Purposefully Accidental

Chapter Twenty-Seven

"How long are you gonna be in New York?" I ask Jonah as we stroll through the streets, almost aimlessly.

Now that we're walking side by side, I can see a difference in his posture from the last time I saw him. It's straighter, his chest broader. It seems like he has earned a few pounds that make up muscles all over his upper body. Which is quite nice.

It makes the shirt he's wearing almost cling onto his skin. I can see the contours of the abs; the sight makes me dizzy. It defines him to be a man that he is now, not the boy I dated in high school.

Jonah shoves his hands into the pockets of his dark jeans. "I'm leaving tomorrow. I've wrapped up all the stuff I needed to do here. Besides, I need to take care of something at my restaurant."

"Can't believe you're a restaurant owner now," I say, amazed. "In LA! I hear the reservation is always full over there. Do you have celebrity visitors?"

He chuckles a little. "People love to exaggerate. It's pretty busy, but not that hard to reserve a table. And, yes, kind of, sort of. It's mostly just wanna-be internet influencers. Don't think of George Clooney or whoever you have in mind right now."

"I was thinking... hmm. Maybe RDJ," I say with a laugh.

"Well, sorry to disappoint you..."

"It's kind of funny. You live in Los Angeles now. Me, in New York..."

"How the tables have turned," he wonders as he looks up at the sky, before turning to me, almost shyly. "Want me to walk you to the nearest station? Or... do you wanna hang around?"

I hum in response, relishing the sight of his small, sort of insecure smile. "How about a walk? I haven't explored the city in a while."

At the corner of the street, we make a turn which I recognize leads to Washington Square Park. Jonah tells me his hotel is just on the other side of the park.

"I haven't been here since the last time I went with you," I admit to him once the arch is in view.

Jonah went to NYU, and I visited him a few times while we were dating. A long, long time ago. I couldn't afford long trips here, so we always had to make do with the short weekends that we had together.

On our first date in the city, we went on a walking tour—both of us discovering the Big Apple together, getting lost among the tall buildings, trying out foods from the food trucks we pass by.

We ended that tour with a stroll along Washington Square Park. Tired after a long day, we eventually just sat there on the fountain, my head on his shoulder as we both listened to live music from a street busker and enjoyed the rest of the comfortable noises around us.

"Really?" Jonah asks. "What do you do for fun, when you're in the city?"

I make a "meh" noise. "I'm not really here for fun. Just here to finish school. It's a long story."

Jonah raises an eyebrow. "Well, we've talked a lot about me. I don't mind a long story from you. I'd love to hear what you've been up to."

I look away as we both cross the street, holding myself back from blurting out the complicated last few years of my life, even though I really want to.

I don't know how to. Where to even begin.

Unlike him, I haven't been spending the last few years exactly... thriving. I was battling endless dark clouds that I couldn't get away from, trying to get out of a fog I thought I'd be trapped in forever. For so long I couldn't say that I was happy, because I wasn't.

It's only in the past few months that I've truly felt okay enough, like I finally can function like a normal person again. There's been nothing exciting going on in my life.