‘Hey,’ I say, trying to imitate the voice he uses with me when I’m freaking out. Not that I’ve ever had as good a reason to do so as he does right now.
He’s not crying. It’s worse than that; his face is completely blank.
There’s a cut on his cheek, a tiny slashed half-moon that twists my stomach into a fist. I run the tip of my finger over it slowly, checking there’s no glass.
Len’s hand comes up to grip mine. His eyes are tight. I want to unwind him, but I don’t know how.
‘It’s fine,’ he says woodenly. ‘I just … shouldn’t have done that.’
It’s only years of knowing him that lets me hear the falter in his voice. Nothing about any of this is remotely fine.
When I can speak I choose my words carefully. ‘Of course you should’ve.’
I manage to get him to sit on the edge of the bed, then I lead him down slowly until we’re lying side by side, arms folded over our stomachs. Neither of us speak for a long time.
My mind is hectically running over what happened. Trying to fit it with everything else when the puzzle pieces don’t match. Trying to figure out how it is that the person hiding behind a shiny middle-class veneer can be that: seen by everyone, and not at all.
Len’s quiet. I think maybe he’s asleep.
Then he says, ‘It wasn’t always like this. When Mum was still here, he just wasn’t interested, but now, when he is …’ His face screws up. ‘And she’s not here, and …’
I inhale deeply and hold it. Usually, I do the talking for both of us, but I wait. It kills me to stay silent, but I do.
‘It’s stopped even making sense,’ he whispers like a confession. ‘It’ll just be random things that set him off, and then he stands there and says—’
‘What?’
He looks up at the ceiling, his face still blank. ‘That I’m useless. I’ll never do anything. My photos are never going to get me anywhere.’
My brain keeps processing, trying to think of something to say.
‘He’s wrong!’ I burst out finally.
Len just sighs, one hand hovering up near his forehead.
‘Whatever the hell that was,’ I say with as much conviction as I can, ‘he’s wrong. You’re so far from useless, it’s not even funny. You are nothing like that. You’re, like – brilliant. Golden.’
‘I’m not,’ he tells the ceiling.
‘You are,’ I insist, thinking how can you not know that? ‘You’re …’
The one time I really need them, I can’t think of the words. I’m so out of my depth here I can physically feel it.
‘Len?’ I try again. ‘This isn’t on you, okay? It’s just not.’
He rolls over and looks at me kind of quizzically, then he grabs the back of my neck and starts kissing me hard.
I kiss back for a minute, until I start to really feel it – but I can feel what’s behind it too: him shutting down. I push away.
‘Stop,’ he grunts.
I pull him in with all the force I’ve got. I don’t know what could possibly make this better, so I just wrap my arms around him and hold.
Len’s totally still, for a minute. Then he hugs back all at once, his chin digging into my shoulder and his rough sounds against my throat.
‘It’s okay,’ I say, like a prayer.
I just keep saying it. Over and over.
For an immeasurable stretch of time, we’re not Lennon and Hamlet, or two people who want each other, or two people at all.
There’s never been a proper membrane separating us the way it does other people; we’re connected, and it runs so deep. I know, from how much this hurts.
I want to give him all my energy to borrow. To keep. To burn.
I give him whatever he lets me. Let him take whatever he needs.
He’s already awake when I open my eyes in the morning.
I prop myself up on my elbow, and clumsily brush the back of my hand across his cheek. His eyes close, so I do it again, letting my fingers push through his hair where it’s fallen loose from its careful style.
He leans into it for a moment then seems to collect himself, opening his eyes.
I start with, ‘Hey.’
‘Hi,’ he says. His voice is tight, the words bitten out through clenched teeth.
His face is tight too: jaw taut and skin blanched white.
‘What’s wrong?’
His forehead furrows deeply.
I touch it. ‘Stop.’
‘Stop what?’
‘Thinking whatever you are.’
His eyes are dilated, but it’s different to last night. They’re not wide with need – it looks like fear.
‘Look. I’m not gonna pretend this isn’t …’ He swallows, changes tack. ‘These last few weeks have been like …’
I wait, confused.
‘Like something from a book,’ he finishes. ‘Something that happens to other people.’
‘I’m that good?’
He doesn’t take the joke. His face is pained. ‘Yes. But …’
But. That’s not good. It comes before—
‘I don’t think we should do this anymore.’
The light in me blows out.
He keeps going, like he’s afraid of what will happen if he stops.
‘The way I stay sane here is to keep away from stuff like this,’ he says. ‘I just … We have to stop, okay.’
Stuff like what? I want to ask.
‘Why?’ is what I ask instead. I’m fully awake now. I can feel my cheeks heating up, anger and shame and disappointment rolling through me. ‘I don’t understand.’
He sits up so that he’s looking down at me. ‘Jesus, of course you don’t! The world’s so simple to you. Life isn’t like a book, okay? It’s not a dream, and people don’t always just get what they want. They don’t get happy endings. And we won’t get anything we want if – if people find out.’
