24. Chapter 24 #2
Of course. His car is full of him. With his phone carelessly tucked in the center console, and music playing from a group he liked in college.
I stare at my lap. I don't know if our past is conducive to friendship today, but I'm crossing my fingers. At the end of the day, who knows where I'll end up with Dom, his friends, or beyond. Trying to rebuild your life as a grown up sucks.
He clears his throat. "Did you have fun?"
"The evening was amazing. I'm not into cooking shows, but Ames was great. So warm and approachable. I think the show will be a hit."
"Yeah, I agree."
"You're really lucky. Your friends are incredible. You have something special with them."
He gets quiet. I stare at his profile.
He squeezes the steering wheel on and off. "I know."
"I never had that. Never have. Moving around so much growing up. As an adult, too." My brow wrinkles. "I stayed the longest in London with Henry but even during that time, I don't think I made friends or built a family like you have made for yourself."
"I thought you're fine with your parents. Your siblings."
I shrug. "I love them and they love me, and they're my family— how I came to be in this world.
But you know how it was. How it is. I barely spent time with some of my siblings growing up.
We didn't have a home. I know I'm incredibly privileged that I can say I had houses to go to, to spend time in, to travel freely to.
And it's also true that it made me… rootless.
Disconnected even from the people who I meant to connect with most deeply.
Maybe that's why I'm trying so hard to avoid conflict with them. I don't want to have them even less."
"Mari," he sighs.
"I know. I know. I'm sorry. I'm in a contemplative mood."
"Don't apologize."
"Is it possible to be nostalgic of things you've never had? Seeing your friends was such a wake up call, in a way."
"Yeah. Same."
"Yeah?" I gaze at him.
The windshield wipers work hard as he drives through the darkened city. No one walks on the streets, with a mix of the late hour and the weather keeping people in their homes.
He nods. "They're so in love it's hard not to think about love. Connection. That village feeling."
"But you have your village."
He nods again, but it seems different somehow.
"And I had love, once," he says in a low, low voice.
He doesn't look at me, but I don't need to see his eyes to understand. He's been considering love, friendship, and community all night. Despite how good he's always been at those things.
Meanwhile, I've never been good at relationships. Of any kind. To this day, I can't wrap my head around how Dom and I ended up falling in love, when we knew it would end.
"Remember our first kiss?" I ask.
"Of course."
We went for coffee then he walked me to my condo.
We didn't want to stop talking, so we stayed outside at the park in front of my building.
The chat lasted through the evening and into the night.
Until there were no cars passing by, and most people made it home.
He could have pushed to get an invite into my place but didn't. When I finally admitted I should be in bed, he walked me to the building door and gave me a gentle, sweet kiss.
Nothing had ever tasted as good as his tongue against mine. His smell bathed my mind. For as long as his lips pressed mine, life didn't feel like a battle. It felt like a promise. I had never experienced a kiss like that before.
"Let's do that again," he said that night.
We did. Coffee dates, walking dates, and study dates at the library. Such a sweet, gentle way to get to know each other, making room for each others' million responsibilities, and misusing the study rooms whenever running to one of our rooms wasn't possible.
My chest feels raw, thinking of how easily I gave my heart to him.
I stare out the windshield. "I don't think I could be that free again, that reckless, knowing what I know today.
After everything you and I went through, and my marriage and just life I guess.
So when I look at your friends I see the stark difference in the choices they've made.
They're willing to do anything for what they feel, when I have never done the same.
I think it means I've believed my parents the whole time— about everything.
I've put love at the bottom of the list of things I want to fight for.
Except I know what it cost me back in college and I don't think I want to pay that price again. So I guess I can't ever just… fall."
He sighs. At the red light, he drops his head back to the headrest.
"Jesus, Mariana." He shakes his head, eyes straight forward to the road. "With the rain drying in your hair, your skin, your clothes… I can smell you ten different ways from here. Your shampoo. Your perfume. Hell, your moisturizer. I don't know."
"And?"
"I didn't think it would ever happen again."
"And?" I repeat, in a way I hope comes across as curiosity.
Opening your heart isn't a time to be a brat.
He frowns at me. "Life has a way of surprising us. I think that's how my friends see it. They were willing to be surprised by love. Regardless of the risk."
I take a deep breath. That's such an opposite take from mine, or my family's.
To live like that feels too unlikely. I know how hard it is when it's gone, and how unlikely it is to show up in the first place.
Who would put their hopes in it? I know it won't help me find the kind of success that would let me breathe easy, because I finally have something to point to and say, hey, I can succeed too.
"Maybe I'm in my pessimistic era," I say. "But I really don't think it's going to happen any time soon, if at all."
Light goes green.
"I get it," he says, eyes on the road again. "It happened once already, right? Lightning doesn't strike twice."
"Even if you stand outside in a thunderstorm crossing your fingers."
He snorts. "That's why we'll go out and have fun without hopes of a future. We're in the era of disillusioned dating. Keeping it light, not seeking love."
"I'll dance in the rain." I sigh. "But I don't plan to go out there with a kite, a string, and a key."
He chuckles. I smile.
He parks the car in front of my building and turns off the engine. Rain falls hard on the roof, filling the car with a drumming noise. I shift on my seat to stare at him better.
"I really loved you." His voice resounds with the same wistful tone I've heard in my head all night. "So much. But with everything… The past has to stay in the past. And I don't have a lot of hope in the future, so this is it."
"I really loved you too," I whisper. "I don't see that happening again. How could it?"
He finally gazes at me. "Yeah. That's not the issue we're having, is it?"