Reflections on a Quarter-life Crisis

The Little Prince

           I returned from my vacation reluctantly eager. The insecure jet rattled as I clutched the bag on my lap and my girlfriends chatted without inhibitions. I had let music drown out their conversation, smiling at them every so often, until the pilot's voice came over the intercom instructing us to fasten our seatbelts, turn off all electronics, and secure overhead baggage.

          My fingers pinched the thin fabric of my bag so that I could feel the contents inside. I opened up the bag and gave the clothes a whiff to see how soon I needed to get down to the laundry room once I got back. A mix of sand, Croatian Lavender, and Peyton circulated in the bag and caught my nose by surprise. I took out the blue dress I had been wearing the last time I saw Peyton, pressed the fabric around my face and inhaled. Jess looked at me with a raised eyebrow.

          "Smells like Scott," I said turning my face to her with the dress still held high.

          "Oh yeah?" She said, "let me give it a smell."

         "No!" I said quickly, shoving the dress back into the bag, "I... um... don't want to share, he's mine," I said jokingly afraid that she might recognize Peyton's cologne.

         "Hey, I just wanted to get a scent of the guy that can make the infamously single Tara smell her dress in the middle of a plane full of people... So, when are we going to meet this Scott character?"

         "Um... soon."

          The plane landed, nerviously circling it's destination. I turned my phone back on only to find it buzzing in my hand. Peyton was "eagerly awaiting" my return. A list of the events, stories, and sights that I had experienced and wanted to tell him strung through my thoughts. Of course, looking effortlessly beautiful was a must but I wouldn't admit that to myself.

           Back in our building, my laundry dragged behind on the floor as I lazily pulled it along; My favorite pair of black skinny jeans were in this load and I had to shrink them before seeing Peyton for the first time since my entire week and a half away. Into the kitchen area and towards the washers I went. The lights were on but the room was silent except for the shuffling of my bag on the powdery tile floor.

           "Well, hello there." I didn't even have to turn around to feel his look on me, warming the right side of my back... inundating the left.

           "Oh hey, what's up? Enjoy your week?" I said fixing my posture and turning around. The hair cleared my face as I whipped my head around and saw him leaning back in his chair. He didn't seem to have any real purpose at the kitchen table. He had no computer, no food, not even a snack, only his phone sitting at the corner of the table, the screen facing the cieling.

            "Yeah, yeah," he replied noncommittally, "But more importantly, how was you're week?"

           "Absolutely fantastic! Oh man, did I tell you we...." I began, taking a seat across the table from him, abandoning my laundry in the middle of the room. He leaned forward as I talked. I could see when he wasn't actually listening to what I said but it didn't make me upset. More so, I wondered what he was thinking about. It was if he were only partly listening to what I was saying and partly daydreaming. His lips always pursed a little to the right and up when he did it and his eyebrows dropped towards his wide eyes. I felt there was always something more that he wanted to say but just kept it behind his continuous grin. He glowed at me withholding secrets and thoughts behind his smile.

            "Well, I have a little something for you," he said.

            Silence.

            "Well then, I'll have to stroll by for a visit." He didn't know that I had stressed much over getting him something from my travels. I settled on Rum... delicious, useful, and not too personal. Playing it safe as per usual. I'm so good at that.

           "Tap, tap, tap," I rhythmically strummed my fingers on his door later that night after checking that no one was around to witness our covert affair.

          "I knew you'd come. Girls always come for the gifts." He said, grinning at the door. He opened the door a bit wider and I slipped in through the smallest crack possible. The room was the most relaxing shade of yellow that I could imagine. If crayola made Peyton's room into a crayon color, they would call it Pure Bliss. The window was open, slightly floating the curtains  upwards and exposing the frames beneath. He had lit a candle and I did my best to roll my eyes but could only bring myself to blush.

           "You're wrong. I didn't come for presents," I explained. That was the truth but I doubted he knew it.

           He pulled out from underneath the bed a large child's book. The cover, weathered by time and use, was yellow and depicted Le Petit Prince in an old-town script. The cover and page edges were tattered; when I flipped through them I embraced the familiar smell of a used book. Each page held extravagant pictures of the tales, painted in saturated colors. The seemingly hand-written French text gave us a glimpse into the pictures above.

                We crunched together at the head of his bed. His feet laid flat with bent knees and I rested myself in the sanctuary he had built with his lower body. He encompassed me, holding the book in front while I turned the pages. I did my best to translate the words I knew I should say but leaned heavily on his skills. He patiently listed as I read, doing his best to not help so that I could learn to do it myself. I forced my mouth to say words I had never thought before.

              "Hey! You didn't even say thank you," he said half-jokingly, nudging me with his elbow.

           "What? Oh, Peyton, Thank You. I should have said it earlier." I really should have said it earlier. Poor Peyton.

            I lay in Peyton's bed the next morning so content. It surprised me.

            My limbs sprawled over his white sheets, still warm from where he had only a couple minutes ago had been laying. He had hopped out to get dressed. I secretly watched him poke around the room trying to get his black jersey shorts on. His back made a V towards his lower body with just enough softness on top of his shorts. His skin had a lustrous hue that made me want to run my hands along the rays - wrap my hands around him and rest my head on the outward arch of his upper back. 

            I closed my eyes before speaking so he wouldn' t know I was observng him. "Peyton?"

           "Yeees, dear?" He replied, buttoning up his dark green collared shirt in the mirror over the mantel.

          "Why are you awake so early?"

          "Well, ma petit," he said looking at me, "I have to leave for work at 7:30."

           "That's silly."

           Fully dressed, he learned over the bed and closely observed my face, smiling and glowing. The pressure of his straightened arm pressed into the indention of the mattress beside me, causing me to rotate slightly into the fortess of his upper body. I breathed in the scent of his the cologne that so many times I had gone home and smelt on my dress - let it fill my lungs - cologne and Peyton. His eyes darted across my face and eyes like an intent newborn. I crinkled my nose as he pecked me on the forehead and continued getting dressed.

               After basking in the glow for a moment, I propped myself up. "O.K., young sir. I should go." All I had was my oversized Community Service Center T-shirt and moon slippers. I dragged the soles of my slippers out of Room 504.

              "See you later. Have a good day at work," Peyton said as he smirked. Always smirking.

              The hallway was notably colder than Peyton's room and the sound of my dragging soles echoed in the concrete corridor. Peering down the way, I spotted the ghost man that lived in our building with his eerily perceptive German Shepard. Slightly ashamed and amused by my irrational fear, I rested on the stairs until he passed.

          I leaned against the cold wall, my hair scattered against the wall in all directions. I pulled my knees into my chest and restd my head on them as the cold coming fromthe tiles through my exposed legs sought comfort in my skin. I smiled and listened in on pale man talk to his dog affectionately.

         "Good girl, good girl." I heard the dog scamper around and pant in excitement. I gently snorted at the thought of such a beast of a mammal enjoying the unconditional positive regard of a such a grim and lanky man who was usually just as stoic as the dog. "Oh, it's raining. Wait here while daddy gets the umbrella."

         I had never heard this man utter one word before now! Even when I effervescently greeted him in the lobby from day to day, he simply nodded in my direction. So out of character... for both of them!