Chapter Sixteen
SIXTEEN
I’m awakened at some ungodly hour (by which I mean sometime before noon) by banging on the outer apartment door. I try to ignore it, but the pounding only grows more insistent. And since there’s no buzzer, the only way to make it stop is to go downstairs.
The minute I toss back my covers, I’m greeted by a blast of cold air, which forces me to scramble for the nearest item of clothing at hand to pull on over my pajamas.
Grumbling, I pad down the stairs and fling open the door to find Fisher standing there balancing two cups from the Grind in one ungloved hand so he can knock with the other.
“Did I wake you?” he asks. “I know I agreed to give you time to think, but I—”
I nod toward the cups. “Is one of those for me?”
“Gingerbread latte,” he says, rescuing the bottom cup from the rather precarious-looking stack and holding it out to me. “New for December. Thought it sounded like something you would enjoy.”
I take it from him, draw in a deep breath of spicy steam, and nod. “We’re not having this conversation on the street. Come inside.”
Ordinarily, I would warn him, maybe even apologize for the mess, because being on my own for a week has rendered my apartment an even bigger disaster zone than usual. But he wants real, right? Well, the reality is that new-and-improved Elle’s focus does not extend to matters of housekeeping.
He doesn’t even seem to notice the chaos around him.
When he sweeps off his chunky knit hat, his hair is as unruly as I’ve ever seen it.
Any temptation to make some smart remark about his needing a haircut dissipates when my gaze shifts to his somber expression, the dark circles under his eyes.
He’s clearly had a sleepless night, and I feel both smug and oddly a little guilty to think I’m probably responsible.
“Cold in here,” he remarks, taking a sip of his coffee.
And it is, uncharacteristically so. “Yeah.” I realize the warm, heavy item of clothing I pulled on over my pajamas is his sweatshirt, and I cross my arms over my chest. But he doesn’t seem to have noticed that, either. “So, um, why—?”
He speaks at the same time. “I needed—” I think for just a moment that the next word will be you, but before it leaves his lips, he clips it off, shakes his head, and says instead, “I needed someone to talk to.”
I gesture toward the couch and then hurry to it first to sweep up an armful of debris and transfer it to the ottoman so there’s somewhere for him to sit.
Thanks to the tall windows, the light in the living area is brighter than by the door, and now there’s no escaping the fact that he looks like hell. “Are you all right?” I ask.
The fact that he has to think about his answer is more unsettling still.
“I, um … not exactly. Last night, I uh …”
At precisely that moment, I become aware of a noise.
Mrs. Merriweather is entering our apartment though the back stairwell.
I know it has to be her, because the stairs lead from the back of her shop to an otherwise useless door between our kitchen and bathroom, and she is the only one with a key.
And I also know it must be an emergency, because in four years, she’s never once used it.
“Now what?” I mutter, scrambling to my feet again. When it rains, it pours.
The door swings open before I reach it. “Oh, you are here,” Mrs. Merriweather says, looking bewildered. “I did try to call first, dear. Three times.”
I glance around, but of course my phone is in the other room. “Sorry, Mrs. M. I, uh, I guess I didn’t hear it.”
“I thought maybe you’d left for the holidays.
That’s why I let myself in,” she explains.
“Brr. They say heat rises, but it’s not much warmer up here, is it?
There’s a burst pipe in the radiator downstairs.
Made quite a mess, and now they’ve had to shut off the water to the building.
These old fixtures—the landlord says he can’t get the part to fix it for weeks.
Do you have somewhere else you can stay? ”
My first thought is my parents’ house in St. Paul, but I’m sure they will have everything winterized, so the pipes don’t freeze while they’re away. As I’m mentally searching for an alternative, Fisher steps up behind me. “She can stay at my place.”
Stunned, I glance back and up at him.
“What about your cat?” Mrs. Merriweather asks, dropping her voice to a whisper on the word cat, as if the landlord might hear it from wherever he is. Surely somewhere warmer than here.
“He’s welcome too,” Fisher says.
“Is this your new boyfriend, dear?” Mrs. Merriweather asks, sizing him up without waiting for my answer. I guess she must like what she sees, because her next words are, “Then that’s all settled. Good. I’ve been worried. Do you want my help getting things sorted?”
