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Karolina stares blankly at the invitation resting at her open palm, a well-cut piece of hard, white paper, with an awful golden font that, after only three minutes, was already threatening to send her head into a pounding mess of a headache.
There are only two things going through her mind, one foot going in front of the other, keys dangling from her fingers as she came to a stop in front of her loft.
How did they find me? Which, overall, was a very good question, because, ever since Manhattan, there was no one to be told about her life. And so, it only took her one weekend of planning, a week notice on her old job, and she was back in California, truly alone for what it felt like the first time in her life.
The boxes still scattered around the floor and the lack of furniture barely a reminder of how long she’d actually been back. The lack of texts a reminder that no one knew.
Of course, there were Gert and Chase, who she knows would be more than happy to hear from her, besides the sporadic texts they shared between birthdays.
(Hopefully.)
And Molly, a few years younger, but a person she had always considered as a little sister.
Her parents. But that was a whole other story and it had already been over seven years, so maybe her parents weren’t really on the list of people she could call to share the news. And Maybe, just maybe, Karolina herself wasn’t ready, or would never be ready, to take them back into her life.
Julie. But they haven’t really talked ever since the breakup, an understandable thing in Karolina’s opinion, because it hadn’t been pretty. It had been angry, full of tears, words neither of them meant to say out loud, or maybe words they should’ve said from the beginning to avoid whatever happened back then.
Which left… A loose string. A story without an end. Or just a story with an end Karolina wasn’t ready to face yet. Because Nico had been the only person she tried to call, and, much like all the previous calls, it went straight to voicemail. They weren’t taking, they hadn’t been for months now, and Nico refused to change that.
Karolina had never been good at letting it go.
The realization that there weren’t too many people in her life stings, a sensation that runs through her skin to settle deep in her bones.
Loneliness, a validation of her wonder.
But, perhaps, the answer was not that extraordinary. Eiffel always found a way.
This is a very bad idea. Which should be the part of her brain she had to listen to and inevitably failed. She sighs, fingers already unclasping the cheap bottle of wine she had bought earlier the week, glasses forgotten at the background as she drops down at the cushions on her living room’s floor. She sighs because she knows there was never a decision to be made, the mere possibility of seeing-
She takes a swing of wine, the drink is warm and it goes down burning her throat, paving the path for the future ones that are to come. It was only a three hour drive, anyways.
**
There are a couple of flaws in her plan, though, something she only realizes two drinks after too many, and it takes her longer than she would ever admit to anyone to put her glass down (she really should’ve stuck with wine) and go on a quest to find her notebook in a dark corner of her bedroom.
For starters, she doesn’t have a car. Well, things go beyond that and she never actually learned how to drive.
Then, the last train leaves around ten and so she would arrive at the station around one in the morning, not something she was really looking forward to. Not when she would be wearing heels and most likely a dress.
It’s how she spends her Friday evening: booking a way too expensive hotel room for three days in Los Angeles and drinking until she feels like she is making the right decision by going. She never feels like it, it doesn’t stop her from trying.
She blames her past self, the next morning, when she can barely open her eyes in the darkness of her room, her tongue heavy and uncooperative in her mouth, dry lips and sore from sleeping in the wrong position for the past handful of hours. The email confirming her stay for the next weekend mocking her sleep and coffee deprived self.
Feels like there was no turning back. Rationally, of course there was: cancel it. Don’t leave next Saturday morning, assemble some shelves, buy the rest of her furniture, hang some paintings on the bare walls, go out for a night in the city she still didn’t know, have a one night stand. The possibilities were endless. Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to do so.
“Fuck.” She mumbles through gritted teeth, wanting nothing more than go back to bed and search for what she needed from the beginning: willpower to let go. She goes out for a run, instead.
**
It couldn’t be pinpointed when, exactly, they became friends. More than that, even, they were best friends. Inseparable, and she wouldn’t trade it for the world. Because she already had it: Nico was her world.
It was easy back then, when they were seven and sat together to read or listen to one of Nico’s father’s old mix-tapes. They used to lay together on Karolina’s backyard, music filling the air between them and stare at the sky. They never talked much, but silence was comfortable enough, and Nico would turn to her side, rest her head against Karolina’s collarbone and hum softly in tune.
They were nine, then. And some guy named Topher made Karolina cry after breaking her silver bracelet, so Nico punched him. They sat together as they waited for their parents to arrive, Nico’s hand tightly grasping at hers.
At ten, sleepovers began. She loved the fifteen minutes bike ride she did every Wednesday as the sun began to set, an orange light shining her path and the cool breeze against her face. She loved the sense of responsibility her parents gave to her, allowing her to go alone as long as they got a call as soon as she got in. She loved the ultimate goal: seeing Nico, spending time with her. Wednesdays became her favorite days.
When they were thirteen, Nico’s father left. She was there back then, watching as Nico pretended to be strong for her mother and her sister, but she was also the girl who cried against her shoulder, hands gripping at the hem of her shirt, until she fell asleep with Karolina by her side. Once day she overheard something about Janet Stein and, when they met Chase Stein at the end of that year, she hated him by extent.
Fourteen made things change for Karolina. Or, maybe, it only made her aware of how different things were when they came to Nico. Because, suddenly, she wanted to keep holding Nico’s hand, like they usually did at nights spent on each other’s bedrooms, and she wanted to run her hand through black locks, she wanted to be the one who made Nico smile, she wanted to kiss her.
Realization hit like a ton of bricks. But they were just fourteen and it was nothing but a stupid crush, so it was going away fast, right? Besides, it was completely normal to be jealous of our best friend and who would be curious about kissing the person who meant everything to them?
It wasn’t just a crush, that much became clear a year later and Nico started the on and off thing with Alex. Things would be fine, when they were Freshmen and there was only four of them: Chase, whom she had gotten closer because of lacrosse; Gert, her lab partner for, well, everything; and Nico.
But one day she got there and her seat was already taken, his hand intertwined with Nico’s and she tried her best, she really did, but there was nothing Alex could do to change her opinion on him. Karolina didn’t hate him, she was jealous and, to her eyes, that was even worse.
Being in love at fifteen was the biggest cliche Karolina thought she would accomplish in her life. Yet, she was in love with her straight best friend who she hoped would feel a tenth of what she felt already.
Talk about cliches.
They were friends for their whole lives. Somewhere along the way, Karolina fell in love with her best friend, because a crush sounded too juvenile, and like didn’t come close to what she felt. A very simple concept, with a very obvious answer: lines tend to get blurry.
**
Karolina checks her hair once again in the mirror of her hotel room before grabbing her purse and heading out.
She has a plan, she always had. Go in, talk to everyone, make small chat for two maybe three hours, avoid Nico and leave. Getting drunk in the process was still an option she was willing to consider. She was, most likely, getting drunk through the night.
A huge part of her still couldn’t believe she was doing this, something she used to make fun of with Nico laying besides her on the bed. She also used to say they would be inseparable, and here they are.
Fingers playing with the ring around her thumb, she takes a look at the city beside her, glowing lights she grew unaccustomed to, the loud horns around her, the cab driver muttering under his breath. She doesn’t belong to Los Angeles anymore, maybe she never has.
**
“So, are you going to give Chase a chance?”
Karolina’s grip on her pencil loosened, the object easily falling from her hand, and she forced her eyes to stay focused on Nico’s eyes.
Lately, she found it was easy to wander, to try and create a reality in which they would be together, simple like that. And she would spend too many minutes memorizing every action, every line on her face, every smile reserved only for her, and she would commit them to her heart.
She would convince herself they were for her and for herself only.
(They weren’t. Alex.)
Wandering became stronger and stronger when all she wanted to do was let Nico’s hair down so she could touch it, she wanted to be the one who smudged her black lipstick and had to clean it off her own face, she wanted to make Nico gasp against her mouth as fingers found their way beneath black shirts.
None of them appropriated thoughts to be having about her best friend as she sat cross legged on the bedroom floor of said friend, staring at expectant dark brown eyes.
There was never another answer to that question. She wouldn’t. And there were two hundred reasons she could list, from being very, very gay, to being very, very in love with her best friend. A long list of reasons and none of them one that she could say out loud.
