by Zelda French
“No, I guess not.”
“Sooner or later, you’re going to have to tell her you’re gay.”
My throat tightens like a vice. “I’m not…”
Michael sighs. “She’s going to notice, eventually. Trust me.”
Michael opens the stall and hurries out, all traces of desire gone from his face. Have I made him mad? I approach him cautiously.
“I’m sorry. Everyone’s coming at me from all directions today. I was so afraid she would learn it from Sacha, and then everything would have exploded, you know. I want to tell her myself.”
Michael walks over to the sink and checks his reflexion in the mirror. “Tell her, then.”
His laid-back attitude toward my explosive inner-turmoil is making my blood boil, today.
“Why do you act like it’s so fucking easy? I’m not constantly harassing you to ask if you told your girlfriend, am I?”
Michael stomps back toward me, his jaw clenched, but somebody enters the toilet at the same moment. A kid I don’t know strolls inside and toward the urinals, whistling.
“You’re right,” Michael mutters, heaving his backpack onto his shoulder. “You’re absolutely right. I won’t bother you with that you again.”
What? What does he mean, not bothering me again. If he means stop pestering me, I’m all ears. If he means to stop kissing me, I’m not voting for it.
The sound of pee splashing against urinal walls bounces off the wall. Charming. Whistling guy looks around his shoulder and nods.
“All right, guys?”
Before I can tell him to fuck right off, François storms into the toilets, disheveled and panting. He clearly ran the whole way from Luxembourg to here, but why? This might be my worst day at Colette’s ever.
“Oh hi,” he says, pretending very poorly not to expect us in here. “We were wondering where you were.”
“We’re here,” Michael says, reading my pointed look. “I’ll be with you in a minute.”
After splashing a sorry amount of water on his hands, The Whistler finally leaves, not without a curious last glance at us.
Michael walks over to the good sink and begin rubbing his hands savagely under the water jet. François hangs around anyway, hovering awkwardly by the sink.
“So, Lou, funny that I got you here…”
Here we go for the final act. How will François add to my misery today?
“I was just talking to Tony.”
“That would be a first.”
François’s fake laughter echoes off the walls.
“Yeah… That’s true. But anyway, Tony just told me you were planning to move to London after the exams?”
My stomach drops. Resentment toward Tony, a combination of fear and anger at Lucie, terror that Michael will interpret my travel plans as an attempt to stalk him… Everything adds up together.
“Is it?” Michael asks, his brow furrowed.
See? He probably things he’s got a stalker on his hands. I straighten up and spear François’s with my most venomous glare.
“I’ve never had any intention of going to London.”
Michael’s frown deepen. François cocks his head.
“Tony said you were definitely going.”
“Tony probably only talked to you for a bet.”
François steps back, looking hurt.
“I joke once that I would move to London,” I say, “and now he won’t shut up about it. He’s pulling your leg.”
François turns to Michael. “Didn’t you say you were moving back to London after the exams?”
Michael, imperturbable, turns around and smiles.
“Of course, yes. I’m going back. It’s not like there’s anything to keep me here.”
It seems decades away that I felt like I was melting his the folds of Michael’s arms, in the very stall at my back. Now all that is left is an all consuming dread.
And to top it all, Michael, calling my name, points at the clock on the wall above the door. My mouth falls open. The test is now fifteen minutes away.
“Good luck,” Michael says to my horrified face.
CHAPTER TWENTY
YOU ARE MY FAVOURITES
“I’M THE WORST person that’s ever lived and I’ll never be happy!”
Moving past Eugénie as she opens the door, I set off straight across the corridor into her sitting room and slinks pathetically on her sofa.
“What’s going on now?” Eugénie asks, a worried look on her face. “Should I get the gin?”
As tempting as it sounds, I refuse with a shake of the head. “No, no, I need my head clear when you tell me how to fix it.”
“How should I know?” Wringing her hands, she sits on her armchair.
