“It was odd not having you around. I got a lot of cleaning done.”
“I see that. You still avoiding your dissertation.” Nick stated it like a fact rather than a question. Tucker’s pale skin flamed pink.
“I know the writing is in my head. I just have to find the right words before I put it down.”
Nick snorted and took a large bite. He realized he hadn’t eaten all day, other than the coffees at the mechanic’s place, and slowly fell into silence as he devoured almost everything from the container.
Tucker was a year ahead of Nick in his PhD program. This was his fourth year, but definitely not his last. Unless he somehow managed to “find the right words” in the next three months, it looked like Tucker was going to be around for another semester. Which Nick could use. Tucker was always on time with the rent money and kept the small, two-bedroom place spotless. He was also really good with finding meals Nick would like.
Nick set down the container that he’d practically licked clean. “What number was that? It was delicious.”
“Four.”
“Get four more often.”
Tucker rolled his eyes. “Is there anything else you need? You’re acting a little odd.”
“The car is really fucked. New battery and brakes. Gonna cost a couple grand that I don’t have right now. I will have it in the future, and I know time makes everything, especially money problems, a lot better . . . but I’m having a hard time with mantras lately.”
“That’s because mantras aren’t anything. They’re purposely void of meaning so a reader can input whatever they want. ‘This too shall pass’? That means nothing. But say it to the right person, and it can mean everything.”
“Huh, I guess so,” Nick said. “And it’s run out of meaning for me. Especially when, on top of the car bills, I’m going to have to head to Toronto tomorrow for a tux fitting for a tux that I don’t think I can afford. Then there’s bus fare getting to Toronto and back. It’s . . . just really shitty right now. But I know it’s shitty for you too. That’s grad school.”
“Well, that’s what credit cards are for.”
“I can’t put a couple grand on my card. That’s . . . too much, and the interest rates would kill me.”
“So put the tux on it. Don’t think about the car right now. And,” Tucker said, digging into his pockets. He pulled out a couple of twenties and laid them on the table. “Take this for the bus.”
Nick blinked at the cash as if it were magic for several seconds. “No, man. I can’t take your money. Your number-four dinner is one thing, but this is too much.”
Tucker merely slid the money to Nick across the table. “Take it. You need it.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes,” Tucker said, rather impatiently. Nick touched the edge of the twenties and felt whatever pride he had wash away.
“Thank you. I’ll pay you back.”
“Consider this payback. You drove me around a lot last month. Remember the Hegel book? I use the car as much as you sometimes, you know.”
“Right, I suppose so.”
A couple of weeks ago, Tucker had needed to find some obscure German history book at the library, and when they didn’t have it, the two of them ended up taking an impromptu trip to Guelph, a town nearly an hour away, just to find a book that looked as if it were at least a thousand years old and bound in human skin. Nick had been grateful for the trip away from his office, so he hadn’t considered it something just for Tucker. Now, looking at the money in front of him, he knew it was an even enough trade. Not that he liked thinking that way. This would be enough for a bus ticket there and back to Toronto, he could put whatever tux on his credit card like Tucker said, and Greg had given him enough stalling tactics for the car. Things would be fine. Difficult, but fine.
“You’re an awesome friend, you do know this, right?”
Tucker smiled. “And a fantastic roommate. I mean, have you seen how clean this kitchen is?”
Nick laughed. “Yes, you’re great.”
Surprising himself, Nick rose from his chair and wrapped Tucker in a hug. Tucker’s skinny arms were stiff as he reciprocated, but he also seemed genuinely moved.
“Thanks, man,” Nick echoed. “I really do mean it.”
“Don’t mention it.”
It was too early. Way too early for Nick—and the sad part was that it was only ten in the morning. As he contemplated his poor life choice of staying up until 4 a.m. in order to watch Pitch Perfect (and then reading fanfiction about the film), he sipped coffee from a travel mug he’d borrowed from Tucker. Being an English grad student had spoiled Nick tremendously. Without classes to attend or actual in-class sessions to teach, he had too much power to decide his bedtime. And he clearly was not ready for this responsibility. Not if he still wanted to make it to Toronto for a tux fitting and a possible lunch with Levi and Alex without bags under his eyes.
