43. A School Night
A School Night
Rafe
The road out of the woods is slick from last night’s rain, sunlight flashing between the trees.
Kasia’s arms are wrapped tight around me, her chin tucked near my shoulder, the world a blur of wind and asphalt.
When we pull into the parking lot, the sign for the Waffle House buzzes faintly, half the letters dead.
The smell of syrup and oil hits even through the helmet.
I kill the engine and we sit there for a second, the silence ringing in our ears.
She taps my shoulder. “What’s the strategy? I could go in and get it to go. Or… we could just risk it.” She looks toward the windows, mostly locals, a few families, one group of alt kids who look like they’ve been up all night gaming or writing manifestos. “Doesn’t seem like your usual crowd.”
I take a long breath. “You’re probably right. They’re either too tired or caffeinated to care. Let’s go.”
We head inside. The lights are bright, the air thick with crackle of food frying and chatter.
The hostess doesn’t look twice at us. I exhale as we slide into a booth in the far corner.
It’s almost normal, her across from me, tracing the laminated menu, the hiss of the griddle in the background. She looks up, smirking.
“You realize you just risked any remaining anonymity for hash browns.”
“Some things are worth it.”
For a while, it’s easy. Coffee arrives, we order enough food for an army, and my focus takes in all the small things like her laughter and the sound of plates clattering behind the counter.
Then I feel it. The prickle on the back of my neck.
At a table near, the group of teenagers have started whispering, looking in our direction.
Hoodies, chipped black nail polish, eyeliner smudged from lack of sleep.
My demographic, once upon a time. Kasia notices, following my glance.
“They know?”
“I think so,” I murmur. “Or maybe they’re just debating whether I look like a man who peaked in 2019?”
One of the girls finally stands up, napkin and pen clutched in hand. She hesitates, heart visibly pounding, then walks over to our booth.
“Um… excuse me?” she says. “I’m sorry if this is weird, but… are you—?”
I pull my sunglasses down just enough for her to see my eyes to confirm. Her jaw drops. “Oh my god. Obelus. It’s you.”
I smile, keeping my voice low. “It's me.”
She’s trembling. “I knew it. My friend said it couldn’t be, but I said, no he’d totally eat at a Waffle House, you're so real like that. You’re… wow. I just—thank you. Your songs helped me so much.”
The word is like an arrow to my heart. Helped.
“What’s your name?” I ask.
“Tina.”
I take the napkin from her, scrawl my name across it, ending with a for Tina and a small heart at the end, then hand it back. “For you, Tina.”
She’s crying now, smiling through it. “Oh my god, thank you so much.” She sighs, wiping her face, and hurries back to her table. The whole group explodes into muffled squeals.
Kasia watches, something thoughtful in her expression. “You really just made her entire life. By signing a napkin.”
I stir my coffee. “Reminds me what it’s all for on the harder days. ”
She leans back, studying me. “You forget sometimes?”
“Sometimes,” I admit.
Her voice softens. “Then I guess it’s good we came.”
I smile. “Guess it is.”
Back at the cabin it’s peaceful. She’s sitting on the arm of the couch, scrolling idly through the comments one more time before setting the phone down.
I'm nervously playing keys on the piano, in random patterns that make enough sense to pretend I'm not just watching her. The light’s shifted, warmer now, slower, sliding across the floor like it’s running out of places to go.
Neither of us talks, afraid to say what we know needs to be said.
I could almost believe the world stopped caring the moment she stopped looking at the screen.
Then she sighs and stands. “I should head home. Charts to finish, laundry, real life things.”
The words hit harder than they should. My brain starts tallying the distance between here and her door.
I try to play it cool. “Real life? Sounds extremely overrated.”
“It’s also messy and I desperately need a shower,”
My mind trips over itself, water, steam, the glide of her skin, the sound she’d make if I—I catch myself. Focus, Ashton.
She’s still talking, listing her errands: groceries, maybe sleep if she’s lucky. I rejoin the conversation halfway through as she says, “—and I haven’t even managed to brush my teeth properly. I feel disgusting.”
“Right. Spare toothbrushes,” I say, like that’s a normal response.
She laughs. “Yes, buy some.”
“On it.” I push off the piano, try to keep it light. “Didn’t plan on having many guests, as you can tell.”
Her smile falters, a half-second where the color drains from the room. She’s already leaving even though she hasn’t moved.
I take a step closer. “You could stay.”
“Rafe…”
“I’m just saying, it’s a long ride and there's a shower here.”
“Any shampoo or conditioner? Body wash?” She levels a look at me.
“I mean...” I try to pretend I'm not aware there's nothing here.
“Nice try.” She looks down, then back up, coy. “You’ve got more time in Seattle, right? Then you’ll just have to ask me on another date.”
The smile that comes with it hits like sunlight after a long tunnel.
She steps in, hands on my chest, and kisses me once.
Enough to restart my pulse. Enough to ruin any good intention I have about letting her go.
When she pulls back, her voice is soft. “Come on, give me a ride home before I change my mind.”
I start to argue, but my phone buzzes on the table. The screen lights up: Stefan
I groan. “Perfect timing.”
She laughs, already heading for the door. “Answer it. You know you have to.”
I swipe to accept. “Congratulations, you broke the internet. That photo’s everywhere.
Rolling Stone wants to run it, and half your fans think you’re secretly married.
