Don’t Be in Love

26

Don’t Button Up His Shirt — Adelaide

I almost committed a federal crime by stuffing my hand in the post box and pulling out the postcard addressed to Auntie Laila. There was a reason they made the slot so skinny—so you couldn’t second guess your decision to send your emotionally distant aunt a postcard full of odd niceties and questions on the application process for a fashion house.

The second James left the café was the moment I realized that I needed to suck it up if I wanted this internship. The applications didn’t close until February 1st, so I had two and a half months. I either had to ask James, ask my aunt, or continue to navigate unanswered Reddit pages.

Hi Auntie Laila,

I know we haven’t spoken in a while. I’m actually in London right now studying abroad (hence the weird stamp) but I just wanted to reach out and say Happy Belated 32nd Birthday. I know you’ve studied abroad here too and enjoyed it. I’m hoping to remain in London when I graduate in May, but I need an internship for the summer. Beverly—the luxury brand I used to talk about—is hiring. I know you’ve worked for a fashion house before, so I just had some questions on applying to one, if you had the time?

— Addy

Now we’d wait. I’d either get a response, or I’d never hear from her and cement our relationship as what I’d always known it: ruined.

Leicester Square was packed with the chatter of onlookers and bustling with reporters and photographers. The premiere was sandwiched by tall buildings and shops, forced into one street filled by the red carpet. Movie banners covered the windows on the building above.

After pushing through the crowd and finding someone with an authoritative enough look to show me the entrance, I was in.

One hotel lobby, an elevator ride, and a pointed finger from a man in a black suit at a walnut door, and I was left alone outside James’s room.

I knocked on the door and a shuffle of shoes on carpet followed.

“Are you Adelaide?” an older woman in a pantsuit asked.

I nodded and she moved to the side to let me in.

Smoke—no, steam actually—filled the room as a man ran a steamer over a burgundy dress jacket. The plumes of steam were pushed around by everyone pacing through the room taking phone calls, cleaning up makeup mirrors, zipping up suitcases. Then there was a woman holding a notebook, running through a list with James.

All of the color in the room came from his ribbon pink cheeks and silver hair. They popped vibrantly like strawberry-flavored candies against sand with his burgundy tailored pants on.

I stood by the door, unsure where I was supposed to fit in.

James’s gaze ticked up. “Adelaide.” He smiled, stepping away. “Did you have an easy time getting in?”

“It was—” I was cut off by someone’s phone ringing.

“I just need a few moments, if you don’t mind?” His question swept the room. Everyone quieted before filing out. “Sorry about that.”

“Remember that thing I said about being an inconvenience?”

“I wanted them gone, that had nothing to do with you!”

“I’m going to leave and get tripped on the way out.”

“Good thing this hotel is carpeted then.” Soft creases formed around the corners of his lips as he stifled a laugh.

I snorted. “I’ll be fast then so I can meet my fate.”

I pulled the watch off my wrist and handed it to him. He put it on as I took out my phone and the single-use camera.

“I was thinking something like this, and then this.” I showed him my example photos. One with a hand in the pocket, and another with a hand adjusting at the opposite sleeve.

“Got it.” He nodded.

Getting down on one knee, eye level with his hip, I snapped some pictures with my phone, and then more with the camera. With his hand halfway in his dress pocket, I adjusted his thumb.

He flinched.

“Sorry, I forgot how cold my hands were. Can you just relax your thumb a bit?” I asked, shutting one eye and pressing the other to the viewfinder.

He cleared his throat. “Do I look okay?”

“You look very attractive James, don’t worry.”

“Well, that’s very nice to hear, but I meant in the photos.”

“Oh, sorry.” I laughed briefly.

“You look very attractive as well.” He looked down at me. His words weren’t light or breezy. Rather a strong gust of wind that pushed your hair back. It made me blink to regain my focus.

“Thank you,” I said softly, looking up at him. I brushed my knee off and stood.

“Could you move your hand like this and hold your lapel?” I placed my left hand against the right side of my chest.

“Like this?” he asked, awkwardly pinching the material.

“Can I?” I hovered my hand over his.

Despite his “okay,” his hand was still tense as I shifted it down and uncurled some of his fingers. His palm was smooth, clear of any calluses or ink that often painted the side of his hand.

