fiction - feb 2006

One plink noise and a final splattering of glass. "Ah shit...."
I had my hands clamped down an unwieldly copy of "Ham on Rye" and winced hearing the smash in the kitchen.
"Anthony?"
He was barely awake but knew where the conversation was headed. "Hmm... Yes Darren?"
"I broke one of your wine glasses, I'm sorry!"
"Oh... that's fine, don't worry about it."
"Well, it's one of your blue ones... You know, the ones you told me not to wash?"
"You mean the ones my mom got for me? You know, my dead mother."
A long pause and Darren came out of the kitchen holding the stem and a hunk of blue glass. "I'm SO sorry!" The loveseat was turned away from him so he couldn't bask in the full sour glare of Anthony wrapped up in all the blankets available within reaching distance.
"It's FINE Darren. Just throw it out." He turned over and pulled the covers over his head as he faced the cushions. I gave Darren a shrug and turned back to Bukowski. He slunk back to the kitchen to finish the dishes in silence save for the running water and tepid clanks of plates on cutlery.
i was finally settling back into the chapter when my cell hummed on the table. Anthony twisted his head around thinking it was his but went back to sulking when I snatched mine up. "Hallo? Hey you... What's up? No nothing at all..."
Anthony was frozen and clearly listening. I got up to have a cigarette and further fan his agression. I listened to the innane chatter on the other end and checked my usual hiding spots for a lighter. I fanned out my seach to the kitchen and fished around in Darren's jeans until I grabbed his zippo. He was sad and wounded from smashing the wine glass. Worse than a goddamed woman. I lit a cigarette in the house and gave the obligatory, "Oh yeah? Yeah? That's interesting..." on the phone and gently massaged Darren's shoulders. I popped smoke out the side of my mouth and dug my thumbs into tense muscles and gave a little pat on his shoulder when I went outside. I better get outside before Anthony panicked over the cigarette.
Out on the porch I hopped into a muskoka chair throne and pulled back a proper drag. Darren came out soon after and dragged one of my meditation pillows over to my feet and sat down for me to play with his hair. He was always horny and hard up for attention when he was trying to cut back on his meds. A not-so-negative side effect since I wasn't going to bitch about a good looking man having his head in my lap. My only responsibilities to him was to fidget with his thick waves of hair and not get a boner. Man, you only do that once and you really get a clear idea of what your curious guy friends can and can't take.
I had spaced out for almost five minutes. Why did Beth call me after going out with her ex? It was the same old tired story and I was feeling more drawn to a clearly devastated man leaning against my leg. Every impulse in me wanted to hang up the phone and play therapist, but I knew the game. It became homo-esque when I wasn't distracted or if it was too one on one.
"Yes yes Beth... I know Jane is a cunt. Yes we know this. You're right and she's the cunt."
The screen door popped open and Anthony strode out in his running gear. He pulled a hat down tight and walked right out the second door. The cold woosh of fresh air came in right on cue and he was off to pound the sidewalks until his knees ached and he would tremble up the stairs to take a shower.
Anthony hooked his left arm around my calf and picked at the frayed ends of my jeans. He reached up for the hand that was skimming over his hair and looked at my watch. Deep sigh and he pulled himself up and left. He was off to start applying the game face to do the evening news and left me to adjust my balls and little and then thank my libido for behaving and not shoving his face in my crotch.What? I respect my friends but it doesn't mean that I can just stop finding them attractive.
Beth was still nattering away, going from triumphant and hopeful to weepy and insecure. I grew weary of it, even though I had ignored the vast portion of the conversation. A little goes a long way with this chick.
"Hey, did you ever get any action from that friend of Anthony? Hello? NATE?"
"Huh? Oh! Oh yeah.. the trainer. No, nothing to speak of. Get a grip Bet, the man is an adonis.We're just hanging out a bit. He's taking some english classes at Cambell during the evenings so I'm just giving him a hand on the essays."
"Is this the one Anthony gets all strange over?"
"Yeah yeah... It's nothing crazy, he just wants to look like him that's all."
I got distracted as Beth kept talking. I saw someone come around the side and cast a shadow into the porch. "Bet, I gotta go... Dan's here."
Dan came in the door and stomped snow off his boots just as I hung up on Beth making the "ooooooooooh!" sound after hearing that Dan had shown up unexpectedly.
"Dan, how're you? I didn't know you were coming over."
"Sorry about that Nate... I was just around and... Yeah. Yeah! Here I am! Do you mind?"
