Sweet Nola

Chapter Ten

Nola lolled around her bed unable to sleep. The flight to San Francisco was today.

Over the past two weeks, Nola and Ben exchanged texts frequently and excitedly, looking to hear back from the other's opinion. "Was this too much?"," How about this?", "Can we make it there if we only spend one hour here?" Nola rolled around on her bed in bliss and anxiety. Nola had only had the twenty-four working holiday a year to go abroad and last year she used it on nursing Allie when he came up with a high fever. Ben had never gone abroad but for one time, when he moved to Ireland from Morocco at the age of five. This chance was a once in a lifetime journey for both of them. Neither of them have been to the American continent.

She decided to get up and head over earlier than planned to Ben's home. She learnt that he lived in the city centre, close to the bus station that they would take to Dublin airport.

It was 6am. She texted Ben she was going to head over now. She got an instant reply. He was also lolling around his bed unable to sleep.

After washing herself, she dressed up in her khaki shorts and slipped on a plain white t-shirt. She decided to go with glasses instead of her usual contact lens. She grabbed her packed backpack, double checked her wallet and passport and headed out to his home on her bike.

She arrived near his housing estate in fifteen minutes. The map on her phone showed a short cut through a rather shady looking alleyway. She got off her bike and walked through the alleyway that was behind a shopping complex. It was an alleyway filled with rubbish. There was a thrown out mattress that she had to roll her bike over, some hypodermic needles lay broken with glass shatterings on the basalt, rubble everywhere and there was a shopping trolley filled with empty paint cans. This was a side of the city she never seen before. She felt like she was walking through the Detroit of Ireland.

At the end of the alleyway, she made a couple more turns to his housing estate. It was an apartment block. She located his one on the ground floor. The curtains were drawn back but the lights glowed through the sides. She rang the doorbell. She heard the shuffling of chains and keys behind the door. It clinkered and clattered seven times before the door opened up. The dawning morning light lit up Ben. He wore a loose white t-shirt decorated by faded bones of a ribcage. Nola suddenly realised that she had only ever seen him wear two t-shirts, a black one with red skulls and a hole due to thinning of the fabric after many washes and this white one with a faded ribcage. We could go shopping when we get there, she thought and then abandoned the thought as it felt overly girly.

"Hi~" she smiled at figuring out his wardrobe.

"Hi," he smiled back, unable to help himself, "early for once." It was a depreciative joke to themselves as they were both always late to class. She chuckled.

She entered. The apartment was empty save for a couch and a tiny TV. She dropped her backpack beside the couch. There was still two hours to go before their bus leaves for the airport.

"Your house is so vacant."

"That's good. It used to be so filthy here; occupied by hoarders," he smiled slyly to himself. "Not anymore now. Did you eat?"

"No. I was thinking we'd get the earlier bus to the airport and eat at the cafés there."

"I was thinking of that too."

Both felt a slight anxiety having not gone on a trip of this scale. Nola wanted the window seat of the bus but fell asleep for the entire journey. They relaxed at the café in the airport. She talked about her work before she went to college which interested Ben because he never worked in an office.