Mélange
That day with the orange tulips
During the week, every midday of the week, she had sat with her lunch in her chair at the desk, coffee brewing in the machine, and grabbed her phone to open Snapchat. Eugenie had heard the name Snapchat for a long time now from the exchanges between her students and she had gathered that it was a place of importance on the internet, but Barry had finally explained to her what Snapchat was and convinced her to download the application on her device.
Barry always sent her very boring pictures of her cat or something funny happening on her very animated street but then, as of late, he had also started to send her lots of selfies. When he was taking care of the plants, removing the dead leaves from the pot, or some other times, it was a picture of him above the shiny sink he had cleaned, or his face smiling wildly with all his socks rolled in the background, and the caption, tuesday funday, him holding a glass of Coca Cola cheering to her, cheers to all the geography teachers.
One time, it had been a picture of his sweaty face and flushed cheeks, hair stuck to his forehead and the top of his shoulders captured in the frame, with the message i did a hundred pushups are you proud, like Generation Z refused to capitalize or punctuate their sentences, she knew. After ten seconds, the photo disappeared. He was not smiling in that picture, it was just a snap without any substantial chat taken in the spur of the moment, the expression on his face unreadable, not posing, just snapping, she supposed. “Fucking hot” she whispered to herself, then placed a hand on her mouth, aghast. The photo had vanished but was anchored in her memory, every little reflection of the sun on his face.
But this Friday, she had not received any image on the little app, and even made an effort to lunch with her colleagues instead of alone in her classroom to catch up on some academics and gossip. Her short but heated argument with Barry in the morning was a new thing, Eugenie saw, but she didn’t trouble herself much with it. She would find, eventually, what was wrong with Barry and try to help him figure his shit out, after all, that’s what she had intended to do the whole time! And that was a hundred percent more reasonable as a project than the one to be fan-girling over his reportage or checking out his butt when he was super focused on making pancakes and flipping them in the pan.
“I bought the flowers with your money though, from your purse, the other purse, you know”
“How” She faced him with astonishment and faked anger.
He replied : “relax, they were cheap, shit, I don’t mean” he shook his head, defeated. He produced a distraction, eyeballing her hard and dubiously as she was standing in front of him with her coat and winter hat on, one mitten still attached to her sleeve and her school badge still dangling from her neck.
He stiffly put on knee on the ground and grabbed that hand of hers that was mitten-free.
She took a step back in panic, “you’re okay Barry?”
“Shit, now it looks like a marriage proposal” he chuckled, rubbed the bridge of his nose. Barry calculated his angle with more cautiousness; he still had a hard time with changes of altitude, anything that threw him down and diagonally at the same time. He brought his knee back up and just crouched under her nose, wearing a pair of bright white clean socks, in the position of a toad with her hand still in his, “all I want to say, Ms White is” She waited, anxious, feeling much too hot wrapped in the feathers of her coat, the wool of her hat burning her brain, “I’m so sorry for earlier. I was afraid, you know, the news from the Teams, coming as a surprise, unannounced”
“I was afraid Jake, for my people”
“No no no, I’m serious”
She lifted her chin, “makes sense”
“I don’t want to be the brat I was in high school. That was all a show”
“What”
“That was all an act, you know, the persona I built for myself at school”
“What”
“So whatever” he rushed through his obviously rehearsed declaration: “you’re not a nobody, Ms White”
She shook her head, trying to focus, “I don’t mind being a nobody, Barry, I just didn’t like your tone. Your tone was shitty, your words were shit”
“You’re more someone to me than all those guys in superhero suits. You actually mean the w—”
“Listen, you don’t have to do this” she cut him off and added her gloved hand to his on top of hers and patted it like a little hamster, “I know. I understand”
He nodded and swallowed something that seemed to be crunchy peanut butter, “I want to ask you like” Then, magically, Barry the student was restored. He was still here with his eager, keen traits, his hopeful face, little Freshman Barry stretching his arm up in Geography class, demanding to answer a question or produce a comment that would throw her off. Or little-slightly-older Barry on the hood of a car waiting for her with the ugliest bouquet of flowers she had ever seen –the tulips were a clear upgrade. Vulnerable, uncertain, abandoned into the wilderness. Alone, she saw, and hopeful.
“Yes?”
“Like… I know you want me to be gone from your apartment because, to be honest, I have been blooming here like those tulips and with the power of love and you want me to spread my wings and fly”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
She concurred vividly, so accustomed to him as she was that she could ride two metaphor-trains at the same time, “such a flower you are, indeed. Such a bird”
“Like a hawk. Like a buzzard. An eagle”
“You can be any bird you want, Barry” she followed, patiently.
“Can I stay a little bit longer? Before we uh, contact Hobbes?”
When she returned home from work every day, she had observed with time, there was never any music playing. Barry never appeared to switch on the radio or anything, listening to shows and podcasts through earphones, and she always stepped back into her flat in an ambient silence, the walls standing still there. He was definitely still hiding and avoiding being noticed. She looked at him in the absence of noise. The windows were well isolated and it was still early evening, and the boulevard was not yet bursting with the Friday night cheer which would come.
Barry was not begging, he was not imploring, he was just hoping. After all this time, and he didn’t even feel secure with her. Oh, she thought, with great sorrow, what it must have taken from him, those isolated years in his unique situation, to constantly feel on the move, never stopping, never trusting. Her heart broke for him that, out of her offer in the morning to reconnect with Hobbes, while she had meant to celebrate some good news, she had made him feel like she was looking forward to getting rid of him. Just like when she had kicked him out of Geography.
