Finding Joy

by Adriana Herrera

  “Desta.” He gestured toward the seat next to his on the table. “Sit. Tsehay’s team only got in like ten minutes ago, so they’re running behind.”

  I waved a hand at that. Tsehay’s team had the farthest to go today, so it made sense for her to need more time. And she would probably not forgo a hot shower because she was rushing to catch Elias alone like I had. “Oh, I’m fine to wait. That’ll give me time to check my email.”

  He gave me an assessing look, as if he were making sure that no body parts had gone missing in his absence. Or maybe that was just what I wished he were thinking. “You had time to shower.”

  I dipped my head and stared freely, since he was doing the same to me. He looked freshly showered too. He had on a gray sweatshirt and tan linen pants, and as usual in the evenings, his Birkens. “I was glad to get back to the hotel today.” I refrained from blurting out that was mostly due to my thirst for him.

  “Did anything happen?” he asked, all commanding. Like he was ready and able to deal with whatever it was. A shiver ran down my spine, but this one took the route that went straight to my dick.

  “Nothing bad happened,” I reassured him as I got my laptop plugged in. “Although I may have to take a hiatus from coffee.”

  I was making a show of arranging my stuff on the table, but kept an eye on him to get his reaction. He actually jumped in surprise at my words, and his puzzled expression almost made me laugh. “No bunna? Something must have happened.”

  You would’ve thought I’d said that I going to start working buck naked, but I still felt all warm and fuzzy at how seriously he took my caffeine obsession.

  I shifted so I could face him, ready to fill him in. “Well, in part I blame you,” I said, barely able to keep from grinning.

  He read my expression, and I saw when he realized that this was going to be one of our jokes. He could do that, just tune into my moods. I thought about how Miguel never quite got my humor. I’d come home with a funny story from work or my commute, and he’d stare at me blankly until the smile died on my face. I’d told myself again and again that maybe it was lost in cultural translation. And yet with Elias, from the first day we’d found a million things in common to laugh, talk, or even rant about. Even after just one week it felt completely natural.

  “How could I be blamed for your coffee hiatus? I mostly drink tea,” he said in feigned disgruntlement.

  “It would’ve been nice to be warned that I could get ghee and salt in my bunna. I almost threw up in one of the families’ houses, Elias,” I lamented with my hands over my face, actually remembering the embarrassment. “It wasn’t even that it tasted bad, it was just so unexpected.”

  I could hear that he was making an effort not to laugh, wheezing and rumbling coming from beside me. When I took my hands off my face, I found him grinning while he shook his head, clearly biting his tongue.

  “Don’t laugh at me, Elias. I threw up in my mouth!” Keeping a straight face was out of the question at this point. It was just a matter of who burst out laughing first.

  He clicked his tongue, obviously not wanting to be the one to break, but he was showing more teeth by the second. “Desta, I can’t leave you even for one day.” He was kidding, of course, playing along with the game I started, but his words pummeled me.

  “I’m hopeless,” I conceded, when what I’d wanted to say was, I missed you. I felt your absence all day.

  He must’ve seen something in my face, because the humor in his eyes changed to something more subdued, but in no way less warm. “You’re not hopeless.” The way he said it, low and earnest, like he needed me to believe it, was almost too much. The air around us shifted and I leaned toward him. For what, I wasn’t sure. I just needed to be closer.

  I could see his throat working, like he was struggling with making words too. I opened my mouth to say something that could bring back the humor from before. But at that same moment the door to the room burst open and two servers arrived with the drinks and snacks I assumed Elias had pre-ordered.

  I shook my head as they moved around, trying to get myself together, and Elias stood up so fast his phone bounced off the table. He dove to catch it and knocked over his chair, making the servers stop what they were doing to look in our direction. Elias told them something in Amharic that sounded self-deprecating, or maybe that was just me projecting. But he had lost his footing for a second there. Elias, who was always the very picture of cool, calm, and collected, had gotten flustered. I wasn’t enough of a fool to think that it was because he’d been affected by me, but I did need to remember to keep my boundaries in check.

