by Zelda French
Slightly astounded than anyone could make Paquin’s homework interesting, it takes me a long time to go home. I find myself stalling to admire my city for the first time in years. I’m even looking forward to having English literature on Friday.
Michael doesn’t have Facebook, but his phone number is safely tucked away in my pocket.
I hope he will understand what I meant, earlier. I hope he’ll understand. There are things simply too precious to share.
CHAPTER NINE
RUFUS GOT TO IT FIRST
I DON’T KNOW if Michael is gay, but if he were gay, I hope he’d pick me.
Ok, ok, let me rewind here. I’m only saying this because, after several afternoons in his company, I believe we really get along and I believe he really likes me, or the version of me I allow myself to be around him, you know.
Clad in my rockstar uniform and stealing glances behind my oversized sunglasses, a cigarette hanging from my lip, a quick joke and a snarky attitude always at hand to make him laugh, that sort of thing. He said it to me once, he said, “You look so carefree, I wish I could be so carefree” and I could have wept, because I have successfully hidden from him my dormant anxiety.
January passed in a blur. In a remarkable feat, I finished The Picture of Dorian Gray in record time, aka less than a week. Even more impressed upon hearing it, Michael offered to meet once a week to work on the essay. We’re both too busy to hang out more, though I wouldn’t mind if he were less solicited. I think we really do get along.
Our essay will be superb. Michael’s smart, he sees things that I would never notice in a million years, but he says it’s because he’s English, and if I were too, I would pick up on certain things. He says despite my years at Colette, we still don’t speak the same language, and it shows. I asked what he meant by that, but he never answered. Answering my questions is not Michael’s strong suit. Perhaps if I bothered asking more of them…
Despite his enigmatic ways, I feel I’m starting to get a good idea of Michael, and I’m amused to recall he once called himself boring, because he’s nothing at all like that. I have spent enough time with him to have picked up a few things.
Michael is kind, really kind. Not faking it, kind. You know like some people are ‘nice’, but they’re not ‘kind’ and the difference is subtle, but it’s there. Nice people want you to think they care. Kind people actually do. Michael worries about people’s wellbeing like Tony worries about the future of Babyshambles. That means, a lot.
Michael’s the sort of person who hangs out with his mother, picks up anything you drop before you notice its absence, and gives directions to strangers on the street, even if he’s new to the city himself.
Michael’s easy to be around. You could say he’s low-maintenance, but he wouldn’t like you talking about people like that. Smiles come easy to him, and he never opens his mouth to say anything vile. He lets people rant on about things he doesn’t even like himself. He allowed me to talk about Franz Ferdinand’s last album for twenty-five minutes once, before gently reminding me to get back to work.
And he doesn’t mind trying new things.
Michael loves Paris, really loooooves Paris. Every bridge must be stopped at and its architect praised, every cobbled alley commented about, every plane tree admired.
At first I thought he was really odd, and Tony might be right, he could be a serial killer, but now I find myself stopping in the middle of a busy street to admire an old mosaic or a lamp post and I’ve realised I’ve taken my city for granted for too long. I told Michael I spend more time smoking plants than admiring them. The way he laughed! Faint dimples appeared in his cheeks, and looked very pretty. I became agitated, but as I was wearing my sunglasses, he didn’t notice.
Michael is so delighted by Paris that he doesn’t even mind the smell of piss in the metro or how rough the hordes of suburbans rushing home at night can be.
But the strangest thing about Michael is that he really seems to like me. Ok, granted, he likes everyone, and everyone likes him which is very annoying. Well, Tony doesn’t like him at all, but it’s probably because he’s a contrarian and also because I have twice cancelled plans with him to work on the essay and he didn’t like it.
Despite Michael’s good nature, I still believe he favours me, a little.
Last time we met at his place, we talked about our future. Michael’s got bright ideas about his, as you can imagine.
