Chapter 1: Before

When I first met her, I was twenty-three and annoyingly pleased with myself.

Not in an arrogant way, or at least I didn't think so. I simply had my routines in order. I trained five or six times a week, knew roughly how much protein was in everything I ate, and could walk past the bakery outside campus without even slowing down.

Most mornings began the same way.

Coffee.

Oats.

Eggs.

Lectures.

Gym.

Dinner.

Study.

Sleep.

It was a system, and systems made me comfortable.

She was not a system.

I first noticed her at a student party in September, sitting cross-legged on the floor beside a low table covered with empty bottles, paper plates and the remains of two pizzas. She was laughing at something one of her friends had said, head tilted back, dark hair falling over her shoulders.

She wasn't thin.

That was probably the first thing I noticed after her face.

Not fat either. Not remotely. Just softer than most of the girls I usually noticed at the gym. Rounded hips beneath her jeans, fuller thighs, a little softness around her waist that appeared when she leaned forward.

And she seemed completely unaware that any of this required explanation.

Someone introduced us.

She looked me up and down.

It was not subtle.

Then she smiled.

"So you're him."

I frowned.

"I'm who?"

"The gym guy."

I turned toward the person who had introduced us.

"What have you been telling people?"

"Nothing," he said quickly.

She laughed.

"Apparently you live there."

"I don't live there."

"How many times have you been this week?"

I hesitated.

Her smile widened.

"Exactly."

"Five."

"It's Wednesday."

"It is not."

She glanced at her phone.

"Okay, fine. Thursday."

Everyone laughed.

I felt myself smiling despite trying not to.

She picked up the last slice of pizza.

"Want some?"

"No, thanks."

"Of course not."

"What does that mean?"

"Nothing."

She took an exaggerated bite while maintaining eye contact.

I laughed.

"You're weird."

"You're hungry."

"I'm not hungry."

She looked down at the pizza, then back at me.

"Sure."

That was our first conversation.

---

She had an unusual talent for making perfectly innocent statements sound like accusations.

Or invitations.

Sometimes both.

A few weeks later, we were sitting in a café near the university library. I had coffee. She had coffee, a cinnamon bun and something involving chocolate that appeared to contain enough sugar to stun a horse.

She broke off a piece of the bun.

"Try."

"I'm fine."

"You always say that."

"Because I'm always fine."

She held it closer.

"No."

I stared at her.

"What?"

"You say no before you've even thought about whether you want something."

"I'm capable of deciding what I want."

"Are you?"

"Yes."

The piece of cinnamon bun remained suspended between us.

I sighed and ate it.

She smiled triumphantly.

"There."

"There what?"

"You survived."

"Remarkable."

"Did you like it?"

"It was okay."

She stared.

"It was good."

She kept staring.

"Fine. It was really good."

"Good boy."

I nearly choked on my coffee.

She burst out laughing.

"What?"

"You can't say that."

"I just did."

I could feel heat spreading into my face.

She leaned forward slightly.

"Oh."

"What?"

"Nothing."

I pointed at her.

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Whatever you're doing."

"I'm drinking coffee."

"You know what I mean."

She smiled and took another bite of her pastry.

---

We started seeing each other almost by accident.

Coffee became dinner.

Dinner became nights at her place.

Then weekends.

Soon my gym bag was permanently sitting beside her front door, usually beneath one of her coats.

She liked cooking.

Or, more accurately, she liked feeding people.

There was always too much food.

If she made pasta, she cooked enough for five.

If she ordered pizza, she ordered two because, according to her, "one is depressing."

Dessert was treated less like an optional final course and more like an inevitable law of nature.

At first I resisted.

Then I negotiated.

One slice.

Half a dessert.

A few bites.

She never argued very hard.

If I said no, she shrugged.

"Okay."

Then she ate hers.

Slowly.

Beside me.

Usually while making irritatingly pleased little noises.

I would last ten minutes.

"Can I try that?"

She would look at me with exaggerated surprise.

"This?"

"Yes."

"But you're not hungry."

"I'm not."

"Of course."

"Just give me some."

Sometimes she handed me the fork.

Sometimes she made me lean over and take the bite directly.

She seemed to find the second option much funnier.

---

She liked touching me.

Not always sexually.

A hand on my chest while we talked.

Fingers tracing my arm when we watched television.

Her palm resting casually against my stomach beneath my shirt.

She was fascinated by my abs.

One evening after dinner she poked me in the stomach.

I tightened automatically.

She poked again.

"Stop that."

"What?"

"Flexing."

"I'm not flexing."

"You absolutely are."

"I'm sitting normally."

She looked at me.

I relaxed.

Her fingers pressed lightly into my stomach.

"Better."

"Better?"

"Less defensive."

I laughed.

"You are insane."

"Maybe."

Her hand stayed there.

Then she pinched the tiny bit of skin she could get between two fingers.

"There."

I stared at her.

"There what?"

"Fat."

"That is skin."

