Freestyle Love

by Marcus Lopes

  Two

  “On a clear day I imagine you can see Toronto,” Shane said, pushed open the sliding patio doors and stepped onto the balcony. The air was warm and humid, the sky a dull blue-grey after the rain that had fallen most of the day. On the balcony, Shane leaned against the brown-painted metal railing and gazed into the thick dark grey clouds rolling across the sky and ready, it seemed, to unleash another rapturous downpour.

  “Not quite, darling,” Malachi drawled as he came onto the balcony, tapping Shane on the shoulder and then sitting down in the oak-stained chair on the far side of the round patio table. He took a sip of wine and said, “Perhaps from the other side of the building you could see Toronto,” and nodding his head forward, “the only thing that way is Chemong Lake.”

  “Still, it must be a spectacular view,” Shane said and sat down in the chair opposite Malachi.

  Malachi smirked. “One you’ve seen before.” He set his wineglass on the wobbly table.

  “I meant the view of Toronto,” Shane said dryly.

  “Right…” Malachi moaned, with the suggestion that he was annoyed by such silly talk. He had invited Shane over for a drink after an exhausting day at Claredon College. Malachi and Shane had first met at the college where they both taught. Malachi was eager to discuss Cole Malcolm without necessarily mentioning his name.

  They looked at each other, over the top of their wineglasses, as they sipped their wine, like two people in collusion and planning some practical joke. Shane was trying to decipher what it was about Malachi that was different. Shane pulled his wineglass back from his mouth as his eyes narrowed. He set his wineglass down on the table, folded his arms and sat back in his chair, smiling. When he had first met Malachi he had noticed, and had come to admire, the air of conceited confidence that Malachi wore — of having everything under control. On this particular evening, that confidence had been replaced by an air of quizzical adolescent curiosity, and it pleased him to see Malachi flustered, insecure, and in an odd way, common.

  Shane said primly, “You’ve met someone…”

  “Don’t be absurd,” Malachi said and dropped his gaze.

  “What’s his name?”

  Malachi, desperate to free himself from the obsession that immured him, looked at Shane and said, “I hardly think you need to know his name.” A smile spread across Malachi’s face.

  “Aha…” Shane let out a soft chuckle, and studied the wonder lust dancing about in Malachi’s eyes. Even without knowing the name of the man who had succeeded at penetrating Malachi’s heart, Shane knew that whatever was happening between Malachi and his new lover was indeed significant, and for Malachi one inconvenient truth. “This has been going on how long?” he said, coolly, and reached for his wineglass.

  “Not long at all,” Malachi said and stiffened. For so long he had felt disconnected from a world obsessed with love and the necessity to be with someone, and that his happiness depended on it. It was the nature of the human condition, the mysticism of everyone having a soul mate, the perfect partner, one true love. But he had lost his faith, and no longer believed in enduring love. It was a great mythology, just like religion, when he hoped to find joy within his life as it was, live in the moment instead of barrelling haphazardly towards some unforeseeable future. “In fact, we’ve only seen each other once.”

  Shane grinned, showing his white, straight teeth. “So that’s what happened to you the other night.”

  Malachi felt buttery inside as he thought about Cole’s hot mint-scented breath, the warm kisses, the gentleness of his touch. Cole had told Malachi that he was beautiful — something no one had ever said to him before — and there was, for Malachi, within that moment, peace of mind, healing of a broken spirit. When Malachi crawled into bed at night alone, the sense of isolation and disappointment at being on his own tackled him, wrestled him to the ground, defeated. Waking up to Cole laying there beside him and listening to his low-pitched snore filling the air, Malachi did not feel cut off from the world. It disturbed Malachi to feel so completely lost in the quagmire of Cole Malcolm; the very foundation of Malachi’s happiness had been shaken, cracked, and was now crumbling. Malachi was, after all, happy in his life, a respected professor of English literature and creative writing. His second novel had made the national bestseller list in the Globe and Mail, and had remained there for twenty-two weeks. His third novel had been short-listed for the Governor-General’s literary award for fiction. But Cole Malcolm was the force chipping away at Malachi’s happiness.

