“Me neither. It’s been so long I think my balls are about to burst.” Neil gripped his crotch and pretended to be weighing the contents of his hand. “Yep, pretty full.”
“Eww,” Sam grimaced. “Way too much information.”
“Sharing is caring, Sammy,” Neil said and gave him a friendly punch on the shoulder.
He was just about to take a sip from the can and managed to pour beer down his front instead. “Watch it, dick,” he said.
It was close to ten when Neil appeared in the doorway. “You ready?”
Sam lifted up one side of his headphones. “Eh?”
“I said, are you ready to go?”
He couldn’t help but stare at the amount of gel in Neil’s hair—when he turned, it caught the light and made his scalp look like plastic.
He got up off the bed and reluctantly slipped on his shoes. “Are you planning on gassing the girls?” he asked, holding his nose and pretending to be overcome by the strength of Neil’s aftershave.
“Oh, now there’s an idea, Sammy,” Neil grinned.
“Has anybody told you you’re feral,” he replied with a wry smile. “And stop calling me that already, will you? The name’s Sam. Just Sam.”
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Neil pull a face.
It was pouring with rain as they made their way along Dixon Street, towards Courtenay Place. He kept as close to the buildings as possible to avoid the spray from the tyres of the cars.
“Fuck, it’s cold,” Neil cursed.
He mumbled in agreement, pulling up the collar of his jacket and raising the zipper as far as it would go.
“IDs, lads,” the doorman said as they walked up to the entrance of the sports bar on the corner. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out a dog-eared—and by now also rather damp—driver’s licence. While the bouncer did the sums, he glanced at his feet and smiled. At least he had remembered to wear the right shoes this time.
“OK, boys. In you go.” The doorman handed back their documents and stepped aside.
“I’ll get the first round in!” he yelled over his shoulder, but Neil wasn’t listening; his eyes were already scanning the room.
There were three staff serving at the bar but it seemed to take for ever to reach the front of the queue. As soon as he reached the front, he planted two elbows on the bar to secure his spot.
All three bar staff were men, but the one furthest away was especially cute. He watched out of the corner of his eye as the barman filled half a dozen shot glasses and handed them across the counter in pairs.
“What can I get you?” He wasn’t paying attention and jumped when the barman shouted at him over the music. He pointed to the chiller cabinet and held up two fingers. “Two Heineken, please.”
They had been there for no more than ten minutes and already Neil had managed to ingratiated himself with two girls. Sam had to admit he was impressed. Not the least because the girls appeared to be enjoying Neil’s company.
“This is Erin,” Neil nodded at the girl on his left, “And this is—”
“Julie,” the other girl finished. “I’m Julie.” She turned to him and held out her hand. He went to offer his own and then realised he was still holding both bottles of beer.
“Um,” he mumbled, thrusting one of the bottles at Neil, “I’m Sam.”
He smiled awkwardly as they shook hands. Thankfully, neither of the girls saw Neil nod at Julie and then wink at him.
“So, you’re from Wellington?” he asked, paying Neil no attention.
“Yeah—Johnsonville,” Erin answered.
Judging by the colour of Julie’s cheeks, she felt as uncomfortable as he did. She nodded in agreement and sipped on her drink.
A long awkward silence ensued, during which he scanned the room in the hope of seeing a familiar face. He didn’t usually find it difficult talking to girls; in many ways, it was much easier than talking to guys. But right now, he had never felt so uncomfortable.
“Do you come here often?” Erin asked. He almost laughed out loud but managed to stop himself.
“No,” Neil replied for both of them. He then put an arm round Julie and whispered something in her ear. She giggled and her face flushed crimson.
“I haven’t been here for years,” he told Erin. “What about you?”
“A couple of times.”
“Are you studying at Vic?” he asked. She looked a few years younger than he was—too old to be at college, too young to be at work. She nodded and proceeded to give him a full rundown of what she was studying. While she was talking, he allowed his eyes to wander.
Statistically, half a dozen guys in this room have to be gay, he surmised and set about trying to identify who the other five could be. One guy stood out immediately. He was standing among a group of girls on the other side of the dancefloor. Everything about him, from his clothes to the way he was standing, screamed “gay”.
He glanced over at the bar. There was a lull in the queue, and the cute barman was chatting enthusiastically with a guy on the other side of the counter. He sized them up for a moment and decided that they were just friends.
“Are you OK?” Erin asked. She had stopped mid-sentence and was watching him. She must have seen all the blood drain from his face.
“Yeah,” he mumbled in reply. “I—”
He craned his neck to get a better look across the room, but there was a group of people standing in the way.
“I thought I saw somebody I knew.” He tried his best to sound casual, but his heart was racing. He turned to say something to Neil, and was annoyed to find that they had disappeared, leaving him alone with Erin.
Fuck!
He took a deep breath and forced out a smile. “Do you want another—”
He was going to say “drink?”, but at the exact same moment, the crowd shifted again. He gulped.
On the other side of room, surrounded by friends, stood Tom. And he looked every bit as good as he had the last time they had seen each other, three years earlier. No, he corrected himself, he looks better.