‘You don’t believe that,’ I say, hurt poking through me.
Len tugs at his hair. ‘Everything’s … I can’t think straight.’
‘Len.’ I reach out to touch his arm, but he stands up.
‘I need … space. I can’t be here with you like this.’
I see it, then: I’m losing him.
The magic bubble of the last few weeks is dissipating before my eyes, and there’s nothing I can do but scrabble for the pieces.
It feels like drowning in reverse.
‘Hang on.’ I grab his arm. ‘Whatever this is, we can sort through it together. Talk, or …’
I wish my voice didn’t sound so desperate. I feel desperate: everything I never knew I wanted but need is slipping through my fingers.
‘What is there to talk about? We were probably stupid doing this anyway,’ he says flatly, all colour gone from his voice. ‘We messed up, letting it go this far.’
‘Don’t say that! Don’t be such a dickhead.’
His eyes shoot over to mine. ‘It wasn’t meant to be like this. I should’ve just left it alone. You’re meant for big things. Not –’ he gestures to the room around us and down the stairs ‘– this. Me.’
‘Stop it!’ I snap, livid all of a sudden. ‘Don’t tell me what I’m supposed to do. Do you really think I’m that weak? That I’d just drop you if things got a tiny bit difficult? Because I won’t.’
His jaw is set – the way it does when he’s decided.
I need something drastic. I take a deep, heart-thudding breath.
‘I’m not going anywhere. Len, listen. I think I lov—’
‘Don’t.’
The back of my throat burns. I will not let myself cry, but my face is beet red at this point. I curse my Celtic genes for giving me away so clearly.
‘I don’t get why you’re doing this,’ I say, thickly. ‘We’re ha
ppy like this. It’s … ours. It’s not like anyone’s gonna know – I wouldn’t give a shit if they did!’
‘As if, Hamlet!’ he snaps. ‘This kind of stuff always comes out. And he’d find a way to wreck it. Or I will, and I couldn’t come back fr— it’d be the end, okay.’
‘So you’d rather just end you and me. Us.’ My voice shakes. I don’t care; let him hear it.
‘We can be friends,’ he says hollowly. ‘We’ll always be friends.’
‘I don’t want to just be your friend! We’re more than that. I’m more than that!’
He lets me in again, just for a second. Leans in close and brushes my hair back from my forehead, holding onto my cheek, breath hitching, eyes black.
I have never seen him like this.
‘I just really have to go,’ he repeats.
‘Go where?’
‘Out. When I get back, I need to … not see you for a bit.’
‘This is insane!’ I protest. My heart’s hammering so hard it feels like I might throw it up. ‘We don’t have to … we can … we’ll figure this out. We always figure it out.’
I try to reach him with my eyes, but he’s as far away as he’s ever been. He starts shoving things haphazardly into a backpack. When he turns to look at me, his features are stone.
‘I started it. It’s my fault. I made a mistake, and … I’m sorry.’ His face falters on the word ‘mistake’. That one hurts.
‘I get that you’re scared,’ I persevere. ‘And, I don’t know, maybe you don’t think you deserve good things – or things you want, or whatever – but you do.’
‘I don’t want this!’ He hurls the words at me like acid.
Then he walks out the door and down the stairs.
I watch him in the garden, morning sun drenching his hair like a spotlight. It follows even when he slams the gate and exits onto the street, as though it knows: he’s taking it with him.
Part III
You are so young, so much before all beginning, and I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
– Rainer Maria Rilke
22
For days, I don’t sleep.
I go through the motions of life: eating, cleaning, answering basic questions. But I don’t sleep.
I just lie there. For hours. Thinking about everything and nothing, the monotonous silence broken only by the hammering in my chest that never lets up. I can’t stop hearing it – obsessively counting the too-fast beat.
Lacey texts that she’s staying indefinitely.
He doesn’t call. Neither do I.
I type: just tell me if ur ok and backspace it, approximately eighteen times.
I wonder too. Years of constant proximity have instilled in me an innate need to know where he is, what he’s doing, if he’s safe, if he’s happy. I’m used to knowing. I’m not used to needing to.
I’m not used to missing him like this.
It’s so bad, I wantonly skip school for the first time ever.
On the third day, Mum and Dad stage an intervention.
I haven’t told them the specifics. I’m loyal enough to Len not to say anything, for better or worse.
They know something’s up, though, and they bulldoze into my room on Tuesday morning armed for a fight.
Mum sits down on the bed beside me and hands me a takeaway coffee. I spin it around, see the café logo, and feel sick.
Her face puckers with concern. ‘What’s wrong, Hen? You look like someone’s died.’
It feels like they did. (Like I did.)
‘You know you can always talk to us,’ Dad says.
I don’t know where to start and I’m exhausted, so I do something I can’t remember doing before: I lie to their faces.
‘Just stressed about exams.’
Mum pouts. ‘You said you felt like you’d done all right.’
‘You know we don’t care about that shit,’ Dad says. ‘With us as parents, we’re just lucky you’re not a drug addict.’
