He shrugged and didn’t look up from his screen. About two minutes later, he set the phone next to my ankle. Indian food reminded me of my ex and the one month we spent eating it every weekend. I always got the same thing with Brien, whatever he ordered for me. I clicked back onto the cart and opened Kael’s order. His selections looked so good. Cauliflower and potatoes with a spiced sauce I hadn’t heard of, but it sounded great. With Kael, even something as simple as a food order felt intimate, revealing. But I knew that was silly; it was only a meal, after all. I added another order of the same dish to the cart and handed his phone back to him. He didn’t look at the phone longer than a second before he touched the screen and put it back into his pocket.

A few minutes later, Kael’s calm had taken over the whole house and I had that familiar urge to start talking about the most random things. I rechecked my little setup and looked at Kael. He seemed content as I made eye contact with him. His face didn’t change, he was staring at me, blank expression. No annoyance, no smile. Just content and still. I tried to let his ease wear off on me even more.

I opened the nail polish, wiggled the polish brush around the bottle, and started to finally paint my fingernails, swiping the brush over my thumb. Even though I took my time, half of the polish got on the skin around the nail. I sighed. I was so bad at this. One of the first things I would do when I made grown-up money would be to get regular manicures. It was a small luxury that I really enjoyed. One day, Karina, one day.

I grabbed the bottle of acetone and a half-used cotton ball to fix my mistake. I tried again, using my other hand this time. I could feel Kael still watching me, but I didn’t feel pressured or rushed. I went even slower, but the strokes were uneven. My hands were shaking a little. I definitely needed food. I was so glad it was on the way.

“I’m just hungry, so my hands are acting funny. I’m always bad at painting nails, but usually a little better than this. Do you know how long until the food will be here?” I was rambling. “Not trying to rush you,” I added, wishing I could clamp my mouth closed. But no matter the scenario, with him around, I couldn’t seem to do that.

“The app said it would be an hour, but sometimes it comes sooner.”