Do I mind? Do I fucking mind some hunk of tasty meat sitting in front of me? Let me think. No. No problem on my end.
He was sweetly grinning and poked a finger up into his tight beanie touque. Dan pulled out a long and serious joint that was rolled by a professional.
"My brother mailed me a baggie of these from BC... Aren't they insane?!"
"Give me that." Perfect baseball bats. Long, thick and I'm very aware that I could be making a sexual comment here.
"Go on, light it. I didn't want to try and have that monster by myself. None of my other friends smoke anyways."
Friend? What the hell... I edit your horribly trite essays and listen to you talk about the number of kilometre's you logged on the treadmill and we're friends? Friends with a gooey and glorious joint that is. The drug fiend in me won out over the wary pessimist and I lit it up in a showy cloud of exhaled smoke.
"Not bad..." Not bad? I can't feel my finger tips and i only just started on it.
"Oh yeah? Well keep going. I only want a little." He pulled out my worn copy of a portable Leonard Cohen poetry collection and began flipping around. "I love this. I've never read anything that felt so... um... like something I can feel and get into."
Exhale. "Accessable?"
"Yes! Yes that's it... I feel as though I can understand all of this."
I tried to hold back a smirk. Gawd! This is such bullshit scratching the surface talk, but to him this was probably the most comprehensive dialogue he's had other than, "Did you wipe down the dumbells after you used them?"
Dan turned to a poem that I had dog-eared the page and read it silently. I toked steadily and thought about offering to get him some coffee when I realized I had the last cup an hour ago. Besides, these gym bunny types don't injest caffine anyways do they?
"Pass it over..."
He pulled on the joint and exhaled. Dan was perpetually smiling in that wholly sweet way and closed his eyes as he inhaled again. And again. The closed in porch was getting the fine haze of smoke effect and I graciously took the joint back. Dan puffed out two lung fulls of smoke into the open pages of the book and studied it intently.
I checked him out as he got lost in another poem and made himself comfortable in the castaway chair from Darren's parents cottage. Dan had kicked off his wet boots and pulled off his socks with them. Truly daring since no one knew what was lingering in the old carpet beneath us. He rubbed the top of his foot with the other in a very innocent and quiet gesture, totally oblivious to me sucking back the majority of the joint.
We kept up the silent exchange of him asking for a drag every few minutes and keeping his eyes trained on the poems, only stopping to put his hand out to recieve the joint or brush ashses off the pages.
I was in mid-pass when Anthony came around the corner. Huh, what a quitter, couldn't have been out for more than a half hour.
Anthony looked so happy to see Dan but immediately went back to sullen when he cast me a smile and took the smouldering joint.
"What about this one? I love the one where he talks about how to..." Inhale. Exhale and rapid speech. "...How to read poetry. Oh! Hey Anthony."
Anthony pulled the door open and stepped in from the chilly air, bringing in a wall of freezing winter wind.
"Dan! What are you doing...here?" He paused as Dan took another drag. He looked like he had nothing left to believe in. His hunk a' hunk of burning exercise addiction was smoking drugs and sitting outrageously close to me.
"Just trying out the stuff my brother mailed to me. Would you like some?"
Ha. Good luck buddy, I've been barking up that tree for years and...
"Yeah sure!"
Fresh from running on a late Sunday afternoon in the middle of winter... Still sweating and trembling slightly on his right leg since he had bolted out before putting his knee brace on. Sweaty and breathless and reaching for the joint as though this is was what we did all the time: exercise and smoke weed.
"This is the same stuff we had last weekend."
LAST WEEKEND? As in this had happened before? Anthony didn't even look at me and just schucked back heartily.
"Let me go change..."
He made a hurried reach for the door to the house and bolted inside. I could hear him bark out wretched coughs and had a private laugh with Dan.
"That's a better reaction than what he had before..."
"Ah, I wouldn't know. He never smokes with me."
Dan looked at me puzzled and turned back to Leonard to pick another dog-eared page to open.
Anthony was back much faster than expected and looked irritatingly happy when i had been used to nothing but miserable and pouty all weekend. He sat at Dan's feet and did some light stretches, something else he never did, even when I yelled at him to do them so he wouldn't seize up with cramps.
Dan didn't seem to notice him sitting there and kept turning pages to show me and declare that it was, in fact, his favorite poem as opposed to the other dozen he had already turned to. What the hell is happening here?