  “Tell me about him,” Shane said, with a hint of suspicion. The slight edge in his voice suggested that he really did not want to know.

  While they were close, best friends, there were certain “details” that Shane and Malachi did not disclose to each other. It did not seem appropriate to them, or remotely interesting, to reveal the more explicit details of their sexual encounters with others. There were, after all, books and magazines and films that were much better at describing such things. Shane liked to imagine that Malachi preferred to dominate, and had once jerked off daydreaming to Malachi fucking him.

  Malachi sometimes laughed when he thought about Shane having sex, and how Shane might be the type to let out a little squeal or perhaps loud grunts of pleasure or get off on dirty talk. Malachi had a strange feeling that Shane liked to be humiliated. How could Malachi describe Cole? One thing was for certain, Malachi, when he was not at the college or home writing, could not stop thinking about Cole. Cole was omnipresent in Malachi’s thoughts. Malachi did not know much about Cole, except for the details disclosed on Cole’s business card: Borden & Co., Senior Consultant, Toronto.

  Malachi said, in a whisper, “He’s a great kisser,” and glanced away.

  “I see,” Shane said solemnly.

  “I said I couldn’t see him again.”

  Shane tied his face in knots. “Why did you say that?”

  “He lives in Toronto —”

  “So?”

  “It just wouldn’t work.”

  “So you say,” Shane said, lifting his wineglass in the air as if he were about to make a toast. He sipped his wine, and then surprised himself by saying, “Did you fuck him?”

  Malachi, at first taken aback by the question, offered a wary laugh. Malachi was thinking about Cole standing naked before him in the kitchen.“I know where his birthmark is, if that’s what you mean,” Malachi said and settled back into his chair.

  The hours Malachi had spent with Cole were worth embellishing, and talking about them again made it seem like Malachi was reliving the moment right then. Malachi was hard, an angled erection bulging in his pants. Had Shane noticed that? Malachi hoped not. Could it really not work between Malachi and Cole? Did Shane believe that? Malachi wasn’t sure he believed it himself. Shane believed in true love just like he believed in fate. And Shane knew that Malachi would buckle at the intrusion of either. Malachi did not like it when his routine, ordinary life, was threatened.

  “It’s true,” Shane said, looking humourlessly at Malachi, “that you barely know him.”

  Malachi nodded. “A complete stranger.”

  “I mean, really, a few hours of mediocre sex.”

  Malachi gave Shane a thin smile. “The sex was anything but mediocre.”

  “Oh…” The surprise in Shane’s contralto voice masked his disappointment. When it came to one-night stands, Shane’s execution was efficient and direct. As so often was his experience, stepping into the darkness of his condo after picking up at Groove, and simply shoving his guest’s pants down between their thighs. Shane had imagined Malachi and this stranger in and out of bed — if they had in fact made it to the bedroom — with the same haste and familiarity of his own one-night stands. “So you’re smitten…”

  “Nothing so romantic,” Malachi said, with a humourless air, but he lacked assurance of that all the same.

  “How does he feel?” Shane asked, nervously.

  “He’s completely in love with me,” Malachi said, with
conviction, and laughed.

  “Ha-ha.” Shane stood and moved to the railing, turning around to look at Malachi. A wave of jealousy, disdain even, rippled through Shane as he contemplated his old friend. Malachi was the last of his friends who was single, who didn’t have to check with someone else before committing to do something. Of course, Shane wanted Malachi to be happy, but Shane also wanted to hang on to Malachi. Shane was never good at sharing. “Then I don’t understand why it’s impossible. ”

  Malachi stood, and as he passed Shane, said coyly, “Maybe it’s not impossible,” and made his way into the kitchen. Shane followed, and slid closed the balcony door. Shane set his wineglass on the counter next to Malachi’s and watched as Malachi portioned out the remainder of the wine between their glasses. Malachi, pouring the last bit of wine into Shane’s glass, said, “Do you think I’m waiting on happiness?”

  “I don’t know what that means,” Shane said, harshly, and picked up his wineglass. Shane was not a thinker, not like Malachi, the aesthete, and Shane easily became irritated when Malachi asked such meaning of life questions. And then, almost mockingly, Shane said, “Is that what he said to you when you told him you wouldn’t see him again?”

