Page 102 of Smoke and Glitter

Autumn

I'm waiting for the kettle when Sam's name appears on my phone.

I leave his name on the screen while the kettle begins to hiss behind me. There hasn't been anything from him since I left Chicago, and seeing it in the middle of my kitchen makes the room feel smaller.

I pick up the phone.

Sam: Autumn. I don't get to ask you for anything. I'd like to talk to you when you're ready. Whenever that is.

The kettle clicks off behind me. I read the message again.

There's no apology attached to it. No explanation of what he's figured out while I've been gone. No request that I give him five minutes, hear him out or tell him how I feel. He's asking for a conversation and leaving the timing with me.

Which is so close to what I wanted from him that I have no idea what to do with it.

I make the tea and carry it to the sofa, but his message comes with me. By lunch I can repeat it without looking. By dinner I've opened the thread enough times that I finally admit I'm not going to stop until I answer.

It still takes me ten minutes to type the lines.

Me: I'm glad you texted. I'm not ready yet. I'm not trying to punish you, and I'm not saying no. I just can't do this right now. I'll tell you when I can. Please let me get there.

My thumb hovers over send while I start looking for ways to make it softer. Something that tells him I miss him too. Something that makes sure he doesn't read not yet as never. Something that takes the uncertainty I'm handing him and makes it easier to carry.

I stop myself and send what I wrote.

His answer comes a few minutes later.

Sam: Okay. Take whatever time you need.

That's it. I wait anyway. Nothing else appears.

I set the phone beside me and finish my tea.

When I wake the next morning, sunlight is coming through the gap in the curtains and the phone is exactly where I left it.

For the next couple of weeks, Sam does exactly what I asked him to do.

He doesn't check in. He doesn't call. Summer never casually mentions that he asked about me, and nobody from Vibes suddenly develops an urgent need to know when I'll be back in Chicago.

I asked him to leave the next move with me. He does. I wish that made him easier to stop thinking about.

It doesn't.

The flowers arrive while I'm on a call.

I'm halfway through sorting out a problem with a Manchester interview when Gemma appears outside the glass with both hands pointing toward something behind her. A man from reception comes around the corner carrying enough flowers to make me lose the next sentence completely.

I hold up one finger and finish the call while he sets them on the corner of my desk.

By the time I hang up, Gemma is standing in the doorway.

"Do you want the room?"

"It's a glass box."

"I can still make people scared to come near it."

"I'm fine," I say, laughing despite myself.