“Alright” she took off her coat because she was burning up, and let it drop on the floor, then got rid of her mittens. She sat down in a lotus cross of legs in front of him, on the floor, in the silence, between her grocery bags. “Okay” she said, choosing her words carefully, “you are uh… not any bother here, as I explained before” Meaning I want you to stay, don’t ever leave, Barry, don’t ever disappear from my life, don’t ever leave me alone “And also, Barry, I said to you that you could stay as long as you need, here, and I meant it. I thought you knew it and you wouldn’t question it”
The expression on his face was receptive, so she went on: “whatever you decide to do about your uh… people, out there, you can decide from here and you don’t have to ask” Meaning, I don’t ever want you to feel lonesome and abandoned, in the jungle, in the desert, the Arctic, cold or hot, I will protect you, I will shelter you, I—
“Ah okay so you get it” he smiled bright “and I can stay”
“Pretty much” she grimaced, wishing she had been granted more power play, but he was a fast thinker and a fabulous drawer of conclusions out of methodical logic “and wait, I made this for you, a while back” She brought her coat on her lap, shuffled into the inside pocket.
“You made me something?” He was beaming. Here he was again, the teenager Barry.
“I had something made for you” she corrected, feeling the heat conquering her cheeks although she wasn’t wrapped in her outside clothes anymore. She dangled a little key in front of his eyes, attached to a key chain that imitated an octagonal road sign. “I know you prefer to… use the balcony and everything but I had a dream about something and it made me think about uh… about keys”
“You dreamed about it?”
“I had some very bizarre dreams about it yes” she said as calmly as she could, “you can have this key, also, to come in and out of here through the door like a normal person”
“What dreams?”
“It doesn’t matter, focus, look, it’s a key”
“Oh my god” he exclaimed, moving the key chain between his fingers, “it says Slow Down on it”
“Yes” she raised her eyebrows, satisfied with herself
“It says Slow Down, and I am the Bolt”
“I’m saying. Also I wanted one that said Pain in the Ass but they ran out of those” Not willing to prolong that face to face and sensing that there was a hug coming and she didn’t wish to participate in it, Eugenie rose quickly on her feet and, with her right hand, she grabbed an enormous leek from one of the grocery bags, brandished it like a sword and mimicked a knighting ceremony, brushing on his hair and then landing on his other shoulder : “Barry Mas… what’s your middle name?”
“Astrid”
“Astrid?”
“Astrid”
“Astrid?” she repeated, “who the fuck”
“Who the fuck? My father named me like this, Ms White. And here is a bullying-free house here, if I’m not mistaken. It’s 2020-plus, names don’t have gender anymore! I will take no mockery about my middle name”
Eugenie swallowed a snicker, re-centering herself.
“Come on” he said, “please restart the rite, I’m loving this”
She went back to her motion, one shoulder, his head, “I declare you, Barry Astrid, hm” she cleared her throat so as not to give in to laughter, “Astrid Masquevert, an official uh—”
“Roommate?” he asked fervently, still cowered like a frog at her feet, bending his neck to be able to throw his curious eyes at her.
“Roommates pay rent”
“Guest?”
She exhaled heavily, restarted the ceremony for the third time, “I declare you, once and for all, Barry Astrid Masquevert, an existing uh… person of this house”
“The Omaticaya say that a person is born twice”
“The Oma—” Eugenie scoffed, “Yes. You are Omaticaya now. You may make your bow from the wood of Hometree”
“I will also choose Ninat as a woman”
“She’s the best singer”
“Not bad” he approved, then removed her hand from his right shoulder and kissed it, a loud smack, cartoonish, devoid of any desire or drive, but a roll of chills climbed up her spine, and those chills were the size of grapefruits “you’re all red” She was indignant and ready to disappear into a hole. There was nowhere to hide. The sound of the kiss echoed against the walls of her brain.
“It’s warm in here, isn’t it?”
“Not really” Barry pushed on his feet to get up but he had been maintaining his squatted position for a bit too long, so he lost his balance, groaned, fell back on his butt, one hand on his stomach, “damn! I keep forgetting to do sit-ups”
She gave him a lift with her hand still in his, the sensation of the casual kiss he had placed on it still lingering, hot, sending waves up her arm. He rocketed from the floor to face her, brought very close by the move. So close, so tall. He smelled like her soap and her shower gel and, below, she heard the little clicks of the key and the key chain he was putting in his pocket. He kept his smile on, that remarkable smile that was his, bringing so many different messages following the contours and the folds of his lips, cocky, cute, also cosy, kind, revering: “thank you” he said, not taking a step back, “gracias” he added, “like they say in your native country”
“Native country?” How did she not flinch from this bubble of boiling proximity, she wasn’t certain, you’re such a boss, look at you, impassible, unwavering, master of your domain
“Spain!”
“Spain?” She rolled her eyes, pretending to be exasperated “Barry, I grew up in Swe-den. In Scandinavia. Not Switzerland, not Spain, Sweden, for heavens’ sake” but she took advantage of the pleasantry to break free from their eyelock, trying not to rush out of it but fleeing with all her might. She gathered her things, avoiding his eyes now.
“Our first fight” he said after she turned her back to him, racing to the cupboards, “I think it went well, wouldn’t you say Ms White?”
She turned back slowly, lifting the grocery bags, facing him again, exhausted “yes Barry, it went very well”