My God. Eugénie’s kind of my best friend, now. If Tony saw this, he would throw himself out of the window. But if Michael saw this, he would think it cute. But what’s the point! I’ll never see Michael again today. Picking up a cushion from the sofa, I bury my head in it and let out a groan of despair.
Eugénie gives me a pat on the knee. “Come on now, it can’t be all that bad.”
I explain to her what happened earlier, making sure to withhold information about anything she’s not supposed to know. Everything else goes. How I forgot to study the test to spend time with my secret lover, how Lucie and I fought in front of everyone, how Tony took her defence and left me, and how poorly I treated my sexy mistress and how she left with François.
Miss Eugénie’s betrays a growing incredulity.
“And as a result,” I say, sniffling. “I completely failed the test, my father will think I’m slacking again, and he won’t let me go to London.” I notice the tissue box on the coffee table and starts pulling the sheets out frantically. Eugénie opens her mouth in protest. “And François! François, always sticking his unusually large nose into my business! He made me look like I was desperate to go to London, and now… and now… Ouch!” Eugénie, worried about her tissues, has slapped my hand away from the box. “Now Doriane, who already thinks I’m bat-shit crazy, is going to think that I’m planning to move in with him after the exams, like a creepy stalker.”
“With him?”
“With her!” I wail, slapping my fists, filled with tissues, on my knees. “Are you even listening?”
“Right,” Miss Eugénie throws a longing look at the bottles in her bar. “First things first, next time you have a History exam, come to me, I can help you.”
I lift a handful of tissues to my face, and blow my nose. “Is that because you’re really old and you lived through most of it?”
“You haven’t lost your cheek.” She sighs. “There’s hope for you after all.”
I nod sheepishly.
“Now, your Doriane,” Eugénie says, a serious look on her face. “Text her immediately. Apologise. She shouldn’t bear the brunt of your bad moods. If she wants you to break up with Lucie, it’s probably because she wants to be in a relationship with you.”
“But…” I hesitate, my bottom lip twitching. “I’m not sure I want to be in a relationship with Doriane.”
Someone rings the doorbell, startling me. With a ‘oh’ of surprise, Miss Eugénie gets up and leaves me to answer the door. I cannot see from my spot, but a friendly woman’s voice comes from the landing. Probably her neighbour.
I take this opportunity to text Michael. What should I say. I’m sorry about earlier. I wish I wasn’t such a blockhead. Should I add something else, like XOXO or a little emoticon that looks like a bird? Screw it. Miss Eugénie reappears. I stick my phone back into my pocket.
Eugénie drops an envelope of junk mail onto her chest of drawers.
“So,” she says, sitting back down. “Why don’t you want a relationship with Doriane? You just told me kissing her is the best thing in the world, and in too many details.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t want to. I said I’m not sure.”
“Why the hell not?”
“Because!” I put my head in my hands and star
t pulling at my hair. How can I tell her without betraying myself? “Doriane is… different. Being with her… would make me different too. I’m not sure I want this. You don’t understand. A lot of people will talk, then I’ll have to tell my family, and that is the last thing I want.”
Miss Eugénie’s expression turns incredulous. “How different is this Doriane? Does she have four arms or something?”
“No. She’s… She’s British.”
Eugénie gives a sharp laugh. “Terrible handicap indeed! Your life will never be the same.”
“Don’t make fun of me, help me, please.”
She holds up her hands. “Okay, okay, sorry. So that’s why you’re always blabbing on about London. You were supposed to move there after the exams?”
“Yes. Sort of.”
“Really?” She pulls a face. “You never told me anything about that.”
“Because!” My voice comes out a whiny and frustrated as I feel. “Because it was never supposed to happen!”
“What are you talking about?” Miss Eugénie leans away from me, her eyes narrowed.
Should I tell her? We have grown so close over the past weeks. Telling her about London is not like telling her Doriane is a bloke.