  “Yes.”

  Shane laughed. “And do you think he’s right, that you’re waiting on happiness?”

  Malachi said, “No,” and, with his wineglass in hand, went into the living room and sat down on the sofa.

  Shane lowered himself into one of the brown leather club chairs opposite the sofa and, with a mixture of pleasure and concern said, “You don’t sound too sure.”

  Malachi said, “It’s just that when you think about —”

  “Because it was a one-night stand,” Shane said priggishly.

  “Yes.” Malachi took a sip of his wine and then set his wineglass down on the coffee table. Malachi had hoped that speaking about Cole to Shane would bring about a finality to it, truly render it impossible, but the idea of Cole continued to poke at Malachi, who did not know what to do anymore. “It just seems —”

  “Too good to be true?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Because he’s interested?”

  “Yes,” Malachi said askance, and bounced off the sofa, shaking his head as he paced the area in front of the entryway to the dining room. “But beyond that —”

  “You’d say beyond that there is truth.”

  Malachi sighed frustration, his hands cupped to the sides of his head and slowly dragging them down his face. He stopped pacing, and looked at Shane. “Truth, that’s what makes it so —”

  “So?”

  “Immoral.”

  “Immoral.” Shane let out a straight-from-the-stomach laugh. He set his drink down on the coffee table as he rocked back and forth, clenching his stomach, but he could not control the repeated convulsions of laughter that tackled his body. His mouth and eyes were moist. Although tears blurred his vision, Shane could still discern Malachi’s cool, disapproving look.

  “Stop that!” Malachi, leaning against the entertainment centre, sat back down on the sofa, his nostrils flaring.

  “Do you hear yourself?” Shane chuckled again. “Immoral. What pray tell does that mean?”

  Malachi, biting down on his parched lip, looked away. “That everything is out there, running ahead of us…beyond.” Malachi knew he wasn’t making much sense, that now there was even more incongruence in his life than before. “It’s like we’re constantly giving ourselves over to an uncertain future, as if that’ll give us peace of mind, make us truly happy. I guess that’s what makes it corrupt. Happiness should be an awareness of now, of being in the present moment, right?”

  “Corrupt and immoral!” Shane hooted, and slapped his hand against his leg, his eyes once again becoming moist and struggling to curb his compulsion to laugh. “Oh, dear,” he said, and rubbed his right eye and then his left. “I’m sorry, but you know I’m not good with that psychobabble and new age philosophy. I mean, why do we have to think about being happy or what that means? Happiness is a feeling, no? It doesn’t seem to me that you wait on happiness as much as happiness waits on you.”

  Malachi looked curiously at Shane and smiled. “Where did that come from?” They laughed. Malachi said dryly, “Maybe I am thinking about this too much.”

  “Overanalyzing, you mean,” Shane said, still revelling in his own cleverness that had surprised even him. Perhaps Shane wasn’t a thinker but somewhat of a philistine; but Shane knew that Malachi would find a way, some justification, to displace, undermine, curtail, smother happiness — the possibility of happiness. Shane continued, “So why don’t you call him,” and gulped the last mouthful of wine. Malachi’s raised eyebrows and coy smile were signs that he had not been moved. Shane lifted himself out of the club chair. “Early day tomorrow.” He made his way towards the door. Malachi followed. Shane opened the door, and looking intently at Malachi, said with an impassioned emphasis, “Call him,” and waved as he strutted into the corridor.

  The door closed, and Malachi turned over the deadbolt. He returned to the sofa and stretched out, his legs crossed and his hands cupped to the back of his head, and stared dreamily at the stark white ceiling. Malachi frowned, held hostage by the fragments of his conversation with Shane coming into his mind, piecemeal. Had Malachi done something wrong? Of course Malachi had done nothing wrong, or unsafe — but he had hoped that in hearing himself talk about Cole that there would be some sort of revelation, some great truth that would reveal itself. Shane’s dramatic supplication, “Call him,” had not really swayed Malachi or compelled him into action. It had been so long since Malachi last felt this rush of emotion, of absolute giddiness, seizing hold of him, making him irrational. He often wondered how love could be a saving force if it were constantly absent from his life. Or was it that he was absent in love?