Nick was wearing a zip-up hoodie with the hood over his bedhead, and his backpack over one shoulder. A couple of other people who seemed as tired as Nick also waited for the bus. It was easier to wait here than any stop in town, since he would be able to get first pick of the bus seats, and with how groggy he was feeling, he was not even remotely up for any kind of social contact or seat sharing. He was about to flick on his iPhone for music, when another group of people with giant suitcases at their side, most likely undergrads, swarmed the bus stop. Nick groaned and wanted to curse Alex for needing him on a Saturday—the busiest day for travel. Nick was scanning the crowd and attempting to do a head count so he could decipher whether or not he could sit alone when he skimmed a familiar white leather jacket.
The woman he’d run into from before stood in the lineup with a small red purse over one arm and a large backpack at her feet. She didn’t seem to notice him at all; she was completely engrossed in her phone. Something familiar-yet-foreign twisted inside Nick once again. He tried to see if she was wearing another Bouncing Souls T-shirt, or any kind of pop punk from the 1990s, but couldn’t tell. When he lifted his gaze from her shirt to her face, she was staring at him.
Nick froze. It looks like I was staring at her tits, doesn’t it? Shit. Nick turned away quickly as he heard his oldest sister’s recriminations in his head for his bad behavior towards women. There had been a solid year and a half before he came out to his sisters and parents as gay that Cheryl would pinch him anytime his eyes sunk to a woman’s chest when they were out in public. He imagined Cheryl now doing the exact same thing to her future son, teaching him how to respect women and to be terrified to look anywhere below a woman’s shoulders.
“Hey . . . you.”
Nick’s heart hammered again. The woman now stood next to him, her smile slightly crooked. “Hi . . .?” His voice hitched.
“Help me out here,” the woman went on. “Do I know you from the Grad House or somewhere else?”
“You— I— We bumped into each other. Yesterday.”
As soon as the woman made the connection, her smile fell. “Oh, of course. I’m so sorry.”
Nick shrugged. “Hey, it happens.”
“Are you all healed? I didn’t actually break anything, right?”
“No, no. I’m fine.”
She nodded slowly, then smiled. “Sorry, it’s coming back to me now. I see a lot of faces, so I sometimes forget who is from where. You’re the Bouncing Souls guy.”
Nick beamed at the name. “I am? Awesome. Are you the Bouncing Souls girl, then?”
“I can be. Not today, though.” The woman undid her leather jacket and displayed a bright-pink and black T-shirt with the name Letters to Cleo on it.
“Ah, very nice. I don’t know much by them, but I appreciate the vintage quality of it.”
“Totally.”
Their conversation became fragmented as the people around them began to stir. The green GO Bus was stopped at the lights closest to the school. Nick gathered his bag from the ground and noticed the woman had hers by her side.
“So,”
she said as she dug through her purse, “I normally hate riding GO buses like this. Super uncomfortable, and I’m never sure if I’m going to get a weirdo or not. But you seem nice, so I think I’d like to take my chances with you. Do you mind if I sit with you?”
Nick laughed. His cheeks heated. Why did this kind of attention feel so nice? It wasn’t quite the same thing as approval from his sisters or his best female friends. This was the same kind of butterfly swooning he first got when Greg had said he was smart and sexy (even though, at the time, he’d definitely had a soul patch) or when Barry had said he’d write a song for him (even if the song itself had never materialized). It was attraction—desire. But she’s a woman. And that’s just plain weird. So it has to be something else.
“Sure,” Nick said. “I think I’d like that. But only if we can keep talking about music.”
“Of course. I’m Katie, by the way.” She extended her hand for a shake as the bus pulled up. Her palms were large in Nick’s, but her skin was soft.
“I’m Nick.”
