Comedic Timing

Chapter V

V

Four days later, I’m on the subway, resenting Alice for bringing me close to tears. After years of concerted effort to maintain a level of detachment, life presents a bad boss. I am determined never to be one of those people who shed tears in public. There’s a joke in here somewhere about being That Woman crying on the subway just after moving to New York, but I can’t find it right now.

I’ve only been working for Alice for two weeks. Two weeks of feeling shrunken. Squashed like a bug. I didn’t realize something as trivial as making a mistake at work could cause me to feel so pathetic. Worse, my music is on shuffle, so some Top 40 hit is playing as the train hurtles through a tunnel, and I can’t switch to something more suitable for this devastating moment, like Bon Iver or whatever.

I respond to anger and sadness similarly. My emotional response to Alice might be displaced, I know, and I can only blame her for so much. Maybe she’s my karmic punishment for refusing to cry over my breakup with Sofia or to feel too sentimental about leaving Chicago.

As if summoned via my thoughts, my phone buzzes with a notification.

Sofia: hey N, hope everything is ok with you in NY. i miss you, btw. take it or leave it. thanks for sending the sweatshirt back. take care.

I miss her too, I think. Or I miss life not feeling like a rug burn.

When I get home, Jhanaki is eating takeout at the kitchen counter, which is unusual. She routinely has dinner in her room, a habit I think is simultaneously unhygienic and endearing. The apartment is quiet, no sound of Essex accents on the TV.

“Hey,” she says, scrolling on her phone. I say hello back and peel off my boots. She squints at me for a millisecond, and then her face returns to its impassive form.

I glance at my reflection in our entryway mirror. My features seem permanently pressed into an expression of despair. My baby hairs are out of control.

I smile at her. “I should order takeout. I wanted to cook today, but my boss kept me so late.”

She doesn’t respond. I busy myself with my coat, hanging it up in the closet. “Tomorrow I’ll be up around the same time as you, by the way. Maybe before. But I won’t hog the bathroom. My boss just wants me to come in an hour earlier.”

I’m still tender. Saying this last sentence nearly makes me well up again. I have the urge to tell Jhanaki what happened: how Alice confronted me, the way she accused me of not caring enough about my job. I’d break down to anyone who’d listen, I realize. I press my lips together.

Jhanaki clears her throat. “No problem. So I wanted to tell you—I get that you need to charge your phone in our living room for, like, sleep hygiene reasons. But your alarm is really loud and annoying.” She takes a bite of pad thai with her chopsticks. A single noodle hangs from her lips, and she slurps it into her mouth.

When I first met Jhanaki and she and I had a cordial get-to-know-each-other conversation, we discussed our pandemic-induced hobbies. Hers was crocheting. Mine was staying up late watching short-form videos. Obviously, scrolling on social media isn’t a real hobby, and I started to feel moralistic about this. I was embarrassed I didn’t amuse myself doing something with more social capital, like joining a supper club or trying to get abs. I mentioned to Jhanaki that I wanted to combat my social media addiction by turning my notifications off at 9p.m. and forcing myself to read a book. The key to succeeding at this was leaving my phone outside of my bedroom.

“Oh,” I say. “Does it wake you up? I mean, you get up before me—”

“Yeah, I do, but, like, you let it go on and on for a really long time,” she responds, never looking away from her food. “And it’s really annoying. I don’t know if it takes you some time to wake up and turn it off, but could you just keep it in your room?” She picks up a piece of carrot with her chopsticks, dropping it a few times before managing to eat it.

“Well, our walls are pretty thin, so I think you’d hear it anyway,” I respond irritably. I’ve never even seen you crochet! I want to say.

“Yeah, but my room is on the other side of the apartment, so it wouldn’t be as loud. The living room is, like, right there. Sorry, but that alarm is so annoying.”

She’s being petty. I notice my blue ceramic vase is missing the bouquet I bought for myself a week ago. It was five dollars, but the flowers made me happy. Positive feelings are in high demand. My face grows hot. A bubble of anger rises through my body, expanding in my chest.

