Running into you

Chapter 3

🍴🔥Nolan 🔥🍴

Morning at the station always smelled the same. Burnt coffee, cleaning solution, and something metallic that clung to the walls no matter how many times they scrubbed them down, and if I was being honest, it had started to feel more familiar than my own apartment ever had.

I rolled my shoulders as I stepped inside, shrugging out of my jacket and tossing it onto the back of a chair, nodding at a few of the guys already gathered around the table, half-awake and pretending they weren’t. The clock on the wall read just past six, which meant we were in that quiet window before anything happened, the calm that never lasted long enough for you to get comfortable.

Firefighting was a lot of waiting punctuated by chaos, something no one really explained to you until you were already living it, sitting still with your body buzzing like it knew something was coming even when nothing was happening yet.

“Morning, Romeo,” one of the guys said, smirking as I poured myself coffee that tasted like regret and survival.

I didn’t even look up. “If you’re calling me that because I’m alive and functioning before sunrise, we need to have a serious conversation about your standards.”

I took a seat, stretching my legs out, letting the warmth of the mug sink into my hands while my mind slowly clicked into work mode.

Training drills came first, gear checks, muscle memory exercises that felt repetitive until the day they weren’t. I moved through it all automatically, hands steady, mind focused, body doing what it had been trained to do without needing permission from my thoughts.

This job didn’t allow for distraction, not really, and I liked that about it. When I was here, there was no space for overthinking or lingering memories or the quiet weight that sometimes followed me home. Everything was immediate, practical, urgent, and clean in its own brutal way.

By mid-morning, we were called out for something minor. No roaring flames or blaring sirens that made your heart punch against your ribs, just routine assistance that still required precision and care. We handled it, wrapped it up, joked on the ride back like we always did, adrenaline fading.

Back at the station, I peeled off my gear and leaned against the lockers for a second longer than necessary, breathing out slowly, letting the noise of the day settle.

It was strange, the things your mind chose to latch onto when you weren’t expecting it.

I hadn’t planned to think about her, not really. But the image slid in anyway, uninvited and annoyingly clear.

I frowned slightly, shaking my head like that would physically dislodge the thought.

She was just my neighbor. A stranger. Someone I happened to see in the mornings because apparently our schedules were aligned in a way that felt intentional even when logic said it wasn’t.

“Earth to Nolan,” someone called, snapping their fingers in front of my face. “You zoning out on us now?”

I straightened immediately. “Just thinking.”

“That’s dangerous,” he shot back, earning a few laughs.

The rest of the shift passed in a blur of maintenance work and conversations that drifted from nothing to everything, the usual rhythm that made the hours feel both long and fleeting. By the time I clocked out, my body carried the familiar, heavy exhaustion.

The drive home was quiet, city streets moving past me. I finally pulled into the apartment complex.

I sat in the driver’s seat longer than I should have, staring at the apartment building like it owed me some clarity, like if I waited long enough, the world might offer a hint as to what I was supposed to do with the rest of the day, or at least a suggestion that it was socially acceptable to do nothing.

I did what any rational adult with too much energy and nowhere to release it would do. I went straight to the kitchen, because cooking was my comfort zone, and if I was honest, I like it so much I forget the rest of the world exists.

I started small at first, thinking carefully: chicken, some vegetables, rice. Then I paused because chicken alone felt sad, lonely even, and I didn’t need sad chicken in my life. I grabbed some beef too, just in case, and then I remembered the pasta in the cupboard. I have no idea when I bought this pasta, but suddenly it demanded attention, and I wasn’t one to ignore a pantry plea.

The pan sizzled, the garlic aroma filling the apartment, and I chopped peppers and onions with more vigor than necessary. Somewhere around the third pan, the fried rice started happening, even though I didn’t initially plan on fried rice. Then I decided the chicken needed a creamy sauce because apparently, plain chicken was beneath me. By the time I realized what I’d done, I had the beef sizzling in its own soy-garlic concoction, pasta bubbling away, two kinds of rice actively frying, and a pan of chicken in a sauce so rich I briefly considered taking a step back to admire my own audacity.