“Perhaps I’ll go to film school.” He was swaying on his chair, dangerously close to tumble backwards, as I stared, slack-jawed.
“Where are you going?”
“I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
I realised a little too late that I had said the truth, without even thinking twice about it. But Michael didn’t think of being judgmental. He waited for me to gather my thoughts while the chair seemed bent on keeping upright just for him.
“I thought I might travel, you know.”
He nodded. “That’s a great plan, do you know where?”
He lifted his pencil to his mouth, chewed on the tip, glanced back at me when I didn’t answer. I shook my head. I wouldn’t want him to think I’m could be going to London. He might get the wrong idea.
I’ve never quite met anyone like Michael before. A part of me wants to impress him, another to never see him again. And yet I always show up to our meetings with a trepidation that English Lit never birthed in me before.
Michael is my well-guarded secret. Tony would make fun of him or grow jealous. And despite her best intentions, Lucie would want to twist him around her finger. Is it wrong of me to enjoy someone’s company without having to justify myself?
Every hour spent in his company rushes by really fast. I like the way the corners of his eyes crinkle when he sees me, the way his eyes are always on me, saving me from more than one massive dog poo and always seeking for my even most random opinion.
Michael likes me, and I like Michael. It’s an unspoken truth, our truth. Sometimes I think we’re the best of friends. I wonder what would have happened if I’d met him before Tony found me. New questions arise, and I’m nowhere near getting answers.
But I know this.
A person like me whose stomach is quick to turn and whose imagination always rushes to the worst conclusion has been able to find peace in the company of another bloke. A simple guy, whose laid back attitude has almost become an inspiration.
Today is the last time Michael and I are to work together. If you ask me, I would tell you the essay was already perfect a week ago, but Michael insisted to go over it once again, and I don’t mind at all. Anything for my grade to be perfect, of course.
Chemistry was cancelled, our teacher is sick. Our teacher is often sick — with us— but as a result, we have decided to spend the afternoon working at Le Censier, a bistro in our neighbourhood.
The day is unusually beautiful and warm. I’m running a little late. I wanted to exchange my sweater for a t-shirt, and collect myself before meeting him. I have been worried about the future of our relationship, now that the essay is over.
By relationship, I mean friendship. Of course.
Michael is gathering two tables together. He accidentally slams his knee into the table leg when he sees me approach. It’s probably because I’m lumbering to hold my baggy jeans together, or anyone on the street would get a sight they never asked for. He laughs. Nothing mean about his laugh. His eyes fall on my jeans. I quickly pull out a chair in front of me.
“Why?” He asks, moving his bag to give me more space.
“Why what?”
The waiter arrives, we order coffee. I repeat my question.
Michael shakes his head. He’s still laughing. “You dress like an old man’s idea of a kid.”
What’s that? I throw myself on the chair, give him a withering look from behind my sunglasses.
“I dress like Kurt Cobain, man.”
“Who’s that?”
Who’s that. Cute. He’s joking, right?
“Are you serious? He’s only one of the biggest rock stars!”
Michael flips his laptop open and our essay appears on the screen. It does look perfect as it is. Just perfect.
“Why do you dress like this Kurt guy? You love him or something?”
Ok no. Just no. The way he says that upsets me. I must defend myself, or he’ll think I’m some cheap-ass groupie.
“I don’t love him per say. But I look like him, so I thought it made sense, you know, to play with it.”
He cocks his head. “Oh so you dress like someone you don’t even like because you look like him.”
“Well—”
“Isn’t it like, erasing your whole identity? Which is exactly the opposite of your rockstar lifestyle?”
Hang on. He’s not supposed to see the glitch in the Matrix. Soon he’ll start to psychoanalyse me and he’ll never speak to me again.
I throw my head back and laugh. “Can we stop talking about my fashion sense? You’re not Karl Lagerfeld, as far as I know. He’s a fashion designer, by the way.”
