Mutual Feelings

by Billy Taylor

  “I know,” Ted then said. “Losing Autumn has been hard for you both, I’m not the only one who loved her. You need each other to help get through it.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I don’t know what to do. I can’t stop thinking about her.”

  Ted leant forward. “Do you love her?”

  “More than I can put into words.” I answered.

  “Then stop sitting here like a miserable arse. I do enough of that for the both of us. Drive to her, and tell her.”

  “I don’t think that is what she would want though.”

  “For God’s sake, Will, you’re an idiot sometimes.”

  “Why am I?”

  “When a girl says one thing, she doesn’t mean that at all, she means the complete opposite to what she said. If she says she’s fine, she isn’t. If she says she doesn’t want something, it means you better get that thing as soon as possible. If she says she’s tired, then there’s something on her mind. It’s always the opposite. Now go over there, grab her, and kiss her, and tell her that you love her. If she really doesn’t want to be with you, then at least you can both begin to move on. But don’t stay here wondering what you two could have been; go and find out. I would give my left arm to have one more day, one more hour, one more minute, one more second with Autumn. Don’t let her go, Will. You’ll only regret it if you do.” He exhaled and then took a sip of his tea.

  I smiled and said, “Ok. I’ll call Natalie now and tell her I’m on my way.”

  “Hello.”

  “Hey, Natalie. I was going to come over now, is that ok?”

  “Yes. She doesn’t know you’re coming though. So I’m going to have to get her into the living room somehow.”

  “I’ll text you when I’m outside.”

  “Ok. See you soon.”

  Ted asked me to drop him off at the cemetery before I went to Zac’s. Ted exited the car and grabbed his foldable chair and his novel off the backseat of the car. Then he said, “I hope it all goes ok, man. I’ll see you later.”

  I thanked him and then began my drive to Zac and Natalie’s apartment. I texted Natalie once I was outside, and she buzzed me into their apartment block. I walked up the stairs to the seventh floor, my heart rate raising as each floor passed. I kept reciting what I would say to her, but I knew rehearsing or preparing wasn’t going to help me. I had to speak from my heart if the opportunity arrived.

  Once I reached the seventh floor I walked along to their apartment, number two. Natalie was waiting for me in the doorway.

  “Hi,” she whispered.

  “Hi.”

  “Zac is sat on the sofa.”

  “Ok.”

  Natalie held open the door and escorted me inside. After I took a few paces into their apartment, I saw Zac on her sofa. She had tucked her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them and her head rested against her knees. She was wearing the beanie I bought her when we first met, which instantly put a smile on my face.

  “Zac,” Natalie said. “You have a visitor.”

  She raised her head and looked in our direction. Her beautiful blue eyes captured me as always. She had such big bags under her eyes. She looked so tired and exhausted. Her cheeks had lost their rosy color. Glum would be the best word to describe her. But she still looked as beautiful as I had ever seen her.

  Only now had I realised I had missed her ten times more than I had originally thought. I don’t think she shared the same feelings. Her face had a large amount of shock and horror on it. She turned to Natalie and shouted, “Why is he here?” And she turned to me and shouted, “Why are you here?”

  “I told him to come.”

  “Why?” Zac yelled.

  “Because you can’t just ignore him. You two need to talk and sort things out…Will, take a seat, please,” Natalie said, pointing to her sofa.

  I walked over and sat down across from Zac. Natalie sat down next to me. “Ok, Will, do you want to be with Zac?” Natalie asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  Natalie nodded and then she turned to Zac. “Zac, do you want to be with Will?”

  As I looked over at her, I already knew what Zac’s answer was going to be. She was staring at the floor, not even making eye contact with me or even looking in my direction. She bit her lip and shook her head. “No,” she said softly.

  The whole idea of me coming over to pour my heart out and win her over was now obliterated. Natalie and I looked at each other. I could feel my eyes beginning to water. So I got to my feet and decided it would be best to leave before either of them saw me crying. I just wanted to get as far away from Zac as possible and hoped that the farther away I was, the less the pain would be.

  “Zac,” Natalie said. “Walk Will to his car so you can say good-bye.” I looked over my shoulder at Zac and expected her to ignore her and remained seated. But instead she sighed and got to her feet. She walked past us and put on her Timberland boots, and then walked to the door.

  “Good-bye, Natalie,” I said.

  “Good-bye, Will. I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. It’s ok.”

  Zac walked silently behind me as she walked me to the car. I didn’t have anything to say to her. I think we’d said enough inside the apartment. I felt like telling her to go back inside because it was pointless her coming to the car.

  I walked down the couple of steps to the road and then unlocked the car.

  I sighed and turned around to Zac. I thought I would make our good-bye a short one. But then I saw she was crying. “Why are you crying?” I asked.

  “Because it’s sad,” she replied, her voice cracking.

  I decided to say one final thing to see if there was any chance we could be together. If that didn’t work, then I could accept that she didn’t want to be with me, and I could go. I walked back up to the steps towards her and stopped in front of her. Our shoes almost touched. Her arms were folded and she was looking away to her right.

