(An Experiment)
The worst thing in the world is walking in a nice suburban town, the family section. In the early afternoon. When it is cold and snowing. When you don’t have your Walkman with you and when you know you look like a Christmas tree in the middle of July here. I’m a tramp, this is not my place.
I’m cursing every boy I knew in school, but I do it slowly and thoroughly, being really exquisite with the words. I don’t hate them. It helps me to get my mind off of all these things that are usually there.
When I feel a nasty icy cold blow against the back of my head, I’m lost. I know it’s probably local teenagers, but I really don’t want to deal with them right now. So I turn around and face the deserted street, no one is around. The wind is howling. I clench my icy cold fingers and imagine that I’m the only one on this planet. The thought is pleasant and I turn around and continue my journey.
“Archie!”
Here we go.
“Archie!” I turn around once again and see a long figure running toward me. A long figure in a nice sweater with snowflakes in his hair. He leaves footprints that are bigger than mine.
“Archie,” he stops in front of me and I look up at his face. Jonny. The name induces multiple explosions of memory in my head: party, pub, him nursing my wounds, him kissing Thom above my head, Thom talking about him.
“Hi, Jonny,” I smile, “Didn’t expect to see you here…”
“My brother owns a house and we are sort of visiting.”
“Oh,” I continue smiling and notice that some strange man in the background is having the time of his life with the dog and the snow. I don’t know which is acting sillier: the human or the animal.
“So what brought you here?”
“A car,” he chuckles and I continue, “Well…you see…a friend of mine lives here, and then…he was a bit too wasted to give me a ride, so I’m walking to the station.”
“Oh,” it’s his turn to be confused now and I watch the man in the background to relieve myself from the tense situation we’ve got. The guy is covered with snow from head to toe, as if the dog, and they are both puffing great white piles of air. The dog tackles him to the ground and they roll together. I smile.
“So, how are you? University?” I’m careful not to ask anything about Thom, for the last time I saw them was about 5 month ago.
“Oh, it’s all good,” he smiled, rubbing his reddened cheek, “Although it doesn’t really feel real. I mean, I don’t feel that I’m going to follow my profession after and it seems I don’t really need it…”
The man in the background is running away from the dog, throwing snowballs at the animal. I really wish I could join them.
“Interesting neighborhood,” I mumble, still staring, and Jonny turns to look at the same direction, “I’d like to meet that guy…”
“Oh,” Jonny chuckles, “That’s my boyfriend.”
I frown, looking at his profile.
“Thom!” Jonny calls, putting his hands to his face, “Thom, come ‘ere!”
Strangely enough, the figure raises his head, stands up and walks to us, the dog nudging his legs from behind. I narrow my eyes and realize that it is really Thom – the figure is walking the same and I see locks of ginger hair peeking from the snow hat.
When he sees me, he stops abruptly, but then takes a second look and starts walking with his pace increasing. I smile from ear to eat when he starts running and my expression quickly changes to horror when I see his intentions.
He jumps on me and tackles me to the ground, the bloody dog on top of our heap, and I’m instantly soaked to the bone. Jonny laughs and hauls him off my body, and I start to get up, but freeze when I notice a spectacle in front of my eyes.
Jonny’s hands brush Thom’s reddened cheekbones and Thom smiles at him. I can almost hear his teeth grinding from the cold and apparently Jonny can hear it too, because he ducks a little and a places his thumb on Thom’s chin, opening his mouth slightly to insert the tongue inside. Thom gives in immediately and tries to embrace Jonny, but Jon knows better than me and places one hand on his soaked chest before he can grasp him. They kiss slowly, sharing the heat and brushing their cold noses, stopping for brief moments to breath, the tufts of white smoke mingling.
I’m mesmerized just by watching, unaware of the water seeping through my clothing, and somewhere in my mind I wish I could become the air that they both share at the moment.
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