I take a second to recompose myself, pushing my messed up hair out of my face.
“The trip to London is just another misunderstanding in the clandestine circus that has become my life. It happened one evening that Tony and Lucie weren’t paying enough attention to me.”
“You are such a drama queen.”
Huh, watch the phrasing, please, Miss Eugénie. I slip her a warning look.
“I pretended I wanted to move to London. They got really surprised and upset, they begged me not to go, that it was supposed to be the three of us forever. It felt real nice to be wanted to badly. So… I may have been using this excuse to get their attention every time I wanted it.” Miss Eugénie laughs into one fist as she bangs the other on the table. “Anyway, it and it was fun, but then… Tony told his father, who found me an flat, and instead of trying to stop me, he became encouraging, saying I should go… Then, when I realise he was trying to push me into going, the idea of moving out grew on me, and became a bit like an escape plan, a way out if things turned to shit.”
“Why would things turn to shit?”
Though the idea has been running around in my head for quite some time, I’m still not ready to articulate it.
“I just know that they will. Things always turn to shit. I don’t want to be there when they do.”
“You want to run away.” Eugénie says.
I give a faint nod. “I think I did, for a while. But Doriane, you see… she’s from London. She probably thinks I’m a crazy stalker.”
Eugénie suddenly rises, and puts her hands on her hips. “The same Doriane who asked you to break up with Lucie?”
“Well, that’s not exactly what she said, but—”
“You’re always running in two different directions.” Eugénie says. “If she wants you to break up with Lucie, she won’t think you’re stalking her. Why don’t you ask her directly?”
I freeze at the sound of her outrageous question. “Excuse-me. Are you insane?”
“Kids…” Miss Eugénie shakes her head. “Did you apologise to her, at least?”
“Yes,” I lean back into the sofa. “I wrote a text while you were gossiping with your next door neighbour. Even called myself a blockhead.”
She waggled her finger at me. “You are a blockhead. And I wasn’t gossiping. I will have you known that I have great relationships with all of my neighbours.”
What is that supposed to mean? And I thought I was her favourite. Now what, I have to compete for her affection as well? Starting with the next door neighbour.
I have to remind myself to stick some glue into her keyhole on my way back up.
Feeling much better now, I propose that we dig out some biscuits. Eugénie, who loves her food, immediately agrees and moves toward the kitchen.
“Are you still bird-watching lately?” I ask, pointing at the window. “I don’t see your binoculars.”
“I might be ready to move on. Try something else.”
“Like what?”
“Well—”
Eugénie’s halfway through the kitchen door when we’re interrupted by the intercom, this time. She ignores my scandalised expression and walks with short quick steps to the machine in the doorway.
To my stupefaction, it’s Michael’s voice that I hear loud and clear coming through the speaker, speaking in perfect French, but with his undeniable accent.
“Hello, I’m so sorry to bother you, my name’s Michael. Is Louis here?”
Immediately, I spring up the sofa, my heart stuck in my throat, and tear across the sitting room toward the doorway. Miss Eugénie turns to me with a little smile.
“Do you know a British lad named Michael?”
“I do.” I attempt to sound casual despite the fact that my chest is heaving. “He’s probably lost.”
Eugénie picks up the handset. “He’s here. Second Floor on the right.” She unlocks the building door with a light touch of her fingertip.
Half-a minute later and before I could fix the damage to my hair, Michael enters, a little windswept, panting, really, from climbing up the stairs. He flashes Eugénie an embarrassed smile.
“I’m so sorry to bother you, again, but—” he notices me lurking behind Eugénie “—I have an urgent homework question for Louis.”
“I’m sure you do,” Eugénie waves at him to come in.
Michael slips me a quizzical look and whispers in English: “Is this your grandmother?”
“No!” I can help snorting. “She’s my friend.”