She shrugged, picking her pencil from the floor and going back to her Math problem.
“Guess not.” Nico only raised an eyebrow at her, another action she knew it would happen without even having to look up to confirm it. “What?”
“He’s been drooling over you for the past months.”
“That’s so not my fault!”
Nico laughed and moved around until she was sitting by her side, thighs brushing, arms pressed together. Karolina sighed when a head came down to rest at her shoulder, a position they found themselves more times than they could count, from the very beginning when the height difference wasn’t exactly a problem.
Fingers brushed against her palm and she took them willingly, smiling softly at the sight. It was calming. Like being with Nico always was. And so she pressed a kiss to Nico’s hairline, letting her chin rest on top of her head, something she knew Nico hated but never asked to stop.
“But, seriously, are you?”
Karolina dared to hope, then, at how fragile her voice sounded, how small she felt pressing herself against her side, how hopeful she looked up from her shoulder, adjusting herself so she could look at Karolina’s eyes. She had never thought she was strong, not until Nico looked at her like that, lips barely an inch away from hers, closer than she had ever imagined being and it wouldn’t take much.
But she didn’t. She found out she was strong then, because it would’ve been too easy to take what she wanted, and to discover what she’d been dreaming about for years.
“No.” She whispered back, tried to convince herself she didn’t see the hints of a smile at the corner of black painted lips. “I’m not.”
“You are beautiful” Her heart raced against her chest so strongly she was afraid Nico would be able to hear because of the small distance between them “and he is conventionally handsome, so you’d make a nice couple.”
“He’s not really my type.”
Nico squinted her eyes at her, the action screaming I know there is more to it but I’m letting it go for now and Karolina had never been more grateful.
“Are you going to help me with Physics or what?”
**
Fashionably late is how she likes to call it. But maybe the term only applied to situations in which the delay would be in the marks of minutes. She was fifteen minutes out of that, then. Blame it on LA traffic.
She is late, then. It isn’t hard to understand that much when she crosses the bar doors, a fancy environment that would be too overpriced for drinks that weren’t half as good. The buzzing is loud, the voices already slightly raised for the drinks consumed, as she strides directly to the bar.
From where she is, she can see Eiffel talking excitedly to what she presumes are some guys they studied with, but she intends on keeping to herself until she is, at least, slightly drunk. One of her plans will be followed perfectly through the night.
The bartender looks at her, an easy smile on his lips, a nod to prompt her into ordering. His short, auburn hair is salted in white, the same way his recently shaved beard is, the black shirt too tight around his arms.
“Whatever you have top shelf, just, make it a double.”
“Any preference?” He asks with humor on his voice, already turning around to sort through the bottles.
“Whatever makes me drunk faster.”
She doesn’t even look at it before she tips her head back, glass on her lips, the shot burning every inch of skin it touches, spreading a warmth in her chest, her stomach already threatening to revolt.
With a hand in front of her mouth, she lets out a couple of coughs, and she sees the amusement on his face when she manages to look up at him, blinking the tears away.
“Shit.”
“Indeed.”
“Do I dare to ask what was that?”
“You can, but I think you would find the answer boring.” And, yet, she waits, elbows resting against the counter, leaning lightly against it, a small smile playing at her lips. “Absinthe, straight from Switzerland.”
“Should I ask how much that is going to hurt my wallet at the end of the night?”
He laughs, pointing at the empty glass and Karolina can only nod.
“Don’t worry, the first is on the house. Call it tasting the product before buying it.”
Karolina has the decency of looking at it this time, green drink toppling over the edge, so she raises it enough, trying her hardest not to let it spill, before she finally downs it. The second one is smoother, not any less warm, and her nostrils start to burn.
“So, the second one?”
“If you’re here for that” He points at the, now Karolina can see, already very drunk adults, laughing way too loudly of something that, most likely, wasn’t that funny “it will also be on the house. But, can I get you anything else? I don’t recommend a third shot.”
“A Manhattan.” She looks around, and, at finding an empty stool, she pulls it closer to her, dropping her body unceremoniously on it, purse finding its way to the counter in front of her. “And I plan on draining my bank account and getting very drunk today, so...”
“Top shelf, got it.”
He is in the middle of mixing everything when he looks at her again, her eyes never leave his even when he throws a bottle in the air and catches it before pouring it inside. She just smiles and shakes her head.
“You know what I don’t get?” Karolina hums, raising an eyebrow at him. “Why would a woman like you would feel the need to get drunk during High School reunion. With all due respect, you are beautiful, and as far as I got, funny. I usually don’t get it wrong, but I find it hard to believe you had a hard time back then.”
“Full of yourself, much, uh?” But she smiles, nevertheless, accepting her drink with a tankful nod, and bringing it to her lips, letting the alcohol do its work. “It’s more complicated than that.”
He sets down a tall glass of cold water, and she can’t even begin to find the words to say to him.
“Trust me, I’ve worked here for the past eight years, there’s nothing I haven’t heard.” He stops for a minute to take a look around, make sure there is no one to be served before he relaxes a little, leaning against the counter so he can lower is voice and still be heard over the chat. “Let me guess, High School sweetheart gone wrong, so you’re avoiding it.”
“We were never sweethearts.”
“Unrequited, then?” Still more complicated than that. “For what it’s worth, I think he was a huge idiot back then.”
Karolina smiles, brings her drink to her lips. “She was.” And takes a sip to hide the amusement clear on her face as realization dawns into him.
The lines around his mouth get more prominent as he looks around, smile getting bigger as he seems to study each person that had shared a classroom with Karolina once, wrinkles tracing the outside of his eyes.
“And they don’t know.”
“Karolina Dean!” A deep voice calls her, and so she plasters a smile in her face, turning on her stool to look at a guy she couldn’t remember at any of her memories. “Guys! Karolina is here, come on, Kar!”
She finishes her drink, she really wishes she hadn’t, and gets up with the water in hands.
“Thanks for the pep talk, uh.”
“Rick.” He strikes out his hand for Karolina to take. “Rick Jones.”
“Karolina Dean, but I guess you already know that.” They hear a chorus of her name being shouted, each time a bit louder than before, so she nods with her head to the tables, a resigned sigh past her lips. “Wish me luck.”
She is going to need it.
**
They hadn’t talked that morning, even though they’ve been together since the evening before. The impending twenty-four last hours of Karolina in California too close to an end and there were no words to be shared that wouldn’t bring them pain beyond they could comprehend.
There were no goodbyes left to do, they had gone out one more time, just the four of them, since Nico was taking a break from Alex. Again. And, even though she swore this time was different, Karolina knew better, it was Alex and they would sort things out by the end of summer break.
But Nico was single, technically, for the first time in three long years, and she had spent the last hours looking at Karolina with so much affection that made her falter, her heart speed out of control, the urge to stay growing bigger every time their eyes connected.
She couldn’t. Because Alex and Nico would go back to each other’s arms before she could count to ten, and she would have to look from afar. To give Nico the love Karolina always thought she deserved but wasn’t ready to receive as nothing but a friend.
It had already taken its tool on Karolina and she couldn’t do it anymore. She needed space. She needed to heal. Being physically way from Nico was the best answer she could find.
Apparently, Nico was the one not ready to let go. Because she was the one who offered to drive Karolina to the airport that morning since her parents were filming, she was the one who stayed the night, body molded into Karolina’s, as if she was afraid that if she put too much space between them, Karolina would be gone before she needed to, she was the one who reached out for her hand as they walked slowly to check in.
They were yet to talk, but the only words finding its way to Karolina’s throat were the ones she would never be brave enough to say. I’m in love with you. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. You’re my everything. So she kept her lips tightly shut, and Nico seemed happy enough to keep it that way.
It was time, to let go, to grow up. To learn who she was apart from Nico’s other half. She gave the hand in hers a light squeeze, Nico looked at her, and the breath was knocked out of her lungs.
Nico was crying. Ever since they met, Nico had cried once, and Karolina realized how similar those were. She, too, was leaving. And there was nothing Nico could do.