“Adelaide.” That strong gust again. His tone pulled my chin up.

“James.”

He searched my face. The chestnut brown of his eyes was so different from Dorian’s dark orbs. His reminded me of a mahogany bureau mixed with vintage paper. Kindness lived in his color.

He opened his mouth and closed it, before parting his lips again. “I’d like to take you on a date.”

Oh .

Either one of my ribs detached from its cage and dragged against my heart, or the look on his face hurt that much . Beautiful, sweet, kind James. Beautiful, sweet, kind James wanted to go on a date. And I had to say no.

“I’m sorry.” The words fell from my mouth.

His mahogany eyes grew but looked anywhere but my face. “Oh. No, it’s—it’s fine, of course.”

“It has nothing to do with you—”

“Really, it’s alright—”

“No, no, I mean it, it’s not you. I don’t date. I don’t do the whole love thing.” His brows rose. I was royally screwing this up. “Not that I’m saying that’s what you’re looking for! I’m just trying to say I don’t do any of that.”

“You don’t do love?”

“I do not,” I said. “It’s um … it’s easier that way for—”

“You don’t need to explain yourself to me,” he said quietly.

Buzz .

He reached for his back pocket before glancing at the phone and accepting the call. “Hey,” he answered.

A pause as the person on the other line spoke.

“She left a while ago, sorry. Why, what’s wrong?” He walked the length of the room, listening.

“Mhm, mhm, okay. One moment,” he hummed. Pulling the phone from his ear, he asked, “Is there any chance you know how to sew?”

“I can hand sew like a basic stitch, why?”

“Do you have anywhere you need to be after this?”

“No ...” I hesitated, still rattled by his previous question.

“Thoughts on helping Dorian?”

“James.” I glared at him. “I’d rather stab myself with a spoon.”

“That doesn’t sound that bad.”

“You’d think, but it actually makes it much more painful.”

“Can’t avoid him forever,” he reminded me.

I exhaled. “What’s the room number?”

I used to have common sense. But now I was standing outside Dorian’s door like a frozen lamppost with a small sewing kit in my hand from the hotel’s nightstand, waiting for an assistant or manager or hairdresser to answer my knock.

The door finally swung open. I was met with Dorian, who was in the middle of buttoning up his untucked shirt.

It was a horrendous surprise. One that clutched my throat and ripped the air out, leaving me without any knowledge of how the English language worked.

“Adelaide.” He was taken aback. “What are you doing here?”

I held the sewing kit up. “James sent me. And I’m assuming from the look on your face that he didn’t tell you ...”

“No, he did not. Were you just with him?”

I couldn’t navigate the look on his face. It was like trying to traverse a map of London upside down. His parted lips said to come in, but the crease between his brows said to go left and exit.

“He was helping me get those pictures for my project,” I explained.

He nodded his head and moved to the side, letting me in.

Shutting the door behind us, the quiet was loud. Uncomfortable.

He sat on the ottoman at the end of the bed.

“I’m surprised you don’t have a million people running around in here.” I attempted to make conversation.

“I like to be alone when I get the chance.” His voice was gruff, turned down at his shirt, trying to finish the tiny buttons.

“I’ll make it quick then.” I put my bag down beside him.

“You know that’s not what I meant. I prefer you in every room.” He looked up and it felt so vulnerable. His body being below mine was a cruel memory. The arch of his neck to meet my gaze made my blood pump faster.

The artificial light coming in the through the windows from the lights in the street kissed his face and pressed into the angles of his cheeks.

I couldn’t isolate this person from the one I had kissed. I couldn’t watch his mouth move as he spoke and not think about when they were pressed against my lips.

“Well, that’s good, because I’m not that great at sewing so it will take me a second,” I confessed. I couldn’t help but laugh as he struggled to squeeze the buttons into the tiny slits. “This is ridiculous, let me help you.”

I pushed my hair back and kneeled on the ground.

He cleared his throat, backing up, his hips hitting the bed. “If this is your version of seducing me,” he took a breath. “It’s working.”

“Dorian,” I shook my head.

“Yes,” he exhaled.

“Stay still.” Taking the sides of his shirt into my hands and gripping each button, I pretended that this had absolutely no effect on me. That the proximity of his face to mine did nothing to my nervous system and that his warm breath against the crown of my head didn’t make my hands shake.

