Her Turn

The windows of the noodle shop had fogged halfway up, and the rain kept tapping the glass like someone who wanted in. I turned my bowl, watched a scallion drift, and opened my mouth.

“Sam.”

He looked up with his chopsticks still in his hand. His coat was hanging off the back of the chair, damp at the shoulders. “That’s my name.”

“I was going to say something. Then I decided the scallion was more interesting.”

He glanced into my bowl. “It’s a scallion. I don’t think it’s winning that fight.”

“I’m not losing my nerve.”

“All right.”

“I’m rearranging the sentence.”

“You’ve been rearranging it since the soup came.” He set his chopsticks down and poured more tea into my cup. The pot was chipped at the spout. “You started three times. Once you got as far as my name. That was the bold one.”

I took the cup because it gave my hands something to do. The tea was too hot. I drank it anyway. Outside, a bus threw water at the curb and a man with a paper bag ducked under the awning.

“It’s a Friday,” I said. “People talk about things on Fridays.”

“People also eat noodles on Fridays.” He ate a bite, then watched me over the rim of his own cup. His hair was still wet at the ends from the walk over. “You can tell me on the way home if the scallion is winning. Or you can tell me here. Either way I’m not going anywhere. The rain already has my socks.”

I smiled in spite of myself. “On the walk.”

“There it is.”

“Don’t look pleased.”

“I’m not pleased. I’m hungry, and also a little pleased.” He pushed the chili oil toward me. “Finish that. You’ve been guarding it like it might confess first.”

I ate. The broth was salty and hot, and the steam kept rising into my face. Sam talked about a bent wheel he’d spent the afternoon persuading back into round, and I answered him, and every time the conversation dipped I felt the thing I meant to say sitting in my mouth unused. He didn’t push. He just kept filling my cup when it got low, and once he reached across and stole the last dumpling without asking, which was rude and also made me laugh hard enough that the woman at the next table looked over.

When the bowls were empty he stood and held my coat out. “Walk, then.”

“Walk,” I said, and put my arms through the sleeves.

The river path was mostly empty. Rain came in fine and steady, not enough to send us running, enough to bead on Sam’s hair and darken the shoulders of my coat again. The lamps along the water had just come on. Their light sat on the wet path in long yellow streaks.

We walked a minute without talking. A cyclist went past with a red rear light, then the path was ours.

“I like to lead,” I said.

Sam’s step didn’t change. “In what.”

“In bed.”

He nodded once, like I’d told him the shop was closed on Monday. “All right.”

“That’s the easy part.” I watched a tug move under the bridge, its wake folding the rain. “There’s one thing in particular. What I like. I’ve known it a long time, and I’ve spent a stupid amount of time not saying it to you.”

I told him, then. The rain kept on. A car hissed over the bridge above us. When I finished, the path was still the path, and Sam was still beside me, and my hands were cold inside my pockets.

“You can say no,” I said. “If it’s not for you, nothing between us has to change. I mean that. I’d rather hear no than a polite version of yes.”

He didn’t answer.

I counted the lamps. One, two, three. My stomach had gone tight in a way I didn’t care for. I’d rehearsed the kind version and the funny version and the version where I made it sound like weather. None of them had included this stretch of quiet, with the river on our left and Sam looking straight ahead like he was reading something on the far bank.

“Sam.”

“I’m here.” His voice was low. “I’m thinking.”

“Take the time. Just don’t vanish while you do it. It’s raining and I like your face.”

That got a short breath out of him, almost a laugh. He stopped under a lamp and turned to me. Water ran off the brim of nothing; he had no hat. His hair stuck to his forehead.

“I’ve thought about that,” he said. “For years. Not as a joke I tell myself. As a real thing. I’ve never said it to anyone.”

The tight place in me let go all at once. I had to look at the river so I wouldn’t grin at him like an idiot.

“Years,” I said.

“Years.” He rubbed a hand over his mouth. “I didn’t know how to bring it up without making it strange. Then you did, and I stood there like my tongue had quit.”

“Your tongue is fine. It just took a meeting.”

“It’s back.” He started walking again, slower, and I fell in beside him. “I want to hear all of it. Not tonight in the rain if you’d rather be dry. But I want it. I’m not being polite.”

“I can tell.” I bumped his arm with mine. “You’re doing the face.”

“What face.”

“The one you get when a wheel finally sits true.”