"It's fat."

"It's barely anything."

She smiled.

"So there is something."

"Everyone has some."

"Mm."

I grabbed her wrist, laughing.

"You're enjoying this way too much."

She didn't pull away.

"You're very sensitive about it."

"I'm not sensitive."

"You're blushing."

"I'm not."

"You are."

"You're annoying."

She leaned closer.

"And you're still holding my hand against your stomach."

I looked down.

I was.

I released her wrist immediately.

She laughed so hard she had to bury her face against my shoulder.

For some reason that only made me blush harder.

---

Her friends noticed us becoming serious before I did.

There were three of them she spent most of her time with.

Maya, Sophie and Lena.

Maya was outgoing and impossible to embarrass. Sophie had a dry sense of humor and could make an insult sound like a weather observation. Lena was quieter, but when she laughed at something, she laughed with her whole body.

None of them were particularly athletic.

Maya was probably a little heavier than my girlfriend. Lena had a weakness for baked things and discussed pastries with the seriousness of a wine critic. Sophie was the closest to slim, but even she treated exercise as something unfortunate that happened to other people.

They found my lifestyle endlessly entertaining.

One night all four of them came over to my apartment before a party.

Maya opened my refrigerator.

Then stood there staring.

"What?"

She turned around.

"You have cottage cheese, eggs, vegetables and chicken."

"Yes."

"Where's the food?"

"That is food."

"No."

Lena joined her.

"Oh my God."

"What now?"

She lifted a plastic container.

"Is this weighed?"

I hesitated.

The room erupted.

My girlfriend was sitting on the counter laughing.

"You weigh your chicken?"

"It's just easier for tracking."

Sophie nodded solemnly.

"Psychopath."

"You're all just jealous."

"Of the chicken?"

"Of my discipline."

My girlfriend stopped laughing and looked at me.

"Maybe."

"What?"

"Nothing."

Then Maya found a bottle of hot sauce in the refrigerator door and declared it the only normal thing I owned.

The conversation moved on.

---

Later that night, after the others had left, she was sitting on my bed eating leftover takeaway noodles directly from the carton.

I was changing my shirt.

She watched me.

"You're really proud of that body."

I looked over.

"What kind of question is that?"

"It's not a question."

I pulled the shirt down.

"I work hard for it."

"I know."

She twirled noodles around the fork.

"Would it bother you if you lost it?"

"My body?"

"The abs."

"I wouldn't lose them."

"What if you stopped training?"

"Why would I stop training?"

She shrugged.

"Life happens."

"I'd start again."

"What if you got lazy?"

"I'm not lazy."

"No."

She took another bite.

"You're very controlled."

"Is that bad?"

"No."

She looked at me for a moment.

"I just wonder what you'd be like without all that control."

I laughed.

"Probably exactly the same."

"Mm."

"What?"

"Nothing."

She put the carton aside and crawled toward me across the bed.

When she reached me, she slid both arms around my waist.

Her cheek rested against my stomach.

"You'd probably get chubby."

I snorted.

"Never."

She looked up.

"Never?"

"Never."

"That's a dangerous word."

"It's not dangerous when you're right."

She grinned.

"Okay."

"Okay what?"

"Nothing."

She kissed my stomach through the shirt.

Then lay back down.

I shook my head.

"You are so weird."

"And yet you're still here."

"Unfortunately."

She threw a pillow at me.

---

The email arrived in November.

I had applied months earlier for an exchange semester abroad and almost stopped thinking about it.

Then suddenly I had been accepted.

Five months.

A university several countries away.

It was exactly the kind of opportunity I had always told myself I would take if it came.

And immediately I didn't want to go.

She read the email twice.

Then looked at me.

"You have to."

"I don't have to."

"Yes, you do."

"We've just-"

"I know."

"It's five months."

"I know."

"That's a long time."

She smiled.

"Scared I'll forget you?"

"No."

"Scared you'll forget me?"

"No."

She stepped closer.

"Scared you'll meet some terrifyingly fit Scandinavian girl and fall in love?"

"I'm Scandinavian."

"Even worse."

I laughed despite myself.

Then she wrapped her arms around me.

For once, there was no teasing.

"We'll talk every day."

"Every day?"

"Every day."

"Video?"

"Obviously."

I kissed her forehead.

"Promise?"

She pulled back and looked directly into my eyes.

"Promise."

"And maybe it'll be good for you."

"What will?"

"Being somewhere nobody knows you."

I frowned.

"Why?"

"You take everything so seriously."

"I do not."

"You schedule your Sundays."

"That's called organization."

"You schedule relaxation."

"Efficient relaxation."

She laughed.

I caught her around the waist and pulled her closer.

"Five months," I said.

"Five months."

"And then everything goes back to normal."

"That's the plan."

She kissed me.

Outside, someone was shouting in the courtyard below, and somewhere down the hall a door slammed.

Five months sounded like forever.

It also sounded manageable.

At twenty-three, most things did.