Part 6:
((thanks for all your encouragement, guys! hope I'm not rolling these out too fast for you all but I am positively inspired! enjoy!))
C-
"Would you mind if we moved inside? I'm.. unfortunately warm out here." Erik asks, after a long moment of peaceful quiet. I got a bit lost in the smell of the magnolias, the soft but perpetual wind making the leaves chirp overhead.
"Oh, sure! It did actually get a lot warmer out than I thought. Probably also a good idea to fridge the rest of the food, too. If you don't mind."
"Not at all." Erik smiles widely, standing. Together we pile in the empty cartons in on top of the full ones, and he picks up the bag, grunting with effort and surprise. "This is heavier than I had imagined. How did you bike here with this? And when it was full?" He asks, impressed. I don't have a basket. I had to hold onto it with one arm, steering the bike with the other. I grin, shrugging.
"I'm just magic." I say it like it's a secret passed between just us two, conspiratorially. I pick up my bag, putting the strap over my shoulder on muscle memory.
"I should have guessed." He shakes his head, still smiling.
"I'll get the door." I say, and skip ahead, taking the stairs two at a time. I open the door and give a little bow, like a fancy butler might do.
"Thank you." He says, dipping his head before stepping inside. I close the door behind us. Erik puts the bag on the floor in front of his fridge, the small white machine almost entirely empty. It seems out of place, inherently wrong that it be so unfilled, but then I remember..
"Did you really not eat for, like, a week?"
"Woefully, yes. I forgot to sleep for even longer." He admits, embarrassed. He focuses on arranging the cartons so they fit in the narrow shelves. "I was.. very upset."
"I'm sorry I was gone for so long.." I pout, feeling guilty.
"You're fine! I didn't have all the details and I very much overreacted." He tries to wave it away, taking the blame.
"Well, you thought I was never coming back, right? I'd probably act the same way, if we're being honest."
"That is a frightening thought if ever there was one." He stands, shutting the fridge. He puts his hands together, rubbing the thumb of his right hand across the knuckles of his left. He does that when he's nervous, it seems.
"It'd be scary and sad and confusing! I'd probably shut down entirely, actually.." I start off with a joking tone, but I am inevitably reminded that I've been there before. That is exactly what I do when I'm too sad, too alone. It's a familiar place to be for both of us I guess.
"I would never leave you, if I could help it. Worry not. This-" He gestures between us. "-is entirely in your hands."
"That's a lot of power over.. everything."
"I trust you to make responsible decisions. I will not not opinionate, either, it's simply that the decisions are ultimately yours. I don't want to, to trap you." I nod. He fears having too much power, but how can I tell him I feel the same way?
"Aw. But I wouldn't want you to feel trapped or stuck either. If I was unbearable, I'd hope you'd tell me to leave, or something."
"I highly doubt you could be unbearable." He says, about to add on when someone knocks at the door. He flinches, startled like a kid who's realised he had something to do just as his parents came home. "P-pardon me a moment." He gestures for me to wait, and I nod as he takes long strides to his front door, the one down to the shop. He only opens it a crack, though, quietly greeting someone through it.
I don't hear the other person, only Erik.
"What are you doing here?" He asks, and then shrinks as the other person answers. I hear the angry flicker of paper, but not the stranger's voice. "It hasn't been that long-" He flinches as they appear to interrupt him. ".. I suppose that is a small while.. I'm sorry, I've been unwell, if you would just come back tomo- No, no, I'm not hiding- Stop, wait-" And then he's pushed, not too roughly, out of the way by an older gentleman in a suit, who walks with a cane. He looks around but quickly notices me, a look of anger and suspicion turning to surprise and embarrassment.
"Oh." He simply states, Erik coming up behind him, towering over him.
"Daroga." He hisses, angry himself, his ears bright red.
"You were acting so suspiciously, what was I supposed to think? You should have just said you had a guest." He half turns to Erik, this 'Daroga', putting his arms out in indignation, explanation.
"What do you think 'please come back tomorrow' might possibly mean other than 'I am busy and you are being rude'?" He snarks, sneering. I giggle, this mood of Erik's being new to me. Erik visually fumbles, flipping between us with uncertainty. The man smiles as well, shaking his head.
"I apologise, Erik." He says, not sounding apologetic at all. Then he steps further into the room, hand out to shake mine. "Forgive me, my dear. I'm Erik's landlord and business partner, Nadir Khan. He's been failing to complete his orders for half a week now, and has been ignoring my nephew's attempts to communicate. He even had to close down the shop these past two days to try to keep up! I had to come see what had him so busy or.. unwell.. that he could not or would not work. But I digress, miss, I did not mean to interrupt.. you two." He explains, shaking my hand firmly. He's so much wider than Erik, and darker, too. He looks maybe middle eastern, dark but rich and healthy color skin, though his hair is white, showing his age. He is short, a little shorter than I am, and built for strength, his width being clearly all muscle. Erik, looming in the background, is tall and thin pale and almost yellow in tone compared to his landlord. The juxtaposition of the two of them is almost comical, especially given how familiar they seem with each other, to talk as freely and easily as they do.
