Chapter 4
Z ainab threw a cushion at Alba’s face, interrupting her reverie. “Hello,” she said, emphasizing and drawing out the word in a way that suggested she’d been trying to get Alba’s attention for several minutes.
“Hello,” Alba replied, grinning. The grin turned into more of a smirk when Zainab shot her an irritated stare. “Sorry. What’s up?”
Zainab rolled her eyes, collapsing back onto their shared couch. “She asks me to get lunch with her, then just sits, staring into the middle distance instead of discussing where. And then has the audacity to act like I’m the one with the problem.”
“Who are you talking to?” Alba laughed.
“You.”
Alba shifted to look directly at Zainab. “Ah, of course, talking to me, about me, as if you’re not talking about me. Classic.”
“Keep this up and I’m never getting food with you again as long as you live.”
“Untrue. We live together, so you know you’re getting food with me all the time.”
Zainab stood again, picking up her bag. “Begrudgingly.”
Alba laughed again, shooting her a cheeky smile. They’d been friends for too long for one day of distraction to come between them. This was just how they worked.
“Are you ready now, then?” Zainab watched Alba with narrowed eyes.
“Just waiting for you,” she said, jumping up from the couch.
Zainab huffed but followed after Alba as she headed for the door, grabbing her things along the way.
Alba should have known she was simply biding her time.
As they settled into the car and Alba started driving, it didn’t register to her that they still hadn’t discussed where they were going to eat. In Alba’s mind, it felt clear, so clear she couldn’t imagine she hadn’t mentioned it to Zainab, but still, Zainab didn’t ask.
She did, however, watch Alba with a studying look. “So, are you ready to share what’s going on with you yet or not?”
Alba frowned as she merged onto the highway. “Nothing’s going on with me.”
Zainab scoffed. “Yeah, right. You’ve been weird for days.”
“How so?”
“Seriously?” She sighed heavily. “Staring off into space, looking worried half the time. Something’s on your mind, and it’s not like you to keep things so closely guarded.”
Alba wasn’t sure that was true. There were things she kept guarded, but, as she thought about it, she supposed the general point was true. The only things she usually kept so private were things she tried not to think about around other people. When she was obviously preoccupied by something, she supposed she did usually talk about it.
She wasn’t really sure why she hadn’t talked about it this time—well, other than the fact that it was weird to still be so consumed by thoughts of a stranger she’d met a week ago. She’d met plenty of strangers over the years, and she seldom spent so much time thinking about them. Maybe she wasn’t talking about it because she didn’t want to be told she was turning into a weird stalker.
“Just like this…” Zainab added pointedly when Alba hadn’t replied for several minutes.
She laughed briefly. “Sorry. I… am… just thinking.”
“Yes, about the same thing you have been for days.” She hesitated. “And hopefully about driving.”
“Of course about driving.”
Was there any real harm in telling Zainab about the whole thing? Zainab was one of the closest people to her in the world. Surely she wouldn’t judge. Well, maybe she would, but perhaps that was what Alba needed.
Especially when she thought about where she’d driven the two of them to.
Zainab looked around as Alba pulled into a parking lot. “Where are we? What is this place?”
“Oh. Um.” Alba scrunched her face up.
They hadn’t talked about this place, they hadn’t agreed where to go for lunch, Alba hadn’t explained anything that was going on. It was so unlike her.
“That’s the name of the place, is it? Um ?”
Alba waved a hand in her direction. “Of course not.”
“Okay… So?”
Alba sighed and twisted in her seat to look at Zainab. “Last weekend, I was at the mall—”
“Right, with that weird cousin of yours.”
“She’s not weird.” They’d had this conversation a million times. Alba didn’t even think Zainab was wrong, they just had different appreciation levels for Alba’s cousin.
“She definitely is.”
Alba shook her head. “Whatever. That’s not the point.”
“And what is?”
“Is that a philosophical question?”
“Alba.” Zainab’s head fell back against her seat in exasperation.
“Right. Well, before I actually got into the mall, I ran into someone outside.”
“Okay?”
“We’d never met before.”
“You go to the mall expecting to know every other person there?”
“Ha. No.” Alba felt more nervous than she was used to. The whole thing was nothing, not really. She just couldn’t shake it, and she knew she was being weird about it precisely because of how hard telling Zainab was. Perhaps that was a sign she really needed to talk about it. Maybe once it was out, the whole thing would simply go away. “It was just… this woman.”
