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 Posted: Mon Oct 12, 2009 9:00 pm
There was no actual reason as to why the hall chairs needed scrubbing. They were long, plastic, uncomfortable chair-rows designed by somebody unkind back in the nineteen-seventies, that never moulded to your buttocks and made any school assembly an orthopaedic hell; Franz was on the Cleaning Committee, and Franz was cleaning the hall chairs. It was evening. The piquant smell of Pine'O'Cleen filled the air (and probably killed off a couple of nasal nerves) as Franz -- and his roomie -- scrubbed at the chairs, both wielding spray cans and wetcloths, hands encased in decrepit old rubber gloves that were more for Howl's benefit than Franz's. Howl had beautiful nails.
Finally, Franz couldn't take it any more. He strolled over to where Howl was scrubbing at one of the chairs and flung one arm over him, bodily: he buried his face in Howl's shoulder.
"Wickham," he said. "We have to talk. About love."
This had every possibility that Franz was inviting Howl to a gay for a day debacle. Occam's razor declined any other reason.
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Posted: Mon Oct 12, 2009 10:14 pm
When Franz had initially mentioned that he wanted Howl to join him in cleaning these chairs, Howl saw no problem with it. Compared to many of the chores around the school, it was a relatively mild one. Many times, chores were excruciatingly painful to complete, and many times they were meant to be punishments. The gloves were also extremely considerate, since the cleaning liquids would absolutely dry out his skin.
The teal-haired lad was scrubbing hard at a particularly annoying chair. He had been minding his own business, mentally humming a gentle tune, when he suddenly felt the space bubble pop. Glancing over, he suddenly found honey blonde hair right there against his shoulder.
"Love?" he repeated, his tone hinting at uncertainty. His thin brow lofted slightly as his gloved hand sort of hoovered behind his roommate's shoulder. He wasn't certain if he should pat the lad on the shoulder or not. The glove was pretty grimy from his duties, and that could get his friend's shirt dirty.
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Posted: Mon Oct 12, 2009 10:29 pm
"Love," repeated Franz, at a slightly more emphatic pitch. He pulled his head up from its position homoerotically nestling on Howl's shoulder, and looked deeply into his eyes in a slightly frenzied way. Franz was always slightly frenzied, or this would have been more worrisome. "Howl. Talk to me."
He dropped his wetcloth on one of the seats with a wet plop. "Have you ever been in love before?" he was saying. "I mean, like, the real thing; the real McCoy; not like, 'oh, they're cute, I wouldn't choke myself to get out of taking them for a hamburger' or even 'well I definitely want you to be my six-month break-up.' I mean serious emotional connection, you know?"
Franz sighed so heavily that for a moment he sounded like Simon.
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Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 6:24 am
With his "bro" on his shoulder, Howl would not be able to really do anything productive. Where as his companion set down the wet cloth, Howl instead began to take off his gloves.
Howl was a gentle soul, but one who was comfortable in any mild situation. To him, speaking of his emotions was quite mild. His teal eyes gently looked into Franz's as he admitted "I suspect I have been in love before, my friend. Otherwise, I would not be having this issue with getting over Amelia."
Even after all he had put her through, Howl somewhere deep inside still believed this, regardless of how true it really was. As he gently set his gloves down, he could not help but ask "Is there a particular reason why you ask, my friend?"
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Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 6:48 pm
Franz flung himself down in one of the chairs, never minding the fact that it was still damp with cleaner. He closed his eyes and leant back, the very picture of despair. "Let's think hypothetically," he said. "All right. Hypothetically. Let's say that you have met the one person for the first time in your life who thinks exactly like you do, only in a more interesting way, and you are pretty convinced that this is the one person you were meant for, the one person, and you could pass off this feeling you were getting on eating a bad shrimp."
One eye cracked open. "Hypothetically," he said.
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Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 7:09 pm
"Hypothetically, yes?" Howl repeated. Franz was so transparent right now, it was slightly amusing. Only slightly amusing.
To give his knees a little bit of rest, the thin lad repositioned himself so he was sitting down on his rear. In an attempt to signal to his friend he was still thinking, he placed a single finger on top of his lip and tapped it for a moment or two.
Carefully choosing his words, he finally began to give an attempt at a response. "Hypothetically it sounds like the person admires the one who thinks exactly like the other. However, admiration should not be confused for love."
Why did these words sound so familiar to Howl? Probably because his therapist had recently been using them on himself.
Yet, the teal-haired lad was not going to give a true verdict yet with such vague information. "Franz, my dear. What would the hypothetical feeling be? Could you describe that more?"
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Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 7:45 pm
"God, it's just like wanting to be around them all the time," said Franz, putting his arms behind his head. "Hypothetically speaking. Hypothetically thinking about them -- like, wondering how their day was. Wondering how hardboiled they like their eggs. Liking the way they spell their name."
He swung his legs up to lean them on the seats in front, crunching himself up into a V momentarily. "It goes beyond admiration, man," he was saying, a bit disconsolately. "Like, man, -- hypothetically -- the admiration's a massive thing, it's definitely a thing, but hanging out just to know how their day went? You know how that goes?"
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Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 7:59 pm
Deja Vu. Hearing Franz pinpoint his specific feelings only reminded Howl of times that had passed. The initial attraction through admiration for one aspect or another. Howl's had been a petty little thing such as admiring a beautiful physical trait. He watched from afar and gradually learned more about this beautiful stranger. Thoughts would constantly fade to her face, everything eventually tying to her.
