#lol. obviously the dialogue is gonna be like hi aubrey sooooo u don't have to write as much im just a ridiculous human sometimes

[aubreyxeliza]

taciturn return || harper & aubrey

Rolling over promptly at 7:00am, Aubrey felt the brain floating in her head follow her body in a delay as she winced at the sun peaking through the blinds. As she unfolded herself from her covers, she saw her legs tangled up in her fleece pajamas – Got my PJs on last night… score. She belabored for a moment, noticing the residue mascara dried on her hands and sheets. It wasn’t rare that she shed some tears before bed. Sometimes, she watches videos of exploited communities totally sober on a Wednesday night before bed and just cries it out, and other nights, she lets the tears fall as she silently wishes someone else was in the other room waiting for her, or on the other line. When she was a kid, she could just crawl into the endless hallway of rooms with her siblings – or hope that her angsty musings alone in her bed were enough to trigger a cautious tap-tap-tap on the door. Instead, here she was: halfway to 28, alone in a studio apartment in Brooklyn, and still as emotional as ever.

Her phone buzzed and she jumped like she was tased. Every morning, there’s a blissful ignorance that exists for about 20 minutes. A few years earlier, she learned to turn off any social media notifications and wake up before anyone could text her so that she could have a half hour of peace in the morning – beholden to no one, not yet at least. Her heart was racing to find her phone in her sheets which were starting to resemble quicksand. Dalton – 1 missed call, 1 voicemail; (14) unread messages; NEWS: Florida man ambushes in wedding dress. Pretty typical morning. Except for the fact that of those unread texts were Harper Slade’s name hidden somewhere in the middle.

I fucking texted him? She unlocked her phone. I CALLED him? Her grumblings made her sick – but she was relieved to find out it was just a voicemail. It was so unlike her to get drunk and leave a voicemail like that. Those days were left in the disgusting dorm rooms of NYU, but then again, she thought Harper Slade was also left on Meeting House Road back home. Things keep changing. Her final grievance: I asked him… to meet me at Huckleberry? Aubrey tossed her phone to the other side of her bed, laid back flat, and let out a quick scream into her pillow. 

As she brushed her teeth, she ran to respond: Hey! Sorry about that voicemail. You remember Dalton, right? Well, he never lets me pay when we get drinks and sometimes I take advantage of that. I promise there won’t be an encore tonight. See you at 7:30. Send. After putting her phone down, she felt regretful. In typical Aubrey-fashion, she ignored everything he had said – well wishes, self-awareness. It wasn’t a good start for her, and she laughed to herself remembering that first email she sent him after he reached out. The anger was still there, but she didn’t have the energy to feel it. Thanks for the kind words, by the way. Huckleberry’s a cool spot. (It’s not). See you! Send.

Her mind wandered all day. At work, she had no assignments, so she left early and told them that she just had to go check in on her nieces and nephews. “Post-partum’s a bitch,” she asseverated to her supervisor before the elevator doors closed. One day, karma would catch up to her – and perhaps that day was today after all.  

Aubrey has been a script writer for two and a half years, but while she sat down to gather her thoughts about the night she was about to experience, she completely fell short. Perhaps things didn’t feel real yet. This whole time, except for 30 seconds in a crowded green room, he hadn’t felt real. Like he was just out of reach or a figment of her imagination like he used to be the first two years after he left. So now, when the clock was winding down and she was about to be with him again, she couldn’t process how she was feeling. 

The last decade, she’d gone through different emotions for this moment – the first was a total relinquishment of any resentment and a fall-back-into-love dream. She used to tell her therapist, “If he came back right now, I wouldn’t even think to talk about what happened. I’d forgive him in a heartbeat,” which, for obvious reasons, was met with extremely concerned glances and registering for a couple extra sessions. Then, the peace phase: “I don’t really think about it that much. I think I’m all good!” she said, during the busiest period of her life. That treaty came to a crumble when she met a Harper at the coffee shop – a 94 year old  man who would ask her for company. One day, she broke down into tears in front of him and they never met for coffee again. Then, perhaps her siblings’ favorite yet most feared, her anger phase. Sometimes, she’d walk into the house for Thanksgiving as a grown woman – 23, 24 years old – sit down at the dinner table, and exclaim, “Aren’t men just the most disgusting creatures to ever walk the earth?” Usually, she was met with commiserations and apologies from the phallic members of her family. One time, she did have to apologize – “Chandler, have you ever considered just how fucking inconsiderate it is that you kept your blonde hair all this time?” The next morning, she apologized thoroughly, and of course, blamed it on her alter ego: Brandy.

But, eventually she stopped going through the motions. Instead, the misery and memory would come and go, like a painful deep breath in. She would excuse herself to take a breath, or become catatonic for a moment, but one day, she turned 26, looked back at her life, and decided to feel contentment. What had happened… happened, and from that day one, she became a new kind of Aubrey. A more consistent Aubrey. So here she was, getting ready to meet up with the one and only Slade again, sitting with a ripped notebook paper and pen, hoping to find what she was feeling, and walking into an abyss of harrowing solitude. All she knew was that she had one goal: stay reticent. 

The trek to Huckleberry was unusual for her. Usually, she enjoyed the bus ride, but tonight, she decided to walk. Leaving 45 minutes early, Aubrey walked about 35 blocks in the hope that she would find how she was feeling, but instead, empty tears welled in her eyes and went. She listened to the way her heels clicked down the streets as she tried to convince herself everything was normal. Her phone started ringing – it was Sophia. But she hadn’t filled in Sophia in almost a week, what does she say? She let it go to voicemail, and as was pretty typical for Aubrey at this point, she’d explain herself in the morning. Instead, “I’ve read that he’s, like, a decent human being now,” played over in her head. A decent human being? In Dalton’s eyes? Did he save a burning orphanage? Part of her had hoped that he had become a sort of demagogue, that she could curse him out, he’d feel nothing, and then that would be closure. But she wasn’t surprised by Dalton. He’d always been a good guy to her. Always. Didn’t make anything easier, though – certainly didn’t help when he left. 

Getting to the door, she laughed to herself at the edifice. Her friends used to joke that this place was a secret brothel – the wooden panels, a bouncer you could pay off with a wink, and the watered down vodka crans. The good thing, though, was that they got busted for having underaged kids – it’s picked up since then, got new lights, repaired the leather on the seats, and was a restaurant until 11:00pm on the weekends. So, it was a pretty safe spot. 

She made her way through the tight entryway, sardine-packs of people to the bar area – finding a quick table, she sat down. What kind of a drink do you order when you’re about to meet up with your high school boyfriend? She let that color her mind for a bit before settling on nothing for now. It wasn’t a date – it was.. What it was. And it would happen how it will happen. Sitting in the booth, she tucked herself into the corner of the wall. 7:24, just on time. Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, Aubrey said a quick prayer to herself and braced for the cruel unknown.

#...once again #I seem to have gotten carried away #i am so sorry lol i just have so many thoughts for her!!!! it's been a DECADE!! big stuff #lol. obviously the dialogue is gonna be like hi aubrey sooooo u don't have to write as much im just a ridiculous human sometimes #anyways #p: aubrey x harper