Spencer rolled his eyes at that, although he followed shirtless guys and their pets on Instagram, so he wasn’t any better.
“What? You don’t like fall?” Patrick asked.
Spencer shrugged and leaned against the wall trying to picture the color of the leaves of the trees on his block in autumn. He drew a blank. He could only remember them lush and green in summer and stark naked in winter. “I don’t really think about it. I mean, there’s Halloween, and that’s fun.”
“Halloween is different. It falls within fall, but it’s not really fall. It’s part of it, but there is so much more to the season.”
Spencer looked down into his empty water glass. “You’ve thought a lot about this.”
“Fall is...magical.” There was no hint of sarcasm in Patrick’s voice. He had a gullible smile as if he were talking about Santa Claus. Oh no - was he one of those people, too?
Patrick stood up from his couch. He knelt down at the box that Spencer had just lugged up three flights of unforgiving stairs and ripped open the tape. He moved aside a thin layer of bed sheets. Spencer peered inside, and his body couldn’t determine whether rage or disbelief was the right response.
Scented candles. Fake pumpkins. Decorative plates with pumpkins on them. More scented candles.
Pumpkin this.
Apple that.
A box three-quarters filled with shit his mom and aunts would buy. It was like Patrick robbed a Home Goods store, and Spencer had to carry them up three of the steepest flights of stairs in the city.
“That is a ton of candles,” Spencer said. “You realize this is just a one-bedroom apartment.”
Patrick opened two, double-fisted them and inhaled their scents like they were smelling salts bringing him to life.
Maybe he was going to host a seance to bring back the ghost of fall past or something. This could not be kosher with the building management.
“It’s only July.”
“Fall is around the corner.”
Spencer’s memory stretched way back to whatever grade he learned about equinoxes. “Isn’t it September 21st? It doesn’t really start cooling down until the end of October.”
“My timetable is a little bit different. I’m on more of a retail schedule,” Patrick said with a laugh. Spencer couldn’t enjoy what a cute grin he had with all the craziness coming out of those lips, but at least the guy had a sense of humor about all this.
“Do you want to smell?” Patrick held out a candle called Pumpkin Patch.
“It’s okay.” Spencer stood up and puffed air out of his nostrils. The multiple scents attacking his nose were making him dizzy. He wasn’t ready to think about fall and the cold that came with it. Days like this - sun, clear skies, warm breeze - were meant to be savored, not tolerated. “I gotta go.”
“Thanks again for the help.” Patrick tucked the candles back into the box. “I’ll see you later. On the roof.”
“Cool,” Spencer said, regretting that he extended an invite. There went his hope of having a normal neighbor.
* * *
Technically,per the rental agreement, no tenants were allowed on the roof. It was not meant for people to lounge. There were no borders, just a flat black surface. It was an insurance nightmare the building management company wanted to avoid.
Being on the top floor, though, Spencer found the hatch in the hallway ceiling that led to the roof. He watched his friends, made sure nobody got wild or drunk. The roof was for chilling out with buds, not epic ragers.
Spencer, Ryan, and a few other friends from the volleyball team shared beers as the last glimmers of sunlight slipped beneath the urban landscape. Patrick awkwardly joined their circle, small-talking with his teammates about moving to Chicago. They had mutual acquaintances from DePaul, so Patrick wasn’t the odd man out - even though Spencer kept looking at him that way.
Fireworks were set to go off at Navy Pier in a few minutes, and they’d have a perfect view of them shooting across Lake Michigan. Spencer hoped Patrick didn’t shoot off any verbal fireworks about his love of the awkward seasonal link between glorious summer and dreadful winter.
Ryan had Spencer follow him to a quiet corner of the roof. They’d been friends since high school. When Spencer had come out to him the summer before junior year, Ryan’s response was “Holy shit. Me, too!”
Spencer checked to make sure they weren’t too close to the edge before he let Ryan say whatever he wanted to say.
“So, Justin.” Ryan raised his eyebrows.