“Are you sure you’re OK?” Erin asked. She turned and looked in the same direction.
He felt light-headed. Feelings that he thought he had dealt with long ago began to resurface straightaway. It was as if time had stood still. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
He gasped for breath. His chest was tight. An invisible hand seemed to be squeezing his heart.
“I think we should find the others,” Erin said, looking around for help.
He was still staring at Tom when Tom turned and looked in his direction. It took a few seconds for Tom’s brain to process what he was seeing. When it did, his eyes almost doubled in size.
Sam smiled and nodded. He could feel a vein throbbing in his temple.
Before he could do anything, the crowd shifted again and the girl from Tom’s flat appeared at Tom’s side. She put her arm round Tom’s waist and rested her head on his shoulder. She was laughing at something and was oblivious to the look of horror on Tom’s face.
“What’s the matter?” Neil reappeared, and he didn’t look happy. The girls were standing to one side, whispering to each other. Neil leaned in close to him. “What’s the deal, bro?” He motioned behind him. “Don’t screw this up, eh.”
He opened his mouth to reply but no words came out. Everybody was watching him, waiting.
“I—” he started but didn’t get any further. What could he say? “I—I don’t feel well,” he lied.
Neil looked distraught. “Wait here. I’ll get you some water—”
“No,” he cut him off. He was already backing away. If looks could kill, he would have been dead already. “I’m sorry,” he mumbled again, pulling at the collar of his shirt, which suddenly felt several sizes too small. “I need to leave.”
“Sam,” Neil shouted after him but he kept walking.
He was soaked to the skin within minutes but he walked on regardless, numb, rivulets of ice-cold water streaming do
wn his face and neck. His shirt clung to his frozen body. His skin was the same colour as the white cotton.
Right now, all he could think about was putting one foot in front of the other.
Neil had rung his cellphone immediately, but he had let it ring through to voicemail.
He stopped at Frank Kitts Park and sat down on one of the empty benches that faced out across the harbour. Opposite, the illuminated red-brick monastery of Saint Gerard towered over the bay below. It all looked so peaceful.
Slowly, the fog in his head began to clear.
What have I done? He pounded his forehead with the heel of his right hand. What the fuck am I going to do now?
When he awoke the next morning, it was still dark. In the few hours that he had been asleep, the top sheet had managed to wrap itself around his body like a cocoon. He could hardly move. He pulled at the sheet to free himself, screwed it into a ball, and tossed it on the floor.It was almost as cold inside as it was outside, and each time he exhaled, his breath misted above his head.
He hauled himself to his feet and wandered down the hall towards the living room, the merino blanket his mother had given him the previous Christmas draped around his shoulders.
The door to Neil’s room was open and his bed was empty. Clearly, he hadn’t ruined Neil’s prospects after all. The relief he felt was short-lived, though. As soon as he thought of Tom, his stomach cramped up again.
Watching television didn’t prove as much of a distraction as he had hoped. Before long, he had exhausted the limited selection of channels and was back where he started.
He walked over to the window and pulled back the curtains. It was beginning to get light. The rooftops opposite stood out against the pale grey sky. He wiped away a patch of condensation and peered down at the street below.
Just a few hours before, the city had been a hive of activity, but now it was completely deserted. For a moment, he watched a flock of seagulls as they fought over what looked, at best, like the remnants of a kebab. He drew the curtains with a shudder of disgust.
It was a cold, crisp morning and he kept his hands in his pockets as he walked along the footpath, towards the bus stop.
To his relief, he didn’t have to wait long; within a few minutes, the number six bus turned the corner and stopped several metres short of where he was standing. There was only one other person waiting—an elderly gentleman sitting quietly in the shelter behind him. He stood to one side to let him by.
“Two zones, please,” he said, handing over the exact fare. The driver didn’t even look up. A paper slip popped out the side of the ticket machine, and he tore it off along the serrated edge.
He had taken, at most, half a dozen steps when the bus lurched forward. His feet shot out from under him and he flew down the aisle, colliding with one of the upright posts and almost landing in the lap of a young woman who was gazing out the window.
“Sorry,” he said, dropping onto the seat behind her. He looked up to find several smiling faces.
He wasn’t at all sure he was doing the right thing, but he had to speak to Tom. He knew that he wouldn’t be able to function like a normal human being until he had. With a sigh, he rested his head against the misted glass windowpane. The vibration of the bus made his teeth rattle.
“Oh God,” he groaned as he realised for the first time that Tom’s girlfriend answer the door.
He thought about getting off at the next stop and walking back to the flat, but something kept him in his seat. He rang the bell and got off at the first stop on the Hataitai side of the bus tunnel. Tom’s flat was a few minutes’ walk from the dairy on the corner of Moxham Avenue and Waitoa Road.
The street was completely still, and the wooden steps up to Tom’s flat were deep in the shadows. He held his breath as he put his full weight on the first step. To his relief, it didn’t betray his presence.
Somewhere overhead, a seagull squawked in protest, but he continued, the need to see Tom carrying him the final few metres.