  “If you can look me in the eye now, and tell me you don’t want to be with me, then I will get in my car now and leave and you’ll never have to see me again.”

  She didn’t say anything. She shook her head and continued to cry.

  “Why?!” I asked. “Why can’t you just look me in the eye and tell me that—”

  “Because I love you, ok?” she snapped. Her head sharply turning to face me. She shut her eyes, forcing more tears to run down her cheeks. She placed her face into her hands and dropped her head.

  I put my arms around her and brought her close to me. “I love you, too.” I rested my head on the top of her beanie and tightened my arms around her. That feeling I had by the lake of being whole was returning.

  “Is this the part where you say something romantic?” she mumbled.

  “Something romantic,” I replied. She laughed and nudged me. I brought her from out of my grasp, put her hands down, and wiped her face with my thumbs. “I can offer you two options,” I said.

  She sniffled and then said, “Ok.”

  “The first is that I play this all casual and say, ‘You wanna get something to eat?’”

  She nodded. “Ok. And the second?”

  “The second is that I can take a step forward and kiss you, and say something romantic. Not the actual words ‘something romantic.’ I’ll tell you what I wanted to tell you inside your apartment.”

  She wiped her nose with her arm. “Ok.”

  “Or three, I could combine them both,” I said.

  She nodded. “Number three sounds good.”

  So I took a step forward, kissed her, and then told her, “You’re the best thing that has ever happened to me. And I have missed you so much. I’ve missed waking up to your beautiful weird self lying on me or in front of me. And I’ve missed questioning whether you’re actually a ninja or not.” I paused whilst she finished sniggering. “But most of all I’ve missed looking into your beautiful blue eyes, that have enticed me since the first time I saw you, and realising just how desperately in love I
am with you… And I’m never going to let you go.” And then I asked her if she wanted to return inside to have something to eat.

  She held my hand as we returned to her apartment. It was nice, and new; we’d never held hands before. Natalie was sat with her back to us and her head to the floor when we reentered their apartment.

  “Hey,” Zac said.

  “Hey,” Natalie grumbled.

  Zac and I walked around her and sat on Zac’s sofa. “Is it all right if Will stays for soup?” Zac asked. “He might be staying for soup more often from now on.”

  Natalie raised her head and saw me sitting there.

  “She told me she loved me,” I said, all excited. “The feeling’s mutual,” I added.

  The surprise on her face was almost comical. Her eyes moved over to Zac, who was clinging to my arm. “You told him you loved him?” Natalie asked loudly.

  I peered down at Zac. She went all shy as she nodded her head against my arm.

  “I can’t believe it! I’m so happy for you two! It was so saddening, watching you leave.”

  We smiled and then I said, “So what do you want to do? We don’t have that long before you need to get ready for work tomorrow.”

  “I have the week off work,” Zac then told me.

  “How come?”

  “They were worried about me so they told me to take the week off and let them know if I was feeling better.”

  “You could spend the week with me if you like.”

  “Yeah, please do,” Natalie interrupted. “You need some love, and so do I. I haven’t been able to have any guys around since I’ve been keeping my eye on you every second.”

  “Thanks, Natalie,” Zac replied.

  “Anytime,” she replied.

  “So what do you think?” I asked Zac, and flicked the bobble on the top of her beanie.

  “Will you make me breakfast in bed?” she asked.

  “Yes, I will bring your smoothie to you each morning.”

  “I have one or two slices of toast as well now.”

  “Ok, I’ll make you toast, too. Am I allowed to take a bite out of each corner piece like you?”

  “No. Only I can do that,” she commanded.

  “Ok, Captain Panda,” I replied.

  “How is the ice cream going?” she asked, suddenly sitting up, her grip not loosening on me, though. She rested her chin on my shoulder, her breath tickling my neck.

  “We haven’t been at work since the accident. The new flavours project is on hold until we return.”

  “Ok,” Zac said, kissing me.

  “Just to clarify,” I said. “Are we in a relationship?”

  Zac smirked. “Yes. Is that ok?”

  I shrugged. “I guess so. That is why I came over.”

  So Zac, Natalie, and I had a bowl of carrot soup each. And I thanked Zac for the portrait she had taken for me for my birthday. She got really embarrassed about that, and she said she was going to throw it away when she got to the apartment. But I told her she would do no such thing. And I just didn’t take my eyes off Zac, and I don’t think I ever want to.

  We returned to my apartment and chilled out there for a bit, and then Ted arrived home later that evening. He congratulated Zac and me, and then he made us fajitas to celebrate since that was the only thing Autumn had taught him to cook. And I’ll give him credit, he did a great job, and they tasted fantastic. Zac ate at least one or two, which surprised me because that’s the first time I’ve seen her eat anything other than toast, smoothie, or soup since, well, since we met, I think. I didn’t mention it to her or ask about it. Clearly she felt comfortable eating them, and I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it so I let her be.

  Zac woke me up during the middle of the night. I thought something was wrong because she’s normally her silent ninja self. “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “I was just checking that you still love me, or like me.”

