05
He sat on a chair, ceramic coffee cup held by both hands. Against the wane light of winter the pallor of his skin made the dark circles under his eyes more noticeable than they usually were. His beautiful hair was in disarray. His leather jacket was ripped on the right sleeve. There were specks of blood on the white V-neck he wore underneath.
“Are you a fucking idiot? Honestly?”
I paced back and forth not sure to do with my hands.
“It’s morning and I wake up to finding you on the hallway floor? What were you thinking going to the bar and fighting? You could’ve been fucking killed and—”
I stopped pacing and turned my back to him. Eyes shut, I rubbed my temples together. Tears. At a time like this and I was going to cry. And not out of anger but out of hopelessness. Unlike a man who cried but remained controlled, a tear travelling down his left cheek and nothing more—I sobbed. Openly, loudly, dramatically like a inconsolable child I didn’t stop until every tear gushed out of me. I wasn’t going to let him see that. Not when he wasn’t sober.
When I regained composure I turned around to find his face buried in his hands. The coffee cup was on its side, its contents pooled on the faux-wooden surface. His broad shoulders heaved. The window behind him framed buildings and concrete covered in snow. And suddenly like an avalanching mountain, his shoulders heaved faster and he started to weep.
Walking to him slowly, I reached from the other side of the table and grabbed his hands. He didn’t look up, couldn’t look up knowing him. Worse than being sad is someone knowing. I knew, was seeing it.
Already an object of shame, I vaguely felt like a catalog of things he’d rather forget, shove under a mattress when no-one was looking, and look through deep into the night when he couldn’t fend off desire.
“It’s okay,” I lied.
I was crying. My forehead was on his. I mouthed the words but the sounds wouldn’t come out.
“Everything will be okay.”
He didn’t let me see his eyes so I looked at the spilled juice on the table. Its sheen reflected what I didn’t want to see but knew I had to: two grown men more ashamed of needing each other than they were of behaving like troubled teenagers.
The start of November, a week before my birthday and I knew what to expect on the morning after today.
Ruffled sheets, his worn clothes on the carpet, some of my work clothes missing. And a piece of scrap on the night-table, “thank you” scrawled in pen. He wouldn’t return my clothes for a few months and I’d wear his jacket for the longest time.