It was almost impossible to see through the frosted pane in the door. He had to cup his hands over his eyes and push his nose right up against the glass. Hopefully, none of the neighbours is watching. From the street, it probably looked as if he was casing the joint.
He held his breath and listened carefully, but he couldn’t hear anything over the thump of his own heart. Within, the flat was silent.
Of course, they’re all asleep, he berated himself. He felt like a fool. You’re the only moron awake at this time.
He rubbed a hand across the nape of his neck as he tried to assess his options. He could ring the doorbell and wake Tom—and the rest of the flat. If he did, he would almost certainly have some explaining to do.
Again he pictured Tom’s girlfriend answering the door. He shuddered at the thought.
Instead of heading back the way he had come, he continued down Moxham Avenue, towards Kilbirnie and the beach beyond. But as he reached the church on the corner, Tom came flying round the bend, barreling straight towards him. He barely had time to jump out of the way.
Tom stopped a few metres further along the footpath. He leaned forward on his knees, gasping for breath. His bright-red T-shirt was maroon beneath the arms and all down
his back. Tom shook the hair out of his eyes and looked up.
“Sam.” Tom spat in the gutter as he straightened up. “What are you going here?”
“What are you doing here?”
He felt himself bristle, but before he was able to answer, he heard footsteps behind him. He turned to find Tom’s girlfriend walking towards them.
He had no intention of waiting to see whether she remembered him. He glanced once at Tom and then ran in the opposite direction.
“You look like shit.” Holly peered at him over the rim of her extra-shot, trim latte. She had never been one to pull any punches. “What the hell happened to you?”
The terrace of the café was packed. He slipped onto the seat Holly had saved for him.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said, picking up the menu and scanning the list of hot drinks.
“So?” Holly raised her eyebrows. “Why the amateur dramatics on the telephone?”
Thankfully, a waitress appeared at that very moment.
“It’s Tom,” he said, once the waitress was out of earshot.
“I worked that much out.” Holly took a deep breath, as if she was preparing to deal with a difficult child. “So are you going to tell me what’s going on?”
He leaned back and gazed up into the vast expanse of blue above. Overnight the wind had changed. Now it was blowing from the north again. He would never work the Wellington weather out. One day, it could be the dead of winter; the next, people would be walking round in shorts and T-shirts. “Do we have to talk about it just now?”
“Hell, yeah.” Holly crossed her arms. “That’s what happens when you wake me up at the crack of dawn, and on a weekend!”
“It wasn’t the crack of dawn; it was past nine,” he protested.
Holly didn’t say anything; she simply raised her eyebrows and gave him one of her looks.
“OK, OK,” he gave in. “I saw him in town last night. I didn’t plan to; it just happened.”
“What happened?” she asked, taking another sip of her coffee.
“Well—nothing really,” he was forced to admit.
“Did you kiss?”
“Sshh,” he hissed, “not so loud, eh?”
Holly raised her eyebrows, as if to say, “Go on.”
“No, we didn’t.” While he spoke, he focused on a spot on the horizon just above Holly’s right shoulder.
“You did talk to him, though?”
He could feel his face turning crimson. He didn’t reply.
“You didn’t even talk to him?” Holly asked. She didn’t bother to mask her disbelief.
He shook his head.
“So what’s all the fuss about?”
He gave her a dark look. He loved Holly—ever since sex had been t
aken off the table, she had been one of his staunchest friends—but sometimes she could be so fucking insensitive.
The waitress arrived with his flat white and they sat in silence until she had gone again.
“Sorry, I’m just surprised—that’s all. I thought you were going to tell me you’d gone home with him.”
Her voice was like a foghorn, and he squirmed in his seat, but nobody was paying them any attention.
Holly lifted her handbag off the floor, placed it in front of her, and started to rummage through its contents.
“Ah ha, found you!” She withdrew a pink, plastic lipstick and applied a fresh coat.
“What do I do, Hols?”
She exhaled loudly and tossed her lipstick back into her handbag. “Do?”
“Yes, what do I do?”
A stone’s throw from the café, the little ferry that crisscrossed the harbour every day was coming into dock. Its engines laboured in reverse as the skipper edged the boat up against the steel pontoon and lowered the gangplank with a crash. The noise seemed to cleave his brain in two.
“You don’t do anything,” Holly said.
He sighed and slumped in the chair. He didn’t know why he had asked for Holly’s opinion. He knew that would be her answer.
“He had a girl with him last night.”
Holly sat up straight, her interest piqued.
“So I went over to his flat this morning. I didn’t really have a choice—I had to talk to him.”
“And?”
“He wasn’t there,” he said. “I mean, he was, but he was out running. He arrived back just as I was leaving.”
“And did you speak to him then?” He shook his head.
“For fuck’s sake, why not?”
“She was with him again.”
“Who—oh. Well, so?”
He almost choked on his coffee. “What do you mean ‘so?’?”
“Well, it’s just a hello, not a declaration of eternal love.”
He shifted awkwardly on his chair. “She might have remembered me.”
Holly raised her eyebrows again.
“I didn’t tell you, but a few months ago I went round to the flat.”
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