Don’t Be in Love

27

Don’t Buy Her a Birthday Gift — Dorian

“We’re just friends,” I clarified, again, over the phone as I sat in Poppy’s closed studio, hours after the premiere, still in my dress pants.

I needed to clear my head.

My mind was whirling with thoughts of her . Talking to her. Watching her lean over me. Feeling her hands on my chest. Having her in between my legs.

She was like an intricate piece of Fine China hidden in a vintage shop made up of complex swirls and patterns that I couldn’t perfectly recreate in my mind. And every time I saw her, I was more enamored, finding more things to explore. From the way she tilted her head when my words were unexpected to the way she brushed hair from her face when she was impatient.

I wasn’t one to study. But I knew the wave-like ups and downs of her voice as if I studied them for centuries. I could predict the meaning of each one with my eyes closed if asked.

“I don’t think you even believed yourself there,” Jasmine refuted. The sound of her pottery wheel spinning stirred in the background.

“What do you want me to say? That I’ve fallen madly in love with her and think about her every waking second as if she’s poisoned me?”

“Brother, I’m proud of you for finally being honest with yourself.”

“How’s Tristan? That dirty sock smell in his hair go away yet?”

“You just had to bring it up, didn’t you?”

“I’m sure Mum would love to know that you’re dying to see him again—”

“I’m just being honest with you! If you don’t want me to be honest, then fine! But there’s nothing wrong with being interested in her.”

I paused the brush on the canvas, letting a large blob of cerulean blue paint accumulate in the middle.

I had an encyclopedia-length of reasons why it was wrong to be interested in her. The first being that I had an unhealthy addiction that was looking, listening, and touching her. An addiction she had no interest in. Letting it simmer wouldn’t help by speaking on it.

Jasmine accepted my silence as my disagreement.

“Have you spoken to James about it?” she asked.

“James and I don’t talk about this stuff.” I rolled out my neck and then searched for a smaller brush in the unorganized stack balancing on the stool beside me.

“You mean you don’t talk about Adelaide-related stuff.”

“That’s not what I said.”

“I know it’s not what you said, but it’s what you meant.”

“They’re friends. I don’t want my opinion to affect that.”

“The opinion that you’re interested in her?”

“Why did I even bother calling you?”

“Because you wanted my wisdom over getting her a birthday gift.”

“What a terrible idea. I must’ve had a stroke. Call me an ambulance, will you? It’s the least you could do.”

“Where should I send it?”

“Poppy’s studio.”

“What are you making now?”

“That painting for your living room.”

“Cerulean blue, right?”

“As cerulean blue as it get,” I replied, staring at the canvas covered in half-finished cerulean blue vases. The few lamps switched on in the studio flickered yellow light over the painting.

“Why don’t you paint her something?”

“Because that’s weird, Jasmine. And I already got her a gift anyway.”

“Why did you call me then!” Her pottery wheel shrieked.

“Because I bought the gift when I was half asleep weeks ago and now that it’s open and sitting in my kitchen, I’ve realized it’s oddly personal, so I need other ideas.”

“What did you buy?”

I briefly explained what the gift looked like and that I got the idea based on something I saw hung on her cork board in her room.

“Dorian, she’ll love that.”

“That’s the problem. If she loves it, then I’m not doing a great job at proving the ‘friend’ thing.”

“Maybe just flowers then,” she suggested. “Oh! You could get her the November birth flower.”

“What’s the November birth flower?”

“Peonies.”

“I don’t know.” I switched the brush to my other hand to scratch my forehead. “That seems a bit romantic.”

“Nooo, not romantic. No one buys flowers for romantic purposes anymore.”

“Dad buys Mum flowers every week,” I deadpanned. “Are you trying to set me up?”

“You’re a hopeless romantic, I don’t need to do that. You do it to yourself.”

“I am not,” I argued, accidentally flinging paint onto the floor in the process.

“Being a hopeless romantic is a sad life.”

“Are you calling me hopeless now?”

“No. I’m calling you senseless.” The eyeroll was evident in her voice. “Dad’s obsessed with Mum, so of course he buys her flowers all the time. It’s possible Adelaide’s never received flowers before.”

Something told me that wasn’t true.

She continued. “I’m telling you. If you walk in with flowers, the first thing she’ll do is smile when she sees you.”

That would definitely be a first.

It was risky. But that’s how things tended to be around us.