Letters to Audrine

10- The Language of Love

When I wake up the next morning, I can't stop smiling. It almost feels as though the corners of my mouth are glued to my ears as I get dressed in a dusty pink romper and spend some time braiding my long hair down my back.

I picked up some new makeup at a store in town a few days ago, so I'm able to take the time to put some of it on. Even though my hands are shaking a bit at the excitement of seeing Silas today, I'm able to get a pretty decent wing on my eyeliner. I have no idea what today is going to be like when we go to the market together, but I have high hopes.

We message back and forth a bit in the morning as I'm getting ready and he says that he'll pick me up at the hotel, since I'm closer to the market, and I give him my room number. There's no mention about what happened last night and everything seems normal.

Just on time, there's a knock on my hotel door. I make sure my hair looks right, my makeup is neat, and my romper is situated before I answer the door.

Silas is standing there, looking like his normal self. I was expecting him to look at least a little bit hungover, after seeing how he was last night.

"Good morning," I smile at him. "How are you feeling?"

"I feel like I'm dead," he tells me. "But I'm persevering."

"You're so brave," I tease him as I grab my purse and room key so that we can head out. "You seemed pretty far gone last night."

"You saw me?" Silas sounds confused. "I don't really remember that much after leaving the bar."

"Oh," I suddenly feel so disappointed, but I try not to let it show. Should I tell him what happened? What he said? What I said? "Not anything?"

He then looks over at me and starts to grin, and then his grin turns into a laugh. He wraps his arm around my shoulders, pulling my body close to his. "No, I'm fucking with you, I remember what happened."

"That was mean," I accuse him, but I'm also relieved that he actually does remember what happened, because I don't know if I would have had the courage to repeat to him what we said to each other.

"Thank you for taking care of me," he still seems very proud of himself for tricking me, even if it was just for a few seconds.

"Somebody had to do it," I relax in his arm as we walk, but the embrace doesn't last long as it's pretty uncomfortable to walk in that position. I wish that I was closer to him though, or touching in some way, as we walk. Just holding hands or something.

"What were you doing at the house so late anyway?" Silas asks me.

"I found a journal written by my grandpa and fell asleep reading it," I answer him. "It was really intense reading about that summer through his eyes. I just couldn't put it down."

"Wow. Figures that the most interesting thing that was up there was one of the very last things that we touched," he laughs at the irony. "But I'm glad it's there, I'm sure it'll give you a lot of what you're looking for."

"Yeah, I think so," I agree with him. "And Audrine might want to read it too, I'll give it to her once I'm done. Maybe we can figure out how to copy the pages so that we can both have a copy."

"That's easy," he assures me. "Did he write about her?"

"The whole thing is basically about her," I say as we continue walking down the path between two stone buildings. I'm not sure how far away the market is, but I can already feel my thighs starting to sweat. "He talked about the first time he laid eyes on her. He just asked for a coffee and that was all it took to fall for her."