30. Downpour
30
DOWNPOUR
E ric’s eyes widened in surprise. “No, why? Isn’t he at school?”
Mathias ignored his question and started shaking him. “Does Zak know where he is?”
“Fuck, no! Why would Zak—” When Mathias released him, Eric abruptly fell silent. “What’s going on? Is everything okay?”
“You have no idea…” Mathias’s arms dropped to his sides. “I haven’t seen him all week, and before that… he…”
“Let’s go ask Zak, then.” Eric gave him a reassuring pat on the back. “Come on.”
Mathias was dragged back toward the others. The cake was gone, reduced to crumbs in the middle of the group. When Joy saw them approach, she turned her head to the side with an angry huff.
Eric tugged on Mathias’s arm as he sat between Xavier and Elodie. Mathias followed suit, his stomach in knots.
“Did you like the cake, Zak?” Eric asked. That wasn’t what Mathias wanted him to ask, but Eric seemed to feel the tension emanating from him and gave a light shake of the head. Mathias kept his mouth shut.
Zak was licking his fingers off one by one. “I loved it. Maybe you should learn to cook like Mathias, and make dishes just for me.”
The smugness in his tone… Mathias realized Eric might have been telling the truth about what they did last night.
“Maybe! We’ll talk about this later, at home .” When his tone turned serious, Zak’s cheeks grew two shades darker. But before he could retort, Eric abruptly asked, “What’s up with Alberto? Has he got kicked out at last?”
Mathias unconsciously balled his fists and shoved them in his pockets.
“No,” Zak said, eyeing his empty plate with regret. “Why do you say that?”
“Haven’t seen his long face all week.”
Zak stopped licking his fingers, turning thoughtful. “That’s true. He must be sick again. I heard him tell Mrs Paquin he’s often sick. I honestly believe he doesn’t get enough B12 in his diet, you know? He doesn’t eat meat.”
Recalling Christmas’s Eve, Mathias’s eyelid twitched. Zak knew everything about Alberto, whereas Mathias knew fuck all. How hard would it have been to make the effort to get to know him, really? Why had it seemed so insurmountable at the time, when today, all he wanted was to corner him and beg him to speak to him again?
“Oh, but has he texted you, then?” Eric’s voice rang false, but no one else seemed to notice. “For homework or… something?”
“No…” Zak furrowed his brow. “What are you insinuating?”
“Nothing. Just that, you’re friends and all, so…”
Zak immediately started shaking his head hard enough to unscrew it from his neck. “We’re not friends! We’re not close at all! He… He didn’t even invite me for his so-called cemetery birthday party—” Zak looked to the others for support. “He didn’t! Even though I invited him to my party.”
Mathias’s heart skipped a beat. Cemetery party…? Did he mean?—
“No, I did.” Eric gave a nervous laugh. “I did… that.” His eyes darted toward Mathias, who opened his mouth to ask something, but once again and to his dismay, Xavier beat him to it.
“Alberto had a birthday party in a cemetery? When?”
Zak gave the lot of them a bewildered look. “I don’t know! Months ago! His birthday’s the 4th of January, so around that time, I guess.”
The light in Xavier’s vacant eyes flickered. “He didn’t invite me either.”
Across from him, Melissa’s mouth fell open. “Yeah, like you’re so close,” she said, scathing.
Next to her, Joy’s face was a mask of resentment, but she kept her lips pressed tightly together.
Though Xavier pretended not to hear Melissa, Mathias noticed his face was flushed. “Has anybody seen Alberto at all this week?” he asked, now completely alert. “Anybody?”
His question was met with a puzzled silence.
Mathias tried to recall the 4th of January. Right after the Christmas holidays, after the museum disaster. School resumed on the third and the next day they… they went to visit Mom’s grave. Did this mean that the whole time, it was Alberto’s birthday, and he didn’t say a word? But why? Either he didn’t care enough to tell him, or… or he didn’t think Mathias would care. Probably the latter, Mathias realized, his stomach churning.
“What about during the holidays?” Xavier asked, pulling his phone out of his pocket. He glanced at his text messages, then opened up Instagram and a handful of other apps, before addressing Zak again. “When’s the last time you heard from him?”