On the second floor of the bus, it felt like Nick could see all of Waterloo laid out before him. Katie sat in the aisle seat after putting her bag in an overhead compartment, while Nick kept his at his feet. As they’d shuffled onto the bus, he realized that Katie wore no heels but was still as tall as him. When they sat down, Katie seemed smaller only when she crossed her legs.
“So, you like the Souls and Letters to Cleo,” Katie said after getting comfortable next to him. She was about to say something else when Nick jumped in.
“Well, I can’t really say much about Cleo. I mean, I just know the 10 Things I Hate About You reference.”
“Ah, but that’s still lots.” Katie tilted her head, as if to assess him. “Are you a film buff?”
“I love movies, yeah.” Nick smiled. When she mirrored the action, he had to look away. He fisted the material of his jeans—a nervous tick he hadn’t done since defending his master’s thesis. “But . . . I’m not a buff. Not in the film-critic kind of way.”
“What do you mean?”
Nick sighed, realizing that this was a much larger discussion than they maybe wanted to have. Her heart-shaped face was open, though, and a faint trace of a smile was still on her lips. She wanted to hear about his random movie opinions, whatever they were. “So, most of the people I know who are into film are grad students who fawn over French New Wave cinema. Or tell me that Kubrick is a god among men. And yeah, I’m all for Jean-Luc Godard and Clockwork Orange, but that’s not what I stay up really late watching at night, you know?”
“Okay, I see that. So what do you stay up late watching?”
Nick chuckled lightly, looking away in subtle embarrassment. “Let’s just say I watched Pitch Perfect last night when I should have been sleeping.”
Katie’s eyes widened. “Oh my God. I love that movie.”
“Really?” Nick said. “That’s amazing. I’ve been expecting everyone to give me shit for it.”
“Everyone?” Katie lifted a perfectly manicured eyebrow. She pursed her lips in a dramatic way, as if she was about to give him sage-like advice. “I think you may need to find better people to hang around if they’ll give you shit for watching a movie.”
“Yeah, probably. Comes with the territory as an English grad, though. Some people in my program are actual film buffs who write long academic papers for journals about this stuff. Which means I get into an argument about Citizen Kane at least once a week. Or I used to, when I was on campus more.”
“I feel you. Probably more than you know.” There was a playful hint to her voice, something that made Nick want to pay attention. Before he could ask her anything, she shifted the topic. “You’re at Waterloo, then? Student?”
“Student and teacher. PhD candidate.”
“Ah,” Katie said, as if that explained everything. Nick found it odd, that though he had been quite forthcoming, Katie didn’t offer to share anything at all about what she did. Other than those Russian art books, Nick had no real idea. He tilted his head, studying her small nose and blue-green eyes as the bus merged into a new lane and promptly became stuck behind a transport truck.
“So what do you like, Katie?” Nick tried to mimic her carefree tone, when he was actually quite desperate to know the answers. “Other than the Souls and Letters to Cleo?”
“A lot of things.”
“All right. Play a game with me, then?”
“A game?”
“Yes, come on. I promise it’s not hard.” When Katie didn’t say no, Nick went on. “This is word association. Very simple. I say two things that you might like and you have to pick the best one.”
“Isn’t ‘the best’ subjective?”
“That’s the point. Most art is subjective, right? This game is my way of seeing someone’s worldview. What movies or books or music do they like more, without thinking, without really explaining. Just picking.”
“Well,” Katie said, her voice low and throaty, “I think you may need more than just media to get me, but fine, fine. Let’s play.”
“Great. Stanley Kubrick or John Carpenter?”
“Oh, Carpenter.”
“Carpenter or Wes Craven?”
“Well, Craven. You can’t go wrong with Scream. Have you seen the Netflix version of it?”
“No! Not yet, but don’t get too ahead of me,” Nick said. A fuller picture of Katie came into his mind as he crafted the next question. “What about scary movies or funny movies?”
“Funny.”
“Romantic or sad?”
“Romantic.” Katie laughed and casually toyed with the ends of her long, dark hair. “Please. I’m so done with sad stuff.”
