Voicemails to Will

five; of heights

I arrived in Paris last night. My mom forced me to go, said I needed to get away from the city, but really, I know she wanted to get me farther from you.

It's funny how even why I'm in an entirely new country, with entirely new people, all I can see, or hear, or even smell is you.

Your laughter roams the streets, accompanied with images of your boyish smile, and the smell of your cologne.

I think the problem is that you've become a part of me, through stolen kisses and stolen glances, and everything in between.

Even on the airplane, in between deep naps, I thought of you, of how you had a knack of appeasing all of my fears, particularly my fear of heights.

It was the start of July, and you had promised me, the best day ever. You drove me, blindfolded, still as my friend, to the state fair.

We arrived as the sun was setting, the very best time to do anything, you claimed.

Although I was still blindfolded, and had been for the last hour and a half, with your hand in mine, I felt perfectly fine.

I stumbled on a step, and you helped me into a seated position, and you finally removed the blindfold.

"Surprise!" You yelled with a smile.

My hands clenched the side of the Ferris wheel pod, and I wanted nothing more than to get back down.

"Will," I moaned through shaky breaths. "I can't-"

Your eyes widened, and you took both of my hands in yours.

"Eleanor, please look at me. Eleanor, deep breaths. Eleanor, look here," you whispered as you took my head into your hands.

Will, your voice, the way you lightly roll the r in my name, that's what's making me go insane, I wanted to say.

My eyes caught your frightened ones, and I wrapped my arms around your torso, burying my head into your shoulder.

"I'm so sorry," you whispered. "We'll be down soon, I promise."

And with those few words, the whole wheel rumbled to a halt, and I had to peek down.

The darkness had settled, so the perception of depth became fractured. What might've looked like only one hundred and fifty feet looked a lot more like five hundred.

"Will, say something, anything, please," I begged, clutching onto you for dear life.

"Um," you hesitated, "well, yesterday Dylan tried to learn how to break dance, and only successfully broke face by breaking his nose.

And I was walking my dog this morning when she decided to chase a squirrel, and dragged me along with her, literally as her leash tangled on my foot.

I might've run into a girl and completely humiliate myself in front of her."

"Oh," I replied, hating how mangled my voice sounded.

You laughed, shaking my whole body. "You're jealous."

"What?" I retorted pathetically. "I'm so not."

You shoved me gently and winked. "Oh just admit it, Nor, you're so jealous."

The Ferris wheel rumbled back to a start, and I took our stepping on the ground as a pathway to a new conversation.

We sat down at a picnic table nearby, and you took one of my hands in yours.

"Eleanor?" You called, with an odd tone of urgency.

"I have something to admit," you said, your eyes straying away from me. "She's nine."

"What?" I asked right back.

A faint pink color rose on your cheeks as you continued. "The girl, she's my nine year old next door neighbor."

"Oh," I repeated as I inwardly face palmed myself.

We walked towards your car, your hand still enveloped in my own when you stopped to a halt. "Plus, Nora, you should know by now that I like you."

As your words seeped into my skin, my stomach started flipping again, but this time for a completely different reason.