What was I doing here?

The question swirled in my tired mind with the spoon in my coffee, mixing a copious amount of sugar into the blend. I knew I’d be sick later with the sweetness of it but at present, I didn’t care; I needed something to do, something to focus on besides him.

Orson sat beside me on one of the bar stools perched before the broad window at the front of the cafe, preparing his own coffee. I watched him in the reflection as he gnawed the inside of his cheek, a nervous habit I’d come to recognize and had heard him scolded for. When he raised his eyes to meet mine in the window, I quickly busied myself with my hair.

“I like it,” he mumbled offhandedly.

I replied with a cool shrug. “You should; it took an hour.”

His face broke with a smile and I soured, remembering that none of my snarling comments seemed to scare him away; a lesson painfully learned over the past year or so.

I couldn’t call him trouble because that held too many fabulously incorrect connotations, but that’s what he gave me. Headaches and heartaches and all too many feelings for me to handle. Which begged the question yet again: what was I doing here?

What had I come for this time? What had he come for?

Dim memories of last Saturday night came swimming back into focus and I took a sip of my coffee to try to swallow them back down as they clouded my mind like steam. The quaint party, the soft evening, the moon which melted the initial tension between Orson and I, and our eventual dangerous closeness…
I should have known better than to linger with a man who was spoken for. And I could recall the tremendous alarm that had rung through my body as he drifted closer to sit beside me, close, so close in the lusty air of that night; an alarm fierce enough to match my overwhelming desire. But I’d steeled my eyes and played aloof. And he hadn’t said a thing; not a word of protest or a hint at offense. Not a word about the girlfriend he loved so much.
Did that make us both guilty?
This question alone had plagued me all week along with the memories, rolling through my mind like reams of a film whose plot had grown tired.
I myself had grown tired last April after the first gale of pain had come thundering down over my hollow head. Yes, that’s where it began. He’d collected my affection, all that I gave, and then simply walked away – with no word of goodbye or explanation.
Two weeks or so was all that it took for me to fall for his charm and it was taking me much longer to unravel myself. I fought with cheap hope through it all, cutting ties and burning bridges, wriggling like a small animal caught in the brush. I cursed him for making it so difficult. For being handsome, for being brilliant, for any crime I could imagine.
Yet as the days wore into weeks and then months, we became tentative friends. Tentative on my part because all of that magnetism still remained. He trusted me; I kept a reasonable distance.
But I was tired of thinking about Orson. I was tired of grappling with the past, with the anger and the hatred that rose like bile in the back of my throat at the mere scent of his cologne. I was tired of burning, a million times a day, catching his name in a conversation and turning my head.
Perhaps I’d found the answer to my question. Perhaps I’d come here to force the hand of the Fates and severe that last connection.
But first –
“You don’t feel guilty, do you?” I spoke at last, my voice, strong and clear, betraying none of my insecurity. “About Saturday night?”
Orson shook his head, fingering the dog eared pages of a magazine lying neglected on the bar. “No, not at all really.”
My brow furrowed and unconvinced, I pressed him further. “But…but you’re girlfriend? Surely you would’ve told her or she would’ve found out?”
He laughed and I could feel some sort of angry desperation roil in the pit of my stomach with the coffee.
“It’s not as if we did anything seriously wrong,” he smiled, wrestling a pack of cigarettes and a lighter from the grey denim pocket of his jeans. “Besides,” he paused and placed the cigarette between his lips, cupping his hand around the lighter and its meager flame, “I’m not seeing her anymore.”
His statement struck me and I sat frozen, staring at him. He glanced away complacently, puffing elegant plumes of blue smoke into the cool breeze. My eyes narrowed and I turned to my coffee, taking a long gulp and letting the hot drink burn in my throat before responding with the only thing I thought appropriate.
“I’m sorry.”
He dismissed my aimless apology with a cool shrug of his own, but went on. “I didn’t feel right – not about the party but about everything. It was all up and down, unstable, unsound. Emotionally unstable.” He stubbed his cigarette with a frown, not looking at me. “I’m not well.”