“Aren’t we all? So, next one: Sleepless in Seattle or You’ve Got Mail?”
“Hmm. You’ve Got Mail, but really, that’s an unfair question.”
“Because they’re both good?”
“No, because they’re both terrible. Sleepless in Seattle is a stalker flick, and well, You’ve Got Mail seems behind the times now.”
“Fair enough,” Nick said. “Just a couple more questions, then I swear I’ll leave you alone. I’m sure you’ve brought your iPod and are probably dying, like I usually am, to zone out.”
“Yeah, I can’t go anywhere without mine. But I did ask to sit with you, and I kind of like this game. So long as I eventually get to reciprocate, right?”
“Oh, definitely,” Nick said. “You know, that’s better. Let’s switch to you now. Ask me your worst.”
“All right, so . . .” Katie rubbed her hands together eagerly, displaying the same purple nail polish as before, but significantly more chipped. “Foreign films or musicals?”
“Musicals. Please.”
“Seemed obvious, but I wanted to be sure. Now, Rent or Rocky Horror Picture Show?”
“Rocky Horror. Hands down.” Nick shook his head with a belaboured sigh. “Man, I hate Rent. It’s terrible. Ask me harder questions, because this is too easy.”
“Oh, sweetheart. I’m just warming up.” Katie laughed dryly. She scrunched up her face in deep thought before she broke out a large grin and a new question. “Eighties movies or nineties movies?”
Nick let out a small tsk-tsk. “Well done. That is an evil question. But I’m going to be a pedantic ass and ask you to specify what genre we’re talking about here, because it matters. Action? Romance? Teen movies?”
“All of the above.” Katie smiled with a nonchalant shrug. “I’m curious.”
“Well.” Nick pretended to crack his knuckles as if he were about to start a battle. “Definitely not eighties action movies. I know that seems counterintuitive when you have Lethal Weapon and Die Hard there, but hear me out. Those movies played the action genre for laughs. No action film took itself seriously, which isn’t always good for the genre as a whole. Also, you have Reagan in office when those were made, making any kind of political message slightly warped. So, in the 1990s, when he was out of office, directors and writers learned fro
m their prior mistake and could refine their titles. It’s why you have stuff like Léon: The Professional and The Rock.”
“So you argue for the sake of the genre, not its titles?”
“A genre is nothing without it’s titles, but yes. Mostly.” Nick watched as Katie seemed to digest this information with a small nod before he carried on, trying to calm his excitement as he did. “But teen movies in the eighties were perfect and nothing can compare. The Breakfast Club. Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Sixteen Candles. I will pretty much die for John Hughes is what I’m saying.”
“Same, really,” Katie said, her voice cracking a little. She cleared her throat before she spoke again. “Pretty in Pink has gotta be my favourite.”
“Oh, good choice. But I still haven’t answered the romances in eighties or nineties. That’s just . . . too hard. It’s like Sophie’s Choice, but instead I’m caught between When Harry Met Sally and Pretty Woman.”
“Should we call it a draw, then?” Katie stuck out her hand for a shake before waiting for Nick’s response. “Because I’m not really sure I know the answer either.”
“Okay. I like that. A draw sounds fair.”
Nick placed his hand in hers once again, the touch more prolonged this time as they shook. Katie’s smile was slightly more crooked than before, and after their handshake was done, her gaze darted back to the bus window. Is she nervous? Upset? Did I say something bad about her choices? Nick’s throat felt dry from all the talking, and he wished he still had some coffee left. Katie’s voice had cracked more than once when she’d spoken too long, making Nick think she also needed a drink. Maybe that’s why the game’s over now. Nick didn’t even know what other categories he’d left out from their round, only that he liked hearing her opinions. They lined up with so much that he liked, but when they had differences, it was interesting rather than conflict inducing. At least, that’s what I thought. When the bus merged onto the highway and had completed its last pickup stop until Toronto, Nick found his iPhone again and skimmed through the songs. All he wanted to hear now was something, anything, from one of the films they’d just finished analyzing.
Hopeless Romantic Page 3