That was a lie, of course, all Nico had to do was ask and she would stay, because it didn’t matter how much she was hurting, she would do anything to prevent Nico from hurting further.
But she knew Nico would never do such thing. Nico would never be that selfish, not when it came to Karolina.
“Guess that’s it.”
“Yeah.”
Nico hugged her. Her fingers grasped at her sides, face buried on her neck and Karolina shivered, wrapped her arms around her shoulders, left a lingering kiss to her temple. It should be enough.
Yet, when Nico looked up, breathed out a tiny I love you, Karolina broke.
She leaned down, lips brushing before closing the space, pressing a gentle but firm kiss and, when Nico didn’t pull back, it burnt more than it would’ve if she had. Because it felt like a maybe, a possibility. Karolina couldn’t handle this. Not now.
“Kar-”
Grabbing her suitcases, she took a few steps back, mouth hanging down, and she was sure then her face matched the horror she felt inside. She had kissed Nico, and Nico stayed, had looked at her with shining eyes and smudged lipstick and Karolina could feel her will resolving.
This time, she didn’t dare to think the look at her was one of hope, decided it was nothing but pity and she created more space between them.
“Kar!”
“I’m, I, Nico, I’m sorry, I” She looked around, trying to find something, anything to get her out of there “I have to go.”
She left. She only remembered to clean her face halfway through her flight.
(Nico was even more beautiful then Karolina could ever conjure in her mind after she was recently kissed.)
**
Kar
Answer me
Please, we should talk.
Don’t do this
Don’t pull away
(Don’t leave me.)
**
“Hey, Kar, you weren’t answering my texts so I decided to call. Should’ve expected it to go to voicemail. But, uh, we should talk about what happened at the airport. You’re my best friend, Kar, I can’t lose you.”
**
“Hey, Kar, it’s me again. I still haven’t heard from you, it’s been two days. Look, nothing has to change between us, okay? I love you, more than I can say, just talk to me.”
**
“Karolina, It’s Nico, uh, I guess I finally got the message, loud and clear. I’ll leave you alone, for as long as you want. I just wish it wasn’t for long. I miss you. It’s hard without you.”
**
“I know I said I’d leave you alone, Dean, but it’s your first day of college, you’re probably excited for New York and all. How’s that going by the way? Call me whenever.”
**
Nico had gone back to Alex as soon as summer ended, Karolina met Xavin two weeks into freshmen year.
**
“Gert! Excuse me, Gert!”
Karolina tries to push her way between two of the guys who were talking to her once she spots a blurry of familiar purple. She couldn’t be more grateful, especially after one of the guys introduced himself as Topher, and she honestly just didn’t care anymore.
She manages, just in time to catch Gert’s gaze and smiles approaching as fast as her heels and the plus two drinks she had in the past thirty minutes allowed.
Gert has changed, but haven’t they all? The purple is fading, barely reaching the tips of her hair, giving space to dark brown, her glasses still in place, a leather jacket around her shoulder too big for her and she was sure who it belonged to. She stops, her eyes going down her body, a smile tugging at her lips.
“You’re-”
“Pregnant, yes, five months. And you’re on the fast lane to drunk.”
The shared laugh is light, like the ones they used to share so long ago, so she takes the last steps to her, hugs her closely and Gert lets her. She hears a chuckle, feels it vibrating against her shoulder, before letting go.
Seeing Gert again, most likely with Chase, makes her stomach writhe with the understanding that she was the one to abdicate of watching her grow and turn into the woman she was today. She was the one responsible for being a part of her life, of all of their lives.
Yet, Gert keeps her hand around Karolina’s forearm, guiding her through the same crowd from the beginning of the night, the strong smell of beer and sweat increasing with the passing hours.
Yet, Gert orders whatever she was drinking before and Rick hands it, not before searching her eyes for permission. And she lets herself be led, feet fighting for space without accidentally stepping in anyone, ignoring the calls of her name, and she stands frozen in front of a secured table at the back of the bar, as far as they could get from the mass of bodies of ex-colleagues and with the worst vision of the front door possible.
She stands frozen because Chase and Molly stare at her, all wide eyes and dropped jaws, empty glasses scattered in front of them. Or, more accurately, the shadows of what they used to be stare at her.
The man bun sported on top of his head isn’t enough to contain all of his hair, the locks falling messily over his broad shoulders, the hint of what it to become a beard angling with his sharp jawline, warm smile on his lips that could be seeing her after a decade just as much as from being slightly drunk.
Molly, with a backwards cap, strong colors and a bright grin, reacts first, jumping from her chair to hug Karolina. She’s stronger, very enthusiastic, and smells faintly of a fruity cocktail Karolina had had a drink ago. But her arms wrap easily along her shoulders and pulls her in, her height matching Karolina’s, a high pitched squeal loud enough to be overheard over the music.
Karolina sinks into the familiarity of everything, on the warm welcome back whispered against her ear, in the strong hold Chase gives her once Molly finally lets go.
The absence of Nico isn’t unnoticed, just not spoken out loud. Karolina had expected to find her with them and, by the way Molly keeps looking behind Karolina, they had expected Nico to be with her. She doesn’t know whether to be relieved or worried.
Maybe plans shift, and she was fifteen minutes away from leaving to go grab some pancakes she had been craving ever since her first shot and, most definitely, a bottle of wine in her way to the hotel. Now, she sits besides Molly, listening to them talk excitedly about everything that had happened ever since she left.
It’s a sad coincidence, really, all of the fall-outs with their parents. It’s an even sadder conclusion that was the reason they all stuck together in the first place, some of them even before they were old enough to understand.
Not Karolina. Karolina was there because Nico was, simple like that.
And Chase looks at her, smiles through his drunkenness, eyes shining from the low light hitting him just right.
“Must be hard to keep in touch with your parents, though. The distance and their jobs.”
Right. Maybe now she would have more in common with them, always being the one with a loving family and no traces of a sad story behind closed doors. How things change.
She picks the little umbrella that came in one of the past drinks Molly had, gaze flicking down to avoid the question, to try and think of a way to voice what happened even if it still hurt.
“We don’t,” She pauses, takes a deep breath and looks straight into Gert’s eyes “I haven’t talked to them since I was twenty-one.”
There is an unacknowledged tension surrounding them, the unasked why? getting heavier and heavier in their eyes, but Karolina only shrugs, so Chase grabs his glass of gin and tonics and tilts it in the air, the motion being enough to spill a few drops on the dark wood.
“To shitty parents, then.” Molly laughs when Gert tries to stop him from taking a sip, Karolina smiles when the cup comes back slamming against the table and Gert relents herself to glare at her boyfriend. “Anyway, how have you been, Karolina? Still dating?”
It’s a light laugh that leaves her lips, even if it still hurt to think about it and everything that it had entailed. Moving across the country to start again one more time. But she laughs, from the alcohol, from the notion that the last time they talked, nothing but a couple of texts through the day, she wasn’t single, from how they all seem to lean a little closer waiting for her answer.
“No.” Her hands rest against her lap, fingers grazing against the soft material of her flow-y, white dress. “Not anymore.”
“What?” And Gert puts a hand on Chase’s shoulder to keep him from getting up, as if he was going to leave to find whoever was responsible for this seemingly monstrous fact. “Do you want me to kick his ass?”
Oh.
There it was. The little, very important thing Karolina still haven’t said a word about, too lost in trying to keep up with their bickering, their augmented tales, and the palpable excitement of seeing her again in Los Angeles after so long.
She lets out an uncomfortable laugh, tucks the strands of blonde hair from her bangs, that fell onto her face, in to the back of her ear and rests her hands at the table, where they could see.
Proudly. Like she had learned to live over the years.
Her heart rate spikes, nevertheless, hands sweating and blood running cold.
“About that-”
**
It had been almost three years since it began.
Three years into New York, one failed relationship and the start of a new found one. But it also meant she spent all that time standing still as she watched the most important thing in her life crumbling down.
