Not that sensible was a priority. Back at Pippa’s, he swiped a bottle of vodka, scrawled a barely legible IOU, and weaved his way upstairs.
In the flat, his hazed mind half expected to find Nero already there, smoking on the fire escape, or sulking on the couch, but the flat was dark and silent. And horrible. For the first time since Nero had shaken him awake at the start of the summer, Nero’s cosy home felt like the last place on earth Lenny should be.
Vodka in hand, Lenny roamed the small space, drifting from the living room to the bedroom and back again, before he retreated to the fire escape, taking Nero’s customary place at the railing, staring out at the city below. His fingers itched for a cigarette, but they were in Nero’s back pocket.
I could roll a joint. But without Nero, that felt wrong too. Which left Lenny nothing but his own thoughts for company, and those led to nowhere but the devastating realisation that he’d pushed Nero too far. Why couldn’t you let him be? But as guilt scorched painfully though his veins, Lenny’s heart knew tonight had been inevitable. The shadows around Nero’s soul were thick and vast, and the fear in his eyes had been there long before Lenny had ever known him. He loved Nero—how could he not?—but it wasn’t enough. Nero needed more.
He needs a friend.
Lenny set his vodka bottle carefully at his feet and went inside. He hadn’t touched his phone in months, not since he’d taken the sim card out and buried it at the bottom of a pile of old clothes, but with his wages building up in the bank, he had plenty of money to load it with credit.
He retrieved it and the iPhone charger Nero kept by his bed, and wandered into the living room. The phone activated a minute or so after he plugged it in, and a series of messages popped up, all from different numbers. The first could’ve been from anyone, or a wrong number, but the second, and then every one after, confirmed that they were clearly a hangover from the dark days when the buzz of his phone had haunted him.
Lenny deleted them one by one, but his thumb lingered over the last: Your hair reminds me of the dolls I’ve burned.
Ew. Absently, Lenny fingered his newly pinked locks. Previous letters and messages had often mentioned his hair—mainly lamenting the colour, or that Lenny had chosen to wear a hat—but threatening to burn him was new . . . or old, Lenny supposed. The messages were all dated and timed at the moment they’d come through, but they’d likely been stuck in cyberspace for months.
Fuck it. Lenny deleted the last message, and his focus returned to the task at hand. It took a while to find the debit card he’d stored for payment, but after a few tries, it was good to go. With shaking hands, Lenny tapped in Nero’s number and saved it. His finger hovered over the Call button, but his nerves failed him. Couldn’t handle the humiliation of an unanswered call. ’Cause an unanswered text is so fucking different.
Lenny silenced the devil in his heart and opened WhatsApp. Nero used it to keep in touch with the staff groups Jake ran for Urban Soul and new messages showed on his lock screen, meaning they were impossible to ignore.
Hey so . . . I’m sorry I fucked up. Again. Please come home. I’ll leave if you want me to. Just please . . . come home.
It’s Lenny, by the way.
Lenny stared at the screen. Smooth, man, but with his only card dealt, there was little he could do but curl up on the couch and stare at the tiny grey tick, waiting for the second one that signalled the message had been delivered. Nothing happened. Lenny wondered if Nero was on the Tube, or perhaps out of battery. The latter option made Lenny feel sick. At least if Nero read his message and chose to ignore it, Lenny would know he was okay.
Ten minutes later, a second grey tick appeared on the screen. Lenny released a shaky breath and sank back into the sofa cushions. He closed the app, made sure the alert-tone volume was turned up high, and set the phone on the arm of the couch. The ball was in Nero’s court now. If he chose not to respond, or asked Lenny to follow through on his promise to leave, so be it. Lenny owed Nero that, and so much more.
He closed his eyes. Sleep seemed a distant dream, but the megaton of booze he’d drunk had other ideas. Lenny’s body sagged, and his chin dropped to his chest. He fought the inevitable, but the spinning blackness of a vodka-laced coma took hold, and he slipped into a blank doze.
His Years & Years ringtone woke him sometime later. He fumbled for the phone and answered without looking at the screen. “Nero?”
“Yeah.”
“Fuck.” Lenny searched for words, his sleep-addled brain unprepared for the unlikely possibility that Nero would call him. “Are you okay?”
“Erm . . . dunno. Probably.”
Lenny sat up. Nero was clearly as drunk as when they’d parted ways, but beyond that he sounded utterly exhausted. “Where are you?”
Nero didn’t answer straightaway. There was a faint clanging, and then the flick of a lighter. “I’m at work.”
“Which work?”
“Does it matter?”
Any hope in Lenny evaporated. If Nero didn’t want Lenny to know where he was, he likely didn’t want to see him. “I just want to know you’re okay.”
“I’ve never been okay, mate. Cass coulda told you that.”
“So why didn’t he?”
“Dunno. Ask him.”
“I can’t do this, Nero. Just come home, okay? I’ll go somewhere else.”
Silence, then a sigh so heavy that Lenny’s heart broke a little bit more. “I don’t want you to leave.”
