He set the empty box aside and wiped his mouth with a napkin, looking like he was weighing my words carefully. I gave him time, sipping my drink while I waited.
"What you're saying makes sense," he said at last. "There's a pretty good chance you're right. But even if he's alive, I have nothing to go on. I can't find someone with zero clues. At this point, all I can do is trust that he'll try to reach me again."
I nodded. Trying to find someone you'd never met and knew nothing about was impossible, not just logically, but practically.
"What surprises me," he went on, "is that you managed to think all this through and analyze it in half an hour."
"Why?" I asked. "Did you think adrenaline was the only thing I enjoyed?"His silence answered that. I laughed and leaned back. "Putting missing pieces together and solving the puzzle is just as fun for me as the action itself."
"Have you ever thought you chose the wrong profession?" he asked, stifling a tired yawn.
"Hmm. Every day I wake up?"
I smiled at my own answer and kept talking as I gathered the empty containers and the notes I'd written.
"But the real question isn't which profession is wrong for me. It's which one is less wrong. If I tried to do the job you're thinking of, I'd constantly get stuck in the system, no matter how good I was. We both know that in places with a strict chain of command, things don't always get resolved by the book."
"I get that," he said. "But you can't expect a flawless system from a species full of flaws."
When my eyes drifted to the movie still playing on the TV, I smiled and grabbed the remote.
"This is my favorite part."
I turned the volume up a notch and stretched my legs onto the coffee table.
Not long after, the heaviness that came with eating made it hard to keep my eyes open. When my head tilted to the side and I felt warmth against my cheek, I gave up resisting and let my eyes close.
"Falling asleep like this is becoming a habit for you, Sunshine."
I couldn't fully process his words as I drifted between sleep and wakefulness, but his soft tone told me it was okay. The last thing I remembered was something warm and gentle covering me.
In the middle of my dream, giggling and voices made me shift uncomfortably. It had to be my noisy neighbors gossiping in the garden again, early in the morning. When the noise faded, I smiled and hugged my pillow tighter. It felt a bit firm, but I was too sleepy to care.
"Just look at them. They're adorable. We should take pictures."
"So our mysterious girl is actually a wild red."
"I approve. Sugarflake is definitely the best so far."
"Don't start planning weddings yet. We still don't know what's going on."
The voices were closer now. And way too familiar.
I cracked my eyes open. The first thing I saw was Kerem's face. I blinked several times, blaming my sleepiness, but nothing changed. We were still on the couch from last night, stretched out, wrapped around each other.
"I think one of the suspects just woke up."
Still half asleep, I tilted my head back. Then I saw them. Three of them grinning, one watching us suspiciously. My eyes flew wide open.
This time, we were really caught!
I tried to sit up in a panic, but I couldn't move at all. He had me pinned between himself and the couch. When I realized it was useless, I started poking Kerem angrily.
They were his friends. Which meant he was the one who had to explain. I had exactly zero believable lies prepared for this.
When my poking got no reaction, I exhaled in frustration. When he slept, it was like he crossed into another dimension. This time, I poked him harder.
Without opening his eyes, he muttered in a rough, sleepy voice,"Stop moving, Sunshine."
While the others giggled like idiots, my face burned.
"Get up, Kerem. You have guests."
"Don't be ridiculous, Duru," he mumbled. "What guests at this hour? Just sleep."
How he knew what time it was while asleep was beyond me.
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, silently begging for patience. That was when Demir saved me.
"Get up, man. You're lying on the girl."
Then Nil added,"You're hugging her so tight she can't even move. Poor thing."
Finally, he opened his eyes and stared at me blankly. I signaled upward with my face. When he turned his head, his friends came into view. Strangely, he didn't look bothered at all.
"I know I gave you the keys," he said lazily, "but knocking once in a while wouldn't kill you."
I leaned close to his ear and hissed,"Get up now and explain this to people, Hotshot."
He calmly sat up and stood, running a hand through his hair. With the other, he grabbed Demir's wrist and pulled it closer, checking his watch. Unlike him, I sat up stiffly and scooted to the far end of the large three-seater couch. With four pairs of eyes fixed on me, I was about one step away from inventing invisibility.
I locked eyes with Kerem, silently begging him to end this torture. He stood there with one hand in his pocket, brushed his hair back, then slid his other hand into his pocket as well. He looked at me, then at his friends waiting expectantly.
Then, with that crooked smile that always meant trouble, he sat beside me and wrapped an arm around my shoulders.
"Say hello to my new girlfriend, guys."
I snapped my head toward him so fast I nearly broke my neck.
"What?"
Everyone stared at me, not him, in stunned silence.