Xx... Sorry for the lack of updates! Anywhoodle, zis is a new chapter that could be potentially very confusing! Look out for the (x)'s! ...xX

I am 16 and it is summer.

There is no better place to be 16 in the summer than London.

It's not compactly overwrought like New York or nauseatingly false like Paris. No, London is just perfect. And when it is sultry, and the air smells like curry, there is no finer place to be a 16 year old boy.

Which is what I am.

And there are times when I need my best friend. Like, right now.

See- Dean Thomas is a very good judge of human character, and, frankly, I let him make all my relationship decisions because I am not a very good judge of human character. I am of the school of thought that says, "if she doesn't cheat and her legs are far apart- stick with it!" Dean is of the opposite opinion. He needs more than sex and security. I admire Dean for that, but I don't admire Dean for that. Understand? Probably not. I admire him for his ideals but I lament the fact that his fucking ideals might keep him alone for a long long time. I love Dean, there is absolutely nothing I wouldn't do for him(x), but sometimes he sets himself up for heartbreak with his impossible standards.

Still, impossible standards are better than no standards, which is the silly position I've taken up.

Back to the story, I suppose. But fuck you if that's all you're here for.

I stand outside the half-gate that separates his garden and house from the street. I dig my hands into my thin hoodie and tap my sneaker'd foot back and forth and back and forth. Finally, after what seems like years, he bounds down the front steps and leaps over the gate. Sometimes, my best friend is so gay it hurts.

"Easy Fairy Queen" I say.

(Dean's parents don't like me)

Dean laughs. Dean reaches an unsteady hand and picks some pollen from my hair.

(I've only been into his house once, the summer after our first year.)

"Right. So who's this ladyfriend?" Dean asks as we amble down his leafy suburban street.

(I accidentally spilled the beans. Dean wouldn't talk to me for weeks.)

"I want you to think Erykah Badu then subtract the LSD."

(I haven't been invited back)

xoxoxoxoxo

Dean has always sussed out my ladyfriends.

From the time we were second years, and he told me he thought Lavender Brown had "a good head on her shoulders" right up until last month when he sadly informed me that Parvarti Patil was "a trollop masquerading as a lady".

I always tend to go for the floosies, so I need Dean- mon ami gay, to tell me the deal.

Not to say that the pendulum doesn't swing both ways.

I mean, I can't tell you the number of times I've had to go into a Starbucks or CD store to check out the boy behind the counter, or pass notes to Cederic Diggory(xx). But I'm crap and sussing out boys, as Dean will tell you- still it's nice that he bothers to ask me.

That's really what counts, the thought.

the thought the thought the thought

Dean hasn't had many boyfriends.

It's not that he's not an attractive catch, I mean, he totally is and I'm not just saying that.

He's super smart and rather good looking and not obnoxious in the way most gays tend to be. Like all pink and Kylie-loving. It's not that Dean is a self-hating gay; he just thinks that he is attracted to guys because they're... guys. If he wanted someone to listen to Kylie and paint his nails with, he'd be into girls.

We've never talked about it. It's what I've sussed out.

Dean has received approximately three love notes. Two of them being of the "do you like check me check YES or NO" from girls.

I've always found it funny that Dean doesn't knock 'em dead in the boy department.

I've heard the rumors, too.

Sometimes I wonder if that's what scares them away.

I try and think "no" but I can't help thinking

"yes"

xoxoxoxox

She has the most beautiful head of hair.

That's what first attracted me to her, honest.

She works in a bookshop and wears glasses the color of licorice.

Her hair is thick and in tight girls. It's mocha colored with streaks of this and that, shades of blonde and brown and black. She always wears "frocks". She tried to listen to "The Arcade Fire" because her last boyfriend(xxx) listened to them but she doesn't like them. She likes "Beirut" and she likes "Patti Smith" and she likes "Patrick Wolf" and she likes "Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings" and she likes "Erykah Badu" and she likes "Beat the Devil" and she likes "Stew".

She is beautiful when I imagine her listening to music.

When I imagine her walking down the steps of her semi with her headphones on. I imagine "Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings" talking about the things on their mind. I imagine her head bopping slightly as she gets on the tube and takes out he book. I imagine her half smile, her eyebrows going up slightly, her lips touching and untouching barely. Barely noticeable unless you're up-close, with a strong camera. Subconsciously mouthing the words without mouthing them. She sings along in her head and

she closes her eyes so her eyeballs can dance wildly even when she cannot.

xoxoxoxoxo

"Seamus... She's..."

We stand across the street. Looking in sneakily. I kick at some gravel to prevent my blushing face from being seen.

"Once I minus the LSD, you're absolutely right!"

I run my hand through my hair, trying to feign disinterest even though I desperately needed Dean's advice and called him here in the first place(xxxx), a fact we're not discussing because I'm trying to be cool and feign disinterest.

"I'm going in," he says resolutely.

And indeed, in he goes.

xoxoxoxoxo

(xxxxx)

xoxoxoxoxo

It is the end of the summer.

Fireflies buzz with purpose, perhaps a bit more ferociously then they did last week, they know that this counts. The last time. The last Tuesday, really. The last Tuesday before back to the humdrum. Back to the abnormal. Back to the seclusion.