“Ohh.” Zainab laughed knowingly, sitting up straighter again. “Pretty, curvy, sparkling eyes, dazzling smile?”
“What?”
“Your mystery woman. It’s always the short, curvy girls that get you. Especially the ones whose smiles you can’t get enough of.”
“Excuse me, I don’t have such a specific type. I’m an… equal opportunities dater.”
“Correct. But nothing makes you weaker than—”
“Yes. Thank you.” Alba adjusted herself in her seat, realizing, even as she protested, that Zainab was right.
But that wasn’t really the point.
“So,” Zainab prompted, “was she?”
Alba scratched her head and looked away. “Um. Yeah, kind of. But I don’t really know what her smile looks like. Not properly.”
Zainab scowled. “Why? You hit her with your car or something?”
“Seriously? That’s your first thought?”
“It’s my every thought.”
“I don’t… even know what that means.”
“Don’t worry about it. Why no smile?”
Was it reasonable to discuss someone else’s breakup with your friends? Maybe Neve didn’t want everyone knowing about her business. She had been deeply devastated, and somewhat mortified, to find herself crying on a stranger. If Alba had to guess, she’d assume Neve liked her privacy. But it wasn’t as though Zainab even knew who she was, or like they were ever going to meet. So, maybe it was fine?
Alba sucked in a deep breath. “She’d just been broken up with.”
Zainab looked away, considering. “At the mall?”
“Yep.”
“Isn’t that something only teenagers do?”
“You’d think so, but no. Apparently, there are full-grown women out there, just breaking up with their girlfriends in the middle of the mall.”
“Weird.”
“Indeed.”
“So, she gets broken up with in the most teenage place her ex could have picked, and you sweep in like her knight in shining armor, and now you’re wondering why she hasn’t called you?”
“I don’t like the person you think I am,” Alba said, slightly petulant.
Zainab laughed. “Don’t worry, it’s thought with love.”
“I did not sweep in like some knight, and I am not expecting her to call. We didn’t even exchange numbers.”
“Restrained. I’m proud of you, buddy.”
“Never call me that again.”
“Sure thing, pal.”
“Or that.”
“So, you’re just pining after someone you met once and will never see again?”
“I’m not pining . I’m just worried about her.” Alba began to get out of the car, unsure whether it was her hunger or her need to be further away from the conversation that drove her forward. “Wouldn’t you be if you’d met someone in their darkest moment and then just left them on their own?”
“You just left her there alone? After she’d been dumped?” Zainab shot her a wild look over the roof of the car.
“No, of course not. I drove her home. But that’s still leaving someone alone while they’re down.”
“Maybe she has roommates.”
“Yeah, maybe…”
“Also, maybe a touch presumptuous to assume that was her darkest moment.”
“You’re telling me that wouldn’t make your list?”
“I mean, it would, but you never know what a stranger’s been through.”
Alba rolled her eyes. “Hm. Always so exacting.”
“Indeed.” She didn’t sound remotely chagrined. If anything, she sounded proud, which felt right.
“So, yeah, that’s the story. Sad, dumped woman I don’t know, but who I’m worried about because I’m a nice person.”
“Which is why you’re buying me lunch at… whatever this place is.” She looked at the café Alba had brought them to. “How’d you even find this place? It’s not like it’s on your usual routes.”
Alba suppressed a wince. “Oh, just… recommendation from a friend.”
“Well, you’re paying, so whatever you want.”
“I didn’t agree to that.”
“And I didn’t agree to eat here, but, oh, look, here we are.”
“Wow. We can go somewhere else if you want.” She desperately hoped Zainab didn’t suggest another place. She knew it was wrong, and she definitely should have asked first, but Alba wanted to eat here.
It wasn’t even like it was really that weird. Neve hadn’t said she went here. She hadn’t said anything about it. She hadn’t said anything about any café she’d ever been to in her life. Alba had simply noticed it when she was driving Neve home. It wasn’t like Neve lived across the street. There were plenty of cafés a similar distance from Alba’s apartment that she never went to. It really wasn’t that odd.
Zainab shrugged, taking the lead on the way to the door. “It’s fine. I’m hungry, they have food, and, apparently, it comes recommended, so I’m sure it’s fine.”
“Right.” Recommendations from online reviews counted, right? It was only a slight bend of the truth.
“Maybe the staff will be cute and you can pick one of them up and stop pining over the dumped girl.”
“I’m not pining,” Alba insisted, catching her up. “And I’m not looking for a date. Despite your apparent insistence, I don’t even want to date Neve—”
“Nice name.”
