It had been a good night. That was the part that made it worse.
They'd been talking since nine, which was normal now, and the conversation had been the easy kind: no weight to it, no moments requiring careful navigation, just the comfortable back and forth that she'd stopped being surprised by and started simply looking forward to. He'd been in a good mood, funnier than usual, and she'd matched it without thinking, and at some point she'd looked at the time and it was past eleven and she hadn't noticed the hours moving.
Seth: okay controversial opinion
Alya: finally something interesting
Seth: the "found family" trope is more emotionally effective than the romance arc in literally every anime that has both
Alya: that's not controversial that's just correct
Seth: SEE this is what I mean. nobody in real life agrees with me on this
Alya: the people in your life are wrong
Seth: chronically wrong. all of them. except you
Alya: I'm a rare find
Seth: you really are
She smiled at the ceiling. The apartment was fully quiet around her. Her parents had gone to bed an hour ago, which meant the particular quality of the silence had shifted: less watchful, more genuinely still. She had her blanket pulled up and her phone screen turned low and the feeling she'd come to associate specifically with these late conversations, of the world reducing itself to just this.
Seth: okay different topic
Alya: okay
Seth: I've been thinking about something
Alya: dangerous
Seth: sometimes. this one is fine though
Alya: okay
Seth: so we've been talking for what? almost a month now
Alya: something like that, yeah
Seth: and I feel like I know you pretty well at this point
Alya: oh really?
Seth: I think so. like I know how you think. I know what makes you go quiet. I know the difference between when you're being funny and when you're using funny to avoid something
She read that. It was accurate. All of it was accurate, and the fact that it was accurate should have felt like a compliment and mostly it did.
Alya: okay...
Seth: so I feel like we're past the getting to know each other part
Alya: into what part?
Seth: the actually knowing each other part
Qlya: and the difference is?
Seth: the difference is I think we can be more honest
She looked at that word. Honest. In her experience it was a word people used right before they said something they wanted permission for.
Alya: we've been honest... Haven't we?
Seth: mostly. yeah
Alya: mostly?
Seth: I mean I think there are things we haven't said because it felt too early or whatever. but it's not too early anymore
Alya: what kind of things?
A pause. She waited.
Seth: like. okay. you're genuinely the most interesting person I've talked to in a long time. and I think you know that I like you. not just as someone to talk to
She stayed very still.
This wasn't new information exactly. She'd known the shape of it. She'd been navigating the shape of it for weeks without naming it. But there was a difference between knowing the shape of something and having it said out loud, plainly, with no joke attached to cushion the landing.
Alya: Seth
Seth: I'm not trying to make it weird. I just think we're at the point where pretending it's just two people who met in a Discord server is kind of...
Seth: anyway
Seth: I've been thinking about what it would be like if things were different. like if the distance wasn't a thing and the whole situation with your family wasn't a thing
Alya: okay...?
Seth: like what would actually happen between us?
Alya: I don't know
Seth: I think you do
She looked at the ceiling.
Seth: like honestly. if we were in the same city. if none of the other stuff was in the way
Seth: I think about that sometimes. being in the same place as you
Alya: Seth
Seth: like actually in the same place. what that would look like
Seth: what you'd be like in person... I think about it more than I probably should
She sat up.
Seth: like I wonder if you'd still be that controlled in person or if it's different when you can't just put the phone down you know
She stared at the screen.
There it was.
It wasn't the wondering about what would happen between them. She could handle that. She'd been handling the edges of that for weeks. It was the last part. If you'd still be that controlled in person. The specific framing of it, like her guardedness was something to be gotten past, like the version of her that existed without the phone was the real one and this version was just a wall he was looking forward to not having to deal with.
She put the phone face down.
Not for long. Thirty seconds maybe. She lay there in the dark staring at the ceiling and felt the warmth of the evening drain out of the room.
Seth: sorry was that too much?
Seth: Alya?
Seth: okay I'm going to assume that was too much
She picked the phone back up.
Alya: yeah
Seth: yeah it was too much or yeah you're there?
Alya: both
Seth: okay. I'm sorry
Alya: it's fine
Seth: you sure?
Alya: yes
He tried to re-establish the rhythm after that. She could feel him trying: a meme, a question about something they'd talked about earlier, a joke that on any other night would have worked. She responded. She answered the questions and reacted to the meme and acknowledged the joke.
Seth: you okay?
Alya: tired
Seth: okay
Seth: you want to just call it?
Alya: yeah
Seth: okay. goodnight
Alya: night
She put the phone on the nightstand and lay in the dark.
She wasn't upset exactly. That was the thing she kept turning over. She'd expected to feel more clearly one thing or another, and instead it was this murky, unsatisfying in between. Part of her understood where he was coming from. He liked her. He'd been direct about it, which she'd always preferred to the alternative. That part wasn't the problem.
The problem was if she'd still be that controlled.
Like control was a malfunction. Like the careful, considered way she moved through the world was something to be fixed or tested or gotten past rather than just a thing that was true about her, that existed for reasons, that she hadn't asked for his opinion on.
She picked the phone back up.
She looked at the thread. His last message sitting there: okay. goodnight.
She typed and deleted three things.
Then:
Alya: can I say something?
Seth: yeah of course
Alya: the thing you said. about whether I'd be as controlled in person
Seth: yeah I know. I shouldn't have said it like that
Alya: it's not about how you said it
Seth: okay
Alya: it's that you said it at all. like my being careful about things is a problem you're curious about solving. it's not. it's just how I am
A pause. She waited. Her heart was doing the loud thing again but she kept her thumbs still.
Seth: you're right
Alya: I know
Seth: I wasn't thinking about it like that but that's what it sounded like and I get why that's not okay
Alya: yeah
Seth: I'm sorry. genuinely
She looked at the apology. It was a clean one: no qualifications, no but I just meant, no redirecting the conversation back to his intentions. Just I'm sorry. Genuinely. She appreciated that. She filed it in the part of her that was still warm toward him despite the last hour.
Alya: okay
Seth: okay meaning we're good or okay meaning you're going to think about this alone for three days?
Alya: both probably
Seth: fair
Seth: for what it's worth. the controlled thing. I don't actually want to get past it. I just wanted to know who you are without it. that's different
Alya: is it?
Seth: yeah. one is trying to change you. the other is just. wanting to know all of you
She sat with that for a long moment.
It was a good answer. She wasn't sure if it was the right answer or just a good one, and she wasn't sure she had the energy tonight to figure out the difference.
Alya: goodnight Seth
Seth: goodnight Alya
Seth: thank you for telling me
She put the phone down.
She didn't move it again.
Outside the wind came down from the mountains the way it did at this hour, cold and directionless, moving against the glass without getting in. She lay there and thought about the difference between wanting to get past something and wanting to know all of it, and whether that distinction held up or whether it was just a nicer way of saying the same thing.
She thought about it for a long time.
She didn't come to a conclusion.
She wasn't sure she was supposed to yet.