Simon has to watch a few of these interactions before realizing that he’s... impressed, maybe? All he knows is that he kind of wants to keep hearing Charlie talk about sourcing old car parts.
“It’s early,” Charlie says after yet another person tells him they haven’t seen Dave. “Not even noon on the first day. He might show up later.”
None of that explains why the man hasn’t answered his phone in a week, but Charlie already knows that, so Simon keeps his mouth shut.
Crowds of people, especially when they’re milling around, make Simon anxious and disoriented. Today is no exception, but the factthat he doesn’t have to do anything helps. Nobody has any expectations, and Simon has no goals, unless you count his secret goal of petting every dog that walks past—a goal Charlie facilitates by being the sort of person who can walk up to total strangers and ask about their dogs. Whenever Simon gets stuck in a sea of people who, somehow, never learned how to walk at a reasonable speed and keep to the right, for fuck’s sake, there’s Charlie’s hand on the small of his back, steering him clear.
That hand—just the lightest pressure, barely even fingertips—is short-circuiting Simon’s brain. He tries to make a list of reasons a person might repeatedly touch someone else’s lower back. His list is one item long.
For lunch, they go to a restaurant that’s clearly supposed to be the platonic ideal of American diners, with lots of chrome and red vinyl, a neon-lit jukebox, waitresses in gingham dresses. The aesthetic is appalling, and Simon says so, low and bitchy in Charlie’s ear. Charlie steps on his foot.
“Is this—this perpetual hard-on that people have for the fifties—the explanation,” Simon asks, turning in a slow circle as they wait for a table, “for why we keep electing shitheads?”
“No,” Charlie says, “that would be racism. Hope that helps!”
“Is there a difference? Is there really?”
“This is cosplay. People can dress up as Darth Vader without being into fascism. Come on, you know this.”
Simon slowly raises his middle finger, then catches a pair of teenagers with their phones pointing at him and jams his hand into his pocket. He was speaking quietly, almost whispering, so he doesn’t think they picked up what he was saying. The owners of this restaurant probably don’t deserve to be called out by minor celebrities. Simon can reluctantly admit that fifties-themed aesthetics maybe aren’t conclusive evidence of actual evil.
“You look exhausted,” Simon says after they’ve ordered.
“You say the sweetest things.”
Simon rolls his eyes. “It’s not an insult. It’s—” What it is, is concern, but Simon feels weird saying so. Two days of peacefully not murdering one another does not constitute that kind of relationship. “I’m asking if you need anything. A nap. A break. I don’t know.”
Charlie takes a drink of his soda and starts twisting the straw wrapper around his finger. “So, I’m not great with stress.”
“Wow, what must that be like.”
Charlie kicks him under the table. “I mean, you were there that first season. I’m not gonna do anything stupid. I’m just saying that worrying about people I can’t help is, like, a problem.”
Simon’s faintly disgusted that Charlie’s managed to acquire an anxiety disorder or whatever fueled by kindness. Meanwhile, Simon’s anxiety is fueled by absolute unadulterated frustration with the entire world, combined with a little bit of self-loathing, just for variety.
“Why do you look pissed off at me? What the fuck?” Charlie asks, loud enough that the people at the table across the aisle glare at him. Simon glares back.
“I’m not pissed off at you. I’m disgusted that you’renice. You’re agood person. I’ve spent years wondering how you conned everyone into thinking you’re a saint and it turns out it’s just true. Gross. And boring.”
Charlie’s whole face scrunches into this expression of bewilderment, like he’s not sure if what Simon just said was an insult. Simon wishes him luck in figuring it out; he doesn’t have a clue.
“Anyway, you’re doing well,” Simon says. “A missing family member would be ten-out-of-ten stress for anyone.”
Charlie gets very busy accordioning his straw wrapper. “Remember you mentioned your pills? Don’t offer me any. Like, even if I freak out.”
“Sure.” Simon doesn’t go around offering controlled substances to people, so this isn’t a big ask.
“That stuff wasn’t a problem for me. I’ve never even taken any benzos—it was just alcohol. Well, alcohol, a little coke, some pills. But I stay away from all of it now.”
“I’ve seen you with a joint in your hand.”
“Weed isn’t a substance,” Charlie says, frowning, like he can’t believe the depths of Simon’s ignorance.
“Sure,” Simon says again, because he’s the most magnanimous person alive and he isn’t going to tell Charlie how to navigate his relationship with drugs. And also because he mostly agrees.
Charlie drags his fork through the puddle of ketchup on his plate. “I don’t think it would take much to get me hooked on, well, basically anything.” He flicks his gaze up to Simon and leaves it there, steady. “My mom was—anyway, you know how you stay away from more food than you have to? Same difference.”
“Got it.”