“I don’t know…” Zak’s voice weakened. “Before the holidays? What’s going on?”
Seething in his silence, Mathias agreed: what the hell was going on? He felt Eric nudge him lightly with his elbow and forced himself to stay calm.
“Do you have regular conversations with Alberto?” Eric asked Xavier.
“Sometimes, but he hasn’t replied any of my texts during the holidays, so I…” Xavier’s face was turning ashen before their eyes. “I thought he might have gone abroad.” Dialing a number, he abruptly got up and stomped off, surprising everyone.
Mathias, his face hot, also scrambled to his feet. Eric followed, but not before reassuring the others with a calming gesture. “Everything’s fine.”
Xavier stood in the middle of the playground, his phone stuck to his ear. Mathias crudely invaded his space, causing him to turn to the side. “Any answer?” He could hear the tremor in his own voice and was aware he’d be found out soon if he didn’t keep his cool; but how could he stay calm, when dread was building up inside of him like dark clouds gathering before a storm?
“Straight to voicemail.”
It seemed Xavier, too, was blocked. But why was he acting so concerned? His worry was obviously, and painfully, genuine. It disoriented Mathias, who didn’t know if he should shake the truth out of him or comfort him as he himself wished to be.
Xavier looked lost, his phone in his hand. “I texted him, of course…” he muttered, as if to himself. “But he never replies to my texts, so I didn’t think anything was wrong. But if nobody has heard from him for three weeks… Nobody at all…” He gripped his phone. “You think… you think the school would have told us if something had happened, right?”
Mathias’s blood rushed to his head. Sweat prickling his armpits, he reached out toward Xavier’s shoulder. “What the fuck are you talking about, if something had happened?”
Instead of answering, Xavier turned away from him.
“What do you mean?” Mathias insisted, his voice cracking. “What could have happened?”
Eric gently called Xavier’s name. “Buddy. Do you think something could have happened to him?”
Xavier turned back around. His gaze was frosty when it fell on Mathias. “Yes, something could have happened to him. He’s… He’s not well.”
Mathias’s hands almost flew to grip Xavier’s jacket. He buried them, shaking now, in his pockets. “What are you saying?”
“All this time spent together, and you’ve never noticed?” Xavier cocked his head with a wry smile. “It’s you, isn’t it? The one he likes? The one he suddenly rushes to my parties for?” He rolled his eyes at Mathias’s stunned silence. “Fine, whatever. I don’t care.” He faced Eric. “He’s on antidepressants.”
Surprise stole across Eric’s face, replaced by a doubtful expression. “What? How do you know that?”
“I saw them,” Xavier said, serious. “This summer, in Aurons. When that drama teacher forced us to share the same room, Kayvin asked me to look through Alberto’s luggage, to find out stuff about him, or stuff to, you know…”
Steal? Mathias’s mouth twisted in distaste.
“I found his prescription meds in his suitcase. I recognized them because my uncle used to take exactly the same antidepressants. Then it made sense to me, why he’s acting like a zombie, like he’s not really here. The stuff he takes is so strong, no wonder why he falls asleep everywhere.” Xavier tossed Mathias a resentful look. “You’ve never noticed?”
Hovering by Mathias, Eric looked slumped, like his worldview had been shattered. His eyes darted between the two of them, his jaw slack. Upon hearing Xavier’s confession, Mathias didn’t look any better.
“I don’t…” Mathias shook his head. “I don’t… ”
Misinterpreting his bafflement for a denial, Xavier gave an exaggerated shrug. “You don’t what ? Alberto never wants to hang out with me, but the moment you two met at my party, suddenly he’s everywhere. And suddenly you disappear at the same time, and he’s smiling more, and you’re smiling more. I know he’s not coming to my parties for my sake. And after what Gwen and Kayvin did to him at my Christmas brunch, he would come back? You think I’m dumb, fine, but I’m not blind! I keep an eye on him all the time! You know who he keeps his eyes on?”
Mathias stomach lurched.
“Your ass, that’s right.” Xavier’s tone grew bitter. “Oh, and dude, I saw what you did at my party. The moment Kayvin moved, you were on him. To say nothing that Alberto actually came to watch a football game. That’s when I knew, even though you refused to admit you don’t like girls. Alberto hates football, for some reason. My cousin Gwen told me.” Xavier cast them a dim smile. “Eric’s not the only one who knows but pretends he doesn’t.”
