I remembered when Fridays were days that I looked forward to. Back when I had been working for Joja Corp., making it to Friday had always been one of two main goals for the week. The other main goal was to not get fired.
Friday had been that one day when management might forgive you for missing your bus or failing to make it onto the jam-packed subway trains at exactly 8 o'clock. On occasion, we would actually have lunch provided for us some Fridays, though the food was often bland and not filling, supplied by some catering company that spent all day churning out sandwiches and salads stuffed with limp lettuce and not-quite-ripe tomatoes. Still, I couldn't ignore the attempt at creating some kind of positive company culture.
On the flip side, Fridays had also been popular days for letting people go. Mornings would be comprised of rushed goodbyes, and afternoons would vacillate between sombre and thankful silences. It was strange to think of how drastically my idea of Friday had changed in less than a year.
And here I was again, facing another, different kind of day of reckoning.
After getting maybe four hours of sleep, Friday dawned bright and warm. The rain had disappeared as swiftly as it had arrived, and I had mixed feelings about this change in weather. Rain and coolness had generally meant good things in terms of my friendship with Sebastian – more days spent outside in the spaces where people would normally frequent, and more temperatures that didn't induce sweating. Was the lack of rain today a sign that this was an ill-fated day?
"Today's the day," I said to Dog as I gave him a pat on the head and headed into town.
It didn't seem to matter that I was taking my sweet time getting up to the mountain. The paths were too short, the sun crept too slowly across the sky. I wasn't ready to say good-bye. There was a note of finality in the crisp autumn air, and I felt strangely like I was grieving as I marched to my judgment.
Don't be silly, I chided myself. It was Sebastian who was moving away, not I. If anything, he should have been the one wandering these paths, soaking in the last glorious bits of the valley's beauty available to him.
As my boots gripped the steady incline of the mountain, dread washed over me, familiar and unabashed. All too soon, the familiar house came into view. There was no turning back.
I took a deep breath as I made slow, deliberate steps towards his house. My knees started to shake as I saw that his garage door was open, and there, just inside was Sebastian. He wore his usual black hoodie and jeans. I paused and watched him work on his bike, polishing it and making various final adjustments for his last ride out of here towards his new home.
Steeling myself, I made my approach.
He looked up as he heard me, his hair falling over one eye as he straightened up.
I couldn't wait for him to greet me first. "I'm glad I didn't miss you," I blurted out, "you know, leaving."
He nodded, but said nothing. Pushing the hair out of his face, he eyed me carefully.
I swallowed noisily and prepared myself. I had rehearsed so many words and variations of them, and yet I still didn't know which ones would be right. I knew that he wanted my honesty, that he in fact valued sincerity. For that, I was thankful, though in some ways it made this all so much harder. I took a deep breath and felt the bite of resolve sink its teeth into me. "I don't know what you've decided, but I want you to know that I will support you however I can."
His expression did not change, though I suspected that I saw acknowledgement flicker in his eyes. "I really appreciate it."
"That being said, I'm sure you're aware that I – and Sam – would really, really appreciate if you didn't leave." I laughed nervously. "Just think, without you it'd be me and Sam hanging out at events together." In spite of myself, I made a face. Dear Yoba, this was not coming out like I had rehearsed in any iteration.
He shifted, looking almost bemused for a moment. "You know, Sam wants to date you."
I froze, trying to read his body language. His arms were crossed over his chest, and he seemed to be chewing on his bottom lip.
"R-really? This is the first I've heard of it." I pressed my lips into a tight line, contemplating my next statement. I had to tread carefully now. "I would reject him so hard, he'd regret ever entertaining the thought of it."
He snorted slightly, just enough to indicate that he found amusement in what I'd said. "He can be pretty persistent when he puts his mind to it." A smile played around his lips – a challenge, a question, another way of saying "go on".
I shook my head. "He's got to be dreaming if he thinks I would date him."
"Is the idea really so hard to believe?"
"Yes," I said plaintively.
He gave me a questioning look.
"It's simple, I'm not attracted to him. He's not my type."
"And what's your type?"
I swallowed, feeling a familiar heat rise to my cheeks. "That's none of your business," I snapped perhaps a little too harshly.
"Oh, come on, humour me one last time." That bitterness was back, infecting his words.
A chill crawled down my spine and my heart sank. If this was to be the last time, then what was there to lose? "My type," I began slowly, "is someone who is a thinker, someone who I can have lengthy, stimulating conversations with. That someone has to be smart, and I don't just mean book smarts, but they have to be clever and witty. I'd prefer someone who isn't super talkative, someone who appreciates a silence filled with mutual understanding. On top of all that, I like a guy with nice hair and an awkwardness about him. It's endearing. And ideally, he'd have just enough of an edge that he would be okay with my quirks and weird tastes." I paused, searching for a way to cap off my remarks. "Oh, and having some shared hobbies would be a bonus, but that might be something that me and Sam actually do have so I'd rather leave that off my criteria."