As he seemed to dwell upon the past, his eyes sank from his friend's face towards the floor. He wasn't even attempting to focus his eyes on anything anymore. The effeminate lad couldn't help but suddenly remember there was so much more after this. Such a realization brought new life to Howl's features as his eyes once more lifted up to look to his friend.
"Hypothetically," he began, "Do you feel complete within her presence? Feel fulfilled by just knowing her? And hypothetically, the moments you are apart, do you feel as if a piece of your soul was wretched from your body?" These answers would probably be the tell-tale in Howl's mind, so he listened carefully.
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Posted: Tue Oct 13, 2009 10:24 pm
"I'm non-denominationally unsure about the soul part, brother," said his roomie, "but the other stuff is -- well -- about right, I guess; you know, the sense of completion? Like wanting to go from an individual to a pair? Like pretending you've been an independent ice skater all your life and now you want to go to paired competitions."
This was a pretty weak metaphor, but whatever helped Franz in the end describe it. "Hypothetically, that is," he added hurriedly.
They looked at each other with a kind of growing, new realisation, a growing empathy even. "Did you -- I mean, do you -- seriously feel this hypothetical way about Amelia?" Franz suddenly said, sympathetic. "s**t, son, I'm genuinely sorry, I didn't know."
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Posted: Wed Oct 14, 2009 11:04 am
To Howl, somewhere in his mind he had decided that Franz's answer was not truly satisfactory. The metaphor he used didn't really help at all. Yet, it was in his wisdom that the longer haired lad of the two decided not to make much of the issue at hand. Franz would figure it out for himself when this girl ultimately disappeared, that perhaps she was not as important as he once thought.
It was only upon the mention of Amelia that Howl spoke again. "My dear friend, there was nothing hypothetical about my feelings for Amelia." He turned back to face his work and picked up his gloves, as if signaling that he was done with this conversation. Under his breath, he sighed out "It is better to forget."
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Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 3:36 am
Better to forget. If anything was so against Franz's idea of how life should go, it was better to forget: his eyes were already blazing as he fatally, unknowingly, terribly, stood up and bunched his hands into fists inside his rubber gloves.
"No way," he said. "No how. That's not how life goes, Wickham. If you love her -- if you seriously love her -- then you shouldn't give up on her, you know, man? What if she doesn't want to give up on you? I mean, hell, if there was just one last chance to tell her how you felt..."
He shook his head, wiping his forehead with his sleeve. "Come on," he said. "I can't believe you'd give up that easily."
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Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 10:05 am
In contrast to all the fiery words spoken by Franz, Howl spoke calmly, even though the words he'd have to say were somewhat painful for him. He smiled a gentle smile, hoping to mask his true feelings over the subject.
"I do love her, but it is now a one-sided love. She has made it quite clear that I already used the one last chance at some point." Mentally, he noted that point was when he received that restraining order. In the past, he would have blamed him, but now, after so much work with his therapist, all he had to blame was himself.
Being the blame felt horrible.
"Alas, my friend. I cannot remain in such a one-sided love. Love is meant to be a mutual thing and to me, cannot work out if the feelings are not shared." He put his gloves back on, one hand at a time while delicately holding the edges of the rubber so that he didn't have to get his fingers too dirty.
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Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 5:17 pm
This sobered his roomie more than anything else he could have said. Defeated, he slid back down into the chair, pulling his knees up into his chest, staring sightlessly into the middle distance. "Jesus, Howl," he said, subdued. "God."
He tilted his head back, looking up at the ceiling now. It was 1. grubby and 2. uninteresting. Franz seemed as torn up as Howl privately felt over having to articulate what the therapist did: troubled, probably applying the same feelings to his own 'hypothetical situation', which couldn't have been less hypothetical had a big neon sign been lit up saying FRANZ IS TALKING ABOUT HIMSELF. "What do you do when they don't love you back, man?"
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Posted: Thu Oct 15, 2009 6:51 pm
Since his companion had mellowed out for the time being, Howl had taken to scrubbing the chair that was in front of him. The work wasn't going to take care of itself. As he scrubbed though, it seemed one more question managed to linger out into the air.
For a moment, the only sound that could be heard was the scratchy sound of Howl scrubbing at the chairs. It wasn't that the lad was ignoring his friend, he was just trying to think of an accurate response to the question.
When his voice broke the silence, he spoke in a clear, yet kind tone. "It depends on when you learn about it. If you learn it early on, then there is still hope. If you learn it early, you can attempt to ease your way into her life and maybe learn a bit more about her. If you are able to do such, you can possibly still persuade her emotions to change."
Not wanting to dwell upon the alternate option, he finished off with a simple "I suspect you hypothetically would still be fine, my friend."
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Posted: Fri Oct 16, 2009 2:36 am
There was a long silence between them -- not an uneasy silence: they had been roomies and even, amazingly, friends for the period now that they knew each other's silences enough for them not to be awkward. It was a thinking silence. It was an amiable silence. It was strange to think for both of them that two boys so utterly dissimilar, so completely different in taste, personality, action and word, had become friends.
Roomies was an act of fate. Friends was quite another.
In the end, Franz sighed deeply (still sounding like Simon Ferris before a Polecats practice). "Damn, brother," he said. "You know, for a long-haired, perfectly-manicured, cleanse-tone-moisturising guy you can be pretty wise, you know that? And that is a Franz St. Germaine compliment, honest to God."
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