And there was no one to blame but herself. Because she became nothing but an extra in her own old life, staring as Nico tried time and time again to reach out, but unable to move. She had fucked up. She kissed Nico and wasn’t ready to face the consequences. Having to deal with questioning stares and the lingering wonder between them weren’t things she was looking forward to.
Leaving was easier. So, she left.
Nico was the one who didn’t. And the mornings were filled with the expectation that she would wake up to face a text at the crack of dawn, Nico too drunk to form coherent sentences but they would be there. A reminder that her presence lingered in Nico’s mind.
She wished she didn’t. Because every once in a while, sometimes longer than that, there would be missed calls and unanswered texts.
I miss you
And Karolina would stare at it through the day, she would sit at the back of the class, phone unlocked by the side of her notebook and she would ache to reach out and answer.
She never did.
Can we talk?
Her fingers would twitch, long to touch the right letters. Yes, call me.
She shut down her phone.
She would lay awake in bed that nights, staring at the ceiling of her small apartment, feeling the weight down her chest, heart heavy, breathing shallow. Because she needed Nico, but she was ashamed and couldn’t deal with the rejection nor the pity.
It hurt. So she became a master in ignoring.
Finger softly dug into the exposed skin of her thigh, snapping her gaze from the lit up screen from her phone. Julie was there, she had been for the past few months, with reassuring smiles and light kisses in the morning, and Karolina fell a little more for her with each gesture.
Maybe Julie started off as a one night stand, the perception that she would never see her again after she hurriedly left her dorm to get back at her apartment before seven am was something she could deal with. What she couldn’t deal with was looking at the one and only Julie Power, flashbacks surfacing at how it felt tugging hard at locks of blonde hair and arching to decided touches.
It was what she got in the end. Not only once a week, but through two hours straight, four times a week. Somehow, this was where they found themselves by the end of the semester.
“Are you going to get that?”
Hey, Kar, I know it’s been a while but, uh
I really need to talk to you
It’s just
Nico Minoru
(2) missed calls
I need you
Sorry
She didn’t answer, rushing, instead, to shove her phone inside her purse, the action being stopped only by a gentle tug at her wrist. Julie’s thumb traced a line from where her fingers were resting until her palm, an encouraging smile on her face.
“I think you should.”
“No, I-”
“Kar,” And it hurt to hear the nickname falling easily from lips but in a voice that didn’t belong to Nico, her grip tightened around the phone in her hands “this is eating you up.” Julie only smiled at her, before nodding. Karolina didn’t have to be told twice.
On her twenty-first birthday, Karolina found herself sitting at the sidewalk in front of a nice restaurant, in a fancy dress and heels that, only after fifteen minutes, were already hurting her feet. But she had her phone in hands, fingers hoovering over the prospect of having Nico back in her life if that’s what she decided on.
She called. Nico picked up on the third ring.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
The silence stretched between them and there was nothing she could do about it. They had much to talk about, Karolina had much to say, to apologize to begin with, but she couldn’t bring herself to do so.
How could she start to say sorry for all the time and distance she forced upon them? She couldn’t, but Nico was there, waiting, hoping. Karolina couldn’t do that. To overanalyze each and every movement, and hope there was a hidden meaning behind them; she had already done that for too long through her teenage years. Look at where it got her.
There was a breathless chuckle, Karolina never knew who was the one to release it, but then Nico was talking about Los Angeles. How Chase was going crazy from trying to conciliate college and taking over his father’s company after his death.
Karolina had read about it, had called him back when it happened and promised herself she would keep in better touch. She hadn’t. Neither had them.
How Gert was helping with everything, even though they could hear her cursing under her breath, and the exhaustion that seemingly walked with them. How Molly was already going crazy because of her SAT, without having even started her Senior year yet.
How things had changed and Karolina was too busy being away to see them. That’s what she got from the conversation.
Karolina didn’t mention how Alex’s name never came up, her throat itching to let the words out, but her brain stopping herself from doing it. She didn’t have to, because he was Nico’s next topic.
“Alex and I broke up.” And she didn’t say anything for the first time since Nico started updating her. Because she had heard that before, too many times, and she learned the hard way not to let her heart react to it. Just because she had learned didn’t mean her heart always listened. “For real this time.”
“Yeah, of course.”
She hadn’t meant for it to sound so bitter, but it did, even to her own ears. She couldn’t begin to understand what it must’ve looked like for Nico.
“I did. Over eight months ago.”
Around Thanksgiving. Karolina doesn’t have to think too hard about it, because Nico called. But she called more times than she would like to admit in a month, but it was different that time. There was a voicemail.
She hadn’t gotten one since her first day at college. She erased it before it got the best of her.
“Today I found out he was cheating on me with Amy this whole time, so they’re both canceled.”
The low laugh she heard was a little dry, too self-depreciating if Karolina knew Nico. And she did, she knew her all too well. Fingers coming to fiddle with the clasp of her shoes, she took a deep breath in.
“Nico.”
“No, it’s fine, really, it’s your birthday, we should be talking about you and not about that dickhead.”
“You don’t have to pretend you’re okay with that, not to me.” When there was no answer, Karolina let go, it wasn’t worth pressing something neither of them were ready to talk about. “What do you wanna know?”
“God, Karolina. Everything.”
Didn’t give Karolina a sense of what direction she should take.
There was a three-years gap to fulfill and sitting in a low lit street at eight pm didn’t do its justice. Somehow, she didn’t care. Because three years were three years too long to spend without her best friend. All of her reasons sounded silly then, too much like a teenager who didn’t know how to deal with what was thrown her way, but had learned from the experience and grown.
After so long, there were just too many things she could say, too many little things she had to learn to live without to truly let go from California.
Interior Design School is great, and my classmates aren’t assholes. I miss going to new beaches every weekend. I painted half of my hair bright pink and it was the best worst decision I ever made. I’m dating. I might have done a tattoo but I’ll never show it to you. I’m visiting Cali next week, so we should get together.
“I’m gay.” And the words were out of her mouth before she could even fully process them. “I’m a lesbian and, fuck, I don’t know, felt wrong not telling you, I guess. I hid this from you for so long, and now I’m dating this amazing woman who tried so hard to make me make up with you and just tell you because you would never do-”
“Kar.” It was so soft she would be lying if she said it didn’t make her heart race, her insides twitch in a feeling akin to affection in its purest form. “I’m so proud of you.”
“I’m sorry, Nico.”
“Don’t.”
“No, I pushed you away and never explained myself, I just disappeared and it was so wrong of me. I had to learn to love myself again and I hurt you in the process, I left, and I’m really sorry.”
If not for the short breathing on the other side of the line, Karolina would’ve been sure Nico had hung up on her. But they were still connected, Nico’s answer being the one thing that would decide for how long.
“You’re here now.”
Things never felt lighter.
**
“Wait.” She smiles shyly when she feels Molly’s gaze taking her in, from the straight rainbow barbell piercing placed at the top of her ear, to the rainbow ring around her right thumb, to the ever so present blush on her neck and cheeks from being subjected to three questioning gazes. “You?”
“Yeah, her name is Julie, and we dated for almost seven years, but she broke up with me six months ago because she said I was emotionally unavailable and she was the only one putting any kind of effort into our relationship.”
Julie had called her a stone-cold bitch and manipulative asshole, but, you know,semantics.
Karolina reaches out for her drink, gaze down, and suddenly feels way too warm, way too sober to be having this conversation with the only three people she still cared enough about how they would react.
But there is laughter around the table, and Molly actually puts an arm around her shoulders to tug her closer. Like all those years ago, she feels ashamed of thinking they would care, or would show anything other than support. It was still a part of herself she had taken too long to show people, and even a longer time to understand she couldn’t help how others would react, she could only change what she was going to do about those people in her life.
Gert, Chase and Molly? They were the ones who should stay, who she should’ve fought harder to keep. But she had shut down and Nico was the one to desperately try to grab a hold to whatever was left.
In Molly’s half-hug, she feels like she didn’t screw this up too much. Maybe they could pick up from where they left.
Maybe.
“I can’t believe I got so jealous of you because of him!”
“So, I’ll have to pass, Chase. But thank you for the offer.”
“You’re gay!”
