I fall asleep to the sound of it.
If this is lying to ourselves, I never want it to end.
46
BASTIAN
mac·er·ate: /'mas??rat/: verb
1: to soften food by soaking it in liquid.
2: when someone steeps in your presence long enough that all your careful defenses dissolve, leaving you soft and vulnerable and completely saturated with feelings you never meant to catch.
Every day, Eliana loses a little more of the world.
Every day, I find myself trying to give it back to her.
It’s as I stand behind her in my apartment kitchen and watch her cook that I realize just how fucked I am.
She’s making risotto by herself and she’s concentrating so hard that her tongue peeks out between her teeth. The wooden spoon moves in slow, steady circles through the heaps and valleys of arborio rice. Steam rises from the pan, rich with the aroma of white wine and chicken stock.
“Like this?” she asks me without looking up.
“Almost,” I say. “But you don’t have to stir quite so hard. The rice doesn’t owe you money.”
She laughs and gives me the middle finger.
I’ve been teaching her everything I know. She’s a good student when she wants to be, which isn’t always. Sometimes, she’ll meet me in the parking garage after work—our new little ritual—and announce without preamble, “You’re cooking tonight. Ya girl is tired.”
I don’t mind in the least. It’s been nice to be back in the kitchen, cooking for someone who appreciates it. Sage is going through a phase of consuming nothing but protein shakes and ground beef, so he doesn’t give a damn about my coq au vin or my homemade basil oil.
But when I make it for her, Eliana puts a spoonful of red wine sauce in her mouth, closes her eyes, and sinks back into her seat. She sighs as the flavors melt across her tongue, a soft little exhale of contentment that makes twenty years of burning my hands to shit in thankless, hot-as-hell kitchens feel like it was worth every stain and scar and drop of sweat.
It’s moments like that that are killing me. Moments like this one, too, as she turns back to the risotto. She’s wearing one of my old t-shirts. It falls to the tops of her thighs, just long enough to hide the curve of her ass. I can’t help sneaking up behind her to steal a kiss and a grope.
We haven’t slept together yet and we haven’t acknowledged that fact. But this, these stolen little seconds and touches, have become part and parcel of my daily existence. I don’t remember what life was like before I had them. I don’t want to.
Work has become oddly manageable. Project Olympus is accelerating toward the May 15 launch, and every day brings new crises, but I find myself navigating the chaos with unexpected calm.
Becauseshe’sthere.
Patricia commented on it yesterday.“You seem different,”she said carefully, like she was afraid I’d rip her head clean off her spine for noticing.
I’d shrugged and told her I was just focused on the launch. But that’s not it. That’s not it at all. The truth is simpler and exponentially more devastating: I’mhappy.
I refuse to name it as such, though. “Happy” is a dangerous word. Instead, I just tell myself what Eliana whispers from time to time, just before we fall asleep:
Isn’t it nice to lie to ourselves?
It is. It really fucking is.
“Eat shit, Bautista!” Eliana shouts. She pumps her fist as her ball trickles down the lane at the speed of a snail.
We’re on a double date at a bowling alley in Logan Square—Zeke’s choice, naturally. The man has never met a terrible idea he didn’t immediately embrace with both arms and kiss on the mouth. I’m sitting at the table, nursing a beer and watching Eliana trash-talk my best friend. She’s wearing the wide-brimmed sun hat I bought her and a pair of black, leather combat boots, and she looks absolutely fucking absurd.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything more beautiful.
“Let me know when your ball actually reaches the pins!” Zeke calls back. He slides into the seat beside me, his own beer dangling from his fingers. “So,” he says to me, “how’s things?”
