Chapter 14 #2
I scan the restaurant until I spot Emily waving from a table on the left. I wave back, then usher Aashiq to follow me. When we get there, I frown when I realize she’s by herself. “Where’s Daniel?” I ask.
“He’s running late,” she chirps in what I know she hopes is a casual tone, but the disappointment mixed with annoyance bleeds through in her voice. She sits on the booth side, so she gestures to the two chairs across from her. “You guys should sit down. He’ll be here as soon as he can.”
Aashiq helps me take off my coat and drapes it over the back of my chair, which he then pulls out for me.
He takes off his own jacket, settles it on his chair, and takes his seat.
Emily watches the exchange with an impressed glimmer in her eyes, like she can’t quite believe the chivalry Aashiq is demonstrating.
“Sooo,” Emily drawls as I pull up the menu on my phone using the QR code on the table. “How was work today?”
“Lots of fun!” Aashiq answers for the both of us.
He peers over my shoulder to see the menu on my phone screen.
I thought about getting him a phone once, but given the fact that one, he spends all his time with me and is at my beck and call, and two, he can’t even work a printer, I don’t think he needs a smartphone.
“This client got super worked up and started yelling at Ziya at the reception desk, but she managed to stay cool and calm him down. It was like she had a superpower!”
My instinct is to downplay the whole thing, but I decide not to.
Usually when clients lose their cool on me, I shut down and another one of the lawyers has to step in, but lately I’ve felt my confidence growing in such a significant way that I took care of it myself.
“It was pretty scary there for a moment, but I was able to handle it.” I nod to Aashiq.
“It helped that Aashiq made him a chamomile tea.”
A proud grin stretches his lips as he places a hand on the spot below his throat. “I make it very good. The kettle is easy to use. I almost broke it only two times.” He turns his head to me. “I want the vegetarian burrito bowl with avocado crema.”
“Are you sure?” I ask. “Last time you had avocado, you said it tasted like grass.”
“I know, but that was a raw avocado,” he rationalizes. “This time it’s a crema version. Maybe it’ll taste different!”
I guess I can’t argue with that. When the waiter returns, we give our orders—I chose a creamy goat cheese polenta with ratatouille—and after he leaves, Aashiq immediately turns to Emily and says, “Tell me more about yourself!”
Emily’s eyes widen, clearly taken aback. “Oh, uh…” she stammers. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything! I love knowing things about people.” His smile stays on his face despite Emily’s weirded-out expression.
“What’s your favorite color? What’s your favorite season?
Do you like mint chocolate chip ice cream?
Do you think the Statue of Liberty looks like a broccoli piece in a funny hat?
Because I do, and let me tell you, it gets a laugh out of me every time—”
I put my hand on Aashiq’s arm, silencing him. “Aashiq, I think you should give Emily a chance to respond to your questions, don’t you?”
“Oh, right.” He leans back in his chair and stares at her expectantly.
Emily blinks a few times. “I mean, I don’t know about the broccoli thing,” she begins. “But my favorite color is red, and I’m a summer baby, so summer all the way.”
Aashiq wrinkles his nose, then shifts his head to me. “I’m confused, Ziya. How does a season give birth to a person?”
“No, no,” I say, patting his hand in comfort. “Emily means she was born in the summer. Her birthday is in July, which is why she loves the summer so much.”
The lines in his face widen. “Ahhhh,” he says. “So, do you love the autumn because your birthday is in November?”
“Nah, my favorite season is the spring,” I tell him.
“Fall is pretty, but it bums me out because it’s a reminder winter is coming, and with it cold short days and unpredictable weather.
Spring, to me, is about hope. The only thing that gets me out of bed during the winter is the knowledge each day is going to get longer, which means more daylight, which means more happiness. ”
Aashiq regards me, warmth in his gaze. “That was beautiful. I hope to see the spring.”
“We have to get through winter first,” I remind him. “But don’t worry, we’ll get there.”
Emily raises a brow at Aashiq. “You’re talking like you’ve never seen the spring before.”
My jaw drops as alarm floods Aashiq’s eyes. “Well, Aashiq moved here from California,” I explain quickly. “He’s never experienced the four seasons before. So, he hasn’t experienced the winter turning into the spring.”
Emily whistles low. “Wow, a West Coaster transferring to the East Coast?” She nods, stretching her cheeks.
“You’re really brave for that. But I think you’re going to love it.
Experiencing four seasons is one of the things I love most about living here.
