Baseline Noise
It was easy with her. That was the first thing he noticed.
It was not the way she looked at him nor the fact that he was there. Just how easy it felt. Mika never asked questions and she didn’t pause to figure out what something meant before letting it happen. She just let it be what it is.
He was lying on one side of her bed, still undressed, propped up on pillows at an incline, his arms crossed, relaxed, as his eyes followed Mika moving around the room. She moved around like he wasn’t something she had to account for. Sorting out the room, while also getting her appearance on point, as if she were getting ready to go somewhere. Not ignoring him; just doing her own thing.
“You still do that,” he said.
She stopped in her tracks and glanced at him.
“Do what?”
“Act as if nothing happened here.”
“Something did happen here.” She gives a small smile and continues her activity.
“Yeah,” He let out a quiet breath, almost a laugh.
That was the thing. It didn’t feel like it was planned or decided. He just ended up here, again.
Mika sat down across from him. Facing him, she tucked one leg under, sitting with the other hanging and making contact with the floor. No tension in her posture. No expectation in the space between them.
“So what’s up?” she asked. She started tying her hair back before she laid her hands by her sides and settled.
He shrugged slightly. “Nothing.”
She nodded once and didn’t push it further. She whipped out her phone from her back pocket, probably to check the notifications. She never asked what that meant and that always made it easier to stay. There was something about the way she didn’t try to define anything that kept things from becoming complicated. No labels. No direction. No version of him that he had to maintain. He knew he could just be there and that felt good.
He leaned his head back slightly against the headboard, watching her for a second longer than necessary. He caught himself trying to place it. Not her. He already knows her. What was it when they were like this? “You ever think this is weird?” he asked.
“Weird how?” She tilted her head slightly, still scrolling on her phone.
“I don’t know.” He glanced away, then back. “That we still do this.”
A small pause. It could have felt almost too long.
“No,” she said, seemingly without skipping a beat. She continued scrolling. He frowned slightly.
“Not even a little?” He sits up.
She shrugged. “It’s not confusing.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
She looked up at him then, putting the phone aside. “It’s not confusing,” she repeated.
Something about the way she said it made it harder to push further because she wasn’t avoiding the question. She just wasn’t giving it the weight he was.
He leaned forward a bit, crossing his arms again.“Yeah, but it’s not exactly… simple either.”
“It is,” she said.
He let out a small breath. “See, that’s what I mean.”
She smiled at him. “What?”
“You just decide things are simple and then that’s it.”
Mika watched him for a second. “I don’t decide they’re simple,” she said. “I just don’t make them more than they are.”
That sat somewhere he couldn’t immediately respond to. He shifted slightly.
“Yeah, but people don’t usually work like that.”
“I know.”
A pause.
“Do you?” she asked.
“What?” He looked at her, a little confused.
“Work like that?”
He hesitated, just for a second. “I don’t know,” he said.
She nodded. Just like that, the moment moved closer. It stayed easy and it same ease he noticed when he walked in. He didn’t think about anything else.
Not then.
Not about where he’d been earlier.
Not about who he’d been with.
That part stayed quiet as it was pushed just far enough back that it didn’t interfere. Here, he didn’t have to reconcile anything. He could just be and that was enough, at least while he was there. Mika reached over toward the nightstand and grabbed the glass of water sitting there, taking a sip before speaking again. “You’ve been in your head all night.”
Soren glanced at her. “Have I?”
“Yeah, you seem to be quieter.”
“I’m already quiet.”
“You get quieter than that.”
A faint smile tugged at his mouth despite himself. “Didn’t know that was possible.”
Mika just gave him a playful shrug. Soren exhaled slowly and rested his head back again.
Earlier that evening drifted through his mind despite his efforts otherwise. Noise. Music somewhere too loud. Someone laughing near his shoulder. The feeling of standing in a crowded room while mentally existing somewhere else entirely. And of course, Noa. Even thinking her name created tension beneath his ribs. Every interaction with Noa felt like it could have weight to them and as much as he loved her, it felt like he had to balance something fragile in his hands.
Here, nothing felt fragile. “You wanna know something weird?” he asked suddenly.
Mika raised an eyebrow slightly. “Sure.”
“I never think about consequences when I’m here.”
She studied him quietly for a moment. “Consequences for what?”
He almost answered immediately, but immediately stopped. He rubbed the back of his neck once. “Anything, I guess.”
Mika leaned back slightly on her hands. “That sounds unhealthy.”
He laughed softly. “Probably.”
“You say that like you don’t care.”
Soren gave a small shrug instead of answering and Mika didn’t press further after that. She reached for her phone again, briefly checking the screen before setting it face down beside her. Soren watched her quietly, noticing how she occupied silence without trying to fix it or turn it into something else. Most people couldn’t do that as they would rush to fill empty space, to explain it away before it became uncomfortable. Mika didn’t and somehow that made being around her feel slightly dangerous but also comfortable. For a moment, neither of them spoke. Soren looked at her sitting there, completely at ease in her own skin, and felt something strange pull at him again. Mika made it easy to detach from everything outside of this room and easy to forget about conversations he didn’t want to have.
Here, he didn’t have to reconcile anything. He could simply exist. And for now, that was enough.
