Friendly Affections

The thrum and pitter-patter of rain on my window matched the tap of my fingers on the end table. It was late into the night, I was sitting in my living room's recliner with one hand resting over my face and other a few inches away from an in-season-therefore-forbidden bottle of beer. My trainer would have cried if he had seen it, sitting within my reach, half-empty and precursor to another. Keeping it company was my unraveled light blue tie, which I had loosened and tossed away the moment I was off the plane and in my car on the way home.
Coming home to a silent, sans the rain, apartment was one of the downfalls of losing road games. After a lose, some guys preferred to be alone while others preferred consolation from their wife or girlfriend. I was one of the latter, but had to turn to a cold one instead of another person.
The tapping of the rain grew in volume and pace and I mentally counted how many beers I had drank. Concluding it had only been two, I knew that the sound was not an exaggeration of my mind. The rain pounded harder and I groaned, half asleep and half annoyed. I usually loved to sleep during storms, but the rain that night had been particularly incessant and loud.
A ringing rose over the rain and my head snapped up, finally falling out of my partial slumber and realizing the rain wasn't making that annoying noise. Someone was knocking at my door and ringing the doorbell.
When I opened the door I found a very wet Jodie. I leaned against the doorway and let out a breath, stunned. Her hair hung around her slick face, clear of make up and she was wearing a peacoat over a teeshirt and pair of jeans that where glued to her figure by the rain. She was biting her lip, fighting the shivers and visibly shaking.
I didn't think, I only grabbed her arm and pulled her straight to the bathroom without a single exchange of words. She wordlessly followed. I drew a just-below-scalding bath and started peeling off her clothes. She again remained silent, and only nodded when I stopped after undressing her to her tank top and panties and told her I was going to get her a change of clothing.
In my bedroom I refused to allow myself to stop and think about her presence in my apartment. I focused on grabbing her a small enough sweater and a long lost pair of her yogas that were still in my dresser. We could talk later after she was safely away from the grasp of pneumonia.
Back in the bathroom Jodie had finished undressing and gotten into the tub, curtain slightly closed. I rolled my eyes, because it wasn't like I hadn't seen all that before, but didn't mention it. I set the clothing down and leaned against the sink.
I could hear the splashes as she moved around. “Feeling better? Warmer, anyway?”
“Much.” She answered, and I realized it was the first time I had heard her voice since December when she had called me. It speared me through the chest.
I continued humorously. “In the neighborhood?”
“I asked Kate to text me when you got home from your road trip so I could come see you. And she did, like fifteen minutes ago.” The splashing stopped and her voice took a quieter register.
“I...oh. So you came over right after I got home, in the middle of the night?” I spoke the question aloud almost redundantly, a little incredulous that she had gone to such lengths to see me.
She laughed shakily. “I wanted to get over here before I lost my nerve.”
“Did you, uh, walk?”
Another laugh. “No. I drove my car, but when I stopped for gas I accidentally locked my keys in the car. So I walked halfway, but that's still not far.”
“It is in the middle of the night when it's raining.” I smiled softly though, because it sounded exactly like something the stubborn and determined Jodie I knew would do.
She sniffed, but didn't say anything. I heard the drain start and saw the curtain rustle as her hand emerged. I handed her the towel and then exchanged it for the shirt and yogas when she stuck out the towel once again. Her insistence on changing where I couldn't see her was almost amusing, and possibly a little insulting. But I bared it patiently.
She finally stepped out, her hair already drying in curly disarray and her feet bare. It was a sight I was so familiar with it hit me with a wave of nostalgia for the relationship we had once had. She blushed when she saw me looking at her.
“You're bashful, now?” I could have laughed but didn't, sensing how uncomfortable she was. Instead I gestured out the door and led her to sit in the couch in my living room. She instead took the armchair, while I frowned lightly and sat on the couch.
Silence followed as I studied her face expectantly. She knit her fingers through her hair and looked around the room like it might have changed an exorbitant amount since she had last seen it but refused to meet my eyes.
“So...” I tried to get her started, but she still didn't speak and only directed her gaze towards me, wide eyed. In the dull-lit apartment her usually lively green and gold eyes were dark pools, fixated on me like I was the one who had waltzed back into her life six months after the fact.
“Jodie, why are you here?” I finally asked.
“Because,” She faltered for a moment and then regained her voice. “I'm in love with you, okay?”
“I...what?” I wracked my brain for a moment seeing if I had even considered it a possibility that 'I'm in love with you, okay?' would be the words out of her mouth.
“It's just...I am.” She shrugged her shoulders like her words where nothing major, just a fact of everyday life. Like she was telling me she liked chocolate ice cream with cherries or her childhood dog had been a beagle named Freckles. She was in love with me, so why not say things like they are?
“You can't just...” My mind short-circuited on the list of things she couldn't do. “How can you just, like, Jodie. This doesn't make any sense.”
“Really, it doesn't? You don't think that didn't occur to me?” She was standing, frustration shining on her face. “You think that I didn't consider: hey, wow, it's kind of weird to show up at his apartment in the middle of the night after six months of not talking just to say 'I love you' even though, like I just said: it had been six months after our falling out? You didn't think I found that weird too? Because I sure as Hell did.” She threw her hands up in the air in an elaborate shrug. “I am an enigma of the universe, I don't make sense at all, but at least I know it.”
I shouldn't have laughed, but seeing her standing before me with her hair drying into a poof of curls, eyes large and flustered and expression sharp with concern and confusion I couldn't choke back my chortles. I laughed so hard I had tears in my eyes and my face rest in my hands which were propped up on my knees.
“Jack!” She stated, her voice filled with helplessness. “You can't laugh when I tell you I love you!”
“What am I suppose to do?” I asked her honestly. “What did you think I would do – what did you want me to do?”
“I don't know!” She snapped. “I really don't know! And that why telling you took me six months! The fear, the uncertainty, of your response! I don't handle unpredictable things very well, you know that. I was afraid to tell you because I didn't know your answer.”
“You couldn't have ever doubted if I loved you or not.” I responded. “It was obvious. To everyone. My teammates and my friends, your co-workers and your friends, my mom – who never even met you – Kate, Melanie –”
“Who's Melanie?”
“Jodie.”
“New girlfriend?”
“Jodie.”
“Because I'll leave. Is she in your room? Is this awkward? I can go.”
“Jodie!”
“I don't wanted to be a total cock-block.”
“Jodie, I love you too.”
“Oh.” She paused. “Oh, okay. Good.”
We both at the same time looked down at the coffee table dividing us from one another. In a single and very loud movement, I slid it aside. The crash that result from it likely woke the other people in my building, but I didn't care. From the way things were going it looked like we would be keeping them awake for the rest of the night with loud noises from my apartment.
I cut the space into between us in half and would have went all the way if she hadn't done the same. We met in some sort of odd hug, with my arms locked around her waist and lifting her up and one of her hands curled in my hair and the other holding my face. We kissed deeply and I smiled went I felt her legs curling around my hips.
I could have mocked her last statement but 1.) my lips were occupied with a task much more important and 2.) I couldn't, because it struck me as so relevant to our relationship. I knew our future together would never be described as 'Ah, perfect' and I knew both our feelings were to strong for it to ever be 'Well, this is major suckage', but she had nailed it right on the head with 'Oh, okay. Good.'