“Yes and no. I’m riding high on dopamine right now, I think. Dopamine from working out, finally. Dopamine from seeing some results – my shorts were baggy when I put them on this morning. Baggy! And honestly, dopamine from what we do together, every Sunday. But with that comes a busyness that I know will invariably result in a crash of some kind at some point. My brain will get tired before it tells me and I then need something easy to occupy it, that’s going to give me more gentle dopamine kicks.”
“Makes sense,” I say. It makes more sense than I can actually put into words. He taps the box once and then steps away. I realise then that he’s making a move to leave. And I don’t want that. Ireallydon’t want that. Especially if this is our last time together, if Tony and I go for that drink. If Tony and I… “Would you like to do it with me?”
“Sorry?”
“The puzzle. We could do it together. Or at least, start it.”
His eyes narrow on the box and then lift up to me before dropping again. “Are you sure you want me to stay?”
“Very sure. In fact, I have some chicken I’ve marinaded that will stretch to us both. With rice and veggies, obviously.”
That earns me a very brief laugh. “Obviously.”
“Unless, of course, you have somewhere better to be.”
“No. No, I don’t.”
As I watch Marcello take the box back from me, and tell me he’ll set up in the living room while I get changed, I realise there’s a chance that it will cause me real and physical damage when I do have to stop these Sundays, if Tony has replied, if we go for a drink, if we end up... It will hurt. I like Marcello in my space. I like him filling the kettle with water, which I can hear him doing. I like him bringing me puzzles and sticking around to do them. I like him.
No, this is more than that.
This is as close to love as I think I have ever felt.
Which is the reason I have to call it off. Maybe this love I feel for him can be channelled into the friendship we share. Maybe we can still hang out regularly, outside of the gym, going on runs and doing puzzles. Maybe I can learn to love him as a friend.
“You want a cup of tea?” His voice bellows down the short corridor.
“Please!” I call back, unsurprised when it comes out rough and dry.
“Wait,” Marcello says and a few seconds later he appears at the door. “I don’t know how you take your tea! How on earth did we get to this point without me not knowing how you take your tea?”
My heart hammers in my chest, loud and regular and full of hope.This point?Does he feel it too? Is he falling for me too?
“I… I don’t know,” I mumble uselessly.
“So go on,” he nods at me, “tell me.”
“Tell you what?” I panic.
“How you like your tea.”
“Oh,”I say and with a quick blink and shake of my head, I bat away any other possible way for this conversation to go. “Strong with only a dash of milk.”
“Very Northern.” Marcello wrinkles his nose.
“Very Scottish, actually. It’s the only way my dad drank his.”
“Coming right up.” He gives me one of his devastating big smiles before disappearing again.
I take a shower in the end. I do so hoping it will wash some sense into me or at least rinse away the emotion I feel thinking that it’s over. That Marcello and I will never fuck again, never kiss again, never hold each other’s bodies in the way we just did.
It doesn’t work.
Once dry and dressed, I walk out of the bedroom feeling like I have weights on my feet and an anchor pulling down on my heart. Just before I turn the corner into my living space, I pull in a long breath and square my shoulders. I hold the breath for three seconds and then blow it out, for six seconds.
I can do this. I can do this. I can do this.
“I give up. You’ll have to tell me!” Marcello calls out from behind an open kitchen cupboard.
