"Where is the restaurant?" Eda asked as she walked through the lobby with Serkan. She was nervous. She didn't know where they stood, she didn't know what she wanted, but she knew that nothing was what it seemed to be and being with him--alone with him--felt exciting again.
"I don't know. This is my first time here." They approached the directory, and both of them realized at the same time that the restaurant was on the 25th floor. Eda exhaled audibly. "25th floor. Never mind. Let's go." Serkan wasn't going to ask Eda to climb 25 floors to get to the restaurant--they could go somewhere else.
"That won't work. Wait a minute." Eda looked back at the elevators. Could she do it? No. No, she couldn't. But she could take the stairs. She was used to it. "We're already here; we can't turn back now. A world-famous chef has prepared a meal for us, after all. It would be rude." She could see that Serkan was unsure. "You take the elevator, and I'll take the stairs." Eda started looking around for the entrance to the stairwell.
"25 floors," Serkan said.
"Yes," Eda confirmed. She wasn't ready to give up on this time with Serkan yet.
"I didn't bring you here to suffer, Eda."
"I can do it, really. It's not a problem." She kept looking for the stairs, determined to show him that the stairs didn't matter, that she really wanted to be here with him.
"Should we try?" Serkan asked, indicating the elevators with a nod of his head.
Eda's eyes widened at his suggestion and she shook her head a little. "No, I can't. You know I can't."
Serkan stepped in closer to Eda, lowering his voice. "Eda, that time on the plane, we barely knew each other, and we got through it."
She swallowed visibly. "I know. But...I get really bad, Serkan. You don't understand."
"Okay," he nodded, "I'm not going to insist. Let's just go back to work." He started to walk away, and a switch inside her head flipped.
"Wait. Let's try." Eda said, determined not to ruin this time with Serkan. He had arranged for the world famous Chef Alexander to make breakfast for them, and she wasn't going to miss it because she was afraid of the elevator. She didn't want to be afraid anymore, and she knew if Serkan was there with her, she could get through it.
"Are you sure?" Serkan didn't want to push her into doing anything that would make her uncomfortable or cause her stress. "We can just forget about this, Eda."
"I'm sure," she insisted. "Let's go."
He looked at her for a long while, trying to read her face. He could see her fear written plainly across her features, but he could also see her stubbornness; she wasn't willing to back down. He walked toward her and took her hand in his, and she immediately felt calmer. She squeezed his fingers in hers, drawing strength from him.
"Come," he said, his voice low and soothing. He walked backward into the elevator, still holding her hand. She stopped at the doors, hesitant to enter, but she finally did. She looked all around her, as if she expected the walls to start closing in on her at any moment.
"Relax. It's okay." Serkan felt her anxiety, and he hated it. He hated that his father was responsible for the accident that took her parents, the trauma that Eda lived through as a child that made her afraid. He would have given anything to help her overcome her fear. "I'm going to push all the buttons so you can leave at any time if you start to feel too bad, okay?"
She nodded in acceptance, but she didn't look at him; she kept her eyes on the open doors of the elevator and she willed herself to stay inside, not to run out of the doors and forget about trying this. "Okay," she whispered.