Michael says nothing while our waiter returns with our coffees, then he gives me a look. “I know who Karl Lagerfeld is, Louis.”
I love the way he pronounces my name, Lou-ie, like the ‘L’ is a string he particularly likes to pluck.
Since we rarely meet around other people, when he says my name like that, I keep asking myself if he’s the same with everybody, or performing just for me. Then I start wondering if he’s got somebody, somewhere. Perhaps he swings both ways. Will I ever know? I should learn not to cares about such trivial things.
Michael is shooting me insistent looks and eventually tears me from my thoughts. A little rattled, I drink a large swig of scalding coffee to look inconspicuous.
“Do you like his music, then?” He asks.
“Who, Kurt? Yeah, sure, but he’s not my favourite.”
Michael edges closer to the edge of his seat. “Then who’s your favourite?”
He couldn’t have pleased me more even if he got down on his knees and called me Jagger.
“Wait, I’ll show you.”
Immediately, I jump off my chair to get my iPod out of my bag. When I turn around, the device in hand, I trip over the leg of my chair and land almost face first onto his lap. My sunglasses slide off my nose, he catches them just before they hit the ground.
As states previously, Michael’s a kind bloke and doesn’t complain, even as he manoeuvres my sorry ass back to my chair. But from the look on his face, I can tell that I have probably broken fifteen unspoken rules and the Queen would have me put down if she knew.
After we’re done making fun of my stunt, his laughter a tad nervous and mine two octaves too high, I stick an earbud into his ear, and play Kaiser Chiefs’s Ruby. It’s a little loud, and I’ll be a little deaf later in life, but who cares? People have less interesting things to say than Kaiser Chiefs. Michael grimaces at first, but when I inch closer and put the other earbud in my ear, he grows perfectly still.
“It’s nice, I like it,” he says after a minute.
“You do?”
He gives a nod of assent. Perhaps it’s a lie, to make me happy. I can’t tell the difference, so I hold on to our earbuds.
Our faces are really close. I can see every speck of gold in his green eyes. I expect he can see the same in my blue ones. Where the fuck are my shades? I look away. He does the same, glances down at my arms first, then at the iPod I’m holding between us.
When the song is over, we part from each other. Michael looks agitated. He does this thing of chewing his bottom lip when he’s thinking hard about something.
“Do you want to…”
“What?”
Whatever he’s about to say, my answers’s already YES, but despite my pleading eyes, Michael doesn’t finish his question. His face softens and relaxes at the sight of something behind me. What the fuck could be more important than talking to me at this exact moment? I turn around. It’s Yasmine, walking her big Malinois on a tight leach.
I’m acquainted with that beast, and accordingly, I withdraw my legs under my chair. She stops at our table, pulling the dog closer. The dog and I stare at each other. He starts panting. Instinctively, I reach for my sunglasses and put them on.
As usual, Yasmine looks unimpressed, too cool for school. She leans down and pilfers one of my cigarettes.
“You guys are still working on that thing? Sacha wanted to go to the movies.”
Michael stretches his arms behind his head. “I told her I had to finish this.”
“You’re trying too hard, it’s only for Paquin.”
She blows smoke out her puckered lips. Her dog begins sniffling under our table. Unnoticed, I squeeze my thighs together.
“I don’t think I’ve ever been accused of trying too hard.” I arch an eyebrow, pretending to be amused. The dog’s snout brushes against my knee.
Yasmine’s smirk tells legions. Michael casually sticks his hand under the table and pets the dog’s head. The beast shuts his eyes, satisfied.
Yasmine, who rarely smiles in public, gratifies Michael of her sweetest specimen.
“Rufus doesn’t like anyone, usually.”
“He’s adorable.”
He’s a lunatic, I swear! Michael is too innocent to know this. But of course Michael has superpowers, everyone likes him. A rattlesnake would remove his hat to salute him. If they were wearing hats, that is.
Yasmine leans over the table and starts reading Paquin’s list of questions.
