3
"Bernard?"
There was someone far away calling my name, and someone's fingers toying with my hair—I frowned. Nobody ever touched me, much less caressed my hair. Again, the voice came—a soft, female voice, much gentler than any ever addressed to me…
"Bernard? C'mon, wake up. What will your boss say?"
I let out a deep, slow breath, and, opening my eyes, squinted up at—
"Miss Sharp. How strangely disturbing."
For a moment, her cheeks burned, and she was flustered, self-conscious; before I could smirk and forget the entire thing, however, an almost mischievous smile curved her mouth, and she raised an eyebrow.
"You should be thanking me, Bernard. I saved your ass from being fired. Besides, you seemed to rather enjoy yourself."
She was a liar. I hadn't enjoyed that at all…had I? No, of course I hadn't…I had no desire for human contact, no wanting to be even anywhere near anyone, particularly the irksome Gwendolyn Sharp.
"Pray, how did you wander to such a mistaken conclusion?" I retorted, turning away and pretending to inspect an exhibit, even as a strange, alarmingly warm feeling snaked its way up my neck. Gwendolyn's smirk just widened.
"Well, Bernard you seemed rather…open to the whole thing, if you want to know the truth. You practically purred, really."
The warm feeling exploded into a blush of sheer mortification as I struggled to remain composed; the girl was obviously enjoying her absurd joke. There was no reason why I should let it affect me.
"Miss Sharp, lying, like stalking, is not becoming. Nor is touching someone without their explicit consent."
Again, the color rose in her face, making little pink patches on her cheeks…but quickly she rallied from my rudeness, and shook her head, looking almost condescending.
"Well, it seemed to me that you gave me your explicit consent," she shot back, even as she blushed. "Come on, now, enough quibbling. What on earth did you do last night that deprived you of sleep?"
Annoyed and irritated at how she seemed to repeatedly force me to manifest the emotions I'd been sternly repressing, I shrugged in my most disdainful manner and murmured:
"When you find a way to clean a museum and sleep simultaneously, Miss Sharp, I'll take your question into account. Until then, I consider it unworthy of reply."
Her brows shot up, and that annoyingly expressive mouth fell open; with wide, childlike eyes she said softly:
"Bernard…were you cleaning the museum…all night?"
"That depends on one's definition of night. Certainly a good portion of it."
She was too flabbergasted to take note of my sarcasm; blinking, she stuttered:
"But—why?"
"Well, Miss Sharp, it's a well-known custom—perhaps you've heard of it; you claim to be so well-versed in them—when one's superior commands one to do something, to do it, without questioning why. I find it highly conducive to my state of continued employment."
Again, I'd irritated her, yet (dammit) not enough to have her forget the reason she'd asked her nosy question in the first place; with a little glint in her eyes, she continued:
"You mean your boss makes you stay here late? Does it happen often?"
I did not see the point of answering that last question; it would only provoke more unsolicited commiseration. And yet, provoked or not, more came.
"But that's awful! Why don't you quit? That's entirely unfair!"
Of course it was; everything was unfair. The child acted as if the injustice of existence was a novelty, something she'd never stumbled across before now. I rolled my eyes.
"Well, Miss Sharp, since life is 100 percent fair the rest of the time, I decided I'd let it slide just this once."
Miraculously, my nastiness served its purpose; momentarily distracted, she cried:
"Oh, stop calling me Miss Sharp! You sound like my teacher! My name is Gwendolyn!"
"I'm aware."
"Then why don't you use it? I don't go about calling you 'Mr. Grahame' like we're in the bloody '40's; call me Gwendolyn—or better yet, Gwen. Saves syllables that way."
"While the conservation of syllables is a primary concern," I deadpanned, as I inwardly acknowledged how amusing she was when she was irked. "I believe, if I must use your first name, I'll use your proper first name. Nicknames are an atrocity."
"It's a sign of closeness," she countered. "Come now, you never had nicknames for any of your friends?"
I almost laughed bitterly in her all-too-innocent face; friends? Surely she jested.
"I never had any to nickname."
"You never had any friends?" she echoed, as if the thought were truly incomprehensible. "Never?"
"I grow weary of repeating myself, Sharp."
"It's Gwen, dammit! And well, Bernard, you have one now; I'm your friend, remember?"
The statement rather took me aback; I stared at her for a moment, processing all of this. My friend. This girl wanted to be my friend.
How strange.
"Well," I said dryly, "I suppose beggars can't be choosers."
In that infuriating way of hers, Gwendolyn took my caustic words to be almost complimentary, a confirmation of how chummy she pretended we were.
"See?" she said, beaming. "Now was that so awful?"
And then, just to prove to me what a swell thing friendship was, she leant in and, before I could back away and utter a scathing remark, wrapped her arms around my waist, laying her head on my chest.
I stiffened at once, and opened my mouth to say something—but words failed me, and, involuntarily, my hands, suspended awkwardly in mid air, were lowering, resting on her back. My posture loosened, and for one single, suspended moment I was the nearest to happy that I had ever been—and then she slowly pulled away, as I gathered the wasted shreds of my snarkiness.
"What the hell was that?"
"That there," she said, flushed but smiling determinedly, "was a hug. A proper hug, and one which you sorely need. And, if you ever piss me off, I'll give you another one without any hesitation, in front of all the people here. Unless, of course," with an impish glance in my direction, "you ask for one as a favor."
"I'm sure I'll be begging for another soon enough; how perspicacious of you to deduce how I secretly adored it."
The girl refused to be put out by my weary acidity; glowing as if she'd proven a very good point, she simply smiled in a way that was a good deal too knowing for my tastes and replied:
"You hugged me back."
Even sarcasm failed me for a moment; instinctively, I retorted:
"I did no such thing."
"You did. Wallow in denial if you like, but you most certainly hugged me back."
"Think what you like," I said simply, shrugging and walking away. "Women are so willfully self-deceptive sometimes."
"And Bernards are so stubbornly cold and heartless sometimes."
There was an aggravating twitching sensation at my mouth, which I did my best to shove down; I was not about to let her think she had amused me.
Yet I had a sinking suspicion that she had, and, what was worse, she knew it.
For the rest of the day I could not shake the peculiar sensation that Gwendolyn still had her arms around me; irritated and wanting to forget the entire, absurd experience, I went home that day at a reasonable hour for once, and buried myself in a book concerning the psychological problems of Hitler.
Yet the feeling persisted, and after a good hour I abandoned the possible, deep rooted self-loathing of Adolf Hitler and tried to reason with myself.
It was merely the novelty of the whole thing; after all, I had not been hugged—or, perhaps, assaulted—for a long time, not since I was perhaps three. And even then the embrace had been half-hearted, almost grudging, as if the whole thing were purely perfunctory. Gwendolyn Sharp's unexplainable hug had been my first in many years—and the first I'd ever received that had feeling behind it. It was maddening that the feeling lingered, that I hadn't completely forgotten about it as soon as we'd broken apart.
Scowling, I dragged myself over to the sink and, rolling up my sleeves, doused my arms in the frigid water (I had no hot water), determined to wash away the unfamiliar sensations there.
And I was, for the first time in years, confused and only seemingly apathetic when it didn't work.
