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Emma comes rushing into my room at the scream I let out which carries through the apartment. I'm sitting on the floor which has been covered with stacks of clothing. "What happened?"
"I totally just remembered whose the shirt is."
"The shirt?"
I nod. "Are we allowed to start open fires in the apartment?"
"I'm pretty sure we aren't," Emma tells me. "What does that have to do with anything?"
"We need to burn it."
"Why?"
"I don't want it anymore."
"Then just throw it out."
"Do you want to know whose shirt I've been sleeping in for the past two years?" Emma nods as she takes a seat on my bed. I rise onto my knees and lean my forearms on the mattress. "Long Limbed Jim."
Emma immediately bursts out laughing falling back onto the unmade bed. "Why do you have that guy's shirt?"
"Do you remember that day I came home from a date all drenched?"
"Oh my God, I totally do!" she squeals sitting back up again. "He was super clumsy because he was so tall and his arms were so long and he accidentally pushed you in a fountain."
"Yeah, not my finest hour."
"At least he gave you a dry shirt," Emma shrugged. "God he was tall."
"Uhu."
"Maybe we can burn it in the shower?" Emma suggests, and I ponder it for a few seconds.
"I think the fire escape would be safer, less traceable."
"Yeah, you're probably right." I grab the black shirt from the floor and the two of us walk towards my bedroom window. Emma swipes a lighter from where a bundle of candles stand atop my dresser. We crawl out onto the steel staircase and I hold up the garment which she holds the flame against.
"Why isn't it burning?"
"Just give it a second," she assures me, and soon I have to drop the fabric to hit the steel construction we are standing on because of the flames that engulf it. We watch.
"I wonder if this is what Nero felt like as he watched Rome burn."
"It's kind of therapeutic, you know, fulfilling in a way."
"Yeah, totally. I get why pyromaniacs are a thing."
...
I hum to myself while I wait for Calum to open the door to his apartment. When he does I rip my eyes from my shoes to meet his. "Hi," I chirp.
"Hey." He holds the door open for me to step inside and I am pleasantly surprised with his accommodation—though I'd already noticed that the rest of the building is very nice, and they have a doorman. "Let me take that."
I gladly hand him the bottle of wine which I brought with me and I shrug my jacket off as we walk further into the apartment. "Nice place."
"Thanks," he says as he sets the bottle down on the counter and proceeds to open it. "Twist cap?"
"Cheap wine is the best wine."
"I bet that philosophy does wonders for your bank account."
"Definitely does." Calum pours us a glass each and beckons me to join him behind the kitchen island which also doubles as a bar. As I pass to walk around it I hang my jacket on one of the high stools.
"How comfortable are you in the kitchen?"
"I make a mean quesadilla."
"I'll take that as maybe a three on a scale," he says with a chuckle.
"Sounds about right," I agree. "Hopefully you can bump my grade."
"I plan to." He leans over the counter and when he turns back to me he holds something up for me and he rolls it out. "You need your apron so you can become a real chef."
"Of course." He pulls it over my head and ties it around my waist for me, bringing me closer to him. I have always thought that my own eyes are dark, but his put a whole new meaning to the word.
"Let's begin, shall we?" I never got into cooking because it has never been presented to me as something particularly enjoyable, but as I listen to Calum explain every step with as much passion as he does and as I watch him move around like this is what he is made to do I find myself thinking that if cooking is always like this, I want to cook all the time.
As we cook we talk, and I find out that he lives with that guy Luke from the restaurant, though he'd managed to kick him out of the apartment for the evening. I tell him about Emma and about the fire debacle of Wednesday morning of this week.
"Can you chop the cilantro?"
"Yeah sure." He places the herb down on the chopping board in front of me and I pick up a knife.
"You wanna twist it like this and hold it together tightly and it'll be easier to cut through."
"OK." I go to chop but a large chunk of cilantro falls out of the bunch as I go to cut through it and I pout at Calum. He laughs.
"Here, try a different knife." He picks a different blade up and takes to stand behind me to wrap his arms around my body to help guide me. His hands direct mine as they rest on to of them and I can feel his warm breaths fanning against my neck. "See, much better. I think you got it."
I find myself missing his touch when he lets go to check on what is in the oven as I finish up working on the cilantro. He breaks into a grin when he returns.
"You did good, champ."
"Thanks," I tell him. I lift up my glass of wine, which has been refilled, and take a sip. "So have you always lived in New York?"
"No, I'm from California," he tells me. He's a long way from home.
"Do you prefer New York?"
"It's pretty all right. You got better bagels here."
"That is true," I tell him, even though I've never been to California before. "So how come you moved here?"
"My parents died when I was a junior in high school," he says, and my heart sinks. That was the last sentence I had expected to fall from his lips. "My sister and I got the restaurant split evenly between the two of us. She decided we'd both stay until I graduated and then we sold the place. She moved to London and I didn't really have anyone keeping me there so I came here."
"I'm sorry," I say and he steps closer to me. "I didn't meant for you to have to bring that up."
"It's all right," he says bringing a hand to the back of my neck to press a kiss to my forehead. "You didn't know."
...
One time a guy kissed my forehead before I got out of his car when he dropped me off home and I almost melted