“What about Kayvin?” Eric asked. “Does he know?”
“Kayvin has suspicions… not about Mathias, but about us. Me and Alberto. But we’re not lovers! We’re not! He has it all wrong.”
At last, Mathias broke out of his stupor. “Stop bullshitting, I saw you kiss!”
“So?”
“You did what?!” Eric started blinking super fast, like a malfunctioning cyborg. “You did wha?—”
“It was nothing. Just a kiss between friends.”
Ignoring Eric’s gasp of horror, Mathias puffed out a laugh. “Sure! Do you kiss all your friends like that?”
“At least, I take care of my friends. Alberto feels safe with me.”
These words stabbed Mathias right into the gut. He fell into an aggrieved silence.
“Okay, but…” Eric intervened in a tinny voice. “That’s all a bit gay and all…”
Xavier turned to him. “It’s best if you don’t tell Kayvin about that, okay? Or anyone on the football team. Or anyone at all. I didn’t see the problem at first until… you know. Until my party last time. Kayvin was furious, he accused me of doing stuff with Alberto behind his back and all. It took me ages to calm him down. So, I didn’t invite Alberto on purpose, but he still showed up!”
“I remember,” Eric said. “You told me you didn’t invite Alberto to avoid trouble, but when I spoke to him I… I thought he had already been invited. It’s my fault he showed up at your party.”
“When Kayvin saw Alberto dance with Melissa, he really lost it. He thinks everyone he knows is turning gay out of nowhere, and he’s already mad about it, but he really hates it when girls like Joy and Melissa give all their attention to ‘the gays’. He can’t stand it.”
“So, you’re just friends?” Eric asked, unsure. “You and Alberto.”
Xavier nodded. “Yes, friends. I care about him, that’s all. After I found his pills and I noticed how fragile he is”—Mathias scoffed—“I felt like I had a responsibility, you know… to watch over him.”
“Why don’t you watch over your own uncle, then?” Mathias snapped. He poked a finger in Xavier’s chest, his face burning. “And leave Alberto to me!”
Xavier pushed his hand away in an impatient gesture. “My uncle’s dead. He shot himself years ago.”
Mathias stood back, horrified. “Shit… I’m sorry.”
“I know. Everyone’s always sorry, after the fact.” A hint of defiance shone in Xavier’s eyes. “You all think depression’s a joke. Or maybe you don’t think about it at all until the consequences hit you in the face. You say I should leave Alberto to you, but you don’t even know where he is. You don’t even know how he felt, what he was going through. You don’t know anything, so don’t you start going all Kayvin on me.”
Mathias’s world tilted. Is that how everyone saw him? Charles-Henry, Eric, even Xavier. He was just a Kayvin in the making, a worthless bully, another asshole drawn to a career that would allow him to shout at people without consequences. “I’m sorry,” he repeated.
“I was watching over him when you were just fucking around.” Xavier’s expression twisted. “So don’t you dare look at me like that. Don’t you fucking dare.”
“I said I’m sorry, okay?” Mathias spoke in a hollow voice. “Because I am! I’m sorry—I’m sorry—I’m—” He stopped himself. He was worse than a parrot now. “I didn’t know.”
A warm weight fell on his shoulder. Eric had swung his arm over it. Mathias said nothing, grateful for this gesture of support.
“You’re right, Xavier,” Eric said. “If anything had happened, the headmaster would know about it. We should go and ask him.”
Just then, they were approached by Elodie and Joy. Sweat pooling at his armpits, Mathias forced himself to stand straight. What did they want, this time? He really couldn’t deal with them right now.
“Have you found Alberto?” Elodie asked .
Mathias didn’t answer. His jaw was wired shut with dread. Eric was uncharacteristically quiet, his eyes shrouded by concern. Xavier took upon him to answer with a shake of the head.
“There’s something you should know, maybe… I don’t know.”
“What?” Mathias finally asked in a raspy voice.
Elodie gently nudged Joy to speak.