I don’t think I could live somewhere that’s the same all the time. ”
“Yeah, it’s one of the reasons I’m glad to be here now.” He interlocks his fingers, resting them on the table. Something flickers in his eyes, like uncertainty, but it’s gone in the next blink. “Enjoying the time I have.”
The way he phrases it is so strange, but before I can ask him about it, he asks Emily, “Can you tell me some stuff about Ziya?”
A conspiratorial smirk crosses her face, and she leans forward. “What do you want to know?”
“Everything!”
“ Whoa , wait.” I throw my hands in the air. “When did this turn into a Q and A panel about me—where I’m not even the one answering the questions?”
Aashiq pouts, and I pretend not to notice the jump in my stomach. “Well, you don’t talk a lot about yourself. I mean, you do , but not the deeper stuff.”
Deeper stuff? My writing is one of the most intimate things about me. It’s incredibly difficult for me to talk about it, even with my actual writing muse. But I thought I was getting better at it.
Aashiq returns his attention to Emily. “What was Ziya like in college?”
“I hate to break it to you, but she was a lot like how she is now,” Emily answers.
“In her room all day when she wasn’t in class, writing or reading or studying.
Every now and then I dragged her out of the dorm to go to a party or a school event, but even while she was there, her face clearly said she’d rather be at home.
” She picks at her fake nails. “It was actually kind of hurtful.”
I furrow my brows. “You never told me that.”
She huffs again. “Well, it wasn’t that I was hurt , it was more like… I was having this great university experience, and I wanted you to be there with me.”
“I was perfectly happy with my university experience,” I say, but even as I speak the words, I know they’re a lie.
One of the unfortunate perks about having a fully developed prefrontal cortex is it gives you the ability to look back on your life with an adult perspective and realize how much you really sold yourself short.
Yes, I stayed in almost every night doing homework or writing, but at the time I told myself I was investing in my career.
I wanted to be one of those people who got a book deal straight out of college.
I was so worried about my future I forgot to enjoy my present, and when I think back, I should have been more involved in college, because it’s a stage of life I can never go back and relive.
Humans are strange: we spend so much time preparing for a future that’s not guaranteed, we don’t realize we’re wasting the time we have now.
And yet, we do it again and again. From childhood to the teen years, to the coming of age into adulthood and the rest of our lives, we forget our mistakes and are doomed to repeat them.
It’s a wonder natural selection hasn’t eradicated the human race entirely.
But I don’t want to repeat my mistakes. I can’t get my sheltered teen years back. I can’t relive my college experience or redo my twenties. But what I can do is live right now.
I reach across the table and take Emily’s hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “I’m sorry,” I tell her.
“You shouldn’t be,” she says quickly, putting her own hand on top of mine.
“I just felt sorry for you because I thought you were wasting away your time, especially after we got an apartment together after college. It kind of felt like you were unhappy but not trying anything to change that, and I didn’t know how to help you. ”
“You help me by being my friend,” I assure her. I plant my other hand on top of hers. “You’ve never given up on me. And that’s more than I could ask for.”
Emily’s eyes get misty, and she blinks a few times before leaning back. “Well, I can at least say confidently that you’ve changed a lot recently.”
I straighten my spine. “Really?”
She nods. “Yeah. It’s been really wonderful to see.” Her gaze drifts over to Aashiq. “And it’s no secret why that’s happened.”
My cheeks flush, and I glance at Aashiq from the corner of my eye. His face is scrunched, though, and his eyes flicker between us before leaning closer to me. “Is she going to tell us why?”
To my surprise, I snort, which causes Emily to laugh, too. Aashiq’s confusion continues, but he quickly rebounds like always. “So, when is Daniel getting here?” he asks.
Emily’s laughter abruptly cuts off. She glances down at her phone. “He was supposed to be here twenty minutes ago, but I haven’t heard anything from him since then.” She blows a frustrated breath from her nose. “I’m sorry, guys.”
I tilt my head to the side. “Everything okay, Em?”
“Yeah, everything’s fine,” she replies too quickly.
I want to ask her more, but I don’t want to do it in front of Aashiq, who could very easily make the situation much worse.
Our food arrives, and we get distracted by filling our stomachs anyway.
But something still feels off with Emily, so I tuck a reminder to ask her about it later in the back of my head.
For now, though, I enjoy watching Aashiq and Emily laugh, and I see the ice start to melt bit by bit in Emily’s eyes.