‘Thanks, I built it.’ I pointed to my long, black desk and my cupboards that were perfectly carved for sound to move through. The room was completely blacked out and I had soundproof palings all over the room.
‘All of it?’ she asked.
‘Yeah, all of it.’
She smiled, looking a little shocked and impressed. Her eyes gleamed a little brighter.
‘So, you went on your adventure. And now you’re here,’ I said, hoping to learn more about what had happened in the past year of her life.
She laughed. She was full of laughter, she seemed to have many different laughs. This one was a laugh of coincidence, a laugh that said,yeah, here I am.‘I’m amid my adventure, but I guess it did lead me here,’ she said.
‘So, Shelley Bay isn’t your place?’
‘I don’t know, maybe it could be. For now, it is and maybe it will be someday again, but I’m just passing through,’ she said, confident about her unknown future. Her face was clearer, her eyes shined brighter.
‘You’re different.’ The words just came out of my mouth as I stared at her, trying to figure her out. She was different to anyone else I had ever hung around. She was just honestly herself, and it didn’t seem like there wasn’t anything that she wanted from me.
‘Different. Yeah, I think you called me that the first time we met. I don’t know what different means. But I’m going to take it as a compliment,’ she said, giggling through her smile, so joyfully.
‘Good,’ I said. ‘You should take it as a compliment.’ I smiled back at her.
I couldn’t stop staring at her. I was just so physically drawn to her. When I looked into her eyes, I got flashbacks of the night being with her. Naked. Her soft skin against mine, her scream, the way her hips moved with my touch. And here she was sitting on my bed. I didn’t invite her over to just fuck her. I could tell she knew that; she sat so comfortably, making herself at home. But I felt such a pull towards her, staring at her lips made me want to kiss them, I wanted to feel her against me again.
‘So, what has been going on in your life? I had no idea that you lived here,’ she said, wiggling around on the edge of the bed to face me.
‘Where did you think I lived?’ I asked curiously, after our meeting I wanted to know what preconceived ideas and beliefs she had built around me.
Emma laughed. ‘To be honest, I know this sounds weird, but I didn’t even think about it, I mean I did think about you a couple of times over the past year. Mostly because I had heard your song on the radio and it made me smile, thinking about that night. But I never thought about where you lived, or what you had been up to, I never thought I would ever see you again. I just took the night for what it was. I didn’t really question you any more.’ She shrugged.
I smiled. ‘Yeah, I guess I was the same. The memory has popped up into my head a couple of times. I do remember pondering one night lost in thought, wondering where your adventures had led you. I would never have thought you would have been so close to me all this time.’
Emma smiled, staring into my eyes with so much warmth. She was so beautiful. ‘Maybe it’s fate,’ she said, giggling at her own comment.
‘Who knows, maybe it is,’ I said, smiling. ‘But to answer your question.’ I kept talking, moving my eyes away from her gaze, giving myself a moment to collect my thoughts, and not get lost in her. ‘I don’t know if I’ve had as much as an adventurous year as you have. I have been traveling around the country a lot, but it’s all been work related. Life just seems like work for me lately.’
‘But you love it, yeah?’ she asked.
‘Absolutely, I do. I wouldn’t want to do anything else in life.’ I perked myself back up. Emma smiled. ‘So, tell me,’ I said, ‘what’s been the best part of your adventure so far? Have you found what it is you were looking for?’ I quickly turned the conversation around back on to her, I didn’t feel like talking about myself tonight.
‘I don’t know if I can answer either of those questions. I think I’m just exploring. It feels great, I’m super happy with exactly where I am at. I think the best part of this adventure so far is how much I am learning about myself. It’s amazing to push yourself so far out of your comfort zone, to be a completely fresh new face somewhere, where nobody knows you. You start to learn a lot about yourself and how you show up and how people perceive you. Every day is so much newness now. I’m just taking it all in and seeing where it leads me. I haven’t made any grand future plans yet,’ she said.
‘Tell me something that you’ve learnt about yourself.’ I asked, slightly abruptly as though I was interviewing her.
Her body stiffened, and her eyes widened, leaning away from me.
‘Oh, sorry,’ I laughed nervously, ‘you don’t have to answer that question.’
Emma bit her lip and looked down to the floor. ‘No I just forgot how much you asked, how intrigued you are I guess, that still seems like a rarity in my life,’ she said, slowly relaxing her shoulders and meeting my eyes. ‘I didn’t realise how much I loved to be in control of my life. And a lot of the time I still do. Every day is a war in my head pushing to control and do and flowing with whatever is coming up for me in the very moment and being okay with that. That’s something I’ve learnt about myself.’
‘You really are different.’ I paused, staring at her. ‘It’s like you can see the world from a way we’re all meant to see it. I’m in awe of that. It’s an amazing quality. I think I’m the same sometimes, a lot of the time but it’s not exactly something that I like to admit,’ I said.
‘I just told you, I’m struggling with realising how much of a control freak I am throughout all aspects of my life, and you called that a beautiful quality?’ Her eyebrows narrowed, squinting at me but still half smiling.
‘Yeah, I think it’s an extremely impressive quality to be so open about what you see as your flaws in a world of people trying to live in perfection,’ I said, I should know, I lived in a world surrounded by it. Emma smiled coyly back at my comment.
‘I lied to you, the first night I met you,’ she blurted out.
‘What about?’ I asked. Emma lifted up her feet on to my bed, and hugged her knees into her chest, resting the side of her face on her knees looking at me, curling up into a ball.