He laughed, properly this time, and the sound went out over the water. We didn’t fill the rest of the walk with talk. He took my hand when we crossed at the light, and he didn’t let it go until we reached my building, where the bookbinder’s window was dark and the stair up to my place smelled faintly of glue and paper.

Inside, I put the kettle on before I took my coat off. Sam stood on the mat and dripped, looking mildly betrayed by his own socks. I threw him a towel from the bathroom and went back to the kitchen, which was small enough that two people had to mean it.

“Boots by the door,” I said. “Towel on the chair, not the books.”

“Bossy already.”

“Warming up.”

He dried his hair and left the towel where I’d told him. I made tea in the blue mugs and set them on the table by the window. The rain was louder up here, on the roof and against the glass. Sam sat with his hands around his mug and waited, which was a kindness I noticed and didn’t say out loud.

“We should talk it through,” I said. “Like two people planning a trip. Where we want to go. What makes us nervous. What we do if one of us wants to stop.”

“A word,” he said. “Something we wouldn’t say by accident.”

“Yes.”

He thought. “Red.”

“Red works.” I turned my mug. “If either of us says it, everything stops. No debate in the moment. We can talk after.”

“Agreed.” He met my eyes. “What are you curious about. In general. You don’t have to draw me a map.”

“I’m curious about you listening when I decide the pace.” I kept my voice even, because if I let it lift I’d smile and then I’d never stop. “About you wanting that, not putting up with it. About taking my time.”

He nodded. A drop from his hair hit the table and he wiped it with his sleeve.

“And nervous?” he asked.

“That you’ll agree to be kind and then go quiet on me afterward. I’ve had that. I don’t want it from you.”

“I won’t.” He said it. “I’ve wanted to say this for a long time and I was the quiet one. That’s on me. I’m not going to make you carry it alone now that it’s out.”

I looked at the tea. The surface shook a little when a truck went by below. “What about you. Curious, and nervous.”

“Curious about following you and finding out I like it more than I already think I will.” He paused. “Nervous that I’ll be clumsy. That you’ll have to stop and teach me and I’ll feel foolish.”

“Clumsy is fine. Foolish is allowed. Cruel isn’t, from either of us, and I’m not interested in that anyway.” I did smile then. I tried to tuck it away and failed. “We’ll go slow. We’ll talk. If I want something, I’ll say so in words you can use.”

“You’re smiling.”

“I’m aware.”

“It’s distracting.”

“Good.”

He drank, set the mug down, and turned it once with his fingers. “What would you want me to do first.”

The question landed warm. I held it a second, because I liked the shape of it, and because the answer was already there.

“Nothing first, except wait for me to decide.” I leaned back in the chair. “It’s my turn to decide things for a change. You’ve been easy on me for six months. I noticed. I’m done pretending I don’t want the other half of that.”

“The other half being you in charge.”

“The other half being me in charge, and you glad about it.”

“I am glad about it.” He said it without dressing it up. “I want what you like. I want you to tell me. I want to do it because I want to, not because you talked me into a corner.”

“I know.” My face hurt from the smiling. I stood, because if I stayed in the chair I was going to reach across the table and ruin my own plan. “Come here.”

He came. The kitchen was barely wide enough. I could smell rain on his shirt and the tea on his breath. I put my hand at the back of his neck, where his hair was still damp, and I kissed him.

He let me. That was the part that went through me, more than the kiss itself. He didn’t take it over. His mouth answered mine and stayed with what I gave him. I kissed him again, slower, and his hand came up to my face, careful at my cheek. I caught his wrist and held it there so he’d feel that I was choosing it. My other hand stayed at his neck. He made a small sound and leaned in, and I felt his fingers slide into my hair, then down, until our hands met between us and his fingers fitted through mine.

I pulled back enough to see him. His mouth was red from mine. He looked at me like the wheel had come true and he didn’t trust it yet.

“Not tonight,” I said. “Tomorrow. I want you to think about it all day.”

Sam laughed, bright and disbelieving, the sound filling the small kitchen. “You’re going to ruin my Saturday.”

“I’m going to improve it.” I squeezed his hand once and didn’t let go. “Go home. Sleep if you can. I’ll see you tomorrow, and I’ll still be the one deciding.”

He laughed again, softer, like he couldn’t believe his luck, and he bent and kissed my knuckles where our hands were joined. Outside, the rain kept on against the bookbinder’s roof, and I stood in my kitchen with his laugh still in the room, already sure the night had changed us.