“It could be nothing, but I’d hate…” Joy’s voice was quivering. “I’d hate it if something had happened to Alberto. I know we’re not friends, but I… I don’t think he’s a”—she gazed at Mathias—“a horse, or a thing…”
Mathias’s shoulders relaxed a little. He even managed to offer her a faint smile.
“What is it?” Xavier asked impatiently. “What do you know?”
“I saw something at your party, a month ago. Kayvin had cornered Alberto outside your house. He had him against the wall, and I…” Joy hesitated and turned to Elodie, who nodded in encouragement. “I overheard him threaten Alberto if he ever got near you again, Xavier.”
“Really? What did he say?”
“I really don’t want to say.” Joy sounded terrified. “Please don’t ask me. But it sounded bad, and now he’s missing or something? I don’t know. Maybe you should ask Kayvin if—” She gasped in surprise.
Mathias was already gone. His head swimming, he tore across the playground toward the lockers, where Kayvin held court. He was on him before the bastard could understand what was happening.
Adrenaline gave Mathias such strength that he lifted him off the ground. Kayvin found himself pressed against the lockers with a dumbfounded expression.
“What did you do to him?” Mathias was beside himself, the rage rushing through his veins blurring his vision. “What did you do to him?”
Kayvin’s eyes were twice their size, all white, the usual conceited pride all gone. “I-I-I don’t know who you’re talking about!”
Mathias’s fist smashed into his locker. When Kayvin saw how the metal had bent from the impact, he let out a yelp. “W-what’s your fucking problem?” His voice was as shaky as Joy’s a minute ago.
Mathias gripped him even harder. “Where’s Alberto, Kayvin?” When Kayvin failed to answer, he slammed his fist into his locker again. The metal screamed, but Mathias felt no pain. “Speak! What did you do to him? What happened after Xavier’s party?” So what if he sounded unhinged? Nothing mattered more than finding Alberto .
“Nothing, man, I…” At last, understanding dawned on Kayvin. His lips flapped stupidly until he found his words. “I swear I did nothing to him. I threatened him a little. He was… he and Xavier?—”
“What did you do to him?”
“Nothing! God! Nothing!”
Mathias didn’t believe him, and his fist found Kayvin’s locker again. “Tell me, you fucking piece of shit!”
Coming from behind, someone wrapped their arms around him to separate them, without success. Mathias could only see one thing, his reflection in Kayvin’s bulging, frightened eyes. He saw his future in the stupid look on his face: a frustrated, angry loser, without anyone by his side. “I hate you!” he yelled, pounding the locker until his hand grew numb. “I fucking hate you?—”
The sound of the airhorn announced the imminent arrival of the headmaster. Mathias instinctively let go of Kayvin, who let out a sob of relief. Mathias watched him slump against his destroyed locker with a cold indifference.
“You’re a fucking psychopath!” Kayvin shouted, his eyes red. “You’re all fucking crazy here!”
“I don’t want to be like you.” Mathias stood numbly, eyeing V.B. as he crossed the playground toward him with a stony face. “You don’t get it… I need him back.”
Next to him Eric was standing, his lips parted in silent astonishment. Mathias realized everyone on the playground was watching him. His friends, their expressions alternating between shock and horror, and other faceless students pointing their fingers at him. They all looked like cardboard cutouts, all except Van Bergen, who shoved Eric and Xavier aside to slam his beefy hand on his shoulder.
“Just give him back to me,” Mathias mumbled.
V.B.’s hand felt light on him. Everything else was a blur. Mathias glanced up toward the building, and a faint feeling of hope rose in his chest. Let’s go, let’s go.
“Please, Headmaster,” Eric said, his face full of anguish.
“Don’t even bother.” V.B. didn’t even look at him and pulled his charge toward his office.
“You’ve got to expel him, or I’ll call my father!” Kayvin shouted, somewhere in the back. He sounded really far away.
Let’s go.
Mathias floated more than he walked toward the main building. Where was Alberto? What happened to him? Did it occur to him to let go, to leave this world then? Was he gone, like Mom? Did Mathias lose him, too?
Death . The prospect kicked the stuffing out of him. His knees buckled, and he would have fallen flat on his face, if not for the headmaster, who yanked him right up. “You’re really busting my balls,” V.B. muttered through clenched teeth.
