My cheeks burn in embarrassment and I find myself catching a hold of his hand, squeezing.
“I’m sorry, it’s the curious part of me. I’ve made a lot of assumptions when it comes to you and then am surprised to find I don’t actually know much about you,” I say.
Matthew blows out a breath, “I’m happy that you’re curious about me. I want you to get to know me better. I’ll try to be more obliging with your questions in the future if you try and voice them in a way that is more imploring and less in disbelief that this rickety contraption can look at something and find it beautiful.”
Matthew moves his thumb in circles on my hand and raises his eyes to mine for a significant moment; my breath catches at the sensation, but Matthew continues.
“Back to the photography; I thought you already had a hobby. I’d listen to you play piano for hours. It was something I looked forward to.”
So many emotions at that. Joy at the memory of playing, frustration at the circumstances around it, and pleasure that Matthew had enjoyed it. He really didn’t know?
“I never played when my dad was home— it made him unhappy. You know my mother was a musician, the piano was hers. Dad locked it after she died. Those afternoons you heard would have been ones where I picked the lock.”
Matthew’s brows knit and he dips his chin.
“Well, your photography is beautiful. Maybe as enchanting as your music.”
My throat constricts with his anger on his behalf, and his compliments. I don’t share either skill with others very often. I shake my head. “Thank you. Now, I’m going to get dressed for work and you should probably do the same.”
I let my eyes glide over his tempting sweatpants one last time before retreating to my room.
✽✽✽
When I sit down to work at my desk, the whirlwind taking up space in my mind since I woke up this morning to the beautiful, invited, intruder finally stills. The silence is a drastic departure from the loud revving of Matthew’s car.
Usually I would have had a driver take me to work but since my new friend always drives, he insisted he chauffeur me while I did my best not to ask questions about his interest in flashy cars and the ability to drive. Matthew seems to legitimately enjoy his car and driving. I don’t know the first thing about cars and Dad hadn’t been interested in them either. Where had this interest come from?
A couple stacks of folders already crowd my desk. Delila has been busy with my requests from yesterday. The R&D team I head is capable of handling most things on their own, so I’d been able to get through most of my backlog yesterday. The only things that had been left on my docket were items that only I can sign off on or had to keep apprised of. There were a few memos that I hadn’t been able to get to until today, detailing projects that Matthew had approved himself to keep them from being delayed on my behalf; it’s surprising that his actions don’t bother me.
The interference would have bothered me yesterday. I would have ridden the elevator, all prickly with anger, and given the micromanaging android a piece of my mind. Today, I just scan the projects, review them to ensure that they should have left the department, and conclude that Matthew’s actions weren’t inappropriate for the situation. It had only taken a day for Matthew to soften me up and I don’t know what to think of that.
A small, paranoid part of me wonders if that’s the big secret around Matthew’s motives for being friendly. Lull me into complacency. It sounded so reasonable when I’d been in his office yesterday, but in the short time I’ve spent with him I’m getting a better picture of his personality.
That picture is probably what tempers my actions toward him. It’s harder to be a bitch to someone you know, instead of the placeholder that you have of them in your mind. The strings of my emotions start to tangle whenever Matthew is involved. Even without factoring my lust into the equation, that man ties me in knots.
My phone buzzes and I check it to see a text message from Jim. A general, flirty text as a response to the text I’d sent him last night. The message only hooks my attention because of the way talking to him made me feel so normal. I hesitate a breath before sending a text back. It’s shitty to use flirting with Jim to avoid the thoughts Matthew inspires but the most important thing for me is to stay in control. Even if Matthew is a person, I can’t have feelings for him beyond friendship.
After finally clearing the buildup from my absence, I look at the team assignments with an alternative purpose. I pull my super-secret project up on my computer. The folder hasn’t been opened for more than half a year. After Dad died, my emotional and mental state made even my day-to-day tasks too monumental to accomplish, never mind putting in the extra hours a passion project would require.
The energy required, paired with the way Dad had reacted to the concept when I’d first floated the idea, had kept the folder on my computer closed. His reaction had been… the memory is a sharp one that I try to dull with others. Memories that show Dad in a more positive light.
If I let myself revisit his ugly sneering over the project that had held my heart together, I could very easily cut the memory of Dad to ribbons. I loved him. But if I don’t curate my memories from the pain he caused me, I could easily hate him too.
My project is fueled by the memory of the only person with whom my memories never cut. Sean Haddell had been my best friend. Fellow outcast of our peers. I was ostracized for the mental illness that I couldn’t always hide, and he was for the physical illness that would never go away. He was the effusive, energetic partner to my subdued calm.
We had traveled the roller coaster of illness together. Some months riding high with symptoms subsiding, other months giving way to despair, but we had each other so there was always hope. Sean and I went to the same college and roomed together. Everyone thought we were a couple but that had never been the kind of love between us. We were a pair of fools entwining strings of hope that the future would bring something brighter.
I look at Sean in the hospital bed and try not to let myself cry in front of him. It helps that I’m wearing a surgical mask; no one is taking any chances of getting him sick before surgery. The mask let me pretend that Sean doesn’t know how scared I am.
“Don’t look at me like that Charlie.” Sean smiled at me. “This is a good thing, it’s what we’ve been hoping for.”
We had been hoping for a call for the last two years. It’s all we could do every time Sean had to miss classes or had to be hospitalized. Hope. Then, last night, we got the call. Sean will get his lung transplant.
“I know, I’m just… I’m so worried.”
“It will be fine. The doctors know what they’re doing. Pretty soon I’ll be able to go jogging with you. We should plan to hike something big. Like the Appalachian Trail or something wild like that.”
I laugh wetly; we’ve never hiked before. “Or you can finally get your nurse to go out on a date with you.”
Sean points at me. “I like your idea better.”
The lung transplant had gone well, and everything appeared as if it was going to finally work out. The memories of that time were bright and cheery.
The health relapse that followed had been quick and devastating. Sean was gone and I was left alone to hope, weak threads trying to hold up all the ideals we had held together. I knotted those threads until I could try to find a purpose for it all, some underlying reason that the best man I’d ever known would now be dead. I came up with nothing. Instead, I became determined to produce a purpose. If something good could come from this, maybe Sean wouldn’t have died in vain.