Gert’s hand rests once more against his shoulder, containing his energy and keeping him in a sitting position. The gesture was much appreciated, even if it didn’t contain his voice carrying through the space, more than a few curious glances turning their way.
She sits straighter in her chair, slipping away from Molly’s touch, her hand finding Karolina’s anyway under the table for a final gentle squeeze. Breathing out a sigh of relief, she directs them a bashful smile.
“Have known for sure for half my life, but, you know.”
“That’s why-” Gert elbows him not so lightly in the ribs, plasters a very fake smile and raises an eyebrow, and it’s all just so them, Karolina can’t stop the warmth in her chest. “Just realized it was a very distasteful question.”
It’s not hard, actually.
Your parents.
Nico.
You stepped away.
Neither of them a question she was looking forward to answering at the moment. Nor in a close future.
Karolina doesn’t like the questions shinning in their eyes, the answers lost in a sea of feelings she never dove too deep for a long time and wasn’t ready to start doing it at the moment. She doesn’t like the understanding she sees there, as if the final piece of a puzzle finally made itself known.
Instead, she lets her eyes wander. She wishes she hadn’t.
And her hands sweat at the sight: the black outfit being hard to spot with the dimmed lights, but it’s Nico and Karolina always finds her.
Black boots and skirt barely reaching the middle of her thighs, a white button up with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows, a frown permanently on the middle of her eyebrows from talking to Eiffel for who knows how long.
It’s the skirt that gets to her, the memories still to vivid of what it is like to trail her hands up and under the hem, soft skin and the loud gasp pressed to her ears, printed on the back of her mind.
“Fuck.”
Their eyes meet when Nico takes a step back, looking at anywhere but Eiffel. And she has ten, maybe fifteen seconds before Nico gets there, (gay) panic rising in her chest, a very amused looking Gert and Chase lost in conversation with Molly.
Double fuck.
“Gonna get another drink!”
They look at her, Karolina hates the way Chase’s face turn into a bright grin and silence falls upon them.
And there are hands on her hips when she turns around, body promptly colliding with a much smaller frame, a sharp intake of breath through her parted lips at being caught off guard, her own hands finding support by resting on her shoulders. Nico, inhumanly beautiful Nico who, the last time they saw each other, had her legs- No.
No.
She doesn’t waste another minute before fumbling out the same excuse and going straight to the bar.
She is way too sober for this.
**
I’m gay.
Two words, very simple, actually. And the reaction should’ve been way simpler. But her parents had only stared blankly ahead, as if Karolina wasn’t even standing in front of them anymore, stance becoming more and more guarded over time.
Leave and don’t come back.
That was simple as well, it didn’t mean it hurt any less.
Because she should’ve be met with love, because that wasn’t supposed to matter, not to her parents, the ones who proclaimed to love her above anything else. They didn’t and it took twenty-one years fro Karolina to understand.
She spent a week at Nico’s. They didn’t call.
She went back to New York. They didn’t call.
She cried in her girlfriend’s lap, as gentle fingers undid the tangles in her hair, her sobs only growing in intensity, tears she didn’t know she still had in her after all the time she spend doing the same with Nico instead. They didn’t call.
Karolina stopped hoping they ever would.
**
She signals for a refill of her martini and Rick stops the bartender of complying. He comes closer, instead, too busy making her drink already, a look of concentration on his features and not a word said in between.
When she happily reaches for it, he pulls it back, just an inch away and Karolina might be drunk, but not drunk enough to embarrass herself trying to closer her fingers around the glass. She looks up with what she hopes is a look of defiance, but he doesn’t crumble, he barely blinks.
Maybe she is close enough to embarrass herself to get her drink and pretend the soft stroke of Nico’s fingers on her covered hipbones wasn’t enough to make her a trembling mess.
“Spell your name.”
It is a very serious question, even to her alcohol clouded brain, and she understands it from the beginning, still takes her a second too long to process it.
“What?”
“Spell your name, out loud.” He must see how her brow furrows in confusion and he smiles a little. “Look, you’ve been drinking ever since you got in. If you can’t do it, I won’t serve you a drink. It’s called ethics.”
“Ethics my ass.” Rick laughs, shakes his head a little but waits. She relents. “K-A-R-O-L-I-N-A. Can I have my drink now?”
The martini is good, better than the one she had before, even though she doubts she feels the actual flavor of it, a light burning on the inside of her cheeks since before she went to have a seat with Gert, Chase and Molly.
Perhaps she sees his point, her voice sounding deeper and slower to her own ears, her eyelids fighting a little harder to keep closed every time she blinks, her movements sloppier than usual.
Perhaps, she appreciates the concern, the extra effort he put into making sure she was still okay and able to make and stick to her own decisions.
Still, he sticks around, much like he did almost three hours ago, leaning against his side of the counter, heads close enough to be brushing to keep their tones low, a secure atmosphere away from prying ears.
“If I would say so myself, she is here.”
“What gave?” She takes another sip, her wrist curving a little more than she anticipated, a couple of drops slipping from the corner of her lips. She grabs a few napkins he slides her way. “My one way ticket to alcohol poisoning or the pure, dread, cold defeat in my face?”
“I would say because of a very enraged, a little scary, woman glaring my way ever since I stepped remotely close to you.”
Karolina doesn’t turn around, doesn’t even spare a glance over her shoulder in search of confirming a rapidly growing doubt inside her chest. Her grip hardens, mouth suddenly dry and she would like nothing more than to finish her drink and leave. To stick to a plan for once in her life.
At least she was drunk, so, accomplished.
But the mere notion of seeing Nico again after three months, specially after everything, too much a temptation to let go so easily. Sneak a couple of glances, see her smile from afar, hear her voice over all the other, to retreat in fear of showing too much.
Felt too much like going back to High School.
She hates it.
“Is she?” Still, she can’t shake the hope in her voice, hanging utterly and completely onto the stupid notion of them.
“Spell your name.”
She looks dead into his eyes as she finishes her drink. There was still to much, over half of it, but she manages, tries to cover the coughing fit as a long laugh and fail miserably at it.
“K-A-R-O-L-I-N-A.”
“Another?”
“Flaming shots?”
“Great choice.” She is left alone for a minute, silently cutting the napkins she got into smaller and smaller pieces, until a dash of blue caught her eye. “And, yes, she still is.”
She doesn’t answer and it’s enough to make Rick keep the shot away from her. He raises an eyebrow intimidatingly, and she knows.
“Spell your name.”
“Fuck you!”
And there is a smooth hand pressing against the small of her back, the same perfume she tried so hard to remove from her sheets, from her mind, from her dreams, enveloping all of her senses.
Nico. Their sides brush even when Karolina tries to put some distance between them, the secured hand burning its way through her clothes, her words hitching at the base of her neck when Nico looks her way, a subtle upturn of the corner of her lips.
“You’re feisty.” She has to bite her bottom lip when fingers gaze their way to her hips, her eyes following the lines of her profile, her own finger itching to reach out and touch. To remember what it’s like to be so close to her. “I’ll take it from here, don’t worry. And sorry.”
Rick looks at her waiting for confirmation, one that he never gets because Nico grabs the flaming shot and downs it easily, and she is not the one to blame for being transfixed on the way her head tips back.
“Karolina?”
“Yes.” She jumps in her seat, turning her reddening face to Rick, resists the urge to get up and run. Things used to be easier when she did that. “It’s okay.”
“Have a nice night, Karolina.”
Her eyes don’t leave his back and she forces them forward when she feels Nico sliding smoothly in a stool next to her. She pretends she doesn’t notice the way Nico’s hand finds her thigh, rests there lightly just above her knee.
She pretends the touch doesn’t send her mind spiraling into memories she’d been trying to suppress, like she didn’t know what it felt like to have it against her skin, instead of feeling it through the material of her dress.
She pretends Nico doesn’t act like they haven’t talked in three months, like she hadn’t run away when they were finally on the same place.
“Can we talk?” To make it even harder to deny, Nico brushes a strand of her hair behind her ear, her touch lingering on Karolina’s cheek, the softest of smiles tugging on her lips.
