Chapter 13

It wasn't nearly as late as the night before when they finally left Perkins, leaving a generous tip for the cranky waitress and paying the cashier. Sedgewick followed Allison to her car.

They stood there in the dark, unsure if they should hold hands or hug goodnight. Sedgewick bit his lip and kicked at a wayward stone. Allison kept swallowing and opening her mouth to speak but then closing it again. She gripped her cardboard card under one arm.

"I think my problem is I don't want to say goodbye."

Sedgewick nodded, feeling squirmy and nervous.

"I don't want to make this a habit, but do I have to say goodbye?"

Sedgewick's eyebrows furled.

"Can I stay at your place again?"

His face relaxed into a smile.

"Yeah, any time."

She motioned for Sedgewick to get in and she started the car and drove the two of them home.

As the car pulled out of the parking lot and up to the red light, she turned down the radio.

"It's not that I don't want to go home tonight. I think I'd be okay. It's just that I—I don't know. There's something safe and familiar about it—about staying at your place."

Sedgewick's hands toyed with the seatbelt absentmindedly. He nodded slowly, thinking that's how home always felt for him, but unsure of how that could transfer to someone else.

"Well, as long as it's not every night. Because if it is we're switching and you can sleep on the couch."

Allison laughed and reached over to poke him with her finger.

"You don't mind giving up your bed, do you?"

"Of course not."

"Because I could sleep on the couch."

"No, it's okay. I'm just being dumb."

The car rumbled through a stoplight and turned down Sedgewick's street.

"But I might start charging you rent." Allison tried to poke him, but he deflected the attack. The car stopped in front of the house and Allison shut it off. They sat there for a moment listening to the motor settle.

"You are okay with this right? I could go back to the dorm if you want."

"I don't want to say goodbye, either," Sedgewick said as he opened the door. Allison sat there a second longer, letting his words and her smile linger, and she opened the door and followed him.

The house was dark and quiet, as it usually was when Sedgewick came home late from work. His grandmother was already asleep upstairs, her steady breathing and slight wheeze could be heard downstairs if you were still.

Sedgewick followed her upstairs to get the blankets and pillow from the night before that his grandmother had put away during the day. Allison went straight to Sedgewick's bedroom, turning the light on and laying her jacket over a chair. She kicked her shoes off and sat down on the bed.

Sedgewick came back to his room, standing in the doorway with a blanket and pillow in his arms. He meant to say goodnight, to turn around and walk downstairs. But instead he stood there, rocking back and forth as if trying to build up momentum. Then he finally stepped forward and sat down next to her on his bed.

"You know we still have to say goodbye."

"No," she answered. "Now it's just goodnight."

And they kissed. If it were the movies that's what would have happened. But it wasn't the movies, and that's exactly what Allison was thinking. She could imagine them turning to each other, hands wrapping around one another and a tender hand coming up to caress her cheek. They both lean forward and their lips touch (in the background the music swells). It would have been a slow, soft kiss, first just one, but then a second, longer, tender kiss. Sedgewick would have said goodnight and she'd be left to melt.

But they didn't kiss. And Allison wasn't disappointed. She didn't want the predictable Hollywood moment. Not that anything else there were doing was predictable.

Instead they just sat there awkwardly, close enough on the bed that they touched, but not close enough to be intimate.

Sedgewick hadn't thought of kissing. He was still trying to figure out how the girl of his dreams had gone from shopping at Cub to sleeping in his bed—not once but two nights in a row—in a matter of a few days. And all the while he didn't know what it meant, if he was establishing a deep friendship of mutual grace in helping her through this time, or if the tears would give way to something more and the hand holding they'd done at Perkins that sent tingles up and down his arm would become a common occurrence. He couldn't imagine such a feeling ever becoming common.

"I should—I should probably go. We could both use some sleep." He stood up, still clutching the spare blanket and pillow and headed for the door.

"Sedgewick?" He paused at the door. "Thank you." He just shook his head.

"Goodnight, Allison."

"Goodnight, Sedgewick." He stood in his own doorway for a moment longer, an innocent smile on his face, looking at Allison, sitting there in his bed with a tender warm look on her face. He took one last look and then closed the door. He stood outside the door another moment, unsure of why he wasn't heading downstairs.