Maybe this was all my subconscious’s tactical excuse to get me closer to him.

I pulled my hands away once the buttons were in, avoiding using his legs that caged me in to stand back up.

I looked for an article of clothing that appeared torn and needed sewing.

“It’s just the jacket—the button fell off,” he explained, standing up.

“Can you put it on?” I asked.

He nudged the jacket over his shoulders and held the button out for me.

“One second,” I stopped him, threading the needle first. I pulled the black string through and took the bottom of his jacket, carefully stabbing it through where the button should be.

“Now the button.” I held my hand out, and he placed it between my fingers. I let the first hole of the button fly down the string before I steadied it in place and pushed the needle through the next hole.

“How have you been?” he asked. His voice was soft and quiet.

“I’ve been alright.” Mine came out just as warm and small, like a teacup full of English Breakfast tea. For once, it seemed like neither of us felt like arguing. We were two boats treading water unsure of whether to dock, nervous to knock into one another.

I continued, “I wrote that postcard actually.”

“You did?”

“I did. This morning. Even went and bought a stamp and put it in the post box.”

“Wow. How do you feel?”

“I stood in front of the post for five minutes debating how dangerous and illegal it’d be to stuff my arm back in and grab it.”

He laughed. “You could’ve called me.”

“You’re willing to commit a federal crime?”

“I would’ve shown up with a coat hanger and gum if you asked.”

“A hanger and gum?”

“Unravel the wire hanger, stick a piece of gum to the end, push it through the box.”

I gasped. “You’re a criminal mastermind.”

“How do you think I’m capable of driving without a license?”

I smiled, suppressing another laugh. “I feel better about it now though—sending it,” I said. “You were right.”

I reached for the tiny pair of scissors and cut the thread at the knot. Tossing the scissors back in the bag, I moved the button around to make sure it was secure.

“You should be proud of yourself,” he said tenderly.

“I don’t know about all that.”

“You should be. You reached out when you didn’t want to, but because you knew it’d be good for you. That’s something to be proud of.”

“Thank you,” I responded earnestly.

“I’ve missed seeing you this week,” he said.

“We have class three times a week together,” I reminded him.

“That’s different. I sit in front of you.”

“Well, if you start showing up at tutoring again then that won’t be a problem.” I directed my gaze at his tie, feeling the urge to fix it.

“I wasn’t sure after the library incident if you’d want me to.”

I opened my mouth and then closed it. I had played the kiss in the rain and the masquerade and being stuck in that nook with him so many times that it grew more dramatic each time I thought of them.

“We have a deal, I haven’t forgotten,” I said, and flattened his tie.

His hand wrapped around mine on the fabric, forcing me to look up. “Just because we have a deal doesn’t mean I don’t respect your boundaries.”

I wish I could avoid his gaze. But he was magnetic, constantly pulling me in, even when he didn’t mean to. Then he trapped me with that hauntingly handsome, serious look.

“Got it?” he asked.

I nodded.

“If you’re okay with me coming Monday, then I will. You don’t have to say now. Just let me know beforehand. Or during. Whenever you want to see me, I’ll come.”

“Alright,” I responded, too dazed to muster up anything else.

“What are you doing Saturday?”

I laughed. “We don’t meet on Saturdays.”

“I know. My question still stands.”

“Well, it’s my birthday.”

“I know.” His lips lifted with a slight smile “That’s what I was getting at: do you have any plans?”

“Who told you it was my birthday?”

“What makes you think someone had to tell me?” he contested.

I rolled my eyes. “I’m going out with Dotty and Iris.”

“Will you be busy the whole day?”

“I’m not sure yet, why?”

He shook his head with an embarrassed smile. “Because I’m trying to ask you out, Adelaide.”

My shoulders fell.

“No, I know what you’re going to say, and I didn’t mean it like that. You’ve dealt with me all semester and we’ve seen each other almost every day. I don’t want to miss your birthday. I want to be there. As a friend.”

A friend. I guess that’s what we became in a weird, twisted turn of events.

There were so many things wrong about saying yes. But he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. And honestly, I didn’t want him to accept my no.

“I’ll be working for the day, so you can join us for dinner after, if you want,” I offered.

“When and where, I’ll be there.”

“Bookstore, six o’clock.”