Love and Other Words(56)

now

thursday, november 23

E

lliot’s building is narrow, a faded turquoise stucco, and must have once been a beautiful Victorian before it was sloppily chopped up into four cramped apartments.

The front door opens to a narrow hall on the right and a steep flight of steps leading to the upstairs apartments. Elliot lives in number four. Upstairs and to the right, he said. Each stair squeaks beneath my boots.

His front door is flat brown, and before it is a thin doormat with the Dickinson quote The soul should always stand ajar.

I lift my fist and knock.

Is it possible I recognize the weight of his footsteps and the rhythm of his walk? Or is it that I know he’s the only one inside – because I’m early? Either way, my pulse accelerates so that by the time he turns the knob and swings the door open, I feel light-headed.

Sometime in the past decade, Elliot figured out how to manage his hair and dress himself. He wears black jeans and a well-loved – either honestly or artificially – dark denim shirt rolled to his elbows. His feet are bare.

Bare feet. Elliot’s apartment. Inside there somewhere is Elliot’s bed.

If I’m not careful, I won’t even go home tonight.

Holy shit, I’m a mess.

“Macy,” he says, pulling me into a hug and drawing me inside with one arm around my shoulders. When he moves away, shutting the door behind me, the smile I see on his face could power a small city. “You’re here. You’re in my apartment!”

Bending, he kisses my cheek, chastely. “Your face is so cold!”

“I walked from BART. It’s chilly outside.” Heat radiates from the point where his lips pressed against my skin, and I put down the pie I brought so I can shrug out of my jacket.

He pulls back a little, surprised. “You didn’t drive?”

“I’m not a fan of cars,” I say, smiling.

He takes my coat, quiet at this. “I could have picked you up.”

Pressing a palm to his chest, I whisper, “You live six blocks from the station. I’m fine.”

“I’m sorry, I’m nervous.” He shakes his shoulders a little, as if loosening up. “I’m going to try to be cool about this – about tonight. I will probably fail.”

I laugh, handing him the pecan pie I bought this morning. “It’s not your mom’s recipe, sadly. Are they coming down?”

He shakes his head and then tilts it, beckoning me deeper inside. I follow him through a tiny living room into an even tinier kitchen. “They’re going over to Andreas’s future in-laws’ place up in Mendocino. We didn’t want the entire Petropoulos clan to descend on them; his fiancée, Else, is an only child and I don’t think they’d know what to do with all of us. It’s just Mom, Dad, Andreas, and Alex headed up there.”

“Who’s coming today?” I ask, watching him slide the pie onto the counter. He’s managed to set up everything he needs in the small space, and it’s meticulous despite the size.

Elliot turns, leaning back against the counter, gripping it gently. The shirt stretches across his chest, spreading open at the collar, revealing the edge of his collarbone, the hint of chest hair. My heart punches me from the inside.

“My friend Desmond,” he says, and reaches one hand to scratch his chin. “And Rachel.”

I freeze, staring wide-eyed at him. Instinctively I look down to what I’m wearing and then back up at him.

“Rachel is coming?”

He nods, watching me carefully. “Will that make you uncomfortable?”

I’m trying not to react too much outwardly, but I feel my brows pulling down, setting a frown on my forehead. “I don’t think so?”

“That sounds an awful lot like a question,” he says quietly. Pushing off the counter, he takes two steps over to me. “I should have mentioned that. She doesn’t have local family. Or… very many local friends.”

I look around the room we’re standing in. “Did she live here with you?”

“No,” he says. “But she stayed here a fair amount.”

Oh. I look at the stove and see images of this unknown Rachel standing there, scrambling eggs in her underwear while Elliot showered. I picture him pouring coffee for her after, kissing her bare, pale shoulder. I wonder if this burning jealousy is how he felt seeing me with Sean and knowing I slept in the same bed as he did, let him touch me in ways Elliot had only started to.

Looking up at him, I say, “I’m trying not to have a fit about your ex-girlfriend coming over today.”

Elliot lifts one shoulder. “I understand. I might not have planned this so well.”

“It wasn’t intentional to have us both here to make me feel… jealous? Not even a little?”

“I swear it wasn’t.”

One look at his face, and I believe him. Elliot has occasionally been oblivious about how other girls in his life affected me, but he’s not cruel. Nodding, I look down at the floor. “Does she know who I am?”

“Yes.”

Another thought occurs to me. “Does she know I’ll be here?”

He hesitates, and guilt spreads in a flush up his neck. “Yes.”

“So she knew, but I didn’t? Elliot, seriously?”

He lifts a hand, scratching the top of his head. “I wanted you to come.” His eyes go warm and soft, the way they do when he feels urgent about something. “I really, really wanted you to come. And I didn’t want her to be alone today. But I worried if I told you that you’d back out.”