  There were no more awkward moments or inside jokes after that. A few minutes after our food arrived, the rest of the team started trickling in, and soon we were caught up in our work. Even Sam had been on his best behavior, at one point thanking us for making sure we didn’t get behind in the surveys. Tsehay had discreetly let me know Mr. Dawit had called Bonnie in Addis, so I figured she’d given him the riot act.

  But now it was almost past ten and everyone had gone to bed except for Elias and me. I wasn’t lying to myself—I was here because I was greedy for some time alone with him. We’d have another two days working in separate teams, and I had no self-control, so here we were. Elias, who had been putting away his laptop while making notes on his iPad, looked down at my stuff, which was still sprawled over the table.

  “Do you have more to do?” He knew I didn’t, since I’d said as much to Tsehay before she left, but I went along with whatever kept us talking.

  “Not really, just giving myself a moment to breathe before heading up.” I stretched my arms over my head, getting the kinks out of my tired muscles. Elias kept his eyes on my face as I did it.

  I could feel that he had something he wanted to say, and my stomach flipped, wondering if I’d made him uncomfortable before. But if I had, why would he still be here with me?

  No, maybe he just wanted to make sure we left the room like we’d found it. That was it. He’d reserved it and didn’t want people leaving a mess.

  “Are you heading to bed?” I asked, my mouth overriding the lecture about boundaries I’d given myself just a few hours ago.

  He looked at me for another minute, and again I felt that charged but comfortable silence from earlier. I usually hated long silences—as an only child I’d had to endure them constantly, especially after my dad died—and I always felt compelled to fill them. But with Elias, I didn’t. It was like I could let my mind drift, and even if it went to a place I didn’t like, I wouldn’t get stuck in there.

  “I’m heading up soon,” he said, then raised his chin in the direction of my laptop. “I’ll wait for you to pack up.”

  He stopped and looked at me again like he was deciding whether or not to say what was on his mind. I turned my attention to clearing my things off the table while he weighed whatever he was considering. Telling myself that if he really had been weirded out, he wouldn’t have stayed behind in this room with me.

  Finally, he spoke. “Desta.”

  I looked up at him, somewhere between wary and hopeful. “Yeah?”

  “Would you like to go for a walk in the garden?” He paused and then added, “With me.”

  I stood up faster and more eagerly than what was probably prudent, and slung my bag over my shoulder as a grin cut across my face. This was a friendly gesture, I told myself. He was just being polite, but I couldn’t stop the racing in my heart when I answered.

  “I’d love to.”

  Chapter 9

  The first three weeks of the survey flew by, and after travelling for days on end all over southern Ethiopia, I was more than a little in love.

  Like my parents, I’d been completely charmed by this country’s boundless beauty. My eyes couldn’t get enough of the sprawling coffee fields and mountain ranges. The people, especially, had been amazing. Ethiopians were brimming with humor and hospitality. Every village we stopped in, people were always smiling or wanting to practice their En
glish with me.

  But the best parts were the times with Elias. Despite my attempts to keep a professional distance, I’d gotten more and more pulled in by him. Every single thing I learned about the man made me want him more. After that night when we’d ended up working together and took a walk in the garden, something had changed with us. Even when we were on different teams—and we’d had to be a few times until Sam made amends with Mr. Dawit—we’d reconnect in the evenings. Sometimes it could be a quick catch-up to plan what new book we’d listen to—Ari and Dante had been the first of many. At times we went on a stroll before bed, but it seemed like my days in Ethiopia were not complete without Elias.

  We’d been together almost every day of the trip, and as we drove up to my guesthouse in Addis, I felt completely unprepared to spend the next few on my own. I didn’t even know if he’d be driving me for the next trip south, or if he’d be on one of the other vehicles with a different team. I should’ve probably been concerned by the level of dread I was feeling about not seeing someone who was essentially a work-related acquaintance. And yet I was too preoccupied with the idea that this could be goodbye to care.