Inside the Sedgewick's bedroom Allison lingered on the bed, clasping her hands and hugging herself, still feeling the electricity of Sedgewick's touch and that last look from the doorway.

At the same moment they both realized they wished they had kissed.

Sedgewick went downstairs and crashed on the couch. It had been a long day and early day, and he could feel sleep coming quickly. As he drifted off he realized for the first time that he felt something deeply for Allison. She wasn't just another passing college girl.

Upstairs Allison went to Sedgewick's closet and found another work shirt to sleep in. She changed in the warm light of the lamp and then crawled into Sedgewick's bed. She wanted to wander around his room again, read the spines of the books on his shelf and look at the photos of his family again, but she also felt like she knew what was there. She knew all she needed to know, and so she just pulled the covers tighter and settled into the pillow that smelled faintly of boy.

Allison didn't drift off to sleep as quickly as Sedgewick did. She could hear Gertrude's steady breathing in the next room. And her mind wandered. The overwhelming sadness that had consumed her the night before seemed to be lifting. Going home that day had been tough, but she'd done it. She walked through it and had come out on the other side stronger. While sadness lingered that evening, coming in little memories and wisps, it wasn't crushing. It could suddenly be crushing again, but for once she knew a sadness she could accept and embrace.

It seemed odd to her that she should be having these moments with Sedgewick, these potentially romantic encounters, the same week her mother died. But it also seemed like it wouldn't work any other way. She couldn't imagine embracing her own sadness without knowing Sedgewick's story.

She thought of the card he had made, the careful drawing of a dandelion in black marker. It wasn't just a touching and sentimental gesture. The drawing was actually quite good. She thought of the words on the other side and smiled.

"v, Sedgewick" he had signed. It was all the love that could make it that day, and Allison realized it was all the love she needed.

The next morning Allison woke in the half dark, half light of dawn. The warmth of the blanket and the closeness of the room reminded her that she had spent the night at Sedgewick's place again. She rubbed her eyes and slowly sat up in bed. She stretched and ran a hand through her hair, which was still pulled into a ponytail. She pushed the covers back and her feet touched the cold floor. It sent goose bumps up her bare legs and she wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. She was still wearing one of Sedgewick's work shirts, which was oversized on her. But they made good makeshift pajamas.

She stood up and walked to the window, looking out on her car on the street and the frost that clung to the grass and the shingles and the car windows. It was the first frost of the year, a coldness that held everything tight, cold and stiff, but at the same time warm and safe.

That's how she felt. She didn't know exactly why she asked to spend the night again. She easily could have gone home and slept in her dorm, told Kallie about the card Sedgewick had made for her and readjusted to a normal life. But nothing seemed quite normal anymore. She knew normal would never be normal again.

It wasn't that she needed the escape like she did the night before. It was trying something new, something different, something hopeful.

She heard footsteps coming up the stairs. It was Sedgewick. She listened to him climb the stairs, walk down the hall and enter the bathroom. She could hear water in the sink and she crossed the bedroom to the door and reached for the knob. The morning before he'd taken off, and she wouldn't let him do it again. Not because she needed him, but because she knew he needed her.

She turned the knob slowly and quietly and opened the door, sneaking out and down the hall. She peeked in the open door and saw Sedgewick standing there, still wearing the same clothes from the night before, his face half under the faucet. She stood in the doorway and watched.

"Taking off early again?" He grinned and shook his head.

"Not today." His eyes were embarrassed, as if caught in the act or suddenly realizing what it looked like. Allison smiled.

"Well that's good. I don't think I'd be able to take a runaway twice in a row. It's a little disconcerting."

"I'm sorry, I just…"

"I know." She stepped into the bathroom with Sedgewick and put her arms around him. She leaned her face against his chest and he slowly wrapped his arms around her, a little surprised and shocked. Then she realized she wasn't wearing any pants.

But it didn't bother her. As much as it could have been a sexual moment, two college kids spending the night together and embracing in the morning, it wasn't. They were two people who needed each other, two people who had just woken up, whose mouths were thick with stale breath and eyes crusted over. As sexy as she may have looked standing there with Sedgewick's shirt falling just below her underwear and nothing else, it wasn't sexiness or lust or any kind of physical attraction that either of them felt.

It was something more. It was something deeper. It was something better.