Apparently, there's some random napkin snapshot from a Waffle House trending with your hashtag, too. Whatever you’re doing, keep doing it. ”
Kasia looks over her shoulder, raising an eyebrow.
I meet her gaze and say into the phone, “I plan on it.”
The ride back feels shorter than it should, it always does when you don’t want to arrive.
The highway burns beneath us, sunlight flickering through the gaps in the trees, and every mile feels like it’s undoing the last few hours.
Kasia’s arms are wrapped around me, tighter than before.
It’s not just holding, it’s clinging, like she’s trying to imprint the shape of me to her body before the day has to end.
I keep telling myself to enjoy it, the wind, the warmth of her against my back, but every second the tires eat up is one less I get with her. When we finally pull up outside her place, I kill the engine and just sit there, helmet still on, like maybe if I don’t move, time won’t either.
She taps my shoulder. “You alive under there?”
“Barely.” I pull off the helmet, rake a hand through my hair. She’s already unbuckled hers, smiling that soft, tired smile that kills me.
“Thanks for the kidnapping,” she says. “And breakfast, and the impromptu PR campaign.”
“My pleasure,” I say. Then, before I can give her time to think up an excuse: “Can I see you this week?”
Her eyebrows lift. “You remember what I said, doctors don’t do school nights.”
“I’ll be good,” I promise, grinning. “No chaos, no distractions. I won’t make a mess, you can even give me a stick to chew on.”
She laughs, shaking her head. “You’re something else.”
“That’s not a no.”
She starts to step back, still laughing, but I catch her wrist before she can. The joke dies in my throat when she turns to look at me. I tug her closer, just enough to feel the rhythm of her breathing against mine. My voice drops without meaning to.
“I’m pretending again. I gotta stop doing that, acting like it doesn’t matter,” I say. “It does. I need to see you. I mean it.”
For a heartbeat, she just looks at me, the weight of something that could break me if I let it. Then she leans in, “Then ask me,” she whispers. “Properly.”
I blink back a shocked laugh. “What do you want me to do?”
She tilts her head, daring me. “You’ll figure it out.”
So I do the first stupid thing that comes to mind, drop down onto one knee right there on the pavement.
Her eyes go wide. “Rafe—oh my God. Get up!”
“What?” I spread my arms. “Is this what you meant?”
She’s laughing now, cheeks flushed, glancing around like we’ve just set off a fire alarm.
“Someone’s going to take a picture!”
“I don’t care,” I say, still kneeling. “Half the internet already thinks I'm married. Might as well give them something to talk about.”
She swats my arm. “Get up, you idiot. Kurwa.”
I grin, stand, but before she can step back again I catch her waist, pull her close, close enough that I can feel her breath against my neck.
“Alright then,” I murmur. “Dr. Kasia Sawadzka, would you do me the honor of having dinner with me on a scandalous Wednesday night?”
Her lips twitch. “Scandalous?”
“Utterly. There will be wine, possibly dessert. I even promise to chew with my mouth closed. We'll be daring the god's wrath, under the full moon of a bloody school night.”
She bites back a smile, trying to keep it formal, but I see it, the yes before she even nods.
“Okay,” she says finally. “Wednesday.”
“Wednesday,” I echo, because it suddenly feels like I can breathe. “I’ll text you tomorrow, make sure you don’t change that brilliant mind of yours.”
“You better.”
“You’re first on my agenda, I promise.”
I lean down, kiss her once more, like a seal on the moment.
Then she pulls away, laughing under her breath as she heads for the door, helmet tucked under her arm.
I stay there long after she’s gone, staring at the empty driveway, sun already bleeding into late afternoon, and all I can think is that Wednesday can’t come fast enough.
Seattle feels different after the cabin. The kind of quiet that makes you aware of everything, the buzz of the refrigerator, the echo of traffic through double-glazed glass, the silence of someone not here.
I drop my keys on the counter, toss the helmet beside them, and just stand there for a minute. My shirt carries her imprint, rain, perfume, sunlight filtered through skin. I should shower. I should sleep. Instead, I sit at the piano.
My fingers find a few soft chords without thinking, the kind that sound like morning.
Every note feels like her laugh, her pulse against mine, her breath catching when she teased me.
The words start before I even know what I’m saying, something about warmth, the sun breaking through clouds, how I desperately want to keep it all in a jar like a firefly before it fades. It’s simple, too simple. But it’s true.
I stop, hands hovering above the keys, and realize, somewhere between the jokes and the chaos, I hadn’t thought. I’d felt. For the first time in years, I just let it happen. No analysis or exit plan. No filter between us, between the world inside my head and what I gave to her.
She makes me feel unbound in her hands. If it already feels like this before, if my body remembers her without even having the right to, then once it happens, once I’m allowed to have her, there won’t be a particle left in me that she doesn't own.
Maybe that’s what all the masters of poetry meant. The ones who wrote like they were bleeding politely onto parchment. Maybe this is the ache they were translating, the torture and the magic sitting side by side.
It’s not abstinence, no, something far closer to devotion.
That unbearable beauty in wanting and not touching, in the pause before the flood.
It’s been years since I was denied anything like this.
But, I don’t feel deprived. I feel alive.
The suffering’s exquisite, in its way, gorgeous and maddening.
The kind of ache that promises a future worth reaching for.
Someone worth reaching for. Her.