Well, Karolina Dean has always been a sucker for Nico Minoru.
**
A small part of Karolina hated herself for feeling so domestic over the stupidest, simplest things in life. And even with the ever so present sirens in her head, she couldn’t stop the rapidly growing happiness spreading through her chest.
Happiness caused by no other than Nico Minoru standing in the middle of her kitchen, one of Karolina’s gray sweatpants mostly folded at her ankles and an oversized white t-shirt, one that she was pretty sure was also hers, hair pulled up in a messy bun.
Nico had looked beautifully comfortable, a too big of a smile on her face as she laughed at her own joke, hands carefully chopping vegetables, the sound echoing around the empty apartment. The scene itself was more than enough to make her hands sweat, her heart clench, the reminder that a part of herself would never completely move on, never exactly get over.
The domesticity of cooking with the woman she was once in love with.
Karolina was fucked.
So, she busied herself, pouring two glasses of wine for them, anything to keep her mind from wondering. She had already learned the hard way nothing good ever came out of that.
Her front brushed against Nico’s back, a sharp intake of breath breaks the silence once settled upon them. She ignored, then, how Nico stopped moving, the sound coming from her, and, as soon as the glass was set at the sink next to the cutting board, she distanced herself.
Nothing good would come from overanalyzing it. Surprise was the answer after all. No need to trace the source of the sudden dryness of her throat.
“You know, I hated the whole hair thing when I got here, but now I just think you look really cute.” It was said so casually, the second before Nico took a sip of her wine and turned to start stirring the brown rice, that Karolina’s words were lost to her. Or maybe her brain stopped working for a moment. Or definitely. “What are the plans for tomorrow, anyway?”
She took her time in reaching for one of the stools and setting down at the counter, mostly because she was sure she couldn’t remember how to form coherent sentences. Or words. Or thoughts, in fact.
“Uh,” The wine didn’t help, apparently making her throat even dryer. Cute. Really cute. “Central Park, maybe?”
Nico groaned. “No touristic things, Kar, you know me better than that.”
“And the whole overrated shit you always pull.”
“Thanks.” Her eyes raised from where they were settled, the spatula mirroring the movement. “But you should keep that as a plan B.”
She was in the middle of her laugh when there was a knock on her door. And her laughter was already dying in her throat when she opened the door to a very pissed-looking Julie.
Fuck.
“I am so sorry.”
Julie was past the threshold even before the first word left her mouth, Karolina grunted after closing the door, her head connecting against the wood in a soft thud.
“Oh, no, you don’t get to be sorry, Karolina.” Julie stood facing her, only partially turned to the kitchen, Nico hidden from their field of vision, as long as she didn’t lean over the counter. She looked beautiful when she was angry, but she always looked beautiful so it wasn’t a groundbreaking realization. “Four days! I’ve been texting you for four days and you disappeared, you made me worried sick!”
Her phone, right. The one without battery, probably, because if Nico was here and she was in a vacation from work, then she wouldn’t need it. Sometimes her brain didn’t catch up.
Karolina took a tentative step forward, but Julie only crossed her arms. Even from afar she could see the slight frown of her lips, her heavy breathing, and that was too much for her to take, the guilt flooding over her.
Four days since Nico arrived and nothing felt as important as spending time with her best friend. She was so in the wrong.
But Julie let her get closer, her hands resting tentatively on her hips, the resolve on her girlfriend’s face breaking and she even managed to leave a light peck on her lips.
“If you think you’re gonna kiss your way out of this argument,” Karolina kissed her again, a little longer this time, fingers digging harder at their grasp and pulling Julie closer. “you’re wrong.”
“Nico’s here.” She whispered, blue eyes finding hers and widening as words sunk in.
And she let herself lean completely against Karolina, her face tucking itself on the crook of her neck.
“Hey, Nico.”
“Julie.”
Fingers found the back of her neck, pulling her down so their lips met once more, deeper and way harder than the first two. Julie’s hand grasped at her forearm, Karolina brought her closer.
“Don’t think you’re off the hook.”
Nico didn’t say anything as Karolina led her girlfriend to the front door, another parting kiss before she went back to her place for the night, observing Nico cook for the both of them, and the now warm half full glass of red wine.
“She is really pretty.” The words were so soft, so low, for a second she imagined she heard it right, but Nico had a small smile on her face, eyes refusing to meet hers.
Karolina smiled at the door, lips still tingling from the last kiss, heat rising in her skin where they touched.
“Yes, she is.”
**
Technically, Karolina didn’t postpone all of her work in order to go home because Nico had texted her. Technically, Karolina had increased the number of all nighters she would have to pull in order to complete her assignment in time.
Technically, she didn’t rush to get her phone out of the pocket of her jeans at the first signal something might have happened, rushing out an excuse about a family emergency and leaving in the middle of the afternoon because, apparently, Nico was at her place. Or waiting to get inside her place.
Perhaps, she did all of that.
She took the stairs, far from being the worst impulsive decision she did that day, to find Nico sitting in front of her door, very concentrated on her phone and a heavy-looking backpack dropped on her lap.
Her head leaned fully against the white wood, hair (short hair) disheveled from the most likely clean, sharp cut above her shoulders, tips in a greenish, almost blue looking color.
Karolina was already in front of her when Nico looked up, a slow grin spreading through her face.
“Impromptu trip?”
“New York was the next flight available.”
Liar. “Come in.”
The apartment was very strange ever since Julie left. The photos were taken down, books removed from the shelves, clothes left a way too big space in her wardrobe, there was now a single key to open the front door, instead of two.
It looked a little less lived in, because Karolina couldn’t spend too much time there without being reminded of everything. Because, even though, Julie had been right, it didn’t make it hurt any less. It didn’t make her not miss her ex-girlfriend and the familiarity of always having her around. How three months changed things.
Because she grew used to it, she grew used to the love they shared until that wasn’t enough for Julie anymore.
Only halfway invested on making it work. Waiting for something that would never happen. Hoping. Hung up on an ideal .
She really hated when Julie could push all of her buttons without even trying.
Nico threw her bag at the far end of the couch, a loud sigh drawing Karolina’s attention to her.
“I broke up with Victor.”
When she realized there was no following up statement, she nodded. “Okay.”
“Because it wasn’t fair on neither of us, you know?” Karolina shrugged, she knew. Of course she did, her most recent failed relationship was the biggest proof of it, that when one loved more intensely, more deeply, the consequences came for them both. “And I’ve been dragging this for three months.”
She could only stand still, watching as Nico leaned against the arm of her couch, fingers fidgeting with the hem of her black skirt, as if she was suddenly shy, realization sinking in.
Three months.
“I’ve been dragging this for nine years.” Nico. She couldn’t do this, not now, not when reality finally caught up to her and she understood that she couldn’t hang onto any piece of her past in order to move on. But there Nico was, saying what she had wanted to hear since the beginning. “Maybe longer.”
“Nico.”
It was soft, afraid of cutting through the weight the confession settled between them, the weight those words managed to lift from her heart only to drop it down all over again. Heavier this time.
“After all this time, Kar, things were moving in the right direction, I could go after what I wanted and I was still sabotaging myself.”
Please, don’t. But she was there, prying her arms from the secured position they settled crossed in front of her chest, hands easily sliding until their fingers brushed, intertwined in the biggest wave of calmness Karolina had ever felt.
Their bodies were close, too close for Karolina’s brain to function properly, especially since it never did when Nico was even sharing the same room with her. She could feel the ghost of their legs touching, the warmth that settled against her neck were Nico’s heavy breathing hit, the promise that they would talk but could be doing much more at the moment.
She couldn’t. It was a one way path, she had found out, the return being too hard and too exhausting, an energy Karolina didn’t have. If she went there, there would be no coming back.
It looked like one way to go.
“At the airport, why did you kissed me?”
The openness in her eyes made her stomach contort, the question never asked filling the space between them, the answer Karolina had always been too afraid to give, because she was going to break. She doubted she would be put back together.
But Nico still deserved the truth, and she had waited for too long to me bet with anything but that.
“I was in love with you.”