My stomach turned at his words, knowing precisely what he meant. Addictions he needed to kick, a soul he needed to lay bare.
We sat in silence for a moment and stared at our reflections in the window, the tension building with the sharp chill in the breeze.
“I’m cold,” I stated blankly, rubbing my arms. Without a word, Orson slipped out of his sweater and plopped it unceremoniously on my head. My poker face shattered as I began to laugh and the tension tumbled after.
For some time, we made quiet talk. I rambled without purpose, about a book, about a dream I’d had, pausing to flip through the magazines to read him an interesting article. And he listened, his chin in his hand and his elbow on the bar, a funny mist growing in his eyes as he burned through his cigarettes and the coffee dwindled in his cup.
When the chatter lulled, he stood, stretching slightly, cup in hand. He smiled, looking livelier than I’d seen him in a while and shuffling into the café, moving through the chic wooden room toward the counter for a refill. I watched him through the window, vaguely remembering the reason I’d even sat down with Orson.
Damn.
I glowered with some frustration into my empty mug, angry that I’d let my guard down.
Alright Rita, came a hard voice in the back of my head, The small talk is out of the way. Make sure he knows where you stand – not anywhere near him!!
I hardened my gaze and straightened in my seat, just as Orson came ambling back towards the bar. I turned to him as he settled onto his stool and had only opened my mouth to speak when he beat me to it.
“I like you.”
I stared at him. He stared back, wiping his characteristically sweaty palms down the front of his pants. Another nervous habit. My jaw clicked shut and I gave sort of a laugh, taken aback at the sudden honesty of his declaration. What was this?
“I like you too.” The words stumbled awkwardly from my mouth. I myself was unsure of their meaning, unsure of his. We stared at one another and a smile rolled across his face as if I’d said the right thing. Something nervous fluttered in my stomach and as the moment passed, I went back to my drink, sipping modestly.
The talk was smaller this time and when he finally finished his second coffee, we decided to leave. The “date”, as my mother so comically put it, had been a brief one and I was walking away more uncertain than before. It was the same every time we met; I was caught between wanting badly to get away from him and wanting to stay.
I fiddled with the radio in his car, flipping through the stations to avoid talking. When I sang along, he complimented me and I fired them back, my mouth suddenly reckless and unabashed. Every rule I’d scribbled down upon my heart - no to him and no to easy, simple flirtation - seemed far away and faded.
Did they matter now? Only when we were apart, when I was on my own to exaggerate the damage he’d done.
I felt flustered and bothered and I welcomed the sight of my house the cold air on my face as I opened my door, before his truck had even rumbled to a stop. I was half way out of the car when he called me back.
“I enjoyed today,” he smiled, drumming his fingers lightly on the wheel.
“Me too,” I replied stiffly, half of me dangling from the car, my foot eager to find the ground.
He opened his arms for a hug, an invitation to touch him. I hesitated for only a moment, remembering the words of the voice in my head just minutes ago at the café. But then I hoisted myself back into the car and leaning across the seat, accepted his invitation. I felt him sigh and press a kiss to my cheek. And then all at once, I was making my way up the path to my empty house.
With the front door closed behind me, I let my purse slip down my arm and from my fingers. And then slid the shoes from my feet. I stood in the front room for minute, in a state of something like bewilderment, unsure of where I’d been or where I was going. After some time, I realized how cold I was and I had not gotten far down the hallway when I was overwhelmed.
My mind spun, reeling with what had just passed between Orson and I. I could still feel the place where his lips had met my cheek. I could still smell his cologne on my sweater. I felt sick, I felt dizzy, and it suddenly hit me, suddenly came rushing towards me with deafening silence.
I liked him. I felt for him. The dam had broken in my heart. I needed him and I would deny it no longer. How could I have thought to let him leave?
I spun where I stood, racing back towards the front door, neglecting my shoes and forgetting the cold. Back down the pathway and into the street and spotting the taillights of his car nearing the end of the road, I ran. The wind bit into my face and I could feel bits of rock and loose twig bear into my bare feet and hear my blood pumping in my ears.
“Wait!” I screamed, running with unknown speed, “Come back! Damn it, come back!”
The truck came to a halt and I stopped short, breathing hard as I watched the brake lights flicker on. The driver’s door opened and Orson stepped out into the street. He stared at me, nonplussed and I took off once more, closing the distance between us.
Whatever breath I’d caught was lost as I collided with him, throwing my arms around his neck in a proper embrace. He wound his arms around me when he recovered from the surprise and held me to him without question.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, my eyes suddenly wet with tears, “I’m so sorry. But I couldn’t let you leave.”
There was a heavy moment, filled only with the sound of our breath. And then finally, his voice, muffled in my hair.
“I never wanted to. I’m not afraid to say so - not anymore.”
My tears dissolved into laughter and in the midst of my scattered mind, a new question formed with the smile on my face.
Who could’ve seen this coming?