PART 3 - HORATIO
By Lizard
I have become less afraid now. His pallor has gone and he is less adverse to being shaved and having his hair combed. I find that I enjoy performing these menial tasks for him. It makes me feel as though I am bringing him back to his former self, and it gives me the opportunity I crave to be near him. To touch him. To know that he is alive. I can almost believe that when he is well again we will be returning straight to the Indy amongst general celebration and congratulation. The perfect ending to a tale.
We talk together often. Inane subjects, such as what our favourite foods are, amusing dreams we have had, always keeping the air joyous and light-hearted. And through it all, I cannot relax. A strange tension holds me in suspension whenever I am in this room with him. It is indescribable - but I keep feeling that there is something just waiting to spring up without warning.
Our friendship was never a gentle easy relationship - it progressed in leaps and bounds in those first days of our acquaintance. Then severed by that swine Simpson. And now this unexpected reunion. But that was several weeks ago. Something is sure to come between us once again - I do not know what but I dread its approach. So far these past few weeks I have endeavoured to reveal to him as much of myself as I can lest we are separated once again.
I tell him about my father, my school life; old childhood memories filling the sickroom with its innocent yet poignant scent. He listens intently, his head cocked gently to one side; but his eyes remain blank. Oh, they shine when I attempt to make a joke and he laughs at my incompetence. But I still feel his detachment. I cannot help but be frustrated - I have revealed so much to him, and still he blocks me out. I tell myself that he needs time, that he has just been through a thoroughly draining experience. But I cannot help feeling offended.
I am not being fair. He *has* talked about himself - mostly about his life in the theatre; sometimes about a girl he had back home. We crack the usual lewd jokes about being caught beneath the docks or behind haystacks and such. I tell him that he is lucky to have found a girl. He already knows of my inexperience in such matters - my knowledge of the mechanisms involved are purely from the textbook.
Whenever the issue of sex arises I feel a barrier coming between us. He knows I feel totally unequipped with the experience needed to be able converse on such matters, and he uses this to draw a discussion to a halt. I had thought him cured - but it seems I was wrong. There is still some niggling problem within him that is preventing him from being his normal self. But, I think to myself, he will never be his normal self again. He has changed - and it is I that caused his alteration. He may claim otherwise, but I know that what I say is true.
Perhaps in his mind's eye, I have changed as well. I hope I have become someone he admires. Why do I feel this need to impress him? When I am with other men, I do not care much of what they think - perhaps it is arrogance on my part, as I am aware that my reputation precedes me. But with Archie, I am not the great hero. I am still a seventeen year old boy with no friends. I am aware that when I am angry with him or when I feel that he has spoken out of turn, I revert to my formal distanced demeanour with him. And he gives me that look, for he knows exactly what I am doing.
I cannot hide anything from him, and yet he will not be open with me. I doubt he will ever reveal himself to anyone. And I hate it - I feel disadvantaged, tricked, fooled. After all my coaxing and cajoling him back into life, I have ended up opening up the deepest recesses of my memories, while he has remained as before. Unresponsive. Living, yes, but not alive.
~~~~####~~~~####~~~~####~~~~