“Was?”
Was. Am. Always will be in an extent. Did the conjugation really mattered?
The reason why she couldn’t do this, whatever it was they were doing, being shoved into her face. Because her honesty with her own feelings only reached so far, and that limit was way before admitting it out loud how she still felt.
She couldn’t concentrate, her heart beating way too fast and way too hard against her chest, the air refusing to enter her lungs and provide the slightest bit of relief to her body.
“You can’t-” But her hands were already wrapping around Nico’s waist, pulling her closer until their breaths mingled and the last shred of space cease to exist. “Why do you keep doing this?”
“I don’t know.”
“You can’t keep coming back, resurrecting my feelings for you whenever something happens in your life.” And she was tugged down so their lips touched, barely a brush but it was enough. Karolina hated that it was enough because she always aimed for much higher. “I’m not that strong, Nico.”
“I don’t want them do die after this.”
And Nico was the one who kissed her, all hot and desperate, in a very easy rhythm for Karolina to keep up with. Because they had over a decade worth of feelings to let go. They didn’t have that much time.
So, when Karolina’s hands slid under the hem of her skirt, to a path of soft, delicate skin, Nico understood, wrapping her legs around her middle and letting herself be picked up.
They didn’t have time, and Karolina thought Nico looked beautiful with smudged black lipstick, chest heaving with each deep breath. They didn’t have time, and Karolina was done wasting the little they had.
She woke up alone the next day, the soreness below her waist and a slight discomfort in her wrist the only indications that what happened wasn’t a fever dream.
I’m in love with you, and Nico had threaded their fingers together, ascending her kisses to Karolina’s shoulder, until she whispered it again to the shell of her ear.
Nico didn’t pick up.
**
Karolina breaths out a laugh, head leaning heavily against Nico’s shoulder. It feels nice, it’s easy, then, to forget the reason she is mad, the reason why they haven’t talked for ninety-seven days, but Karolina surely isn’t counting.
I’m in love with you, and the thought of the open mouthed kiss left on her bare shoulder haunted her dreams ever since.
It’s easy to forget Nico showed up, handed all the words Karolina ever dreamed of receiving, just to leave the morning after, no words shared. And it’s nice because Nico turns around just enough so she can lay a kiss to her temple, murmur a praise as their bodies press together in order to occupy as less space as they can at the corner of the bar Karolina was right about all along.
No matter how nice Rick is, with knowing looks and raised eyebrow every time he refills Karolina’s glass of water, no matter how nice the place looks, the right amount of cozy and trendy, there were pretentious drinks and bottles of beer all over the counter, something she still wasn’t used to after so many nights spent in questionable bars with her friends.
It’s the kind of place she would go to had she stayed in touch with her parents through her college years.
It’s easy breathing her in because she is way past tipsy and feels like nothing else matters beside the fact that Nico is here.
“Karrie, I’m serious, you have no idea how terrifying Gert gets if you as much thinks about touching her cat.” Her voice sounds low and steady, barely a whisper above the music and against Karolina’s ear. “She threatened Molly, who does that?”
The hand on her knee gives a gentle squeeze, the touch light but not forgotten over the minutes they shared. No, she is completely aware of how her skin burns at every slight flick, the reminder being enough to make her shift in her seat in search of a more comfortable position.
She finds none, because Nico turns in her stool, their knees brushing as Karolina straightens up her spine, and it really should be illegal for Nico to wear that. It’s easy to blame the alcohol when Nico draws a finger up her thigh and she has to bite her lip in order to retain the humiliating whine that threatened to leave her mouth.
I’m in love with you, and the skin between her shoulder blades still burnt at the memory, the ghost of lips touching it, whispering in order to not break the perfect silence settled around them.
“How have you been?” Karolina asks, partially to keep their topics around things she can hear without breaking a little bit inside, mostly because she wants to shake the memories trying to spring back to the front of her mind.
“Spent the last ten weeks in Phoenix doing shitty costumes for a shitty movie, my roommate found someone else so I kind of don’t have a place to live, but I was thinking of moving out anyway, so doesn’t matter.”
“How shitty is it really?”
“It’s going to be pretty big, but the storyline sucks.” Her eyes follow the hand Nico brings up, palm easing back the hair that had fallen into her face. “I, uh-”
And Karolina hates how Nico’s shoulders square up, how she holds her head high, chin turned up slightly, preparing herself physically for what’s to come. She hates it because she knows the shift things will take, because she is not ready to hear.
Knowing and hearing are very different things.
Before her mouth can even curl into the shape of a word, Nico is already continuing. “I wanted to apologize. For disappearing.”
From all the things Karolina could’ve heard, an excuse was way down the list. But then again, it was them, things were always a little (lot) different when it came to their friendship.
“You don’t have to.”
“I do. I really do.” And there it is, the lingering tension between them, somewhat always present and never acknowledged. She really doesn’t. “Because I told you I was in love with you, then left.”
Was.
Was.
Past tense, oh my god, was.
“Because I got so scared of telling the truth, of doing what I wanted the most, I couldn’t face you. And I freaked out, so I ran and it’s stupid to think that I could just pretend I never said anything because I’ve been in love with you my whole life, then I got scared of coming back. This is probably the worst apologize you’ve ever heard in your life, but I can’t explain what I was thinking, I just we were getting out of relationships and felt wrong jumping into us, into this, but I want to, I-”
“Nico.” She whispers softly, leans in until their faces are almost touching, I’ve been in love with you my whole life. There was really no other way of putting it. “Are you going to shut up so I can kiss you?”
Their lips touch and Karolina is suddenly drunker than she has ever been, for entire different reasons.
She gets drunk at how Nico grasps at the back of her neck, surging her forward, indulging her in not going back. She gets drunk at the tiny sigh Nico lets out through her nose, her own hand reaching out to rest against her cheek. She gets drunk at holding back the long, drawn-out moans from Nico biting at her lower lip.
They kiss and feels like finally acknowledging something they had known for too long, that they had held back for further than they should, a couple of spills that led to a hurried kiss and, in Karolina’s opinion, the best of her life. Spills of emotion until they were old enough to understand, to try and make things work.
“Manhattan seems nice to live in.” Nico leaves another much chaster, much shorter kiss to her lips, before she moves a few inches back to be able to look at her in the eyes. “I could find a more permanent place there, also I have a lot to apologize for.”
Karolina agrees, but they have a whole lot of other things to be doing at the moment and none of them involved words. Better yet, none of them involved coherent sentences, she is really fine with words.
Her mind already has thirty different plans running around, all of them with a very familiar outcome. Dragging Nico to the back of the bar to be pressed against a wall as lips left mouth to explore newly exposed skin instead. Dragging Nico to a shared cab to her hotel, so clothes could be shred from bodies and she could put her ostentatious bed to good use. Dragging Nico to the bathroom, a single, and spending as much time as they could back there. Making out with Nico, yes, Karolina was very inclined to the idea.
Body already lifting from her stool to take the step that separated them, thumb tracing the outline of her cheekbone, Karolina has her favorite plan in motion. Kissing Nico. Kissing, yes, kissing is good.
“You’re here now, there’s no more running away, okay?”
“No more.”
They understand, and they kiss, Nico’s fingers digging at her sides, tugging her forward, her legs spreading so Karolina could press closer, her heels getting in the way of the perfect height, so her neck strains at the motion of leaning down.
She doesn’t mind. Not at all. Not when Nico keeps kissing her jaw even when she has to break it off to breathe, to stop burning, to stop the warmth from coursing to very unwanted places at the moment.Nico has just found that place where her jawline meets her neck that she was so fond of the last time, when they hear a loud squeal, a shocked gasp and a laugh.
Standing, perhaps at arms length, are Molly, Chase and Gert. Karolina is all too aware of the black lipstick covering the lower half of her face, she just doesn’t mind, not when Nico grabs her hand and kisses her cheek, not giving her an inch of space.
“My best friend and my sister!” Chase screams, and maybe two or three uninterested faces turn their way.
“He’s clearly drunk, ignore him, please.” Gert is the first to step forward, wrap them both in a tight hug that brings the truest smile of the night to her face. “I’m really happy for you.”
