Under Control.

chapter thirty five.

+

They'd shared a cab.

Nora had kept her promise to Albert — she did make her way past him on her way out, giving him a kiss and a hug and thanking him for dragging her out. For caring, for trying, and for being her friend. For everything.

He'd hugged her back and then let her go, pleased with himself and all of his many and varied efforts to the point of distraction — enough so not to notice that Nora hadn't gotten into her midnight chariot alone.

Julian had given the driver Nora's address first, insisting that he owed her one and tossing her a pleading look for good measure to please just give him this — to just let him do the absolute least and pay for her fare, just this once. And so, that was how Nora had ended up home safe at a semi-reasonable hour on a Saturday night.

She'd trudged wearily up the stairs, trying to ignore her whirring mind all the while, and once she was safely inside, she had managed to get as far as kicking off her shoes and shucking her blazer onto the nearest chair before there was a gentle rap on her door.

Deciding whether or not to open up was as nervous a wait on one side of the hardwood as it was the other.

Nora took a breath, deep and long. She knew who was waiting for her on the other side of that door — she'd seen the look on his face when he hadn't known she'd been looking, at the gig and in the cab. She'd seen him, and he'd let her, and she missed that.

She missed him.

All of this time, Nora had been so determined not to think. Not too hard, not too much, not about anything. She just moved from moment to moment, day to day, and accepted things as they happened. After short days and long nights spent orbiting one another in sad new ways, Nora always left Julian behind, went home alone, and fought not to think about him. She didn't dare to let him in because she knew that if she did — if she even considered the possibility of it — then, it was all over.

She'd be back where she started, with her heart in his hands.

Nora knew that all the ways they'd gotten better at being easy with one another since he'd arrived home had been leading to this. But still, she knew now just like she always had that letting him back in was dangerous. Because, as ever, the truth was that she did still love him. And Julian was, in almost every sense, a weakness of hers.

He was a blind spot, a risk Nora still yearned to take even after it all. And so that's what opening up the door to him meant — it meant opening up herself again, as well.

For his part, Julian hadn't thought about this — about climbing the stairs and knocking on Nora's door.

He'd considered every conceivable way that he might be able to win her back since he'd first lost her, but he hadn't planned anything that had happened leading up to now, here, tonight. It just was, the way that he was drawn to her. And he'd accepted that about himself and them together a long time ago. So for now, the best that he could do while he waited in Nora's dingy hallway for her to make up her mind about him and everything alongside, was to hope.

And so, he did.

And then, there was her.

'I don't really know what I'm doing here,' Julian says after she opens up to him, swaying on the spot while he takes in the look on her face. At first, Nora looks behind him, a blooming blush hiding the fear in her eyes. 'Lotta stairs. More than I remember, actually.'

But then, she looks right at him.

'We could not,' she breathes, her voice the steadiest thing about her.