Page 83 of Fruit
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Despite my best attempts at telling my emotions to go fuck themselves, they weigh me down no matter what I do. I go to work like a listless zombie, the computer screen hazing in front of me before I tell myself not to be so pathetic and forcing my feet back on the ground. Even when Hikari calls to give me the go-ahead for the gallery show, it’s like watching the excitement buzz inside a glass jar. Fifteen.
I want desperately to call the youth centre and tell them I can’t make it this week, but the only thing worse than going would be not going. The kids are expecting the art club; Jasmine and Jackson are counting on my help.
I suck it up and go.
Ridiculously, I expect everything to have changed. I feel like I should find all the furniture moved an inch to the left or something, to have Jasmine and Jackson look at me with pitying, knowing eyes. But everything is the same. A few parents drop their kids off, teenagers walking in by themselves, greeting each other loudly in the waiting room. Jasmine is telling them to go into the common room and they barely look up, engrossed in what they’re talking about. Jackson pulls me to the side and tells me Gwyn had a bad day. I go talk to her, agree to talk to her mom about contacting the school regarding the use of her dead name. Jasmine pulls me to take out some drinks, Joshua reminds me Art Club has to be set up…
The evening just happens. It’s one domino hitting another until Art Club is being wrapped up and I’m with Joshua, putting the last of the art materials away.
“How would you feel about getting some lessons, Joshua?” I say a little out of the blue. By the way he looks at me, a little startled and suspicious, I should have probably eased myself in. I’d been thinking about it for a while, however. Art Club was good, and it was obviously helping Joshua be more confident in his artistic ability, but direct instruction would help hone that craft into a sharper form.
“From you?” Joshua asks, and I manage not to roll my eyes at his sceptical tone.
“Well, I could find somebody else if—”
“No, that’s okay. You’re all right,” Joshua says. I grin at him, and he looks away, but we both know that’s high praise coming from him.
“What do you think, then? It won’t be here; we’ll have to find somewhere. And I don’t specialise in graffiti by any means, so we’ll be using other techniques. It’ll be hard work, at times. You won’t be good at everything straight away—it’ll be hard work,” I say again, because I don’t want him to agree expecting any less.
Joshua looks at me steadily. “I don’t have the money to pay for lessons like that.”
“Joshua,” I start, but stop myself at the stubborn clench of his jaw. I sigh. “How about this. You pay me by working hard. I give you lessons, and you work at what I give you. No excuses.”
“That’s not—”
“It is. To me, it is. That’s what I want from this. What do you want? If you don’t want the lessons, or don’t have the time, or the energy, or don’t want to—”
“I want to.”
“Then it’s sorted then.” I stick my hand out for him to shake on the deal. He hesitates for a moment before taking my hand.
We finish up in the art room. Before we step out, I smile at him, and he looks at me questioningly.
“I’m proud of you, Joshua,” I say. His face scrunches defensively.
“I haven’t even done anything yet.”
“I’m proud of who you are.”
Joshua makes a tsking noise, frowning. “Whatever,” he says, pushing into the common room. Before he gets lost in the fray, however, he turns and smiles slightly at me.
I smile back.
**********
I don’t see Sebastián for two weeks. He doesn’t come out of his office when I’m at the youth club, and I can’t force myself to take Nina there and face him. His absence is like an ache in one of my muscles.
It makes me realise how threaded into the fabric of my everyday life he was. My mind will automatically turn to share things with him. Nina will do something funny, or I’ll see Hugo and Joshua hold hands, or something happens at work, and my first instinct is to tell Sebastián. I’ll imagine curling up on the couch with him and Nina and having a completely unspectacular night. The image will press on the ache, making it flare.
Sometimes, the pain will turn toxic. I’ll press and press and press on the bruise. I’ll think about what could have been. What my future could have been like, with Sebastián’s kindness, his strength, his resilience beside me. I’ll imagine him with someone else, wonder if she has something I don’t, wonder how I can fix myself so this never happens to me again. The pain will quickly turn to anger. I’ll curse him out in my head for being a fucking idiot, for not realising the value of what we had, for thinking he can do better.
It’s exhausting. Mostly, though, life goes on. My mind will turn to him, the ache will spread, but then there’s another thing to do, something else catching my attention, and it’ll fade into the background again.
He’s just a guy, I remind myself.There’s more from where that came from.
And if, late at night, I imagine him in my bed. Not spread out and wanting, but curled up close to me. Imagine him as he was when he told me about his brother. Imagine him fighting for everything he has, the strength I could feel in his body and his voice, in the material making up his soul. If, when it’s past midnight, I’m haunted by that ghost, of the man I’d grown to know and love, of what it would have been like to be with someone like that, and I curl up against the pain and the worthlessness of it, alone in the dark.
