Jonah

Bailey

Present

Bailey ran up the stairs to her miniature apartment as best as she could whilst carrying two large, rain soaked grocery bags.

When she reached her door, she balanced on her right foot, steadied one of the bags and fished her keys surprisingly quick out of her handbag. 

Bailey could never find anything in her bag, no matter how big or how small it was. Her wallet, diary or phone were impossible to find never mind pens, keys or mints. Michelle, Bailey’s best friend always teased her and told her she should stop carrying a bag altogether and simply stuff things in her pockets.

As she was about to turn the key into the lock, one of the treacherous bags broke and her carefully selected apples along with the large tub of extra chocolaty ice-cream tumbled on the floor.  

‘Shit’. She exclaimed, a little louder than intended.

‘Hold on, I’ll help you.’ Bailey’s head jerked up and she looked straight into the impossibly blue eyes of mister 34D, her next door neighbour.  

‘Uhm,’ Bailey began. ‘That’s ok, I can manage.’ She said softly. As if on cue, the second bag ripped and the rest of her food supplies fell ceremoniously on the floor.

‘Sure, I can see that.’  34D chuckled and began to rescue her food. Bailey wished she could click her heels like Dorothy, or that Scotty could beam her up. Instead, she stood rooted to the ground and told herself to get a grip.

In a bid to save her face, she turned and fumbled with the lock, trying to remember if she had cleared her table before she left the house this morning. She hadn’t of course she hadn’t, not when everything else went wrong today. She knew she shouldn’t have laughed when Nicole, her conniving colleague, had tripped over her immensely high heels. Karma truly was a bitch.  

‘Are you ok?’  34D interrupted her thoughts and looked at her intently. Only now had she realised he had asked her something and she had failed to answer as she was still thinking about her messy apartment.  ‘

Yes, I’m fine, thanks.’ He smiled at her again and his dark hair flopped messily over his forehead.

‘So, are you not going to open that?’ He questioned, his arms full with her groceries and nodded towards the door.

‘Mm,’ Bailey was stalling, how could she ever allow 34D neighbour-boy to see that she ate coco puffs for breakfast not the mention the Lion King DVD she had watched with her niece.  

‘O well, what does it matter now anyway,’ she muttered and pushed open the door. ‘Did you say something?’ 34D asked.

‘No, nothing my door squeaks a bit.’ Bailey inwardly groined, that sounded lame even in her ears. She went ahead and he followed closely behind.  

Ten minutes earlier

Jonah was just about to leave when he heard his cute neighbour come up the stairs. He had moved to the building nearly a month ago and he remembered the very first day he saw her very clearly.  

A month ago

She had been with a friend and the two had been laughing happily about something.

They hadn’t really noticed him until they stood in front of her door and she had been startled by him standing there. The estate agent had told him that the apartment had been empty for a while so Jonah had guessed rightly she hadn’t expected anyone there.

He had apologised and the girl had smiled nervously and disappeared into her apartment, leaving Jonah on his doorstep.

‘How cute,’ he had thought. She was shy. It had taken him a good few seconds to recover, she was truly stunning and when she had looked up and looked him straight in the eyes, he swore he had gasped.

Oval shaped, dark eyes that reminded him almonds. She had high cheekbones that gave her an elegant, statuesque appearance and full, plump lips. Jonah noticed how her lower lip was slightly pinker than her upper lip and it gave her a natural pout. She had black hair, messily pinned up and Jonah had to resist the urge to reach out and tuck a strand behind her ear.  

Since that day, he had only seen her twice more, and he had tried very hard to start a conversation with her. But she always fluttered inside quickly, like a butterfly, away from him.  

Present

Jonah, still with his arms full, waited until his Butterfly instructed him where to place the groceries. He knew she was shy so he didn’t want to impose. She still stood with her back towards him and Jonah wondered how she could look so adorable even though she had clearly been caught in the rain. She wore dark blue jeans, an oversized cardigan and a black hat.  

‘I’m sorry for the mess,' his Butterfly stated and he smiled at her.

‘Don’t worry, I don’t see any mess and coco puffs can hardly be described as mess,’ he added.  

A tiny promise of the smile he loved emerged and he carefully piled her groceries on the table.

‘Wait, there’s more’, he said and retrieved the rest from the hallway.  Bailey took the opportunity to look at herself in the mirror. Her black beanie hat was perched on top of her head and her hair was a mess. Aside from her shoes, she was completely drenched and she looked like a drowned cat.

‘I look dreadful,’ she muttered to herself and had failed to notice 34D had come back with the rest of her stuff.  

‘No you don’t, he said and walked over to her. Bailey chewed on her bottom lip and wished she could come up with something witty to say. She came up blank, totally completely blank. Normally she wasn’t shy, not like this at least but her neighbour, with his striking blue eyes, strong jaw and kissable lips made her feel like a giggling schoolgirl. Michelle had told her so much the first day she had seen him. Michelle had fought with her to knock on his door and welcome him to the building but she had downright refused.

Michelle was convinced that he had liked her; she even said that he had gasped when she looked him in the eye. ‘Gasped’, ha, men didn’t gasp’. Bailey thought bitterly.  

‘You look..’ 34D thought for a while and said ‘Divine’. ‘I’m Jonah Galante,’ he said and extended his hand. ‘Galante,’ she repeated and he liked how his name sounded from her mouth. ‘Courtesy of my Italian father’. 

‘Bailey Michaels,’ she replied and shook his.   

‘Bay are you ok? You’re door was open and you didn’t pick up your phone I..’ Michelle ran into the apartment but stopped in her tracks when she saw 34D.  Bailey, not sure if she welcomed the interruption or detested it, answered her friend.

‘Yes, I’m fine, my groceries fell and Jonah here was kind enough to help me.’ 

‘It was nothing’, he said, his eyes still fixed upon Bailey. ‘I’m Michelle, nice to meet you 34D.’  

Jonah chuckled while Bailey groined. ‘Well, I just came to pick up this, Michelle said and picked up some obscure china figurine Bailey had picked up at a flea market three years ago.

‘Now I’ll be on my way. I call you later Bay,’ and with that, Michelle had left the stage.  

'34D huh,’ Jonah laughed. He found funny that she had name for him, granted the name was obvious but he hoped it meant that BB – Butterfly Bailey – and her friend had discussed him. He had two sisters and he kinda of thought he understood women. It was the same reason why he hadn’t been more direct with Bailey, he figured she probably needed some time to get used to him before he could approach her and ask her out.

Thank god for those flimsy bags, they had saved him some precious time to get to know his Butterfly.  

'Well, I should probably let you get on with it Jonah.’  She didn’t really want him to leave but she needed to restore some of her confidence rather than rambling on how bad she looked and repeating his name in order to listen how wonderful it sounded to her.  

‘Actually, I’m free.’ He said it perhaps a bit too quickly, but now that he finally had met her properly, he wasn’t about to cut their time short. He pointed the tub of extra chocolaty ice-cream and sighed apologetic.  

‘Besides, I don’t think that this survived so I was hoping if you would like to join me to the ice cream shop on the corner. I’ve been told that they have the super deluxe chocolaty ice cream with the chocolate swirls. I really like chocolate you know.’  

He winked and this time he was awarded with a full blown smile from Bailey that reached her eyes and lit up her already beautiful face.  

‘Sure’, she heard herself reply and picked up her keys.  

‘Thank god for flimsy bags,’ she thought, and locked the door behind them.