“You missed one,” she says.
“What? Which one?” Michael bends over the list.
“Here. Question 4: Which event causes Dorian to alter his life?”
Michael looks all flustered to have missed a question. The dog watches him quietly through his dark brown eyes.
“It’s getting really hot.” He wipes his brow with the back of his hand.
“Of course,” Yasmine says. “You’re wearing fifty layers.” She points at her cropped top and high-waisted jeans.
I put my coffee cups to my lips. “She’s right.”
Just like that, Michael pulls away from the table, grips the hem of his sweater and gives the whole thing a good yank upwards. He accidentally lifts his t-shirt as well, revealing a flat tummy and an inch of neon blue underwear.
It’s as though I received an electric shock. Something springs up within me, rises every hair on my body. Coffee catches in my throat, sending me into a coughing fit.
Yasmine turns to me. “Jesus! You’re ok over there?”
“That’s too hot,” Eyes streaming, I point down at my cup of coffee.
Of course the dog pounces on me, barking, and sticks his snout between my legs under the table. Michael stares at me, open-mouthed, while I battle with the beast.
About ten seconds too late, Yasmine finally retrieves him, and leaves us, laughing all the way.
There are drops of coffee all over Michael’s laptop and my embarrassment is so bad that it takes all my willpower not to throw me under the first passing car.
“What’s wrong, Louis?” Michael looks concerned.
“Nothing. Why are you asking this?”
“You look very anxious.”
“That’s not true.”
What the hell was this? What is happening to me? I’m shaking. I could always tell him I have epilepsy. That might work.
Michael is pinching his lips.“You’re the most anxious person I’ve ever met.”
“I’m not.”
“I’m not saying it’s a bad thing.”
I clear my throat. “I’m not. It’s just… I don’t see what more we can do for the essay, and I’d prefer to go home, so let’s get to it, so I can go home.”
Michael scratches the back of his neck. “You can go, if you want. There are only a few typos to fix. I can do that myself.”
“Really?”
“I’ll take care of it, you go.”
His evident concern for me makes it all the mor
e devastating, but I cannot stay around him any longer. I swing my backpack onto my shoulder, and after a last wave, I sprint back home, without a look back.
CHAPTER TEN
HIT ME WITH YOUR BEST SHOT
“ARE YOU DEAF or what?”
Tony slaps me across the back, tearing me from my thoughts. I stare at his amused face, then around me. We’re the gymnasium’s changing rooms. Everyone’s dressed for the volleyball class starting in five minutes, except for me. My backpack’s open, my gym clothes bunched up in there amidst random papers, old pens and pieces of rubber erasers.
“What?” I bark, rubbing my eyes.
I haven’t been myself this morning, ever since I woke up sweaty after four hours of awful sleep and a bunch of nonsensical dreams.
Tony, looking too skinny in his sweatpants, studies me through narrowed eyes.
“You’re hungover.”
“I’m not.”
“You are. You went out yesterday? With Lucie?”
I love Tony, but sometimes, he gets on my nerves.
Without any hope for success, I attempt to shove my foot into my trainer. “I wasn’t with Lucie. I was at home.”
“Then why didn’t you come to my place? My mother made lasagna. You love her lasagna.”
Because! I was laying in bed in the dark, having all sorts of weird thoughts about Michael. I’m sure he’d love to find out that seeing another bloke’s underwear gave me a boner and that Yasmine’s Malinois almost chopped my dick off.
I’m slowly losing my grip on reality. This morning, I was that close to run to people on the street and ask: ”Tell me, am I gay??”
“Sorry, Tony. I’ll come next time.”
“There are leftovers, you know. You can come tonight.”
“Fine, tonight.”
Tony stomps his foot. “Perfect, but in the name of sweet baby Jesus, hurry! If you move it we can share a joint by the dumpster.”
I stare down am my halfway laced-up trainers. “Nah, I’m good, thanks.”