“It’s kind of you to offer,” I tell her—though the words are directed at both of them, really. “But I’ll manage.” Mentally, I’m still searching for another place to go.
Once she’s gone out the way she came, I turn to Fisher. “Thank you. But until I’ve had more time to work out how I feel about yesterday’s little revelation, I don’t think us living together in your six-bedroom-but-only-one-bed house is such a good idea.”
“It’ll be fine,” he insists as he drops onto the couch again. “I won’t be there. I’m leaving in an hour, in fact.”
As I approach the place where he’s sitting, I’m struck again by the weariness behind his eyes. “Why? What happened?”
By now, I know this visit has nothing to do with what we discussed last night.
“My, um—” He pauses, then has to press his lips together and swallow before he can continue. “My dad is in the hospital. It’s his heart.”
For some reason, the memory of that single red heart emoji pops into my mind. Even though I’ll probably never know what he meant by it, and I do know I dodged a bullet when I hesitated over sending one back, for some reason I suddenly regret not doing it.
“Oh, my God, I’m so sorry.” I touch his hand where it’s resting on the couch cushion. His fingers are still cold from the walk across town, but I don’t pull away when he grips my hand and squeezes. “Is he … OK?”
“He’s stable. My mom called me at two thirty this morning from the ER, and I stayed on the phone with her until just a little while ago; I guess they’d been there most of the evening already.
And I mean, there’ve been plenty of warning signs this could happen.
The doctor wanted to do a less invasive procedure last year.
But my dad insisted on waiting until things were a little slower at work.
Now he’s scheduled for major surgery tomorrow morning. ”
“I’m so sorry,” I tell him again, because really, what else is there to say? “Do you need someone to drive you to the airport?”
He shakes his head. “This is all so unpredictable, I think it would be best if I drove myself. I really have no idea when I’ll be back.”
And even though he says when, I hear the shadow of if behind it.
I remember what he once said about finishing his degree remotely.
There are so many new variables at play, including whether the timeline for joining his father’s company has now been drastically accelerated; it’s not difficult to imagine him deciding never to return to Grantham.
He straightens his leg to reach into his pocket, removes a ring of keys, and takes off an old-fashioned-looking brass key. When he holds that key out to me, I don’t immediately take it from him.
“I know I fucked up, Elle,” he says, pressing the key into my hand, which is lying right where he released it, slack on the couch between us.
“But you need somewhere to stay. Let me do this for you.” His eyes scan my face, like he’s hoping to glean from my expression the right words to say. “It doesn’t have to mean anything.”
Unless we want it to.
No, no, no. Haven’t we covered that ground already?
Wanting isn’t enough. Wanting is what got us in trouble in the first place.
“All right,” I say.
He tugs me closer with our joined hands and presses a soft kiss against my forehead, just as he did once before.
Except this time, he’s the one seeking comfort.
He smells of black coffee, and the unshaved whiskers around his mouth prickle my skin, but somehow, that only makes the moment more …
real. “Thank you,” he murmurs, leaving his lips there long enough to draw one slow breath, like he’s absorbing my calm instead of the other way around.
Eventually he pulls away and stands up in one motion. “I should go. Just come over whenever you’re ready. That key opens the back door, too, and you can park your car in the carriage house. I’ll, um, I’ll update you about my dad. If you care.”
Instinctively, I want to reassure him that everything will be all right, except of course I have no way of knowing that’s true in his father’s case, and after last night’s ruminations on hope, very little faith in the idea in general. All I can do is nod.
After he’s gone, I text Cassie to let her know the situation, pack a bag, and wrangle the cat into his carrier. I wait to go to his house until I’m sure he’s already left for the airport. I wonder whether the Davis family owns a private plane.
The back door opens into a large, well-organized mud room, with hooks for coats and places for shoes. Beyond it lies the kitchen, spotless and sparkling, not a thing out of place … except for a sugar bowl sitting in the middle of the counter near the fancy coffee maker.
I’ve never seen it before, but it only takes me a moment to understand: Fisher didn’t want me to have to hunt for it. He knows I take my coffee sweet.
It’s just ordinary thoughtfulness, but it feels like a lot.
Mostly because he had so many other things to think about before he left.
And also, I suppose, because everyone I know is too drained to think about others much at all.
Grad school is an endless succession of lessons in how to survive on little and expect even less.