Everything I Had Misunderstood

Julian waited thirteen days before I agreed to see him.

He would probably have said he waited as long as I needed. That sounded better, and Julian had always been good at making inconvenient facts look presentable.

For once, though, he hadn’t tried to hurry me.

He sent the account I asked for. He answered my questions. He stayed away while I changed the lock, followed up on the injuries, and worked out which parts of my anger belonged to which memory.

Being glad he was alive didn’t make everything else disappear.

Neither did being angry stop me from noticing that my phone had become unusually quiet.

On the morning of the thirteenth day, I sent him the name of a café and a time. His reply arrived before I had put the phone down.

I’ll be there.

I read it, locked the screen, and went back to choosing a shirt.

Then I chose a different one, because the first looked like I had made an effort.

***

He was waiting outside when I arrived.

I saw him from the opposite pavement: one hand in his coat pocket, the other holding his phone. He checked the screen, looked up the street, then checked again.

I had spent years believing Julian appeared wherever I happened to be. Apparently, there had been waiting involved.

He saw me across the road.

The change in his face was small, but I caught it. His shoulders loosened. He put the phone away without finishing whatever he had been doing.

That pleased me.

I decided it was because nobody enjoyed being kept waiting, and it was satisfying to know he had worried about it.

“You look relieved,” I said when I reached him.

“I wasn’t certain you’d come.”

“I said I would.”

He opened the café door and stood aside. “I still wanted to see you.”

I went in before he could watch me find an answer.

***

I bought my own coffee.

Julian found us a table beside the window, with enough room between it and the next one that we wouldn’t have to lower our voices every time I said something embarrassing.

He remembered I didn’t like sitting with my back to the door.

I noticed that now.

A month earlier, I would have assumed he wanted the better view.

We talked about work at first. He asked about a project I had mentioned before the accident, including the deadline I had forgotten telling him.

I answered while stirring my coffee long after the sugar had dissolved.

Then I put the spoon down.

“The extra lunches in college,” I said. “How often did you actually order too much?”

Julian looked at me over his cup.

“Not often.”

I thought of the sandwiches placed beside my textbooks, the second coffee he claimed had arrived by mistake, the containers he handed me whenever I announced that I was too busy to go downstairs.

At the time, I had congratulated myself on benefiting from his inability to estimate portions.

Apparently, I had been eating my way through a confession.

“Were the errands an excuse, too?”

“Some of them. I liked knowing you’d come back.”

He said it without a smile.

That made it harder to turn into a joke.

I glanced toward the window. People walked along the river with takeaway cups and dogs, conducting lives that presumably didn’t require reassessing every free sandwich they had accepted at nineteen.

I had been twenty-one when we met, but Julian had always made me feel younger by acting as though he alone understood sensible footwear.

I remembered his first payment arriving on my phone.

His pleased expression when I returned with the package.

The way he lingered in my doorway afterward, asking questions he didn’t seem to need answered.

Perhaps I hadn’t been nearly as good at reading him as I thought.

***

When I asked about the wet bedding, his fingers tightened around the cup.

He didn’t pretend the question was unexpected.

“I wanted you in my room,” he said.

“I understood that part when I caught you paying Owen.”

Julian looked down briefly, then met my eyes.

“I liked you. I wanted to kiss you, and I was afraid you’d laugh if I asked.”

I had prepared for an evasive answer.

The direct one left me with nothing ready.

For a moment, I looked at his mouth.

Then I noticed myself doing it and reached for my coffee, which was no longer hot enough to justify the length of time I spent drinking.

Julian wanted to kiss me.

Had wanted to.

For years.

I had dated women. I liked women. Nothing about those experiences had felt mistaken or incomplete.

Until that afternoon, being attracted to a man had seemed like something that happened to other people.

Yet the thought of Julian wanting me didn’t make me uncomfortable in the way I expected.

It made me warm.

It made me want to know when, and how often, and whether he had thought about it while I was sitting beside him complaining about assignments.

That seemed dangerously close to encouraging him.

“So you involved two roommates and a wet towel.”

“It was a terrible decision.”

“You made it three times.”

“I know.”

I studied the river through the window.

I had been on dates with women. I had liked them, kissed them, and occasionally made enough of a fool of myself that Miles still brought up the stories.

Nothing about that part of my life had felt false.

But I had never sat across from a man who told me he wanted to kiss me and felt this particular mixture of alarm and pleasure.

That seemed like something I should examine privately, preferably with nobody watching my face.

“Did Ben and Owen know?” I asked.

“They knew I liked you.”

I closed my eyes briefly.

“They spent years calling us an old married couple.”

“I remember.”

“And I kept telling them they were idiots.”

