Chapter Fourteen
Lewis makes us stop at his favorite pizza place in Hell’s Kitchen on the way back uptown, one of those hole-in-the-wall places that are cash and standing-room only.
Even under the stark, fluorescent light, with his tie flapping open around his neck, Lewis looks a million times more at ease than back on the boat.
We eat our slices crowding around a tiny sliver of the bar table, his a marinara and mine with vodka sauce, and then he takes me back home, offering a softly spoken “Thank you for coming today” when he says goodbye at my door.
And my heart does that weird buoyant thing again.
Which it shouldn’t. Because while our history goes over four years back, I’ve only really known him for five days, and for most of those, I thought we despised each other.
But his apology yesterday flipped everything around, and I can’t stop thinking about how good he felt pressed against my body in the library, how well his hand fit on the small of my back, and how, even though he already answered so many of them today, I have a million more questions I want to ask him.
I don’t want to think so much about him, and yet it feels like my brain is starting to dedicate an entire lobe to him.
I try to remind myself that it’s natural.
The kiss predictably triggered a cascade of biological processes, including a heavy dose of hormones, and they’re the real reason for why my feelings for Lewis are amplified.
It was biology that caused those glitches on the boat today, where I felt like my neurons fired a little harder, just for him.
Upstairs, I peel my dress off, hang it on the shower rack, wipe off my makeup and slather on moisturizer, all while oddly specific details about Lewis loop through my mind.
The dimple in his chin, the freckles on the bridge of his nose that have multiplied since Saturday, the top two buttons of his shirts that he always leaves unbuttoned and, worst of all, the parsing look in his eyes in the library before he moved in to kiss me.
Since it’s just biology, the good news is that all I need is a little time away from him to recalibrate.
The bad news is, I have to get through another forty-eight hours with Lewis before the weekend.
Less if I tell him to head to campus tomorrow morning without me.
Even less if we don’t spend the evenings together like we have for the last few days, which I’m sure we don’t need to, since Lewis didn’t mention any more family obligations, and our colleagues at the conference seem convinced of our relationship status.
Really, I have sixteen hours to get through. Sixteen hours of having Lewis close enough to track how the blue in his eyes changes depending on the light, sixteen hours of his presence and the potential it has to rewire my entire nervous system.
Sixteen hours, and then another five days, but that’s a problem for future me. For now, I just have to get through these sixteen hours.
They say you should never meet your heroes, probably because it’s incredibly hard living up to those mile-high expectations we form of them. While I never thought I’d agree with the statement, what happens on Thursday morning makes me reconsider.
Coming out of a toilet cubicle, I spot Professor Rosanna Alderkamp touching up her cherry-red lipstick and start babbling.
“Professor Alderkamp, hi! I’m such a huge fan.
I’ve actually been waiting for you to get here.
I mean, not this toilet but here here, the Sawyer’s.
Oh, I’m Frances, by the way. Frances Silberstein.
” I thrust out my hand to shake hers. Just then, I realize that a) said hand is unwashed and, b) the person whose papers I’ve been reading, disseminating, discussing, and praising for the past twelve years has listened to me pee.
Yeah.
So much for meeting your heroes.
“Oh god,” I say when my prefrontal cortex comes to the rescue. I take two large steps to the only other free sink and deposit my hands under the faucet. “That was… I’m sorry.”
Professor Alderkamp has barely had the time to turn around and face me throughout my avalanche of words, but she smiles kindly.
In the mirror on the wall behind the sinks, her large brown eyes find the lanyard with my name tag around my neck.
“Silberstein…” She tilts her head pensively, as if the last few seconds didn’t happen. “Where have I heard that name?”
Her voice is lower and smoother than the one I’ve come to know through my tinny laptop speakers when watching her recorded lectures. She’s deep in thought as I rip a paper towel out of the machine and quietly die of mortification.
Behind me, she snaps her finger. “Silberstein, that’s it! I read your latest paper on the flight over.”
“You did?” I hate how insecure my voice sounds.
She stows her lipstick in her big navy leather tote, unclasps the clip in her hair, and finger-combs her thick salt-and-pepper curls.
