EPISODE 5: THE FIRST WEEKEND APART
861 Words
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Day 5. Friday.
Weekends used to be our thing.
Saturdays meant market runs and Tariq complaining about the heat.
Sundays meant tea, bad movies, and him falling asleep on my shoulder.
Now it was Friday and he was 7,000 miles away.
"How are you feeling about the weekend?" he asked on our 9pm call. He looked more awake today. First week down, he said.
"I don’t know," I admitted. "Empty, maybe. What are you doing?"
"Work party tomorrow. Then I was gonna try to not freeze to death." He laughed. "What about you?"
"Probably clean. Call my sister. Miss you."
The word "miss" hung there. We’d been saying it a lot.
"Can we do something?" he asked suddenly.
"Like what?"
"Like... a date. But apart. Saturday night. 9pm our time. We both cook the same thing and eat together on call."
I smiled. "That’s cheesy."
"Cheesy is all we’ve got right now."
"Okay. Deal. What are we cooking?"
"Something easy. Pasta? With whatever you have."
"Pasta it is."
*Saturday. Day 6.*
I woke up late. The house was quiet in a way that felt heavier on weekends. No Tariq making noise in the kitchen. No Bwino stealing socks.
At 4pm I went to the market. Bought tomatoes, garlic, pasta, and the cheap wine we liked. The vendor asked where Tariq was. "Toronto," I said. "For work." She nodded like she understood. Everyone here knows someone who left.
At 7pm I started cooking. Put on music we used to play. Burned the garlic once. Texted him a photo of the mess.
*Me: Chef Morie reporting for duty. It’s not pretty.*
*Tariq: Send me a pic of the wine. For quality control.*
*Me: It’s the 3-dollar one. You’d hate it.*
*Tariq: I’d drink it anyway. With you.*
At 8:55pm I set two plates. One for me. One empty one across from me, with his hoodie draped over the chair.
9:00pm.
He called. He was also in the kitchen. Also looked like he’d burned something.
"Did you survive?" I asked.
"Barely. I think this is pasta. It might be soup." He held up his pot.
"Mine too. Cheers."
We clinked mugs through the screen.
We ate. It was bad. Salty and mushy. We laughed about it.
"This is the worst date ever," he said.
"Best worst date ever," I corrected.
Halfway through, his roommate knocked and asked if he was okay talking to himself. Tariq yelled back "I’m on a date!" and then went red.
"Did you just tell them about me?" I asked.
"I tell everyone about you," he said. Like it was obvious.
We talked until 10:30pm. About the food. About his coworkers who kept asking if he was dating "someone back home." About my sister who said "you two are so dramatic" when I told her about the pasta date.
When we hung up, the apartment felt less empty. The empty plate across from me didn’t feel sad anymore. It felt like proof we tried.
In my notebook:
_Day 6: We had a terrible pasta date. It was perfect. 176 days to go._
*Sunday. Day 7.*
Sunday is the worst.
Sunday was always our slow day.
I woke up and didn’t text him right away because I knew he was still asleep. 7 hours behind.
At 1pm my time, he texted:
*Tariq: Morning. Well, your afternoon. How’s my girl?*
*Me: Missing my Sunday person.*
*Tariq: Same. Want to do a movie?*
So we did.
I picked something stupid and romantic. He picked popcorn and said it tasted like cardboard.
We hit play at the same time and kept the call on mute, just texting reactions.
*Me: Pause. He’s so dumb.*
*Tariq: I was gonna say the same thing.*
*Me: Unpause.*
At one point I fell asleep for 20 minutes. Woke up to him still watching, with his chin in his hand, looking at the screen.
"You asleep?" he whispered when I moved.
"No. Just resting my eyes."
"Liar."
"Maybe."
After the movie we stayed on call and didn’t talk. Just existed. Him working on laundry. Me folding clothes. The quiet didn’t feel lonely. It felt like being together.
At 9pm he said, "I have to do work prep."
"Yeah."
"This weekend sucked and was good at the same time."
"Yeah."
"I’m proud of us."
"Me too."
We said goodnight.
Sunday night I laid in bed and thought about the week. 7 days. A fight. A package. A bad pasta date. A silent movie.
It wasn’t what I pictured when I thought of a relationship.
But it was ours.
In my notebook:
_Day 7: First weekend apart. Survived it. Didn’t fall apart. 175 days to go._
At 11:15pm:
*Tariq: Can’t sleep. Weekend was weird without you.*
*Me: I know. But we did it.*
*Tariq: We did. Team us: 1, Weekend: 0*
*Me: Team us forever.*
*Tariq: Forever. Even from Toronto.*
I fell asleep smiling.
The first weekend apart didn’t break us.
It taught us how to make new memories in old routines.
It taught us that "together" doesn’t always mean in the same room.
Sometimes it means two plates, one bad pasta, and a call at 9pm.
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to be continued...*
- Writer