“They were still idiots.”

“Correct idiots. That’s much harder to tolerate.”

Julian gave a quiet laugh, then watched my face to see whether it was welcome.

I found myself smiling before I intended to.

“That doesn’t mean what you did was fine,” I said.

“I’m not taking it that way.”

“Some parts are funny now. Some parts still make me angry.”

“You don’t have to make them all feel the same.”

That answer stayed with me.

I remembered his narrow bed, the spare pillow, the coffee he had made in the morning. I also remembered standing in my doorway, furious, while Owen held the evidence.

I could keep both versions of the memory.

Neither required me to pretend the other hadn’t happened.

***

We walked after the coffee.

Julian took the side nearest the road without making a performance of it. When a cyclist passed too close, he moved behind me rather than pulling me out of the way.

I noticed that now.

I also noticed his hand disappearing into his coat pocket afterward.

The river wind caught the end of my scarf.

My scarf, finally back around my neck.

He had returned it in a paper bag, neatly folded. I had put it on before leaving home and told myself it was simply the warmest one I owned.

“Why were you wearing this?” I asked.

Julian glanced at it.

“Because I missed you.”

I looked at him instead of the pavement and caught my shoe on an uneven edge.

His hand steadied my elbow.

For a second, we stopped close together. His fingers were warm through my sleeve, and his face had lost its usual faint amusement.

He waited until I had my balance before letting go.

I wanted to accuse him of saying things deliberately to make me stumble.

Unfortunately, that would reveal how well they were working.

Instead, I resumed walking with more attention to the ground.

The absence of his hand felt strangely noticeable.

***

In the days afterward, I began finding Julian everywhere without him needing to appear.

He turned up in memories.

The umbrella he carried over both of us while insisting I walked too slowly.

The restaurant near my office where he claimed to be meeting someone who never arrived.

The time he criticized my frozen potatoes and I bought another bag to annoy him.

When I mentioned that last incident during our next meeting, he admitted he had been trying to invite me to dinner.

I laughed so hard that he had to wait before continuing.

For years, I had mistaken a badly phrased invitation for a nutritional intervention.

Julian let me enjoy that discovery. He didn’t use it to suggest I had secretly understood him all along.

That mattered.

I hadn’t understood.

I was only beginning to.

***

I took him furniture shopping because he knew how to inspect a frame and because I refused to buy another couch that might collapse during an emotional event.

He came without trying to change my budget.

At the blue couch I liked, he crouched to check the construction, pressed against the back, and sat down with the concentration of a man assessing a bridge.

I stood beside him, watching.

His sweater stretched across his shoulders when he leaned forward.

I looked at the price tag.

Then I looked at the ceiling.

Neither required that much attention.

He shifted over to make room for me, and I sat.

Our shoulders touched.

There was ample space on the other side, which I became aware of immediately and declined to use.

The salesperson smiled at us.

I suddenly remembered how we might look.

Then I remembered how irritated I would have been, a few weeks earlier, if someone assumed we were together.

The irritation didn’t arrive.

Julian asked whether the seat felt comfortable.

I answered too quickly and spent the next minute studying the removable covers.

I ordered the couch.

On the way out, he held the door while I carried the paperwork. I caught myself smiling at him and redirected it toward the confirmation receipt.

A successful purchase. That was all.

***

Dinner at my apartment was supposed to be simple.

He brought food. I complained about a client. He listened without offering employment as a solution.

We ate at the kitchen counter because the old couch still leaned at a dangerous angle.

Once, I reached across him for a napkin.

He turned slightly to give me room, and my hand brushed the front of his sweater.

Neither of us said anything.

For the next several minutes, I was aware of exactly how far away he stood.

I had shared beds with him in college and managed to sleep.

Now apparently I couldn’t reach for paper without turning it into an experience.

At nine, Julian put down his empty cup.

“You said you had work to finish. I should leave.”

I glanced at the clock.

He had remembered.

I wished, briefly, that he hadn’t.

At the door, he thanked me for inviting him, then stepped into the hallway without inventing a reason to remain.

I watched him walk toward the stairs.

The apartment became quiet behind me.

I had wanted him to stop making decisions for me.

Now that he had, I was discovering how many decisions I wanted to make in his favor.

“Julian.”

He turned immediately.

“You can come tomorrow, if you’re free.”

His face changed before he answered.

I liked that expression far too much.

“I can make time.”

“Bring tools. We’re getting rid of the couch.”

He smiled.

“I’ll be here after work.”

I closed the door and leaned against it for a moment.

Then I went back to the counter, where his cup stood beside mine.

I picked it up by the handle and remembered his fingers there.

This was becoming difficult to explain as friendship.