“I mean, yeah,” I said, not sounding as confident as I would’ve liked. “We haven’t talked about it. But…he kisses and hugs me, and yesterday, as we walked through campus, he picked one of the flowers from the garden bed, which I’m pretty sure you’re not meant to do, and gave it to me.”
“That’s nice and all,” Rome said, “but I think you’re meant to have a talk.”
“A talk?” I said.
“I don’t know for sure,” Rome said, “but I’ve heard about it. People even make jokes about it. The whole ‘what are we?’ talk.”
“But shouldn’t it be obvious? It’s not like I have sex with my friends.” Even as I said it, I couldn’t help but feel like I’d been doing this wrong. I’d never had a relationship before, and with hookups, we never had to say, “Let’s agree to embark on a mutually beneficial sexual arrangement with no strings attached”. We just got to it.
Leo hadn’t said anything either, but maybe he was just as clueless as me.
Maybe, for us, the usual rules didn’t apply.
“I hope I haven’t worried you,” Rome said. “You know what, forget it. I have no idea what I’m talking about.”
I realised I was frowning and replaced it with a forced smile. “No, it’s all good. I’m not worried,” I assured him. We both started on the questions we’d been assigned and thankfully, by answering the legal hypotheticals, I was able to push the matter completely out of my mind.
14
On Saturday afternoon, I laid out several outfit combinations on my bed. From what I gathered, the house party would be full of alternative types, and I didn’t want my knitted jumpers to look uncool. I’d wear ripped jeans if I owned any, but from a young age, I’d internalised Mum’s opinion that paying to look homeless was silly, and there was no point buying pants that wouldn’t protect me from the cold.
In the end, I chose a pair of dark blue corduroy pants and a colourful striped jumper, with the black collar of the shirt I was wearing underneath peeking out. I styled my hair, then promptly un-styled it so it looked dishevelled in a cool, effortless way, and grabbed my things before heading to Leo’s for dinner. I rang the intercom, and he let me up. When he opened his studio door, he wrapped me in a big hug before quickly letting go and rushing back to his kitchenette.
“I’m still cooking, so you’ll have to wait a bit,” he said, sounding frazzled as he stirred the contents of his pan. “I hope you’re not hungry. I didn’t think cooking would take this long. When I cook for myself, it doesn’t, but I didn’t want to feed you garbage.”
“What are you making?” I asked, looking over his shoulder.
His pan was overflowing with chicken, beans and capsicum slices, swimming in a light-brown sauce. “Stir-fry,” he said, then gestured at the only other spot on the induction cooker, which was occupied with a saucepan. “And that’s the rice.”
I stared at it, seeing not rice but a bunch of white frothy bubbles. Right. Not everyone had been given a rice cooker as a moving-out present like I had.
“It looks good,” I told him. “Thanks for cooking.” I pressed a kiss against his shoulder, and his body relaxed.
“I’m sorry I don’t have a couch,” he said. “But feel free to sit at the desk. Or on the bed.”
I chose the desk, spinning the chair around to watch him.
“How was your day?” he asked as he adjusted the heat of the stove.
I chatted mindlessly, not really paying attention to what I was saying but instead looking at him. He reached above him for a cupboard and pulled out two bowls. He served the rice first, placing half in the first bowl. As he scraped the saucepan to fill up the second bowl, he winced as he scooped up crunchy rice. It was all stuck together, hanging stiffly off his fork.
He shuffled to the side as if to hide it from me. A second later, he brought the two bowls over and sat beside me. He’d given me the fluffy top half of the rice, which made my heart warm.
Halfway through the meal, I asked, “So tell me about this party. How do you know these people?”
“From all kinds of places.”
I waited for him to elaborate.
“Some at the uni gym, others in class. I played social basketball with a few last year. Where else…” he went quiet for a moment as he thought. “I met Gailey while she was walking her dog, and I met Nick in the supermarket, and I met Tommy when I sat next to him in a lecture…”
I shouldn’t have been surprised. Of course Leo made friends in the most random of places.
Later, after we both finished our meals, I insisted I’d wash up and took the bowls and cutlery to the sink. I had just filled it up with hot water and washing liquid, and pulled on the neon-greengloves that were slightly too big for my hands, which secretly delighted me when Leo wrapped his hands around my waist.
I stiffened. Not because I didn’t like it, but because this was something I’d seen in romantic movies. This, right now, with Leo resting his head against the back of my neck, his warm embrace around me, was what you’d find if you searched “romance” in a stock photo directory.
“What’s up?” I asked, picking up the sponge and washing one of the bowls, trying not to move my shoulders too much so I didn’t inadvertently shrug him off.
