Chapter 83 What it feels like
We came to my apartment yesterday. I told Ryan it would be good for him, a change of environment.
He didn’t argue.
Ryan rarely argues when he understands the intention behind something. So now we’re here, on my couch. And, as always, Survivor is playing. We always start with something else. Every single time. A movie. A documentary. Something new we tell ourselves we’ll both pay attention to like two reasonable adults expanding their cultural horizons.
But eventually I notice Ryan isn’t really watching. His eyes drift. His attention moves somewhere else entirely. Sometimes to the window. Sometimes to whatever quiet thoughts are passing through that mind of his.
The first time I called him out on it, he didn’t even look embarrassed. He just shrugged and said he’s very particular about his entertainment. When he finds something that works for him, something that settles into the exact frequency his brain likes, he stays with it.
Not out of laziness...out of loyalty.
Because good things, in his experience, deserve to be followed all the way to the end.
So now Survivor is on again. And I’ve already made peace with the fact that we’ll probably have to watch it until we run out of episodes. Which, judging by the number of seasons currently available, is an almost impossible task.
I’m lying stretched out across the couch. Flat on my back, one arm hanging loosely off the side. My head is resting in Ryan’s lap.
He’s sitting upright beside me, eyes on the screen, completely absorbed in whatever minor tribal politics are unfolding on the screen. His fingers move slowly through my hair.
Absent-mindedly....his fingers comb through the strands, pause for a second, then start again. It’s the kind of touch that makes it very easy to forget the world outside this room exists.
Ember is sprawled across my stomach. Every time my hand stops moving, even for a second, she nudges it firmly with her head. I scratch behind her ears again and she settles immediately, purring low and satisfied.
For a while, no one says anything. And there’s something about the moment that feels strangely delicate. The kind of quiet that only exists when two people stop trying to fill space with words. Then Ryan’s fingers stop moving in my hair.
The absence of the motion registers almost immediately. A second later, I feel his gaze. I open my eyes and look up at him, blinking against the soft glow of the TV.
“What?” I ask.
He's smiling a little. Not broadly, just enough to crease the corner of his mouth.
“Do you remember that restaurant we went to?” he asks. “The one with the live music?”
I shift slightly, squinting up at him.
“The one we went to on our first date?”
His smile deepens, amused.
“It wasn’t a date.”
“It definitely was.”
He chuckles under his breath, the sound warm and quiet. Then he nods. “Yeah,” he says. “That one.”
“What about it?”
It’s around eight, technically still early. But the idea of Ryan wanting to go anywhere right now seems unlikely, especially when the nausea has crept back in over the past day or so, hovering just beneath the surface like something waiting for the right moment to strike. His hand resumes its slow movement through my hair.
“When I used to pass by there at night,” he says softly, “when the music was playing.... I’d sometimes see couples dancing.”
His fingers pause briefly again before continuing.
“And I had this stupid little fantasy.”
I wait.
“That one day I’d go in there with someone I liked,” he says, eyes drifting slightly as if he’s watching the memory play out somewhere beyond the living room. “And I’d push through the fear long enough to ask them to dance.”
A small breath leaves him. “Just to know what it feels like.”
I tilt my head slightly against his lap.
“I don’t recall being asked,” I say.
Ryan glances down at me.
“So what, you didn’t like me yet?” I continue. “Were my feelings just tragically one-sided through that entire dinner?”
He huffs out a quiet laugh, then he shakes his head.
“No,” he says.
“I worked myself up to it a couple of times.”
A faint smirk appears. “Then lost my nerve before the moment arrived.”
I study him from where I’m lying. The angle makes him look younger somehow. The light catching the edges of his face while the rest of the room sits in shadow. After a moment he says quietly, “When I’m feeling better, we should go back.”
His fingers slow slightly....“I won’t hesitate next time.”
I nod slowly. My eyes drift to the television screen, where contestants are arguing about rice or alliances or something equally inconsequential. But my mind isn’t really there. Instead it lingers on what Ryan just said.
When I’m feeling better.
The phrase floats in the air between us like a fragile promise. I try to imagine when that might be. When the nausea will stop. When his body will begin to trust itself again. When the quiet war happening inside his bloodstream will loosen its grip long enough to give him that version of himself back.
But time has started behaving strangely lately. Stretching where I want it to move quickly. Racing past the moments I want to hold still. And the truth is, I no longer know how to predict its pace.
I look back up at him. “Should we practice?” I ask.
His gaze narrows slightly.
“Practice what?”
“Dancing.”
I push myself up onto one elbow now, looking at him more directly. “You know,” I say casually. “So when the time comes, I don’t embarrass myself.”
He studies me, I hold his gaze.
“Come on,” I say, nodding toward the open space. “Let’s practice.”
Ember makes a soft, annoyed sound the moment I sit up. The movement disrupts her carefully constructed throne on my stomach, and she rises with theatrical irritation before stepping delicately onto the armrest instead. She curls her tail around herself there, glaring at me. But I barely notice.
Because I’m watching Ryan.
A faint flush is climbing up his neck. It creeps slowly beneath the collar of the hoodie he’s wearing, my hoodie, and spreads upward toward his face like he genuinely didn’t expect the suggestion. He scoffs lightly.
“Now?”
I nod. “Now.”
Then I lean a little closer to him, smiling slightly. “Are you shy?”
His brows lift. “I’m inexperienced,” he corrects. His tone is matter-of-fact. “I’ve literally never danced before.”
I tilt my head. “You said you had once. In college.”
He exhales through his nose. “That was because I was drunk.” A small pause. “And I have absolutely no memory of it,” he adds. “Which I’m very grateful for.”
“Well if this is the attitude you’re planning to use when you finally ask me to dance,” I say, “I’m afraid I’m going to end up very disappointed.”
He smiles at that, then looks away for a moment, eyes drifting toward the large windows before he turns back to me again.
The hoodie sleeves fall slightly over his hands. And for a brief moment a strange thought slips quietly through my mind....that this same hoodie would have looked different on him the first night we met. It would have hung differently. Filled out in ways his body no longer does.
The realization flickers through me like a cold current.
I push it away. Instead I stand and extend my hand toward him. “Come on,” I whisper.
Ryan looks down at my hand. I wiggle my fingers impatiently. “You said you wanted to know what it feels like.”
Then I soften my voice slightly. “I’ll hold you,” I tell him. “Guide you through it.”
A small smile pulls at the corner of my lips. “You just have to follow.”