  Once we arrived at the guesthouse, Elias killed the ignition, and turned that heart-stopping smile on me. “We made it.”

  I looked at him and I wondered if it was the ill-advised crush making me see things, but I thought he seemed a little regretful that our trip was coming to an end.

  I didn’t know how to say goodbye or thank him for how good he’d been to me in the last few weeks, but I was having trouble finding where to start. So I went with rambling. “Thanks so much for everything. I hope you get to relax before going back to work next week. I’m so ready for a shower and some sleep.”

  He looked like he wanted to say something, but like a moron I opened my mouth before he could. “Okay, so I guess I’ll get going.”

  As I went to open the passenger door, he stopped me. “Do you want to go see some live music tonight? There’s a good band that plays on Fridays in town. They do lots of covers and I think you’ll love the lead singer.”

  Oh.

  Oh?

  Oh!

  “Really?” Funny how the tightness in my chest from the last hour loosened instantly. “That sounds great, actually. I told you how much I like live music, and I’d love to see a gig here. I’m in.” Stop talking, Desta, you’re now fully in overexcited puppy territory.

  He laughed, shaking his head at my extreme enthusiasm, and I kept going. “If you throw in a dinner with anything not containing injera, you’ll be my hero. Not that I don’t love the stuff, but I’m ready for a pizza or something.” I was the first one to admit that my love for injera waned after weeks of eating it cold for at least one meal a day.

  “How about pizza and beer? Then music.”

  I rolled my eyes in ecstasy. “That sounds incredible. What time should I be ready?”

  “I’ll be here at 7:30. The show doesn’t start until 9:00, so we can eat and then walk there. The Beer Garden is right behind the bar where they play.”

  I gasped at that. “Beer Garden? You really are trying for superhero status.”

  “Just making sure you get the best of Ethiopia.” He grinned in that way that made his dimples pop, and I was a complete fucking goner.

  Once he was back in the vehicle, I stood by the entrance to the guesthouse and lifted my hand to him, feeling like this was nowhere near sufficient for a goodbye. “See you in a few hours.”

  Elias nodded and the intensity in his eyes once again made me wonder what exactly was going through his head. “Eshi, Desta. See you soon.”

  After I watched him drive away, I climbed the stairs to my room, sporting a grin of my own. Self-recrimination about my poor choices in men flew out the window with every step.

  By 7:15 p.m. I’d changed clothes twice and was doing way too much for what should have just been dinner with a colleague. I’d turned it into a thing, and was currently standing in front of the mirror in my room tugging at my dark brown curls, which had become completely unruly in the last few weeks. I’d also gotten a hell of a tan from so many days in the sun. The deeper brown tone of my skin made my hazel eyes look weirdly lighter, like some kind of wild cat. Which, given my current mood, was probably appropriate.

  I looked good. Not that it mattered, because this was not a date.

  Sick of myself and my fretting, I grabbed the black leather bomber jacket I’d brought, and was tugging it on over a green sweater when I heard a knock. I rushed to the door, my heart almost pounding out of my chest. As soon as I opened it, I realized I had not been ready for what was waiting on the other side.

  Elias looked fucking edible.

  I actually had to lean on the doorframe to keep from coming too close. I tried to discreetly take in what was in front of me, and knew I was failing miserably. He was wearing a white linen shirt under a brown leather blazer, with extremely well-fitting dark blue jeans and red Chucks on his feet. His curls sprung high on his head, held back by his usual thin elastic band. Tonight he was also wearing a few silver bracelets on his wrists, and a wide silver ring on his right hand.

  He was such a fine man. His perfectly shaped lips were incredibly distracting, made for kissing, and God, I wanted to.

  I realized I’d only opened the door to stare at him, and let out a flustered, “Hi.”

  The smile he gave me was radiant, like he was so damn glad to see me. I was reading too much into it, I knew that. But when he stared me up and down and kept his eyes on the general area of my mouth for a few seconds longer than warranted, my head, once again, started going places it shouldn’t.

