A Room With A View

Chapter Fifteen - Brian

September 9th, Saturday

"You did what?!" Brian squawked into his phone.

     Alina's voice crackled through. "I knocked on her door and I said hello."

     Brian slumped down against the side of a building, his face in his hands. "Alina, how-how could you do this?" He had been on his way to meet with Charles when Alina had called.

     "Clearly you didn't have the guts, so someone had to start the conversation," Alina said.

     "Well what, what did you say to her?" A passerby looked at Brian curiously.

     "I just pretended that I was looking for you and had gotten lost. She thought I was your girlfriend."

     Brian's heart sunk. "She thought we were dating?"

     "Don't sound so disgusted," Alina spat through the phone, "but yes, she thought we were dating. So it's a good thing I stopped by to set the record straight."

     Brian thought back to last night. He had been furiously typing away, and hadn't looked into Madeline's apartment once. Madeline. It still felt strange to know her name.

     "I didn't even see you in there." Brian hadn't meant to say that out loud.

     "Oh god, you creep. You need to stop spying on her through your window."

     Brian rolled his eyes and stepped away from the building. Charles's office was just a block away on 38th and Broadway. Brian had chosen to walk from the Watley, and a light sweat had broken out around his neck.

     "I did. That's why I didn't see you there last night, I wasn't looking." Brian decided to leave out the fact that it was because he had been distracted.

     "Well even if you had been, I didn't stay."

     Brian crossed the street. "So you just came all the way up from the village to knock on a girl's door? Who's the creep now?"

     He could hear Alina scoff through the phone. "Don't be stupid. I had a party in the Upper East, so I just stopped by. I love you, bro, but not enough for that."

     Brian slowed, the shiny glass doors of Charles's building just ahead. He was glad Charles had agreed to meet on a Saturday. He was eager to show him what he had.

     "Does...does she think I'm odd?" Brian bit his lip. It felt like Alina was taking too much time to respond.

     "No," she said, but without inflection. Brian closed his eyes. He was doomed.

     "I'll have to move," he mumbled. 

     "Brian, shut up. Of course she thinks you're odd. Everyone in that café thinks you're odd. But don't stress over it. All the good people have a quirk, yours is just excruciating awkwardness."

     "Is this meant to be a pep talk?" A bead of sweat worked its way down Brian's spine. He moved into the shade.

     Alina took in a deep breath. "Dude, you've made books your life. I get that, okay? And so I understand that interacting with people off the page is hard. If she's the one for you, she'll get it. You literally have nothing to lose by saying hello to her. She seems like a pretty cool person, and so I'm sure she'd say it back. You never know until you try."

     Brian opened his mouth to say something more, but Alina beat him to it.

     "And I know I don't say this that often, or at all," she said, "but I think you're a pretty cool person, too. And I just want someone else to see what I see."