“Right?” Alba felt herself smile before squashing it. “I really do just want her to be okay, and I hate not knowing things like that.”
“Indeed.” She opened the door and gestured Alba in ahead of her.
The place was nice—a well-developed aesthetic, plants, sleek wooden chairs, one wall painted with a dark limewash. Alba liked it a lot, which was both pleasant and unfortunate. If she liked it too much, she’d want to come back, and if she kept coming back, the chances of running into Neve in the area increased, and that would be… weird.
But she really meant it when she said she wasn’t interested in Neve. She had literally just been dumped. And, yes, maybe Zainab was right, and, in another set of circumstances, Neve would be Alba’s type, but Alba didn’t fancy every person she met who fit a handful of criteria. And she didn’t make a habit of crushing on sobbing, recently dumped women. No matter what Zainab seemed to think.
“Huh, not bad. Your friend’s got good taste,” Zainab said, pausing beside Alba.
“I’ll… tell them you said so,” Alba offered, knowing it was a lie, but deeply unwilling to share that Neve was the reason they were here. If she gave up that information, even if the recommendation hadn’t come directly from her, Zainab would never let it go.
“A friend I know?” she replied, asking exactly the question Alba didn’t want to answer.
“Um… Should we sit down?” The question was a cover, to buy more thinking time, but it was also a genuine question. The café seemed to sit somewhere between a regular café and a restaurant, and Alba wasn’t clear whether that meant they were supposed to pick a table, wait to be seated, or order first.
Whether or not Zainab noticed the stall quickly became irrelevant when a guy popped out from around the corner with a warm smile that did nothing to alleviate the shock of his sudden appearance.
“Eating in?” he asked, apparently unaware of the spike in Alba’s heart rate he’d just caused.
“Yes. Please,” Zainab replied, her tone implying a similar level of shock.
“Great.” He pointed down the room in a way that suggested there were more seats further back than they could see. “Find a seat anywhere you like and one of us will be with you soon. There are menus on the tables.”
“Thank you.”
Alba could hear the suspicion in Zainab’s voice, but she hoped the guy couldn’t.
They walked through the café together and, once they were out of earshot of him, Zainab hissed in Alba’s ear, “And your friend couldn’t have warned you about that?”
“I doubt he’s here every day,” Alba protested, suddenly protective of her non-existent friend. However, she felt certain that wasn’t the regular greeting because she’d read more than her fair share of reviews for the place and not one of them had mentioned getting the fright of their life upon entering. People liked to complain about a lot of things on the internet, so she could only assume that would be one of them.
“The rest of us won’t be here for many more days if he keeps jumping out like that.”
“Well, you can be sure to let them know via email if you so choose.”
She rolled her eyes. “Please, I’m not complaining.”
“Could have fooled me.”
“I’m complaining to you . But that’s what friends are for. I’m not complaining officially. Who do you think I am?”
Alba laughed and gestured to a table. “Here good?”
“Great. So long as our new friend doesn’t jump out and scare us again.” She paused, reaching for the chair. “Actually, check under the table. He’s not down there, is he?”
“Don’t be ridiculous. It’s not a jumpscare café.”
“If anyone recommends one of those to you, do not invite me.”
“Noted.” She pulled one of the menus over to herself. “Though, why you think I’d want to go to one of those in the first place, I have no idea.”
“Probably because you’re being oddly avoidant about who recommended this one, so I’m over here wondering whether the person you have a crush on is the recommender. In which case, you’d have done weirder than going to a jumpscare café just to impress them.”
“And you haven’t?”
“Can’t be trying to impress someone when I don’t know who they are .”
Alba sighed. She really had hoped the distraction would be, well, a distraction. No such luck, apparently. “I don’t have a crush on anyone. And it was just someone from work.”
Zainab eyed her over the menu, every part of her expression skeptical. “And does this person from work have a name?”
“You work with people who don’t have names?”
“You know how to answer questions?”
“Sometimes—”
“Alba?” The voice was both unfamiliar and too familiar all at the same time. And, honestly, probably the worst voice Alba could have heard at that moment, even as something in her stomach felt soothed by the fact that she was finally going to get an answer.
Maybe the fixation had simply been the unanswered mystery. Now, the mystery would be answered and she could go back to not caring about this random stranger.
And maybe Zainab wouldn’t notice anything…
Alba shot up from her seat, watching as that short, curvy woman with the most unusually colored hair stepped tentatively towards her. “Neve.”
Zainab snorted. “Someone from work my ass.”