He was silent, his dark eyes studying me with a weary sadness. "You've put a lot of thought into it."
"Not really," I said flippantly and shrugged. "I just had to think of my favourite person and list all of their attributes." I looked away as my cheeks continued their slow burn.
He said nothing, only sighed and leaned against the garage door frame. His arms remained crossed over his chest, though they seemed less tense and strict in their positioning.
"So," I began, desperate to salvage the situation, "when is Sam coming over to say his good-byes? I should probably let you get back to packing and preparing before he comes and monopolizes the rest of your time. I'm sure he'll have lots to say, given that you've been friends for so long."
"He should be here soon," he stated simply, belying nothing.
Defeat settled itself like a heavy mantle on my shoulders. I sensed that my time was up, and I had made no headway in trying to convince him to stay. Biting the inside of my lip, I tried not to dwell on my failures. The last time I'd felt this hopeless was the day I had put in my resignation at Joja Corp. There had been so many emotions in me that day, so much anguish and frustration that my life was stagnating, and so much fear that I was damaged forever, unable to find a use for myself in society. Strangely, handing in that resignation had probably been the best thing I'd ever done for myself. This time, the story was much different. I had one last shot to shift the course of failure I was hurtling down.
"Well, I guess I should leave now," I said and my voice cracked. I pulled my backpack around to my front and began to grope around inside of it, keeping my eyes trained somewhere vaguely between my bag and the ground. "I have something for you."
"You didn't have to, really." I didn't need to look at him to know that there was a blush painted across his cheeks.
"No," I said, voice strained from my mounting frustration as my fingers brushed over every other thing in my bag. "I do. I really do." I forced myself to breathe and focus. "Ah-ha." At last my fingers found it, and I tugged the thing out of my bag with one mighty yank.
My cheeks burned as I brandished the bouquet of flowers at him. "Here," I said gruffly and waved it in his face. "For you."
There was silence. His eyes widened, and his breathing seemed to stop altogether.
Oh great, I somehow managed to kill him, I thought miserably. Perhaps Sam had suggested these flowers as a prank. Perhaps Sam knew of some fatal allergy to flowers that Sebastian had. Perhaps I had been set up by the biggest asshole of all time. For a moment, I truly believed that Sam had gotten the better of me.
But then the expression I had mistaken for anaphylactic shock melted into a softness tinged with red. Sebastian looked, dare I say it, pleased. "I'll accept this. Thank you." He turned the flowers over in his hands, admiring them from another angle. "I didn't know you felt the same."
"Wh-what?" Suddenly I was back on high alert. What depth of trouble had Sam gotten me into?
He gazed at me curiously. "Maybe you don't know, but in the valley, this bouquet is a token that indicates when someone wants to enter a steady relationship with you."
Sweet relief dazed me as I silently cursed Sam one last time. He was one crafty asshole, though his heart was in the right place. "Oh, yes, well, that is how I feel. That is what I want." I was surprised that the words felt right as I said them, despite how awkward they came out. Emboldened by the flush of his cheeks, I continued, a firmness bolstering my next statement. "Sebastian, I like you as more than a friend."
He smiled and it was as though his mask slipped off, revealing a pure, unadulterated joy. His dark eyes danced in the sunlight, twinkling with a liveliness that burned straight into my soul.
I took a deep breath and could not contain my own smile. "You," I continued, "are my favourite person, and if you move to the city, I'm leaving with you."
His eyes widened, though the flush still remained across his cheeks. "You'd go back to the place that's the backdrop for most of your nightmares?"
"Yes," I said softly, but firmly. "I would follow you wherever life takes you. I'm not sure if I could describe the kinship I feel with you, or the sense of belonging that you give me. I've been an outsider for so long, I didn't think I'd ever feel it. But then I got to know you, and I realized something." I swallowed, but allowed myself a grin as I took a few steps towards him, my eyes locked to his. "You are what feels like home. It's not the valley or the city, it's you."
"I-I think I know what you mean. I feel it for you, as well." He crossed what little distance remained between us, and I felt a cautious fluttering in my chest as we leaned closer into each other.
A flurry of footsteps against the dirt path cleaved the moment, and hastily, we broke apart, the both of us lightly panting for breath. Neither of us could tear our eyes away from the other, a last attempt to hold on to some shared secret.
"Finally," Sam hollered, a grin plastered across the bottom half of his face as he jogged into view. "Finally, I'm here." He noticed the bouquet clutched in Sebastian's hands as he came closer and his grin only grew. "Finally," he repeated, giving us a knowing glance.