This chapter is told in Syed POV. Set the morning after we saw Syed troubled on the bench and Christian made a decision.
My empty fingers wrap the familiar cold handle of the door and I yank my body through the waiting space, physically jolt my feeble mind back to daily labour, back to sanity.
You take yourself to him and you stand outside his door. What was it you were expecting when your thumb pressed the buzzer and you held your breath to hear him there. What did you think, he'd be sitting waiting, placed exactly where you had left him months before. And what if he were, what you would have possibly done with him.
The smallest breath of life ago I let myself fall back there.
You knew what you were doing, you didn't sit because your legs were drained and you needed to rest your bones. You needed him. It is always him. Part of you did not know what you would do if he did not walk through the noise and out the door; part of you did not know what you would do if he did.
The mad hours are over, I shake myself. Through the snap of the door, I lose him, I re-gain myself. The man I need to be is here when he is not.
Calmly, beautifully, he stands there.
"Hey," he says with his gentle smile. It traps the life in my gasping lungs.
"Hi," I hear myself speak. "What are you doing here?"
His perfection is here to mock me, it can only be.
"Jane asked me to cover." As if to soothe my nerves, he shows me his own; eyes dart down and hands rub blue cloth. "Plus, you know, I miss the apron."
"Of course," I gain breath with a laugh. No one will ever make my heart beat faster; no one will ever put me more at ease.
"About the other night...," he starts.
"It was nothing," I stop him.
"Yeah," he says, though I am too aware he has yet again seen through the words I give him. In a life of make believe it is he who sees through it all, who without a thought, sees through me.
"It's just...", he speaks quiet. "...if it was something...you could tell me." In a life dedicated to delusion, it comes to nothing with just one look. His eyes tell me I am pretending, and I watch as my fake world, meticulous in its construction, crumbles in his sight.
"Yeah well...there's nothing to tell," the script is followed regardless.
"But if there was...", and with insistent moves closer, he takes the safety of our distance from me. "...you could." I feel his piercing eyes warm me and he tempts me with his care. "I meant what I said. You can talk to me Sy."
I look back at him and I am fully aware I stand so weak, one tug of my strings and I would be crying at his feet. One word of comfort, the slightest touch, I warn myself of just how little it would take for him to drag me from this place.
"What is this then? Comfort?"
"Syed..."
"Well thank you very much but I've got no use for it. I never needed your comfort before Christian and I don't need it now."
...
I love the gentle sound, a little hum, lazy and low and caught on a breath, the hum of him.
It is sound my mind would consume through every hour if I were to let it...if this were life. If life was laying in hushed darkness and used sheets and the inescapable luxury of his warmth, I would float away in a willing trance.
I tilt my head over the mount of strong shoulder bone to see the red tinge of minutes we have left. It is early still, no alarm will call for a hand full of hours but that a timer exists is cruelty enough. The silent pound of the second hand tick drags my head to where I must return, that I must return at all.
I am back with him with his smallest stretch, his head delving into pillow and pressed lips freeing a murmured purr.
The gentle shut of his sleeping lids, the chest rise and fall of shallow breath, he is peace, he is calm, and I know it is mine to share.
I rest my head into the nuck of moulding chest and return myself to fill the space his body tells mine it was made to make. Nose nuzzling the velvet heat of his skin, I ground myself in the calming murmur of his heart, still racing heavy head with the soothing drum of its familiar beat.
Through the senses of shuffling dreams his arms stretch to bind waiting waist, large finger tips spread to protect fragile back and I am wrapped in his offering of tender strength.
...
"How about we just call it conversation then, you know, talking, like people do."
"Except there's nothing to talk about."
"Nothing, huh?" he asks in that way, like he knows the answer.
"Well we could try the weather, the price of curry, but other than that no, not a thing."
"Except it wasn't the forecast or Masala Queen's new menu that was on your mind last night was it?" His eye lids lower in comfort, along with his quietening voice. "Sitting on a bench outside a pub at 1am, that isn't you Syed."
I force myself to feel anger; because he dares say that he knows me, because he thinks that I need him, because he feels that I am his...because he is right.
"You don't know a thing about me."
"Really?" He sweeps the shrinking distance from us. "I think I know you pretty well."
I dip my confessing eyes to avoid his sight; the fix will only make me weak.
"I know when you need help, the last thing you'll ever do is let yourself take it. I know when you're scared, you shut me out. I know whenever you needed me..."
"Christian..."
"...I'd be there."
And for a second I let myself feel just how much I need him.
"I'm married," I tell myself, as if saying the words enough will shock my mind into sense.
"It doesn't mean you can't talk to me. I'm still your friend Syed."
I need him too much to let him near.
"Except we're not friends Christian," I say, because I can't be. "We never were."
...
"Here. Drink this."
I place the little comfort I can give to him into fragile open hands, and wrap myself in the empty space his curled body sits without.
"Why do I think this isn't whiskey?" his eyebrow raises with a sulk.
"Coco," I instruct, the grey laced lines under sunken blue bled eyes taking my pausing sight. "It'll help you sleep."
"I'd prefer whiskey."
"Well you're under supervision so today we're trying good old fashioned warm milk."
"Are we in the Walton's?"
My smile breaks out and I hear myself laugh. That laugh, the sound, the ease that only he can build. I beam as I see his grin and feel his humoured ease join my own.
With the cruelty of nothingness, a sharp sound rips the air. Harmless mundane noise shatters his smile and I watch him flinch.
"It's okay," I soothe, with the folding of fingers into his hand. "It was just a car horn," I stroke my thumb calmly on the flesh of his wrist. "You're okay."
"No, no I'm really not." He drags a hand over a shaking head. "This is just pathetic. I'm sorry."
"Don't even think that. It isn't and you don't need to be. Ever." He looks back at me as if I gave him what he needs. "Let's watch something," I say, reaching for the papered guide. "I fancy a film."
"It's been hours already. You should get back."
"I'm comfy here thanks," I say, squashing down into comfort piled cushions.
"They'll be wondering where you are," he persists.
"That doesn't matter."
...
"We weren't friends?" he echoes with confidence, deathly low.
I stand silent, not able to bring myself to tell either of us another lie.
Knowing I am falling, his body moves, no space left between our flesh.
"I don't suppose we were lovers either."
Fire lit pin pricks flicker crimson heat across my cheeks. My chest struggles for its next breath, consumed by lustful memory laced blush.
Bashful eyes try to dip but his determined stare holds me in place.
"Did you share my bed for six months?" The words ghosts from his tempting lips. "Just so I'm clear on what was real."