“Did you throw my flowers out?” I ask her.

“Yeah. They were dead. It looked sad.”

“Don’t touch my shit!” I snap. Her eyes grow wide. I storm into my room. I slam my door shut, and the tension rod holding my curtains up falls to the ground. I groan loudly, rage blurring my eyesight. I’m overcome with immediate regret.

I need to get out of the apartment. Partly because of the embarrassment from losing my temper at Jhanaki and partly because I want to see David. I miss when writing could comfort me. Not being able to rely on it as a way to process my thoughts these last weeks means my emotions are about to eat me. I message David without deliberating.

Naina: do you have plans tonight?

He texts me back almost immediately, inviting me over. On my way out of the apartment, I shoot Jhanaki an apology message.

Naina: sorry bad day at work. i’ll move my phone.

I don’t say “apologies for my poor emotional regulation skills.”

A shirtless Christian greets me at David’s apartment door. Beads of water and foamy drops of soap glisten on his neck and chest, his blond hair wet and brassy. A bruise stretches across his right side.

He laughs at the sight of me. “I thought you were the pizza delivery, so I rushed out of the shower.”

“What happened to your...” I point to his ribcage, yellow and green, ghoulish.

“Fell off my bike,” he says, shrugging. “Luckily, I didn’t hit my head. I wasn’t wearing a helmet. It’s a bit sore, but I’ll be okay. Here, come in.” He lets me into the apartment and jogs back upstairs.

As I take my shoes off, David comes down the stairs to greet me. He hugs me, also smelling freshly showered, soap mingling with deodorant and a distinct hint of cologne. That sandalwood scent again, undisturbed by the presence of garlic or sweat, rising like a heat wave off his skin, dizzying me.

“Shitty day?” David says as we settle on the couch. I pull my knees to my chest and sigh.

“I can’t write. I can’t think. And work sucked.”

“What happened?”

“My boss asked me to cover for someone but then reamed me out for making a mistake doing their job. It was like I pressed the wrong button and dropped a nuclear bomb. Or tripped on a wire and unplugged someone’s respirator. We work in marketing, not the fucking ER.” As I ramble, the anger reheats, bubbling up like lava.

“What was the mistake?” David asks.

“I linked something incorrectly in a newsletter that isn’t even being sent for another few days,” I respond, deadpan.

“How could you?” David shakes his head.

“How is she like this?” I mumble.

“You know”—he takes a breath—“she might have had horrible bosses. And instead of wanting to be different, she thinks she needs to pay it forward. I mean, she’s probably doing that thing a lot of people in higher-up positions do, right? Put other people through the same shit they went through? Everyone’s had a shitty boss—abusive, micromanaging types, whatever—and some people are more interested in having their turn than changing things.” David curls his lip to emphasize his point, still shaking his head.

These are the moments when it’s obvious David is older than me. He functions with a certain kind of patience and acceptance. He never seems bothered that I see things differently or that I’m harder on people, less willing to let things go.

“What should I do?” I ask. I’m surprised by how genuinely I want to know what he’ll say.

He shrugs. “You could try talking to her. But she seems a bit unreasonable...”

“I think she invented gaslighting.”

“ Men invented gaslighting.”

“Well, that makes up for everything else you’ve ever said,” I respond sarcastically.

“Good, that’s why I said it,” he says, teasingly tapping my elbow. His finger lingers. My shoulders loosen, slackening from his touch. My anger drifts like a balloon, eventually disappearing.

“Thank you for listening to me vent.” I take a deep breath. I was vulnerable, and nothing fell apart as a result.

“No need to thank me. I’m sure you’ll hear me rant about some work thing eventually,” he replies.

“I already have. Snooze fest,” I say, pretending to yawn.

David playfully rolls his eyes. “Glad this friendship goes both ways.”

A lump forms in my throat hearing him refer to us as friends. I conceal my disappointment with a laugh.

Did I imagine the chemistry we had that night at the bar? The tension between us the other night at dinner? He’d cooked for me. I guess friends make pasta for each other. I guess they drizzle olive oil over ice cream and walk each other to bus stops.