Back inside, V.B. pushed Mathias in his office without ceremony. “What the hell is your problem?” he boomed, slamming the door shut behind him. “Do you want to get kicked out so bad?” He stood against the far wall of his office with his arms crossed, his muscles stretching the gray fabric of his shirt.
Mathias eyed him warily for a moment. His wits were slowly returning to him. He was exactly where he needed to be, in the headmaster’s office. Where no one could hear.
“Where’s Alberto?” The cold anger in his voice made V.B.’s brow wrinkle with incredulity.
“Who?”
That only angered Mathias further. “ Alberto . Gazza. Première Littéraire A? 1 .”
The headmaster looked around the room. “What the hell?—”
Wrong answer. Mathias reached out behind him and swiped a pile of files off his desk. “Where’s Alberto?”
“Okay…” V.B.’s incredulity turned to mild amusement before Mathias’s eyes. “Before we do this, just know that trashing my office won’t achieve anything except pissing me off for disrespecting the cleaning staff.”
“Oh, really?” Mathias sneered. With a movement of his arm, another pile of documents was pushed off the desk. They burst open on impact, littering the floor with sheets of papers. Van Bergen glanced at the mess with a click of his tongue, but he didn’t move a muscle.
“Just tell me where he is.” Mathias’s voice was shaking.
“Who, Alberto?”
“Yes, asshole!”
At last, V.B. reacted. “Hold on…” Raising a hand, he thoughtfully raked his fingers through his hair. “Are you dating that kid?” His eyebrows shot up. “Under my nose?”
With a sound of frustration, Mathias grabbed his name plate and hurled it in his general direction .
“Hey, watch the face!”
Mathias met his glare head-on. “Don’t you get it, yet? I will destroy your office bit by bit if you don’t tell me where Alberto is.”
“Have at it, then!” V.B. shrugged. “I can’t give you that information. It’s private. Do you know what private means?”
“Do I? Do I?”
So, he knew where he was, but he wouldn’t fucking tell him? With an angry curse, Mathias flung his pen holder across the room, and when the headmaster snorted, he did the same with his desk lamp, his diary, then the greyhound statuettes near his picture frames.
“Hey! Not the dogs, come on.” V.B. leaned down to pick them up one by one.
“Where is he?!” Mathias shouted, and his tone froze V.B. on the spot. He held up his hands, his entire face frowning.
“I don’t know what’s the matter with you, but you’re acting crazy. You need to get your shit together.”
Mathias couldn’t care less. He raised his arm, his hand hovering over the largest picture frame in the middle of the desk.
Van Bergen’s eyes grew cold. “You wouldn’t dare.”
Mathias seized it and held it up between them. “I would, I really would.”
“Mati—”
“Don’t Mati me, you bastard! I will break it, so help me god, I will hurl it out the window if you don’t tell me where he is.”
“Just stay calm now.” V.B. kept his hands up. “Your mother’s on that picture. Surely you wouldn’t want to do that to her?”
“My mother?” Mathias burst out a laugh. “My mother?! She would tell me to burn this place to the ground, and you, and your statuettes and your pictures with it, if you refuse to tell me where my… where my… where my…” Mathias choked on the words. Tears began streaming down his face, as hot as lava. “Tell me!”
“I can’t!” V.B. pleaded. “I can’t! Even for you. I can’t do that. It’s confidential. I can’t…”
“Oh, God…” Mathias’s knees weakened again, and he had to lean on the desk to support himself. “I pushed him away, just like Mom. Oh, God… He’s dead, isn’t he?”
“What?”
“He’s dead, he’s dead?—”
Suddenly V.B. was right in front of him, his arms reached out as if to hug him. With a cry of despair, Mathias landed a blow on his shoulder, then another, then another, until he was reduced to a mushy pile of tears and snot, sobbing at the headmaster’s feet.
“Alex!” he cried, burning with fear and grief. V.B. had trapped him in an embrace tight enough to crack his ribs. “Alex…”
“It’s okay… I know…”
“I want my mom…”
“I know, my boy. I’m here.”
“I did it,” Mathias gritted out between sobs, twisting Alex’s shirt in his fists. “I killed her. That time… I was so angry at her, I told her… these things… and then she gave up. She gave up because of me.”