Chase gets in, then, whispering the same sentence again, in a voice akin to wonder, as if daring himself to think of that possibility once it was openly presented to him. Molly collapses against them so forcefully that she has to lean a little more into Nico to keep her balance.
“Well,” Molly says when they step back, three sets of eyes failing to look at their joined hands subtly. “we were going to offer a ride, but you seem busy so...”
“I think I’m going to stick around for a while. What do you say, Kar?”
“Yeah, if you’re staying.”
“I’m feeling really stupid for taking so long to realize this.” Gert hugs them once more, less fierceful and a lot quicker. “Have fun and keep in better touch, Karolina. We missed you.”
“Gert, it’s my best friend and my sister.”
She watches them go, locking eyes ever so often with Chase, who seems enthusiastic on looking over his shoulder in their direction, waves energetically when Karolina raises her free hand.
Then, Nico is all she can think about, because she’s pulling Karolina to mold their bodies together, a hand resting dangerously low in her backa confident smile plastered on her face, one that Karolina knows all too well.
“So,” Nico leaves a kiss just above her collarbone, a shiver running through her skin. “what about I buy you a drink and we talk thing over when you’re completely sober?”
“Why not talk now?”
“Because I would also like to profusely apologize to you, which I cannot do for the next sixteen hours.”
Oh. Karolina kisses her, deep, dirty, tongue swiping at her bottom lip before nipping at it.
“I take my martini dry.”
**
It is too bright for her partially open eyes, even though, judging by the amount of light pouring through the mostly closed curtains, it’s still too early for the sun to be at its high. Doesn’t mean her head doesn’t pound tongue rasping against the ceiling of her mouth scraping it like sand.
She is never drinking again. Which was something she told herself more often than not. Perhaps she should’ve listened the her past self that had made that promise the first time, because it would’ve spared her from so much.
Like not remembering what she had done the night before. Nothing good ever came out of that.
The duvet is soft in the small of her back, the mattress too bouncy, as she forces her eyes open to take in her surroundings. She is in her hotel room, at least, but the slightest movement is enough to make her stop dead in her tracks.
She is not alone in bed. And, sparing a glance under the covers, naked. Mostly.
“Are you freaking out yet?”
Her voice is light, covered in a humor Karolina can’t begin to figure out where is coming from. She is naked, in the bed of a very expensive hotel, waking up with what is yet to become the worst hangover of her year (life), with Nico. Nico. She can barely remember leaving the bar.
Tugging her arms tighter around her chest, she shuffles around in bed ignoring the throb in her right knee, and Nico stayed, made herself comfortable in one of Karolina’s shirts and, judging by the way their legs were brushing, nothing more. She tries a nod, but her head won’t obey and, a low grunt later, Nico laughs, leans in to kiss her temple.
“Do you want some Advil?”
Please. She sits up against the headboard trying to pull the covers with her in her ascension, she really needed to find something to wear. Anything.
Feeling barely human after two glasses of cold water and some pills, the events of the night before came back, most of it things she would very much prefer to forget. Then, nothing. And she should’ve stopped right after Nico found her at the counter, maybe things would’ve been slightly less mortifying.
“So.”
There is a dip on the bed right in front of her body, Nico’s hand tentatively reaching for her, fingers brushing at the outline of her thigh. It’s still too bright, everything too loud and now her stomach burned, the nausea coming back full-force.
Logically, Karolina knows they should talk, or maybe not talk because they had already shared everything they needed last night, perhaps reassurance was the best concept. To make sure the drunken words came from a true place.
(It had.)
“Can I at least put something on?” Nico’s gaze flickers down, her collarbones standing out, forearms trying to keep as less skin as possible from being seen.
“You do realize we’ve had sex already, right?” No, shit, no. they slept together and it explained the no bra situation as well as the absence of her dress and “Like, we had sex last time we saw each other and there’s nothing I haven’t seen.”
“I’d feel better if I could put my bra on.”
Nico grins, the corner of her eyes crinkling, rosy lips stretching into the most beautiful smile she has ever seen and she was so not ready.
“You don’t remember.” It’s not a question, a simple, blank statement that pulls all the air out of Karolina’s lungs. “You kinda lost it.”
“What?”
“I know, it was a nice one and I would’ve loved to see you wearing it., but you took it off at the cab.” She gives Karolina a second to process it, waiting for permission to continue. “Then you tried to pay the driver with it.”
Death by embarrassment. That was her way to go.
“Oh my god.” She whispers softly, palms resting against her rapidly reddening cheeks and she allows her body to sink into the bed. She feels it on her skin, the way her body seems to heath up by the reminder of a forgotten memory. “No.”
The way Nico laughs is beautiful and it would’ve been way more appreciated if the pills had made any effect by now. As it is, she really wants to go back to sleep, to convince herself this is just a nightmare and wake up again in her empty apartment. Preferably, a week ago.
But a hesitant touch displaces her hands away from her face, thumbs brushing against the inside of her wrists. If she is met with the most adoring look she has ever received in her life, it’s just a bonus.
“She wasn’t mad, a little amused, but who wouldn’t be?”
“I still want to get dressed.” She pouts for good measure and Nico relents.
“What about you take a shower and I’ll treat you to breakfast? You should eat and drink more water.”
Getting up is as hard as her brain made it to be, body aching, her surroundings only growing brighter and she has to close her eyes for a second. White sheets secured around her torso, she takes a wobbly step forward, Nico’s hands hovering around her as it here was much she could do if Karolina’s body decided to just give up.
A part of herself hates the fact that from all the promises she made getting drunk was the one she committed. An even smaller part of herself thinks about promising never drinking again. Not to the point of losing control.
The one urge that wins is taking a look over her shoulder, hand slowly coming up to rest against the bathroom’s door frame, her heart actually leaps at the sight of Nico standing by the foot of the bed, wearing nothing but Karolina’s shirt and fingers fidgeting with its hem.
Maybe.
She clears her throat, their eyes meeting shortly after. “Last night. Did you mean it?” Because there were so many words said, most of them marking their way to Karolina’s heart, the lingering promise of them.
That had happened in a wave of boldness, and bold was the last thing she felt standing in front of Nico with a thin sheet covering her. She hadn’t missed the way Nico’s gaze fell to her chest every couple of seconds when they were in bed, there were some more urgent matters.
“About a more permanent place?” Karolina provides, a shy smile making its way to Nico’s lips, way too alike her posture.
“Yes.”
“If it changes anything, I just moved to San Diego.”
The smile she gets is answer enough.
It changes everything.
**
Fashionably late is what she likes to call. But she still has a slowly growing company to run, employees to hire, clients to attend, a place to decorate and maybe (definitely) an adopted dog to take care of.
(She was impulsive and she was left alone for thirty minutes. She got bored, not her fault.)
So, Karolina is mostly resigned to the fact that for the next weeks she is going to be late to every place she has to be. Especially if it involves her personal life. Which was something she never thought she would have to juggle once she moved back to California. But it had taken fifteen minutes below a shower, and, that time, Nico was left unsupervised.
It only meant that she had scheduled Skype calls with Gert and Chase (she tried hard to clean her appointments to squeeze them into her day) and long late phone calls with Molly.
Her personal life also meant having Nico. All of her. It wasn’t that complicated.
Nico, who never minded the gaps in their texting, because Karolina would get busy and completely forget to reply until she left work to be met with a very understanding smile. Nico, who always had Karolina’s order in hand when they met at the coffee shop two blocks away from her place, demanding a kiss as an exchange for the caffeine Karolina has been craving fr all afternoon.
Nico, who only mildly whines at the prospect of not living together and her terrible roommate, which she stops doing the second Karolina’s hand is in hers. Nico, who sometimes stays over and wakes her up with the smell of recently made breakfast and the sight of Nico in an open button up and underwear, her dog sitting by her feet waiting.
Dating Nico, one of the many things she never thought she would accomplish, and yet, here they are.
It takes them ten years. Which is ten years more than it should’ve been.
Strangely, Karolina wouldn’t have it any other way.