He’s late. Almost too late.
But he came.
The next thing I know, there is a soft thwack as his body crashes into the chair next to mine.
“What are you doing?” I ask, looking at him now and hating how my body reacts to his chiselled face, the stretch of his shoulders, the veins I can see in his forearms and hands. I take it all in in seconds. How is that even possible?
“Sitting down to watch the end of the sunset,” he says. “And then I'm going to apologise to you. No, actually I think grovel is more accurate for what I'm going to do.”
Because I’m at a loss for words, I turn my head back to the horizon too, and without saying anything else, we watch as the golden globe melts into the sea and the surrounding sky lights up red and orange and pink, almost as if in protest. When the sun is completely submerged, I turn my focus to the space it inhabited, looking for a green light, all the while wondering if Marty is doing the same.
“So, funny story...” he begins, and I already know I’m going to listen. I’m going to sit and hear what he has to say and then I’m going to see how it makes me feel.
“Arnie,” he says then stops. I blink and wait for him to continue. “Arnie was my best friend and then, for the last three years, my boyfriend. We fell in love while travelling together. Well, technically that’s not true. I’m pretty sure we were in love long before that but he’s a stubborn fool and I was still in denial about how boys gave me boners. Anyway, just over a year after we got back from travelling – he was studying English at Trinity and I was doing Culinary Arts at a tech college – he became ill. Out of nowhere, he was getting all these bruises and nosebleeds and his skin was itchy all over. When he started to get fevers and would often sleep for more than twelve hours, he went to the doctors. A few days after that, we knew it was leukaemia.”
“My God,” I say, the air feeling thinner.
Marty keeps his eyes on mine as he talks. “Yeah, massive great big pile of shit. But there was some hope and we did everything we could. After six months we thought he was going to beat it.” Marty looks down briefly. “After a year, we knew he wouldn’t and that was when we moved into his parents’ place together. He held on for another long, painful but very special eight months. I was holding his hand when he passed... which was a year ago yesterday.”
My head clouds with confusion. I don’t know what I was expecting him to tell me, but it most definitely wasn’t this. I shiver as waves of sympathy for him wash over me.
“Marty...” I say, and I hope it says more than his name. I hope it says,I’m sorry, andI’m hereandThat’s so fucking shit.
“Not long after he died, I went on a holiday with some mates. I didn’t even want to go, but Arnie wanted me to have something... something to look forward to, and so I went. And well, I never went home. I got on that plane to Ibiza, got far too drunk and took more than a few illegal substances and when the rest of the lads took a taxi to the airport a week later, I didn’t go with them. I got a job washing pots in a bar and didn’t go back home for nearly six months. I’ll save you thedetails, but it was a horrible messy time. It’s why I don’t drink anymore. And it’s why my parents dragged me on this holiday.”
“So, they didn’t let you come down this evening?” I say trying to connect some dots.
Marty shakes his head and squeezes his eyes shut. “Oh, no. That’s still my balls-up. Because of all the aforementioned fuckery, when I did come home from Ibiza, I started taking anti-depressants and also some other tablets to help me sleep, but I stopped taking them last week and well, I then stupidly took one today after thinking it may help with some... some extreme feelings I’ve been having, and well, I think I took the wrong one.”
My lips curl downward, and I hope it doesn’t appear in pity. It’s in empathy. I can almost feel his pain in my own chest.
“It knocked me out and I woke up like three minutes before I got here,” he says and nods at his feet. “Didn’t even bother to put shoes on.”
I test a gentle laugh. “Yeah, I noticed that and was going to ask if that’s what the cool kids are all doing these days?”
“Ha, not the cool kids, no. Rather the moronic idiots who keep fucking shit up,” he says, and it snaps me to move, to take what feels like a risk. I reach for his face, cup his chin in my hand and squeeze a little to get his attention.
“Marty, stop. Stop talking about yourself like that, because your brain will be so far gone believing it there will be no turning back.”
His eyes are pinned on mine as we stay like this long enough for me to see the fading light make the flecks of green and gold in his eyes glow.
“I still feel like a dick,” he says in a whisper.
“You look like one, with those crushed pillow lines all over your face and some serious bed hair going on.” I put my hand in his hair and he closes his eyes at the touch.
“Seriously though. It feels all kinds of wrong to tell you about Arnie now as if that excuses being late like I’m playing him as a Get Out of Jail Free card.”
“I don’t think you’re doing that.” I rub my nails against his scalp, and he pushes into my hand. It feels very inappropriate but somewhat inevitable when heat floods between my legs.
“And do you want to know what the best part of yesterday evening was for me? It was that I wasn't that guy. That guy who lost his best friend and boyfriend, the guy who reacted by going on the rampage for months on end. That guy who lets people down.”
“You didn't let me down. You don’t owe me anything,” I say but it doesn’t seem to help ease the strain in his features.
“Yes, I let you down,” he says. “I said I'd be here, and I wasn't. Also, I just lied to you.”
I drop my hand from his head. “You did? About Arnie?”
“No, not about any of that. Sadly, that sorry tale is true. I lied when I said that you not knowing about my background was the best part of last night. It wasn't.”