I sit at a table with her. We are sharing a latte and nurse it as if our lives depend on it. I lean back in my chair and she lifts her glasses up to rub her eyes.

It is three a.m.

"Happy Wednesday"

She is looking down at her watch, just noticing this and that and perhaps she remembers the birth mark I have on the small of my back or perhaps just thinking about Yoko and he she really did fuck everything up.

I am thinking about her hair, as I often do.

But really, my mind keeps wandering back to her wonderful middle toe.

In my mind, this is where I picture Dean at this very moment:

It is very late. Or early, depending on how you look at things. 3 a.m.

He, being Dean of course, is walking the square besides his house. He clutches the other boys hand tightly. The boy who wears his hair a bit too long and a bit too messy and whose clothes are a bit too wrinkled and whose eyes are a bit too far apart and red from lack of sleep. The boy clutches Dean's hand back just as tightly. The cigarette drops from the boys' mouth onto the pavement and Dean stamps it out and the boy pulls him into a soft kiss, tasting of cigarettes and roasted new potatoes.

For some reason, there are a million stars visible from this oblique suburban London square. What an odd occurrence it is. Stars in the city. So perfect at this very moment.

The boy lets go and Dean rubs the side of his head.

The boy realizes he can't go another ten seconds without Dean's lips on his.

Perhaps some fireworks would go off in the distance at this part, and someone will have to kick their leg up. Dean will.

He's always been the romantic one.

He savors the taste of the boy, the softness of his lips, the strange smell, the good smell,

the good everything(xxxxxx)

(x)Enter Dean. We are fourth years. His face is splotchy.

"You ok?

He says nothing.

"You ok?

Again the same, only this time he goes to his bed and flops onto it dramatically.

"Dean..."

He doesn't even have to say anything. I know. After all, I'm his best friend. I go over to where he lays and sit next to his sprawled out body. His hear is thick as I run my hands through it. I don't know what came over me next. I mean, I knew he was hurting and I knew it wasn't my fault, but somehow I felt it was. It wasn't love, in the erotic sense. It wasn't duty, no matter what I say. It was probably compassion. It was compassion that leads me to slowly unbutton his corduroy trousers that night. It was compassion that guided my mouth, my tongue, my lips. It was compassion which made me warm.

(xx)"Well!?" he bounds up to me when I emerge from the used vinyl shop. He holds a latte he picked up to kill time while I hunted the prey.

"He's got nice eyes..."

"Yeah? And...?"

"For chrissakes Dean! I only said about four words to the boy, and you know I'm shit at this!"

We sit on the curb and I take a sip of his latte.

"He does have nice eyes..." he says dreamily, thinking of all his unattainable love.

(xxx)We are at a rock club. I see them. Dean is with me, trying to get drinks off of some old gerry at the bar. She is in a floral, whatchamacallit. I really... I mean, the only way to describe it is to call it a frock, but that's not doing it justice. I suppose only she could pull it off. With her skin the color of chocolate and her beautiful beautiful hair and bangled arms with tattoos and her glam heels. I have to blink.

He wears skinny jeans. He has an indie mullet. He listens to "The Arcade Fire". So does Dean, though I tell him to get sense. That's why we're here.

To listen to "The Arcade Fire".

And to fall in love, I suppose.

(xxxx)"Hey"

"Hey"

"Did I wake you?"

"Nah... A little"

"Sorry."

"S'ok"

"How's you?"

"I's good"

"Your mockery is not pretty"

"Your face is not pretty"

"Fuck off. I have an important mission, should you choose to accept"

"Lemme think about it"

"Dick"

"I accept"

"She works at a bookshop."

"Meet me at the gate tomorrow. I need to sleep now."

"nighty night faggot"

click.

(xxxxx)This is how Dean tells it:

He walks in. Stacks of books everywhere. Hemingway mingles with Plath and "Goodnight Moon" with "Great Gatsby". She is taking inventory on a legal pad. He approaches her and says something along the lines of 'can you help me find something miss?' and of course she, being lovely and beautiful and nice and possessing a head of hair that makes gods envious says 'sure' and he walks her to the philosophy stack and kisses her and at first she is a bit surprised and then she is a bit disgusted and then she is a bit violet and then she hits Dean with her legal pad and says 'what kind of book are you looking for?' and this is when he knows that she is a keeper because she just said that and then he just smirks and looks at her and scratches his freckle and goes 'my friend is in love with you. me? I'm queer.' he makes to go and just as he reaches the door he pauses in anticipation, just for a moment, hardly recognizable to the untrained eye, but she stops him anxiously '...for your... friend' and it's written on yellow legal pad paper. the most wonderful number combination in the world.

(xxxxxx)This is where Dean really is: in bed. He is in his pajamas that he should have given to the Salvation Army years ago in his room which I have never seen but imagine to be covered in juvenile wall paper. He is alone. He doesn't dream of anything, or anyone, because that is stupid.

That is stupid that is stupid that is stupid that is stupid that is stupid that is stupid that

"NO IT'S NOT!"

I want to yell at him.

But I can't.

I can only think it. Think it loud enough that maybe there's a way I can penetrate the quietly guarded place that is his mind, his dream world.

But probably not.

I want to be holding him right now, telling him everything is going to be awesome and we're going to be rich and buy brownstones next to each other. I want to lie to him.

Dear god,

I want to lie to him so badly.