“I did.” She gives me a wide smile in the mirror.
“Very impressive, although I can’t say I understood all of it.
But then again, I’m not a modeling wizard like you.
But you have your session today, right? I was hoping to stop by. ”
“Uh, no. It got swapped with another one, so I already had it at the beginning of the week. But I could send you the slides and the code?”
“That’d be great.” Her phone starts ringing in her bag and she rummages around for it. “Anyway, I need to run, but we should have lunch together while we’re here.”
It’d be wildly unprofessional to pinch myself right in front of her, but all her praise has me wondering if I’m still asleep and dreaming. Or did Rosanna Alderkamp really just compliment me? My overanalytical brain provides the much-needed reality check: Maybe she’s being polite.
But before she dashes out of the restroom, Professor Alderkamp turns around and adds, “I’ll be looking out for your email, and from there we can set up lunch. Oh, and please call me Rosanna.”
My heart sprints with euphoria. Not only did my idol recognize my name but also wanted to stop by my workshop, found my paper impressive, and called me a modeling wizard.
I wish I could call Karo to share my excitement, but she’s still off the grid, finding peace in the California wilderness.
My second instinct is to run to Lewis and gush to him about it, but I ignore that one, too.
I need to tell someone to let the adrenaline out, though, so when I spot Brady down the corridor, I beeline toward her. With her bubbly enthusiasm, she strikes me as someone who’d get how starstruck I am right now.
“You survived the boat!” she greets me and pockets her phone.
“I did, and I also just met my idol—in the bathroom, of all places, but she was so great,” I tell Brady, the words tumbling out of me.
“Look at you go,” she squeals and gently bumps her fist into my biceps. “Who was it?”
“Rosanna Alderkamp! I’ve been dying to meet—”
“Frances, there you are!”
I don’t get to finish as Vivienne rushes down the corridor.
Brady throws me a confused look, but before I can ask her about it, we both turn to Vivienne.
Dressed in a shimmering green dress and black flats today, she looks effortlessly elegant as she drags her pencil over her tablet.
“Brady, hi! I’m so sorry to interrupt, it’ll only be a minute.
Frances, there’s something I need to run by you. ”
“Sure.”
“Perfect. So, we’ll have our Growing Up in Science Q and A tomorrow evening, but the bar you were supposed to have your session in canceled the reservation. Something about a problem with the pipes.”
The event she’s talking about is a casual evening out during which students get to ask questions about life as a scientist, grad school, and making it in academia.
I think back to the moment when I signed up to mentor a session, wondering if I qualified since I hadn’t yet made it in academia, with my grant pending and the persistent worry that I might not even have a job a few months from now.
“Which is unfortunate,” Vivienne continues.
“I need to do a bit of juggling now to get a new place booked for you, but there’s space at the bar I booked for Lewis, so I was wondering if you’d be fine joining him?
I normally wouldn’t do this, but obviously you’re dating, and a lot of students requested to speak to both of you in their forms anyway, so it might even be a good opportunity for them. ”
Well, shoot. Vivienne and Brady both wait for my reply, oblivious to the fact that they’re adding two, maybe three, hours of Lewis to a system that’s already near the breaking point.
I put my new plan in motion this morning when I told him to head to campus without me, but instead of enjoying the few extra hours in bed after the many late nights, I lay there, nearly spraining my thumb by updating my inbox for (still absent) grant updates.
I have yet to see him this morning, and my anticipation is building like a tidal wave that will not be helped by additional hours with him tomorrow night, but I don’t have another option.
I guess I’m signing up to spend more time with the person I desperately need time away from.
“You can put our sessions together,” I tell Vivienne.
She breaks into a smile. “Super. I’ll email you the details later!”
“Golgi, she’s so nice, isn’t she?” Brady says, watching Vivienne walk away.
“I thought it was fake at first, but she’s always this kind.
We work together on this massively complicated project I’m heading.
It involves a ton of different hospital departments back in BC, plus collaborators around the world, and she always does more than she needs to, just to take some work off my plate. ”