Chapter 12 #3
‘I’m talking about my future. I’m pretty damn good at what I do.
And I’d be great if I stopped whining about other options I don’t even have.
Or if I stopped panicking about my parents’ expectations.
They believe in me, what’s wrong with that?
And they’re what they are, but I’m outrageously privileged, and I should contemplate giving that up for… what? The sake of rebelling?’
George mimes a brain explosion, which Charles chooses to ignore because he’s about to muddle up even more.
‘And it’s not just that! I have the greatest bunch of friends, but I’m ruining the fun, feeling like shit and hiding that I feel like shit because I can’t explain why I feel like shit. And I have the most fantastic girl, but I take her for granted instead of—’
‘Hold your horses, Chasanova! The fantastic girl is not yours to accept or refuse or make spinach of!’
‘She could be again. I’ve never fought that battle.’
‘Good grief… Why am I sober for this?’
‘You have a problem with Els, now?’
‘Not at all! I’ve got so very little problem with Elsy that I forbid you to do that!
You know what? Hug Milton goodnight if that feels right.
Embrace the MBA as a good fit if it helps.
Have a blast working for Clifford & Vultures.
Do all that, I’ll keep my mouth shut. But don’t you dare use Elsy as a ploy in your existence reassessment.
If her failed affairs with wankers are taking a toll, an assertive and crispy Chips may stand a chance. So don’t play games! You hear me?’
‘You’re shouting in my face.’
‘But do you hear me?’
‘Yes!’
‘Wicked!’ George glances at his watch, alerting him of an incoming call. ‘I think the fantastic girl is wondering where we are.’
‘Let’s go back.’
Charles sighs and inches towards the door, but George holds him by the sleeve.
‘Not just yet! Hear me once more. You’re the third brightest person I know, and the entire world is yours for the taking, or the refusing, but you’ve got to figure out what you want!’
‘I’m sorry, were you hearing me?’
‘Stop overthinking every single— No, don’t scoff me off! Just stop. Remember when you jumped in front of a bully to protect my backpack? Did you overthink before turning into an Avenger that day?’
‘I ended up hurt.’
‘Yes, and you knew you would, but you jumped anyway, because I was worth getting your arse kicked for. Something mattered to you so you made a split-second decision. Well, do that again when one of your backpacks confuses you so much that you lose the plot. Your backpacks or your plates of spinach. Stop weighing up what you’ve always thought of spinach against what you could do with spinach if, if, if…
Enough! You’ve got a plate, a bully appears and snatches it.
Do you jump to protect it at the risk of breaking a bone?
Or do you thank them for taking it away?
You need to spinach your dilemmas, simple as that!
Now you’re free to go. And please don’t make me yell again.
’ George exaggerates a shiver. ‘It’s so unsophisticated. ’
‘I’ll try.’ Charles swings an arm around his friend’s shoulders. ‘And I love you too, but… Third brightest person?’
‘You’ve got nothing on Hannah.’
Charles smiles and pulls him closer.
George allows it until the entrance hall where he wriggles away, plastering a grin on his face to greet Alex and his girlfriend Isa.
Fifteen tea pots are lined up behind labels indicating the cocktail they’re filled with. Charles reaches for the Long Island iced tea, only to close his hand into a skin-scratching fist.
Drinking his mind blank might bring him back to square one in the morning. However, it would postpone the decision-making process a while longer and—
He clicks his tongue. He just needs to spinach it.
He places his hazy conclusions onto a plate and the recipe to getting hammered onto another one. Nothing worth a beating from a bully, but if offered to keep one, he would choose his mental baby steps.
He grabs a beer from the ice bucket underneath the table and joins Phil, who’s slouching on a sofa, sipping Mai Tai from a China cup.
‘Did Elsy rent those tea sets?’ he asks when Charles sits down.
‘No, I’d say they all belong to Catriona.’
‘Who needs that many?’
‘Who needs five pairs of skis?’
‘Touché.’ Phil smiles and lowers his voice. ‘About that, did you have a chance to check with Elsy? Is she coming to Kitzbühel?’
‘I don’t think so, no. Her family from Scotland will travel down for Christmas and New Year. She’ll probably be stuck here. With all the tea sets.’
‘Brilliant! I mean, not for you. But I can play the “Sorry, love, it’s a boy trip!” card.’
‘What if George brings Hannah?’
‘Do you reckon he will? Come on, he’s known her for two months! But yeah, you’ve got a point. Naturally, Downes might make my life complicated…’
Charles clings on to his bottle as a new vivid vision of Loris – who he’s known for less than that – springs to his mind.
He tries to mentally exit the flat to stay with Phil, who’s searching for excuses to keep his girlfriend from joining their ski trip. Except Phil is now comparing different chalet parties they can attend on New Year’s Eve, and Charles has no idea at what point his friend switched topics.
