Flynn fiddled with the buttons on his sleeves. He was chewing on his bottom lip and I wondered what I had done to distress him.
“What is it, Flynn?” I asked. I was learning that being direct was the best approach to handling Flynn. Sometimes he’d answer me straight away. Other times he’d get angry and there would be some flipping out involved.
But either way it usually gave me the answers I needed.
“I just want to go with you. I don’t like it when you leave,” he said. Even though his tone was emotionless as ever, it was his eyes that told me everything. And his eyes were unhappy.
I walked across the room and kissed him softly. I wanted to run my fingers through his hair but there were still times when touching him too much was not okay. He would still tense up and pull away and I struggled with an irrational sense of rejection because of it.
While I accepted him and cared about him for who he was, it didn’t change the difficulties that were involved with being with someone like Flynn. And I was sure Flynn faced his own difficulties by being with me.
We were a messed up, complicated pair. But somehow, together, we worked.
“I don’t like leaving you either. How about you meet me at Ma’s Diner at noon. We can get lunch and then you can come with me over to campus for my meeting,” I suggested, pulling back before he was able to.
Flynn released his bottom lip but still wouldn’t look directly at me. “You’re going to apply for college?” he asked, his face brightening a little.
This had been an ongoing discussion. Flynn had latched onto my applying for school like Murphy with his squeaky toy. He was emphatic that I should do it.
That it would make mehappy.
Everything always came back to that. What made me happy. And to Flynn that was the most important thing.
I was terrified to commit to something like that. I didn’t know if I was ready for that significant of a step.
But the longer I stayed in Wellsburg, the harder it was to pretend I was content with where my life was headed.
I was happy with Flynn. I was happy with taking a few college courses. But both had opened my eyes to what else I could do. What else I could be. And that was a tempting image.
I would never have been able to dream of it without Flynn. He had been to college. He had left Wellsburg. For someone so isolated and disconnected, he had experienced more than I ever had.
My eyes fell to the guitar case propped up against the wall in the corner of Flynn’s bedroom. I kept it here because he liked me to play for him. I had purchased a few second hand music books at the consignment shop in town and was attempting to teach myself a few new chords. No matter how horrible I sounded, Flynn always clapped. Even if he was brutally honest and would tell me if I sucked.
That was what being in a healthy relationship was. Cheering someone on even when their efforts blew huge monkey balls.
And that’s what he was doing now. He’d tell me if I fucked up. But he’d encourage me anyway.
“I have a meeting with the head of the Continued Education Planning Department. She’s going to help me do some applications online and see where that goes. You know if I’m doing this, you should see if Professor Channing is around. Maybe talk with him about doing some more workshops,” I suggested.
Flynn’s jaw started to tick and his teeth captured his bottom lip again. I knew my words had him stressed.
Professor Channing, the art teacher who had coordinated Flynn’s earlier workshop, had approached him about accepting a part-time teaching position at the school. When I had agreed with the professor, saying it was a good idea, Flynn had gotten almost violently angry. He had thrown things and screamed at me.
And it wasn’t until he calmed down and called Kevin, his therapist in Greensboro, that he was able to say he couldn’t do it. That he hated people staring at him.
“But they think you’re awesome, Flynn!” I had argued. But that didn’t matter. He didn’t want people staring at him all the time. It made him feel anxious.
But that didn’t stop me from delicately pushing the topic whenever I felt it safe to do so. The conversations hadn’t gone too well but he was encouraging me to take some pretty huge leaps of faith in my life. I felt it only right to return the favor.
“Maybe,” Flynn mumbled and I tilted my head, angling my ear closer.
“What was that? Did I just hear a maybe?” I asked, smiling.
Flynn didn’t grin like I would have liked him too. His face remained solemn.
“Yes. I said maybe,” he replied, turning away from me. I wanted to jump up and down and clap my hands with glee. Well if I was the jumping up and down and clapping my hands sort of person.
“I can live with a maybe,” I said, kissing him again before going back to get ready.
