Chapter 3 – The Mysterious Suitcase
Howdy! This was certainly a difficult chapter for me, it's still a little shorter than I wanted it to be but ah well. Better something than nothing at all! It's exam period at the mo, so I probably shouldn't be writing at all :P. Good news is I'll be able to update after wednesday – my last exam (Eeek!)
I woke up on the day of Max's arrival, still worried about what he thought of me. I'd imagined a million different ways our reunion could go, most of them negative. The rest were awkward at best. Mason and Alex certainly hadn't helped improve my mood; they'd been arguing most of the night at top volume. I hadn't heard anything being smashed which was a relief. I'd usually walk into the living room to see the lamp broken. Again.
Instead, that morning I walked into the living room to find a full suitcase on the floor. Automatically I thought the worst, after hearing Alex and Mason's heated argument last night, a thought struck me that maybe it was their last one. But who was leaving? Mason or Alex?
Rushing around the apartment to find one of them, I ran into Mason coming out of the bathroom, still in a towel. He looked a little confused and I realised I must have looked a little strange, running around the apartment, wide eyed and desperately looking for anyone. So I tried to make my next question as casual as possible, to deflect suspicion, "Er.. who's suitcase is that in the living room?"
"Oh, that's Max's. He got here earlier this morning. I thought that would have woken you up." I was trying to maintain eye contact with Mason and focus on the words coming out of his mouth, though it was hard to when he was practically half naked. "He's in the spare room now if you want to see him, though he may be asleep." My mind suddenly pieced together what he had said and I was surprised to find myself feeling nervous about seeing Max again.
Walking up to the spare room, I could feel my heart thumping quicker. I tried to tell myself to relax, that he wasn't going to hate me. He probably doesn't even remember. But that little voice in the back of my mind was nagging at me, telling me that he's going to despise me. By the time I reached the spare room I'd got myself so worked up that I had to stop and take a few breaths. Really, where had this irrational worry come from? It was just Max. Goofy, immature, sweet Max who wouldn't hurt a fly.
I was hovering outside for a while, working up the nerve to knock on the door. Eventually I stood facing the door and took a breath when it opened. Max stood right in front of me. Feeling awkward I just froze up. Here was a guy I hadn't seen in years, the last time being a painful experience for both of us, and I had made our meeting ten times more awkward than it could have been just by being my usual hesitant self.
It seemed as though we were standing there forever, my mind trying to calculate what to say as he regarded me with a confused expression plastered on his face. "Hey Harper" he greeted me, looking thoroughly amused; at which point I realised how short the awkward silence had been even though it seemed to drag on forever when I was actually in it. Then he did something that completely caught me off guard; he hugged me. I was expecting something like a dirty look or a snide comment, definitely not this! When he pulled away I noticed how tall he was, he's certainly not the same sixteen year old I turned down all those years ago.
We did the whole polite small talk routine, both avoiding topics we didn't want to discuss. For him it was becoming recently unemployed, for me it was the awkward goodbye when we were younger. Who knows, maybe he was avoiding that topic too. Though while we were chit-chatting I zoned out a few times just thinking about how much he'd changed: his hair was a bit longer and wavier; he'd gotten skinnier, I thought he couldn't have gotten any more skinny; he was looking a lot more mature, he obviously hadn't shaved in the past couple of days and had a shadow of stubble across the lower half of his face; and, on the whole, he'd gotten way more attractive, y'know in a completely objective way.
Max had walked back into the spare room and opened his suitcase, I followed and had a nosey look around. When the suitcase opened I saw it was stuffed full of a random assortment of objects; from what I could see he had packed an empty fishbowl, one tennis racket, a pogo stick and other strange items. I laughed and asked what they were all for. "Oh, just the essentials" he replied nonchalantly. I didn't question him this time, feeling reassured that he was still the same Max.
After the awkward small talk routine had ended, we were able to banter and joke with each other just like we always had. In a way, it was like the years we hadn't spoken to each other just disappeared.