Page 31 of All That We Are Together

“I shut that door,” she replied.

“Maybe you didn’t throw away the key, though…”

Leah went to the armchair and grabbed her bag.

“I need to go out and get some fresh air.”

“I’ll keep working here,” I responded.

Her steps were less audible as she descended the stairs. I stayed there in the middle of Leah’s world, staring at artwork that seemed to stare back at me and still feeling her skin on my fingertips.

33

Leah

I closed my eyes after walking outside. Inhaled. Exhaled. Tried to stay calm, focused on feeling the air slowly enter and leave. Just as I figured, I’d needed only a few days to fall apart in front of Axel.

When we saw each other in the gallery, I was so flustered I barely registered it. A few weeks later, in the café, I managed to keep my cool, despite the tension. The day he showed up in my room, I started to crack, especially when I came back that night and realized the bed smelled like him. And then the ground shook beneath my feet when I saw him in the attic looking at everything with those curious and insightful eyes that seemed to see more than the paintings showed at first glance. I was breathless when I felt his arms surround me and his body press close to mine.

I wanted to keep it all in, the way he did, hide all I was feeling, but I couldn’t. Because it was true. I’d hated him, sure. But I’d missed him too.

It was almost unnatural for these two sentiments to coexist, but in some twisted way, they did. Because I hated that last part ofour story, the part where I realized Axel wasn’t the guy I thought I’d known, but one with many more layers, of cowardice, of emotions never really processed. I still remembered the last words he uttered before I ran out of his house in the middle of the night. I felt like a little girl listening to my own voice in my head telling him:“You’re incapable of fighting for what you love.”And then his voice, filling everything, the porch, the morning, my heart:“I guess that means I don’t really love then.”

That Axel I wanted nothing of.

But the other one, the one who had been a friend, family, the Axel I didn’t have to ask more of than he could give, because there was no need to, given the circumstances—that Axel I missed. Him and his jokes and his cheerful mood. I missed having him in my life.

The problem was that it wasn’t easy to separate the two, because they blended together like two drops of paint, two different colors that blended together to form a new tone, and I wasn’t sure where it belonged on the canvas.

I took a few slow turns around the block.

When I felt calmer, I retraced my steps, but instead of going back up to the attic, I walked into a café on my street and sat at one of the tables in the back. I ordered a coffee before taking out a notebook and looking over my class notes in silence.

My phone rang almost an hour later. Axel.

“Where are you?” he asked when I picked up.

“Downstairs at the café.”

“I’m on my way,” he said, and hung up.

Five minutes later, Axel was sitting across from me, elbowleaned casually on the wooden table, face pensive as he decided what to order. The waitress waited, intrigued. I’d forgotten the kinds of reactions Axel could provoke if he put his mind to it.

“How’s the vegetarian sandwich?”

“No complaints so far.”

She smiled and he smiled back.

“One of those, then. And an iced tea. Thanks.”

“You’re very welcome.” She winked and walked away, while I raised an eyebrow at him.

“I was actually on my way out…” I told him, though there was no need to do so, since my coffee cup was clearly empty.

“I’m still not done with the artworks.”

“How long do you need?”