  “Eshi, Desta, are you ready to go?” Maybe I was imagining things, but it sounded to me like he was a little flustered too.

  “I am. I took a nap, and now I’m starving.”

  He grunted in approval, which made my belly flip and the skin on my face tighten. But when he spoke, that’s when all the blood in my brain went south all at once. “We have to get you what you need, then.”

  When we came out of the guesthouse he walked me to an older model Toyota Corolla and held the door open for me. I sent myself another reminder that I was not on a date and got into his very well-cared for car. “Wow, this car is pristine.”

  He seemed pleased at my noticing, and by the compliment, but when he spoke he was a little apologetic. “I’m a bit intense about it. Taxes for cars here are really high. And it’s almost impossible to get a loan from the bank. It took me a long time to save enough to buy it, so I make sure I care for it.”

  I smiled at the obvious pride he had in his car and thought of how different things were for us. Even knowing as much as I did about the many inequalities in the world, a lot of them were just that: something I knew about. Not something I’d needed to live with, or through. My work exposed me to them, yes, and I hoped in some way I helped bridge those gaps, but I was always at a safe distance. I didn’t really have skin in the game, not like Elias and Tsehay did. Maybe that was why they held themselves to such an impossibly high standard.

  “You’re a man who knows how to care for things, that’s for sure,” I said, unable to keep the admiration out of my voice, or my mind from marveling at how he cared for the people in his life.

  Elias’s smile was the exact reaction I’d been hoping for. “And I employ that care in taking us where we need to go. Are you ready for some beer, pizza, and music, Desta?”

  His energy and smile were infectious, and I felt one blooming on my own face as I answered him, “I am so ready.”

  Chapter 10

  The “beer garden” turned out to be a microbrewery that made four varieties of delicious German-style beer on site. The owner was an Ethiopian man who’d lived in Bavaria for decades, and had returned home to start his own business.

  The place was a trip. Decorated in a mix of German and Ethiopian kitsch, it was packed with people, and there were servers buzzing around in lederhosen, shouting in Amharic and handing off huge s
teins of homemade beer to customers. The place, the food, and the company had me feeling so content I closed my eyes and sighed deeply after one too many slices of pizza—which apparently was the most popular item in the menu despite not being exactly German.

  After a moment, I felt Elias clink my stein with his. I opened my eyes and clinked back, once again pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to be with him.

  When I looked at him again, he seemed worried, and after a moment asked me, “Are you too tired? Would you like me to take you back to the hotel?”

  The lethargic feeling of the last few minutes evaporated at the thought of losing his company, and I sat up. “No, not at all. I’m excited for the music, but I’m feeling pretty relaxed right now from all the good pizza and beer.” I glanced around again, utterly charmed by the place. “This is a great spot. Thanks for bringing me. Addis is full of surprises.”

  He smiled then, and it looked wistful. “Yes, it is. It’s hard for me to think of living anywhere else.”

  The way he said it made me think he was considering exactly that. “Oh, are you thinking of going abroad?” I asked with way too much interest.

  He didn’t answer immediately, considering my question as he twisted the wide silver band on his finger. “I’ve been accepted into a doctoral program at Columbia University, in psychology,” he said quietly before taking a long drink.

  “Wow,” I said, genuinely impressed. “That’s great. Congratulations.”

  After a moment he ran his hand over the tablecloth, smoothing the crease running down the center of table. I could tell he was trying to figure out what to say next. “I was accepted last year, but I deferred.” Something about the way he said it made me think the reasons for the deferment hadn’t changed much. “I have a few more weeks to decide. If not, I’ll lose my spot.”

  Just the idea of Elias potentially living in the States did unsettling things to me. My chest fluttered, and I could practically feel the blood rushing to my face. Immediately, the possible career change I’d been agonizing over for the last year—and how it could mean a move to New York City—filled my head. A flare of annoyance at myself tamped down some of my inappropriate excitement, and I tried to focus on what Elias said. On how obviously conflicted he was about the decision he needed to make.