Read Online Nights Like This by Divya Sood - Free Book Online

martinis. But I didn’t.
    â€œJess, you okay?”
    â€œYeah,” I said softly.
    I realized I wasn’t about to go home.
    â€œVanessa?”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œYou okay?”
    â€œYeah, why?”
    â€œYou haven’t said anything either.”
    â€œEnjoying the moment. Why fill everything with words? Life is enough. Kind of why you closed your eyes just then.”
    â€œI was just…”
    She stopped walking and faced me. She placed her hands on my face. She looked at me and I started to wonder what she saw.
    â€œIf you want to close your eyes, you can. I got you. While I am with you, I got you. You can enjoy the world with me. No need to fill perfectly full spaces with words.”
    She kissed me so softly, I wondered if her lips had ever touched my cheek. I wanted to keep looking at her. I wanted to look inside her. But she turned again and took my hand. We kept walking. And I realized for all her talk of basics, she had a soul too. And perhaps she had her own fears about the chemistry of it all.
    We walked a long time in silence. As we passed the swarms of people that always seem to be walking to nowhere in New York City, I started wondering about their destinations. I wondered about the circles they would walk this night. I thought about the first date hellos and tasteless cosmos. And I felt like I was swimming in a great transparent lake of air above all these people who would not close their eyes unless they were asleep to the world and to themselves.
    â€œYou ever wonder where all these people are going?” I asked.
    â€œAlways,” she said, “Sometimes I’ll follow someone into a bar just to see what they do there. Whom they meet. What they drink.”
    â€œAre you serious?” I asked.
    She stopped walking and swung my hand back and forth. Her eyes met mine.
    â€œWhy not?” she asked, “I don’t interrupt their evening. I don’t talk to them. I just take a seat and watch them. And I get a feel for how they live, what they know. It’s interesting.”
    â€œWhat are you, a stalker?”
    She laughed.
    â€œNo, I’m a writer.”
    I didn’t know how to feel about Vanessa being a writer. Every coffee shop I knew had many writers most of whom used “writer” to mean jobless and slightly depressed. I was somewhat turned off by this image and I felt as if my magical evening of full worlds and empty words was coming to a quick end. I asked the question I thought needed asking.
    â€œHave you ever published anything?”
    â€œI don’t talk about my writing.”
    I was relieved. I didn’t want to hear about her writing either. I didn’t want to hear about anyone’s writing. We started walking again towards our unknown destination.
    â€œI’m employed as a schoolteacher,” she finally said.
    â€œSo you’re a teacher?”
    â€œNo, I work as a teacher. I define myself as a writer.”
    It was a lot of bullshit for someone who spoke of empty words. I wanted to change to the subject to whatever it was that would allow me to float in my great transparent lake again.
    â€œSo what do you do?” she asked.
    â€œI am employed as an optical sales professional.”
    â€œSmart ass,” she said.
    â€œThat I am. But mostly, I am studying for MCATs this summer. I want to take them over and hopefully go to med school.”
    â€œOh,” she said.
    This time the silence was awkward. I wondered if she was judging me. Was this connoisseur of empty words criticizing my decision to go to med school? I thought perhaps she could see into me. Did she know that I did not want to study? Did she know I did not want to go to med school? Did she know I envied her because, despite my agitation with coffee shop writers, I had failed as a coffee shop writer and I wished that I had not? I wished that I were not scrambling for a life I did not want because I had failed at the one I had