When Phil gets up, tired of monosyllabic opinions, Charles barely has time to refill his constricted chest before Elsy slumps against him. She pulls the TV remote out of her dress, slides it hidden behind his back, then raises her phone.
‘Look.’
18:21 HRH CATRIONA In my study? Really, Elsy?
18:21 HRH CATRIONA Charles’ hair needs a trim.
Horrified, Charles shoves the phone next to the remote.
Elsy laughs, stroking the nape of his neck. ‘She’s right.’
‘Well, I’m not going to the barber until I forget that text exists. Until I forget Catriona exists.’
‘You’re losing the energy.’
‘The exhibitionist side of it? Yes. It will never happen again.’
‘We’ll see about that when I put my finger on what triggered you.’
‘Nothing triggered me… As I said, it had been too long.’
‘Indeed.’
Elsy nestles closer and Charles shuts his eyes, shaken to the core by how much he wishes her touch on his neck felt different.
He wasn’t seeking intimacy with Elsy because, lately, he’s only been longing for high-inducing massages and craving after honey-scented hair to bury his face into.
Because the smile scrambling the concepts of time and space was framed by a stubbly sharp jawline.
Because he was lulled to sleep by the echoes of a deep and accented voice.
For weeks, his brain did a fine job at disguising this fixation as a consequence of his new-found lucidity and the emotional impacts he was adjusting to. But the costume no longer fits now that his body has taken over.
And it doesn’t matter whether or not Charles was attracted to Loris from the start. He was when he kissed him, he is tonight and he will be the next time they meet.
Some of the tears thickening behind his eyelids arise from this terrifying reality. But most of them are due to the intuitive certainty that such reality comes at much too great a cost to consider tackling his bully over it.
‘Are you sleeping?’
‘Short power nap…’
‘I’ll go hide the remote in the safe. But what if Hannah can hack the safe from her phone? Or using the microwave panel? Damn it. I’ll just get her drunk!’
Elsy stands up, and Charles wedges his bottle between his thighs to fold his arms in front of his face. To dry with his sleeve the distress he might fail to contain.
***
Charles has never been great at basketball, and it didn’t help the accuracy of his pill throws that all the tears he held back at Elsy’s broke free as soon as he sat against his bathroom door. So on balance, he did well, only missing the toilet bowl six times.
He gathers up the loose pills on the tiled floor, chucks them into the water with the rest of Spencer’s stash and hastens to flush. He can’t wait and risk being tempted to swallow one.
Back in his room, he sits on the edge of his bed and unlocks his phone. He can’t afford to wait for this either. He’s already tempted to rethink the answer he came up with, one throw at a time.
He clears the pain from his throat and slides up the voice note key in his chat with Loris.
‘Hi… I’m sorry for replying so late, and I’m sorry for not having the balls to face you.
I… I just can’t. So… yes, I recall what happened and my analysis is…
I wanted to kiss you when I kissed you, but in general I don’t.
I’m not into guys, I don’t— I’m not interested in you that way.
And I don’t know if I sent mixed signals before, and even if I didn’t, this one was confusing enough on its own…
It’d be normal for you to get the wrong idea, but I don’t want you to— Especially if you’re into me and— But I’m not saying you are!
I don’t know, but if— Shit, I’m sorry… This is terrible.
It all sounded better in my head, and that says something because nothing ever sounds good in my head…
So all this to… apologise for acting on a brief moment of confusion.
And I apologise for the way I reacted and…
and then worried you. You didn’t deserve that.
You mean a lot to me and I’m grateful that I met you when I did.
I needed you and— The moments we shared, I needed that, but I’ve been too distracted lately and it’s been affecting some…
It’s not good and I believe it’s best if we don’t see each other for— If we…
If we don’t anymore. It’s just better for me…
I’m sorry about your drawings. I hope you can finish them without me, but you might not want to after this…
And I kept your polo shirt, I’ll have it sent to you.
And… It’s a long shitty mess of an answer, and it’s probably hurtful, so I’m sorry that you met me when you did, and that you had to deal with all my crap… I’m just… so fucking sorry.’
Charles pinches his lips to push back a sob, sends the voice note and sinks a thorn into his chest.
He tosses the phone aside and gropes his way to his desk.
He grabs a pair of scissors and his notebook, and starts cutting its pages above his bin.
The pages covered in half-baked ideas for a novel he won’t write and the pages filled with far-fetched theories about a brother who never existed.
Charles shreds them all to pieces, nicking the skin of his forefinger in the process, and once there’s none left, he drops the cover of the notebook on top of the dangerous ravings he should have never indulged in.
After a quick shower, he goes back to his phone and trips mentally.
He didn’t think Loris would still be awake.
01:17 WITH ONE L Don’t bother with the tshirt I don’t want it back
The thorn sinks deeper, and Charles brings a pillow to his face, to cry out the self-inflicted loss of the one thing he had chosen and built all by himself.