I laughed to myself, because this is exactly how it spirals every time: start with one dish, end up with enough food to feed a family reunion I did not invite.

“Who the heck will eat all these?” I muttered under my breath, glancing at the chaos like maybe someone would materialize in the apartment to justify the absurd quantity. Silence answered. I took that as permission to keep going.

By the time I pulled everything off the stove, tasting and adjusting seasonings like some chef on a very private reality show, I had created a minor culinary apocalypse: creamy chicken, beef stir-fry, fried rice, plain rice because apparently I didn’t trust myself, and pasta that should never have existed in the first place but now did. The counter was a disaster, my phone sat ignored on the table, and the smell alone could convince someone I had my life together, which was hilariously false.

I stared at it all with pride and disbelief, finally accepting the truth: this was far too much. But every single bite was too good to waste. Then I finally start packing some away because even I know there’s no world where I eat all of this without serious consequences. After half the food was packed and ready to become future meals, I paused, hand on my hip, surveying my handiwork with a small, self-satisfied grin.

Then the thought came, quietly, politely, almost annoyingly: she might like this.

I froze, a container of creamy chicken hovering in the air. I rolled the idea around in my head, rationalizing, overthinking, rehearsing every possible reaction, all while telling myself this is completely normal, friendly, neighborly, nothing to panic over, and definitely not a situation in which you start panicking anyway.

I tell myself it’s nothing, that offering food is normal, that people do this all the time, that this doesn’t mean anything. I also tell myself I’m absolutely not overthinking it while actively overthinking it.

Before I could talk myself out of it, I grabbed a bag, packed a couple of containers, added one more because showing up with too little seemed worse than showing up with too much, and suddenly I was locking my door behind me, keys jingling, heart quietly arguing with my brain.

I clutched the bag like it was a bomb or an especially judgmental puppy, each step echoing louder than it should in the empty hallway. And then, finally, I was there, standing in front of her door, hands tightening on the bag, stomach twisting.

This is a terrible idea.

I stared at the door, imagining her opening it and seeing me there like some culinary vigilante, holding homemade food as if it were a peace offering or a trap or both. My mind, predictably, chose this exact moment to replay every possible wrong interpretation, every awkward glance, every possibility that somehow, in my overzealous generosity, I’d misread all social cues ever.

I could leave. I should leave. I absolutely should not be here.

And so I stand there, frozen in the doorway, frozen in indecision, knowing there is no turning back now.

I raised my hand, finally, then knocked.

Footsteps echoed faintly from behind the door. I shifted from one foot to the other, dragging a hand through my hair, muttering under my breath something that was probably neither coherent nor useful: just be normal, just be normal, just be normal.

The door opened. Not wide at first, just a sliver, a cautious c***k, and then I saw her. Her eyes. Those eyes that could be warm or icy depending entirely on her mood, now wide, eyebrows raised, mouth slightly parted, like she was witnessing some kind of low-budget magic trick.

And I froze, because that expression—half amusement, half confusion, and a generous portion of “what the hell is he doing here?”—hit me like a wall.

She tilted her head slightly, one hand on the door frame, and I swear I could see the gears turning in her mind as she tried to place me in the category of “annoying neighbor” or maybe “potentially unhinged food-delivery vigilante.”

“I—uh…” My voice cracked somewhere between confident and panicked, so I cleared my throat. “Hi.”

The words sounded absurdly formal coming out of my mouth, like I was reading from a terribly written greeting card. And judging by the way her eyebrows shot up even higher, I could tell she thought exactly that.

Her gaze flicked down at the bag in my hands, then back to me, and the corner of her mouth twitched as if she wanted to laugh but wasn’t sure if it was appropriate.

And in that moment, I realized, terrifyingly and delightfully, that I had no idea what would happen next.