  Malachi reached for the remote control for the TV and caught a glimpse of the envelope with “Holiday Inn” stamped in the upper-left corner. He sat up and stared at his name, printed in neat block letters, before lifting the envelope off the coffee table, holding it delicately, as if weighing its contents. The envelope had been left on the radiator in the foyer to his condo building, which one of his neighbours had found and had slipped it under his door on the afternoon of the day he and Cole had parted. He pulled out the folded piece of paper, unfolded it, and glared at the text. He had not mentioned the note to Shane, which read as follows:

  Malachi,

  I am confident you will think me mad, but my heart is so certain, and for me to not say anything, then I would be unreal. I must see you again because I love you. It’s not as crazy as it sounds. Consider this seriously, thoughtfully. What I say to you now is real. Consider your own feelings, how it felt when we were together, and then contact me.

  I look forward to hearing from you.

  Cole

  Malachi had read and reread the note, trying to make sense of it all, to see beyond. He loves me. Malachi smiled, stood and, carrying the note to his office, remembered that warm flurry of love that had invaded his body when he woke up that morning to find Cole there beside him. Was it so impossible to conceive of love evolving from a one-night stand? Was it really so corrupt and immoral, or had Malachi unconsciously surrendered to the conditioning of his youth? Was he really as free as he thought he was from others’ opinions and beliefs?

  In that moment, it all felt complicated, and embarrassing. The responsibility of some possible future rested squarely with Malachi, a nagging grey weight in his chest that surprisingly carried both the promise of something new and wonderful and the fear of reliving old wounds. The faint sound of footsteps, from the unit above his, echoed through the silent room. Occasionally, he could discern the sound of a chair being dragged across the floor. These were only temporary distractions from the dilemma of Cole Malcolm and what Malachi was inclined to do about it. He glanced at Cole’s business card that was propped up against the photo of his grandmother next to the computer monitor and sighed
loudly, as if expelling that grey weight but it continued to linger.

  Malachi sat down at his desk, opened his email application and typed the email address that was on Cole’s business card, and then began composing a message. He drafted several versions, deleting them because he felt they made it sound like he was either too desperate or too expressive when he wanted to remain somewhat aloof, not that he wanted to play at something, but to, in a small way, keep his dignity intact. He settled on the following short missive:

  Cole,

  Let’s get together for dinner — my treat of course. This week’s a bit hairy. Maybe next weekend? Let me know what works for you and we’ll take it from there.

  Malachi

  After staring at the text for some time, Malachi dragged the cursor across the computer screen and clicked on the send button. Maybe I’m the one who’s mad. But in clicking the send button Malachi felt a sense of relief, the release of some great burden. It did not matter now whether or not Cole responded because Malachi had gone beyond to where there was truth. Malachi chuckled, shaking his head, and thought, “Shane’s right. ‘Beyond that there is truth’ is something I would’ve said.” He could hear the edginess in Shane’s usually calm voice.

  He shut down the computer and laid out his papers for the morning that he would work on before heading to the college. He went into the bedroom, slipped out of his blue jeans and tossed them in the chair in the corner of the room. He sat down on the bed and pulled off his socks and T-shirt. He stared blankly at the floor for a moment, feeling a certain anxiousness — not for Cole but for himself, now uncertain as to how close he had come to truth, or if he were capable of becoming whole. He climbed under the bedcovers and turned off the lamp next to his bed but he could not sleep. He lay there deliberating about Cole, and if he would respond. “It’s not the response that matters,” he said to himself, shifting from side to side. He thought about getting up and doing something but concentrating on anything would be impossible. He sat up in his bed, turned on the lamp and reached for the pen and black hardcover notebook he kept on the nightstand next to his bed. His hand sped across the page: The challenge is toseeoneself within thattruth — cryptic, deceiving, absolute — preying on the soul, trying to extract itself, searching out the core. He closed the notebook, returned it and the pen to the nightstand, and smiled a self-congratulating smile. He switched off the lamp, staring into the darkness and before long was fast asleep.