Do I want male validation so badly that I’m imagining there’s something between us?

“To be honest,” David says, tapping my elbow again, this time with his knuckles, “you’re a really good listener.”

“Really?” I ask. He nods. I squeeze his forearm, and he responds with a smile, as if he was waiting for me to touch him.

Was he?

“Thank you. I try. And speaking of which—you never told me about your short film idea,” I remind him. “Have you been working on it? Are you going to work on it now?”

He nods and pulls his laptop off the coffee table. “I wrote an outline.”

He hands his computer to me, and I read the setup, about a man who brings a date back to his apartment. At first, it seems like the story is about the man. But the moment they’re in his bedroom, obviously about to have sex, different versions of the man—him as a child, then as a teenager, then as a twenty-something—appear before the woman.

“The point is that we get caught up in narratives about what ‘men and women are like’”—he adds dramatic air quotes. “Think Tall Curly Haired Guy and Beautiful Girl Who Works in Marketing.” I punch his arm, and he puts his hand on my thigh, keen to explain himself. I am delighted to be touched by him; it sends shock waves through my system, and I am suddenly still, clinging to every word he says. Beautiful.

He continues: “No, but really. We end up treating people as archetypes rather than as people. So, this woman’s assumptions about the man are challenged by these younger versions of him. And in the same way, she challenges the assumptions other people have created about her.” He lifts his hand off my thigh, and I immediately miss it.

“What happens at the end?” I ask.

“I’m not sure. This is the first time I feel like I have something to say. Historically, I just wrote and shot what I thought would be cool or funny. I hope this will be cool and funny too, obviously.”

“So when are you going to start writing it?”

He shrugs. “I think now. If you were serious about a writing session.”

“I very much was.”

“Okay, but want some tea first?”

It’s late, and even if I leave now, I won’t get more than four hours of sleep. David and I have been talking, nonstop, after a long stretch of typing punctuated by short distractions (“Did you know a pickup artist invented negging? A guy named Neil Strauss”; “Sorry to disturb your flow, but I really think we should get some snacks”). We finished writing an hour ago, and he’s slumped into an armchair, legs outstretched on the ottoman while I sit cross-legged on his couch.

“I need to go home,” I finally say.

He checks his watch, which, I realize through our silent working time, beeps at every hour. “It is 2a.m.,” he agrees.

We sit in silence for a moment. I don’t feel like leaving.

“I feel awful. I was so rude to my roommate tonight,” I confess. “I went home in a horrible mood after work, you know, and she had a simple request. For some reason, it pissed me off. I snapped at her.”

“What was the request?”

“To keep my phone in my bedroom at night. So the alarm doesn’t bother her in the mornings. Apparently, I sleep through it for a long time before I wake up.”

“Heavy sleeper, huh?”

“Yes. My girlfriend—ex-girlfriend—would have to shake me awake. Meanwhile, I’d be dreaming I was on a boat in a storm or something.”

“Do you get nightmares?”

I tell him the truth, something I’ve only ever shared with my last therapist. “I do. They can be really disturbing, and sometimes I wake up and feel like my entire day is ruined. I mostly dream about my mother in the hospital. Sometimes I’m screaming for a doctor because I’m afraid they’ve abandoned her and that she’ll die from their negligence. Or my mother is talking to me but then walks away when there’s something I really need to tell her. I chase after her but can never catch up.” I’m not ready to tell him about my mom dying outright, but this is a start.

He nods, his hands clasped together and pressed against his mouth. He’s looking up at me, wordlessly, from under those knitted, dark eyebrows. David makes it easy, I realize, to be honest. High risk is high reward with him. He is good at making me feel like I matter—and that perhaps the risk isn’t as high as I thought.

“I used to get nightmares a lot,” he finally says. “Then I did this thing called EMDR therapy.”

“For PTSD?”

“Yes.” He stands up suddenly, and I wonder if my question went too far.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to push,” I say.