Michael takes one look around the living room, the carved coffee table, the plum curtains, the record player, the picture frames, the knitted blankets, and his expression grows from incredulous to dumbfounded.
“Wait, do you live here?”
Eugénie chuckles and nudges Michael toward the armchair opposite her while I resume my seat on the sofa.
“No, I don’t,” I say, with a pointed look at Eugénie. “I live upstairs. I told you. Eugénie is my friend.”
Eugénie nods. “Nice to meet you, Michael. We can proceed in English if you like.”
“We can?” I ask, stunned.
Eugénie clicks her tongue. “Boy, you know nothing about me.”
That may be an understatement, and already, my mind starts racing with questions. But Michael is sitting a breath away from me, and to see him here, in this place, feels so out of place, like mixing two different universes that have nothing to do together.
Like Ironman having tea with Dumbledore, that sort of thing.
“Perfect,” Michael says, his cheeks taking on the most delightful colour. My heart is already doubling in size. “I rang all the doors. Half of them didn’t have any names on it.”
“Some stupid kid used to remove them for fun.” Eugénie says, peering at me from the corner of her eye. “People gave up replacing them.”
My shoulders lift in perfect innocence. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“So, Michael,” Miss Eugénie says, “since you’re so serious about homework that this couldn’t be done over the phone, I’ll leave you to it for a minute while I get some snacks and open a bottle of Porto a friend just sent me.”
She vanishes into her kitchen and closes the door. Instantly Michael turns to me, panic in his voice.
“I’m so sorry, I didn’t know which door to ring.”
For once, I’m the one surprisingly calm about the situation. Relaxed, even, considering twenty minutes ago I thought he’ll never want to see my face again.
“Just pretend you’re my friend, and if you’re asked, there’s a British girl in our class named Doriane.”
“What? Why?”
“She’s you. I… told her about you, but she thinks you’re a girl.”
Michael hides
his face in his hands. His shoulders quiver. My hand moves to touch his shoulder, worried. Then I notice he’s laughing.
“What?”
“Dorian is a man’s name, Louis.”
“I know a girl named Doriane.”
“I bet you she’s not British.”
For heaven’s sake. Let’s hope Miss Eugénie didn’t notice.
“Why did you come?” I whisper, but it’s quite safe. Miss Eugénie is making a hell of a racket in the kitchen. It sounds as though she’s ripping the doors of the cupboards off their hinges and throwing their contents around.
“I wanted to tell you I’m sorry, then I saw your message, and I thought I needed to tell you it was all right.” Michael seizes my hand, gives it a squeeze that raises the temperature in Eugénie’s flat by about a million degrees. “And I have some news.”
Michael leans toward me, hopefully with the intent to kiss me, but Miss Eugénie reappears, holding a bottle of Port and a small ball of Pretzels.
“So much for tearing your kitchen apart,” I comment, expecting at least a cheese platter. She silences me with a glare. “Open this while I fetch glasses.”
She leaves us again. Michael pounces forward and smacks his lips against mine. My heart jolts in delight. The familiar scent of fresh apples fills my nostrils. I manage to pull his bottom lip between my teeth before he breaks away.
My head swimming, I set out to open the bottle, but I cannot twist the cap. It’s stuck.
“Damn, this thing won’t open.”
Michael watches with an arched brow as I plant the bottle between my legs to get a better grip. Nothing will do.
“This is hopeless,” I say, panting.
Michael’s laughing face grows suddenly serious; a dark glint flashes in his eyes.
“I could think of worse things.”
“What?”
“Than being stuck between your legs.”
Struck by a sudden fit of coughing, I wave my hand around, searching for a glass of water. There’s none. Michael quickly moves, and with a hard slap on the back, brings me back to my senses.
“What’s going on now?” Eugénie come running out of the kitchen, and gasps at the sight of my red face and streaming eyes.
“Nothing, Madame,” Michael says calmly. “Louis’s just having a little trouble with the bottle.”