We walked to the other side of the hall, where the elevators were, and when I reached out and pressed the button I wondered how many times I’d done this. But when the elevator doors opened . . .I froze.
“Let’s take the stairs,” Noah said, reading my body language.
“It’s okay. I think I can do it.”
“Are you sure? I mean, there’s no pressure. If you’re afraid of something, it’s fine. It can take a while to get over it. When I was five, my parents got a clown for my birthday party and I was so terrified of it that I screamed and ran away and I’ve never been able to look at one again. So I get it.”
“No. I can do this. Besides, I’m too excited to see the inside of my apartment. I can do this.” I must have said this with a little more confidence than I was feeling inside, because Noah didn’t look convinced. But he gave me a warm, supportive smile as we walked into the elevator together. The last time we’d been in an elevator together, the circumstances had been totally different. I walked to the far end and leaned my back against the cool steel wall and watched as the door started closing in front of us. I saw some people coming for the elevator and I rushed to stop the doors closing.
“Hey, come in,” I said to the two women standing by the lift, arms weighed down with shopping bags.
“Uh . . . hey,” one stuttered, and avoided eye contact with me, while changing the hands holding the heavy-looking bags.
“Come in, your bags look heavy,” I said, with an encouraging smile. The two women looked at each other for a moment and then turned back to me.
“We’ll take the next one,” one said, taking a step backwards.
“There’s plenty of space,” I offered.
“It’s fine,” the other one said, also taking a step back.
“Oh.” These two women were looking at me like they knew exactly who I was. I felt a hand pull mine off the door button gently.
“They’ll get the next one,” Noah said, and the doors started to close again.
I gripped the railing that ran the length of the wall and held on tightly as it started to move. I tried to steady myself when it gave the tiniest shudder.
“Are you sure you’re alright?” Noah asked.
“Are you really afraid of clowns?”
“Yes. It’s nothing to be ashamed of, or so my old therapist told me once. Apparently, a fear of clowns is a common thing.”
I chuckled as he put his hand on his hip. It looked like an attempt to make himself a little more manly.
“I wonder if I’m afraid of anything?” I mused.
“Nah. I doubt it. You’re afraid of nothing. Look at you riding the elevator like nothing happened. Eating the hottest chili in the world, and climbing that thing at the gym . . .”
“Yeah,” I said, “I’m badass that way, aren’t I?” The elevator continued to rise until it stopped with a ding.
“You have arrived at floor three. Floor three,” a stilted-sounding American voice said. I looked around to see where it was coming from.
“Doors closing in ten seconds. Depart now. Depart now,” it said in that deadpan tone.
I flicked my eyes in Noah’s direction and we both laughed.
“Well, that was completely unnecessary.”
“Totally.”
We stepped out of the elevator and surveyed the area. This was it. This was where I lived.
CHAPTER 30
A corridor to our left, a corridor to our right. I looked up at the numbering on the wall and then pointed.
“This way.” I was so excited I almost skipped down the corridor. I was only seconds away from seeing it all. My life. No doubt there would be color and maybe even patterned wallpaper like at Sindi’s. The walls were sure to be pink, or maybe purple. There would be lots of plants.Oh God! Who had watered them in my absence,poor things?Feathers and fluff and sequins and shine and sparkle and romantic rose-pink whimsy. All the things that I’d come to understand about myself in the last week. As I got closer to my apartment, the excitement felt like it would explode out of me. Like a fizz of champagne following a cork into the air. And I was almost there. Only a few doors to go, and then . . .