He’s in the kitchen, pouring us water. He furrows his brows. “What? No, you didn’t at all—I’m just thirsty,” he says. He stretches, back arched and arms raised to the ceiling. I catch a glimpse of his stomach—hairy and solid—and turn away. He brings me my glass, and I drink the whole thing in a few gulps.

“I have to be at work an hour earlier than usual,” I say with a sigh. I feel a bit shy, like I overstayed my welcome, and a bit raw too: I came to David’s not only to write but also, admittedly, to seek comfort. Now I feel foggy, like I’m hungover.

I find my jacket draped on the back of the bulbous couch and slip it on—denim with sherpa lining, gifted by Sofia for one of my birthdays—and tuck my head into my hat.

“I’m glad you came by. Thanks for motivating me to write,” he beams.

“Any time,” I respond, remembering the “friend” comment. Lemon juice on a paper cut.

“How’re you getting home?”

“The bus.”

David winces. “It’s too late for that. Want me to drive you?”

“You have a car?”

“Christian does.”

I realize if I resist, David will only insist. And he has a point: It’s late.

“If I tuck my hair into my beanie, maybe no one will bother me.”

He rolls his eyes. “Let me go knock on his door for his keys.”

“I can just get a car,” I respond with a shrug, waving my phone. “That’s actually a better idea.”

“You don’t want me to drive you? Or do you just feel bad about me driving you?”

“The latter. So technically the former, too.”

David gives me a stern look. “One sec.” He walks upstairs, and I hear him knock on Christian’s door. After a quick, muffled exchange, he jogs back downstairs, holding the keys up to me.

“I can drive you. But I don’t want to push if you’re uncomfortable. I just need you to know you’re not an inconvenience.”

I don’t worry about being an inconvenience to David, for some reason. His generosity lands so sweetly that I am willing to say yes, even if only to spend more time with him.

When we climb into Christian’s Chevy Malibu—“Terrible choice. Seriously, he’s going to have issues with it soon. His parents know nothing about cars”—David adjusts the mirrors. His driving is steady and focused. His hands remain firmly at ten and two, his posture upright and alert. I’ve never seen someone sit so uncomfortably in the driver’s seat. He looks like he hates being there, but he’s doing it all the same.

“This song,” he says, turning up the music. He hums.

“What is it?”

“It’s the algaita . It’s a West African wind instrument. No sad girl music tonight, just vibes,” he says, grinning.

“Where are you from?” I ask him. “Why haven’t we talked about this?”

He shrugs. “Why talk about it? Don’t people come here to escape where they’re from?”

“Don’t be corny. You know I’m from Chicago and that my parents are Indian. What about you?”

“Thanks for not asking me what kind of brown I am this time. I’m from Delaware. I’m Persian.”

“I figured. From your last name.”

“You knew I was from Delaware because of my last name?”

I swat at him. “Dad joke.”

He snickers, eyebrows raised mischievously.

He pulls up to my apartment building. He yawns, then I yawn, our eyes glittering.

“Thank you,” I say, unbuckling my seat belt.

“Hang in there at work tomorrow.” He squeezes my shoulder. I move to hug him, and I lean in so abruptly that he’s caught by surprise. His arms brace around my shoulders, as if to steady me, then quickly soften, as if giving my body guardrails.

“You’re cool,” he says when I pull away. “I like you.”

David is my friend, despite his dizzying smell. David is my friend, even if I’ve had to tear my eyes away from his arms. My friend with kind smiles and soft features and good advice that doesn’t even annoy me. Who doesn’t hide how he feels, who values this, our friendship.

I grin and respond, “I like you too.” My heart races with uncertainty, unsure if my words convey the depth of my affection or just a deep fondness for our newfound camaraderie. David’s watch beeps, and he looks at the time.

“We should get some sleep.”

He doesn’t drive away until I’m inside. After I wash my face and change my clothes, I collapse into bed. The next morning, I wake up and check my phone. He texted me shortly after dropping me off.

David: You left your bag with your laptop here. Not your work laptop, I hope? I can bring it to you tomorrow. Let me know.