  “Of course I do,” I replied, lifting my arm and allowing her to tuck into me and rest her head on my chest.

  “It’s ok if you don’t,” she mumbled.

  “Shut up and go to sleep,” I said as I shut my eyes again. And I predicted what she was going to say next so I placed my hand over her mouth. She hummed and then I moved it away.

  “What was that for?” she whispered.

  “You know what it was for. Those two little words you’ve used on me before.” She giggled and then kissed me before resting her head back onto my chest.

  April 20th

  I’ve spent today taking care of Zac. She is ill. I’m not sure what is wrong with her. I don’t know if she had a bug or the flu. Or there was something wrong with the food she ate last night. But if there were something wrong with the food last night, surely it would have disagreed with me, too. I thought it might have been because her stomach isn’t used to eating fajitas. I don’t know.

  I woke up this morning at six or seven a.m., and she was sat up. She looked so pale. I was about to ask her if she was ok, and then she threw up. And she threw up everywhere. Normally when I see sick seconds later I’m sick, too. But I managed to bypass that and quickly get to my feet and help her to the bathroom and over the toilet to throw up in. She was so weak. She could barely hold herself up. I had to stack a pile of cushions that she hadn’t thrown up on beside her. It held her up, so if she did need to throw up she only had to lean forward slightly.

  Meanwhile I ran a slow bath with a small amount of bubbles in whilst I cleaned the bedroom. I wiped and mopped the floor first, and then scrubbed the rug and put that into the washing machine. Every two minutes I poked my head around the bathroom door to check if she was ok. But I didn’t know what the definition of ok was at this moment. Her eyes were shut and she was breathing. I didn’t know if she was sleeping or was just so exhausted that she couldn’t keep her eyes open. One time when I came to check on her, her head had drooped forward. By then the bath had filled with water. I checked that the water was mild enough; I didn’t want it to be too cold, and I didn’t want it to be too hot, even though she likes hot baths.

  Her clothes were covered in sick as well and it smelt horrible. I got some on myself and I kept gagging, but still didn’t throw up.

  Once I’d taken off her Star Wars pyjamas, I picked her up and placed her into the bath. I left a jug from the kitchen beside the bath so I could pour some water over her hair as she had somehow managed to throw up into that, too. There weren’t many things she hadn’t thrown up on.

  I held up her head with my right hand as I rinsed her hair with the jug in my left. Then I shampooed and conditioned her hair. The washing machine started to bing as I was conditioning her hair. I could now put the bedding into the washing machine and then I could put the spare bedding onto my bed ready for when Zac got out of the bath. I couldn’t let Zac go though because she would sink under the water and drown. But I had thought this through, too. I placed one of those cushions that you wear on planes or trains for comfort. You know, the one you wrap around your neck and it’s a cushion, but also a neck support. It kind of looks like a jigsaw puzzle piece. Anyway, I placed that around her neck and watched it for thirty seconds just to make sure that it would actually float, and it did.

  The bedding was still covered in sick, but I just crammed everything into a small ball and stuck it into the washing machine. I shivered afterwards, and then rushed back to the bedroom to put the spare bedding onto my bed. Afterwards I knelt beside the bath and searched online how to wrap a towel around your head so her wet hair wouldn’t drip everywhere. I sat her up and attempted to do so, but it looked nothing like it should have so I decided not to do that. I picked her up and stood her on the bath mat, then tied the towel around her, which wasn’t easy. I then sat with the hair dryer on the lowest setting so it wouldn’t be too vigorous or burn her. It seemed like I was drying her hair for at least an hour. She still hadn’t said anything or opened her eyes or flinched. Nothing. She was like a flimsy doll. Once her hair was dry, three days la
ter, and a lot more fluffy and full of volume than normal, I put her into a fresh pair of Star Wars pyjamas and then placed her into bed.

  I walked into the kitchen and grabbed a few bottles of water and a special bottle because it could be tipped upside down and it wouldn’t allow the water to leak. I then got into bed and spread my legs either side of her, and placed her head onto my lap. I thought it would be the best position for me to keep an eye on her in. I placed the television remote and the water and special bottle within reaching distance, as I wouldn’t be moving anywhere for a very long time. I pulled the covers up to Zac’s chin, so about my hip, so she was nice and warm. She did look rather snug.

  She started to become the tiniest bit responsive when I tried to give her some water. The bottle had a special nozzle on it and her lips would slightly pout as she drank water. She would occasionally let out a little moan, too, but she didn’t speak or move.

  I sat and watched TV for the next few hours and may have fallen asleep for ten or fifteen minutes. But Zac was slowly regaining her colour. At around 5:30pm the front door opening waked me. Ted had come back from the cemetery. I glanced down at Zac, and she was awake, watching me, still all snug.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked.

  Her beautiful blue eyes met mine. “Better, thank you.”

  Ted poked his head around the bedroom door. “You ok?” he asked.

  “Yeah. Zac wasn’t very well. She was throwing up this morning, so I’ve been looking after her and making sure she drinks water.”