I can feel both of them wanting to ask about the elephant in the room but knowing to hold back. I’m abruptly, incredibly glad these people are my parental units.
‘I’ve just fucked everything up,’ I murmur. ‘All of it.’
Dad tsks. ‘You’re eighteen! All of it hasn’t happened yet. What’s this really about, champ?’
I push myself upright. ‘I appreciate the pep talk, guys, but I’m fine. I just need to get out of the house for a bit. Thanks for the coffee.’
Mum scrutinises my face, but then they leave me to it.
I throw on some clothes and grab my keys. I do need to get out of here – that part wasn’t a lie.
Today is drawn in grey; it cloaks me when I step out into it. It’s drizzling but only slightly, the rainclouds almost as lethargic as I am.
I don’t know where I’m going. I just drive aimlessly through the neighbouring suburbs and then onto the highway, until I’m headed towards the coast with all the windows down. Wind bites my hair and face and I turn the radio up to blasting.
I reach the turn-off for the coast road but hesitate, blinker clicking, the Pissar wheezing.
Someone honks from behind me. I swing around through a divider and turn back the way I came, ignoring the shouted expletives. The city springs up ahead of me, a blue-grey co-conspirator of misery. I decide to drive into the heart of it, since mine’s a shredded pulp.
I end up at the old bookstore in the CBD that Mum and I used to go to. Miraculously, there’s a park right out front. I reverse in, only slightly nicking the curb, and put my money in the meter.
It’s quiet at this time of day, not quite breakfast or lunch.
I order another coffee from the counter at the back and then browse the shelves half-heartedly until I land on a thick-looking academic examination of Caligula’s mental state. Perfect.
I’m several pages into the chapter about him making his horse a Consul when my phone pings with a text. I flip it open, clicking on the message without reading who it’s from.
Emilia: <33333
She’s attached an image. I open it, expecting to find a picture of a dog doing something funny or her pulling a face. Instead, it’s the photo Willa posted of us at The Party at the start of last term. That feels like years ago now.
I’m lying on the couch, my head propped on a pillow on Len’s stomach. His black-clad legs are dangling in front of him and his arms are around me loosely, one hand resting on my chest and one on the opposite shoulder. Our heads are bent together, cheeks touching, eyes closed and mouths parted, asleep.
I stare at them for a long time, these versions of us; they look so peaceful. I want to rewind.
I keep staring at it until the bottom half of my coffee is cold.
I go back to school on Wednesday, nerd that I am. My personal apocalypse takes place, and I’m still sitting in home room at 7:56 with my religion book ready for first period, three days later.
The first time I see him cuts like a knife.
The second time is duller, but still blade-like – a fifteenth-century practice sword, maybe. I watch him walk through the quad, shoulders square, and the splinters twist in my chest.
I want to talk to him (so much), but decide to take the high road.
Vince corners me in maths when it’s just the two of us.
‘What in the ever-loving shit is going on?’ he demands. ‘Why’ve you and Citizen Cane gone full St
alin and Lenin?’
‘Top historical reference,’ I compliment blandly, stalling for time.
‘Been studying your flashcards, haven’t I?’ he responds impatiently. ‘Don’t try to change the subject.’
‘We had a fight,’ I say. ‘It was nothing.’ Even to me, it sounds weak.
Vince gives me the evil eye. ‘That’s a bloody understatement. When I asked him where you were the other day, he went off like a frog in a sock. What’d you fight about?’
I’m spent by this day, and it’s not even lunch. ‘Just leave it, okay?’
To my surprise, he does.
Harrison and Ged have similar reactions when I tell them I’m going to the library at lunch. I can tell the latter wants to shake the truth out of me (by brute force if necessary), but Harrison holds him back.
They probably assume I’ll crack eventually. It’s usually a safe bet, but not this time. I’ll take this secret to the frigging grave.
Between library exile lunches and it mostly being an elective classes week, I make it through two days only seeing Len in passing.
Our lockers are still a problem, though.
On Friday afternoon before our last debate club meeting, I bodily run into him while I’m pulling party food out of my locker, books and chips hitting the floor.
We both stop for a minute in the harsh-lit hallway. Habit. Gravity.
Len opens his mouth, then closes it again, and stalks away.
(Seriously?)
I snatch up my stuff off the floor, and set off after him.
Martin’s already waiting outside shit block with three bottles of Coke Zero. Harrison, Eamon and Ben are there too, with various baked goods. Len leans against the bubblers.
I regret deciding to make this a party. My mood’s about as celebratory as sugarless soft drink.
Once we’re all inside, Len sits right at the back.
We divvy out the food quickly, crunching chips. It’s so quiet it would be awkward, but there’s always Martin Finch.
‘Is anybody else finding all these revision lessons counter-productive?’ he asks.
‘You’re kidding, right?’ Ben looks horrified.
The Fincharoo is not kidding. ‘Research shows that dedicated individual study time is best! We should be doing it at home, away from distraction.’
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