms flexing. The silver ring on his right index finger catches the lamplight. He absentmindedly adjusts it, noticing my gaze. “So when should we get together again? For a writing session?”

“I’ll text you, and we’ll figure it out.”

“Okay,” he says. “It’s really important we write together. It’s for my own good.”

“For your own good?”

“I think you’re going to be a positive influence on me,” he states.

“Well, what about me? What if you’re a bad influence on me?”

He laughs and rubs a hand across his chest. “I don’t think you’re the kind of person to let that happen.” I don’t know how he can tell what kind of person I am or how influenceable I might be, and I wonder if he’s wrong.

He offers to walk me to the bus stop, and I nod, not quite ready to be alone with myself to process my time with him. We move in silence, the cold air biting our faces. My eyes water.

“Oh my God, the wind.” I wipe my eyes and avoid the temptation to make a banal comment about Chicago weather.

“How often do you cry?” he asks as we arrive at the stop. “From sadness. Not the wind.”

I blow a raspberry. “I don’t really cry anymore. There’s no point.”

He scoffs. “Naina.” I am gleeful, hearing him say my name. “You think you’re too good for crying?”

I recall myself at thirteen, the permanence of my mother’s absence enveloping me like a dark cloud. “The saddest thing that could happen to me already did. No need to cry until the next saddest thing happens.”

“Don’t tempt fate,” he teases. I can see him deciding whether or not to press me for more and landing on no.

“When was the last time you cried?”

He curls his bottom lip as he thinks, stuffing his hands in his jacket pockets. “Years and years ago,” he finally says. “I have nothing against crying. It’s just hard to find a good enough reason to cry again.”

“Well, that’s not too far from what I just said.”

The bus rolls to a stop in front of us. “That’s you,” he says. We hug. Our bodies are fully, unabashedly pressed against each other. The right side of my face rests against the lower part of his chest. You are so warm , I want to say. A button on his jacket pushes against my cheekbone.

I pull away reluctantly, and he tells me to text him when I make it home safely.