The Butterfly Effect

PART THREE / Editing the Opening Scene

-- Friendly reminder that this is the last part of this short story AND that this book is rated for Adults ;) --

– 4 weeks later –

'Mister Ricciardo, which weather forecast would you like to hear?'

Norah never knew exactly when her phone would ring and show Daniel's name, but in the last few weeks she could always be sure it would never take more than a day or five. Even though he has been travelling pretty much the world due to his duties as an F1 driver, he would always call to check up on her. Norah was very clear from the start though, that she didn't want him to worry about her or her ankle too much. That's why he convinced her he needed to stay in touch so she could look up the weather forecast for his newest destination. It would open their conversation in a casual way and would eventually lead to a more serious talk. So far she informed him about the sun and clear blue skies in Los Angeles California, about three days after they met. Then there was slightly cloudy and a chance of light rain in Paris a few days later. The most exciting one was a light thunderstorm in Barcelona two weeks ago.

'Oh hey there,' his thick Australian accent as familiar as ever. 'Please let me know what the weather is like in Monaco?'

'You're coming back to Monaco?,' Norah was glad that her ankle had recovered in the last weeks because she was now automatically jumping up from the couch.

'No,' he shortly answered.

'No?'

'I am back in Monaco. Open that fancy door please.'

Norah's body now froze for a moment. He didn't mean...her apartment door, did he? A loud knock confirmed that he actually did. He actually fucking did.

It was crazy to think how Daniel had influenced her life in the last weeks. His positive, chaotic, crazy influence had shaken everything up. Like she got into a rollercoaster after their first encounter. One that she thought she could just wait in line for and then immediately take the exit after getting to the actual station. She never thought she would actually sit down in the cart and take the ride. And that was exactly what she had needed.

One of the first loopings was to fly back to England after her ankle let her. It was one of the hardest things she had ever done to open up about all the past events to her parents. She nearly got a panic attack in the airplane, but Norah kept herself calm by listening to the Spotify playlist Daniel had made that only involved happy and cheerful music. It was like somebody had translated his personality into sheet music and then let musicians play it. Every time Norah would listen to it her thoughts would brighten up and often the memory of her lips kissing his would pop up. Of course that would always be an instant shot of dopamine for her brain.

During her stay in England Norah had managed to convince her parents to take a little sabbatical and work on her photography. Even though they still weren't convinced that it was considered a job or anything remotely like a career, her parents seemed to understand that it was important to her to take some time off and see where it would take her.

After her parents there was Jess. Jess took a little more work to say the least. Norah tried to talk to her former best friend, but nothing that she said or texted would make Jess talk to Norah. And that's when Norah realised that maybe, just maybe, she wasn't the bad friend. Maybe in this case Jess was. And it was better to have no friends than to have bad friends. Of course this insight hadn't just popped up in her head, but Daniel helped let her see things clearly like this in one of their phone calls.

And now this crazy goofball who Norah had shared one kiss and hours of phone calls with was standing on the other side of this wooden panel that was her door. In her excitement Norah cancelled the phone call, threw her phone on the soft couch and ran up to her door. At the moment she opened it she forced her body to calm down again. In their weird little friendship that had formed over the last few weeks he was supposed to be the overly energetic idiot. She was the more realistic and calm one.