“Is that what you think?” Alex cursed under his breath, his hand rising to cup the back of Mathias’s head. “Your mom loved you! And she knew how much you loved her. She didn’t take it like that. And she didn’t give up either. That wasn’t her style. Don’t you remember your fucking mom? You really think a snotty brat like you could have made her flinch?”
Right then, the door burst open, and Mathias looked up to see his dad and his sister rushing inside. The sight of his boy crumpled on the floor with tears streaming down his face brought fear to his father’s eyes. “You texted code red?”
Without releasing Mathias, V.B. glanced at him. “I don’t know what to do this time.”
Dad and Elisa each picked a side, and Mathias found himself choked in a group hug. He should have hated it, but in truth, he was so exhausted that he reveled in their warmth. He even reached around his sister to hold her closer.
“Your office’s a real mess, Alex,” Dad said. “Way to set an example to the kids.”
“That’s right!” Ella squeaked, almost buried under her godfather’s arm. “You should clean up a little.”
“Ha, ha.” V.B. extirpated himself from this sorry pile of humans with a wounded look at his tear-soaked shirt. “Cyril, did you know about Mathias and that Alberto kid? This one thrashed my office to get me to tell him where he is.”
Mathias froze. He made eye contact with his sister. Elisa shook her head, his lips pinched.
“Is he alive?” Mathias asked anyway.
“Of course, he’s alive!” Alex clicked his tongue impatiently. “Cyril, did you know they were a thing?”
“Maybe.” Their father shook his head helplessly. “What can I say? ”
“You’re my best friend,” Alex muttered. “I’ve known you two decades. You could have told me.”
“And yet, it’s really not my place to say.”
“He’s as good as my nephew, and now I find out he might be gay, like that? What if he needed me as a role model?—”
“Who the hell would want you as a role model?” Mathias said darkly. “Unhinged fucker.”
“Ah…” Dad let out a sigh of relief. “He’s better now.”
As if they all knew he had reached his limit, Dad and Elisa released him to stand on their feet. Alex stood by, a smile tugging at his lips. Disoriented, Mathias remained sat on the floor, his eyes fixed on his father.
“Are you sleeping with Alberto’s mother?” he managed to spit out.
“What? No!” Dad said, and relief washed over Mathias. “It’s not like that!”
Part of Mathias wanted to ask what the deal was, but at the same time, he couldn’t make himself care. His mind was still full of Alberto. What was he supposed to do now? Wiping his face with the back of his hands, he slowly got to his feet.
Elisa picked up a box of tissues off the floor and handed it over to him. “Alex,” she said, turning up her nose, “you’re not going to expel Mathias, right? Kayvin’s the biggest bully. You always tell me to punch bullies in the face, how can you expel Mathias now?”
“I don’t know.” Alex shuffled toward his desk with a troubled expression. “Let me deal with this stuff. Cyril, you need to take him home.”
“I can take myself home,” Mathias said.
“Can you?” Alex sunk in his desk chair with a sigh. “Mathias. You’ve been acting up all year, and I let you get away with it every time. You broke out of the detention room, for Christ’s sake! And I still let you get away with it.” He swiveled in his chair to face Mathias. “This time, you really did it. Kayvin’s father is the last person I want to deal with. So, be good and wait at home while we fix your mess.”
“Fine.” Mathias met his eyes. “ After you tell me where I can find Alberto.”
Alex scoffed at his insolence. “Your boyfriend’s mother called me, and naturally, asked me to secrecy. I’m not going to betray her confidence, even for you. If I do, I could lose my job, and much more.”
Mathias hadn’t originally thought about that. Now that his mind was clear, he could see why that would be a problem. “I’m sorry, I hadn’t thought about it.”
“No, you hadn’t.” For the first time in years, Alex looked genuinely tired. “So, anything you want to know, you’re gonna have to ask Miss Gazza.” He motioned toward the door. “Now please, get the fuck out my office and go home. Ella, here’s a note. Get back to class immediately. Your dad and I need to talk.”
Mathias trudged toward the door in silence. From the moment Alex mentioned Mrs Gazza, a glimmer of hope had rekindled the fire in his heart. Alberto’s mother knew everything, and he knew where she lived.