"It's okay. The work thing is kind of my fault." He raises an eyebrow at this, sneaking a weird look to Erik, who blushes furiously, all the way from his ears to his jawline, or so I can see. I realize what that sounds like. "I- I've been sick and Erik was taking care of me w-while I recovered, that's all!" I blush myself, indignant at the supposition that we were, that I was, that I'm only- oh my gosh.
"I'm sorry for making assumptions, dear." Nadir?- Mr. Khan?- says, chortling. "I believe you. I also know my friend very well. He is not very good at personal interactions, such that I had no reason to believe anyone was here at all. He is a very antisocial fellow." He explains.
"Daroga!" Erik nearly bellows, hands fisted tightly at his side. "Will you please leave?"
"Will you have time for me tomorrow, monsieur?" He teases. "Yes, I will leave, but we have things we need to talk about. Namely, stop ignoring my emails." He points, cane in hand, toward the desk and the computer.
"I apologise for failing to communicate, Daroga. It will not happen again. Now, please leave." He growls, practically begging.
"I leave, I leave." He says, wandering towards the door. To me, he turns and says, "Again, I apologise for the intrusion. It was, nevertheless, a pleasant surprise to meet you, miss..?"
"Christine." I say.
"Miss Christine. Enjoy your afternoon, children." He gives a sort of bow, and then disappears down the stairs. As he goes, Erik practically melts, anger and outrage falling away into mortification.
"I am so very sorry for that, for him, I would never- He should not have- If I had been- Oooh.." He groans, fingertips burying in his hair, all curled on himself like an angular octopus having a panic attack.
"Hey! It's okay! It turned out all right!" I say, coming around the island counter to pat his arm. "You didn't know he'd show up, did you?"
"I should have." He says, shaking his head anyway. "We have an agreement. I may stay here, keep my shop and run it as I please, so long as I keep up with the work and check in with him every so often. If I do not, he comes to chastise me."
"That's a weird agreement." I say flatly.
"Yes, well.. it is necessary, sometimes. If I am left unattended I.. well, I do what happened when I thought you were cutting me out."
"You stop functioning?"
"Yes." He sighs. "I have a backlog of work to do, now. Darius, it seems, attempted to mimic my work for a while, but he is not as fast as I am.. Luckily, none of these orders were terribly large or complicated, but now I do need to step in for the ones that are.. I am so terribly sorry, Christine." He looks at me, and he seems small and tired and sad again.
"For what? I get it, work happens." I shrug.
"I do not want to send you away, but it's imperative I get to work on these as soon as possible, namely, now. Several of these are for tomorrow." He groans.
"Hey.. I can stay. I can be quiet and undistracting. I'd love to watch you work again. I can draw, or just listen to music. We don't have to be doing things all the time. Like, together." Erik looks relieved.
"I would enjoy it if you stayed." He nods, uncurling from himself.
"Oh- speaking of music, I just realized I still have your phone charger. It's here in my bag."
"How are those related?" He asks, chuckling.
"I can have music on my phone, and new headphones too, and my phone's in my bag and I remembered I gave you your phone and then I remembered I didn't give you the accessories, and the charger, at least, is important." He nods.
"I still.. I cannot believe you gave me a phone." He admits.
"It was free, so why not?" I shrug. "And you can load your email on there, too. Keep up with Mr. Landlord. By the way, he called himself 'Nadir Khan', right? Why'd you call him 'Daroga'?"
"Oh, that is.. something of a nickname, between us. It is a long story."
"Cool. Oh- also talking about music, why's yours all french?"
"I was born in France. It's what I knew when I was younger. It's familiar." He shrugs nonchalantly. "Oh. I hadn't mentioned that, had I?"
"Nope." I saw, in awe. I have a crush on a foreign guy.
"Ah, well, there you have it." He laughs. "May we head downstairs?"
"We may." I nod, grasping the strap of my bag for emphasis. I have all I need. He opens the door and holds it for me.
"Very well, after you." I grin at his politeness, the smoothness with which he's recovered, and trot down the stairs. The work room is not terribly large, but it's plenty big enough for the two of us, with enough counter for two of us to work at too. I set my bag down on one half, and Erik slips out into the shop, presumably to grab some supplies. I pull out my sketchbook and get ready to draw, though I'm not sure what. I don't have any 'orders' myself, so there's not really any business I can do.. With a sigh, I take a look at my environment, hoping to find some inspiration. An interesting, a funny shape, anything.
But the room is sparse, purely functional, except for a cork board that spans the wall above the counter. There's a couple pages tacked up, probably with instructions, maybe a list or two, and then there's.. wait a second.
Oh my gosh. It's the drawing of the daffodils I gave him that very first day, all the loose sketches and warmups I'd managed to do before I startled him and we met. It's pinned at the right side of the board, still as neat and unmarked as it had been when I gave it to him. Did I really smudge it that much when I signed it? Goodness..
It feels like a year has passed since we met. So much has happened, both in the times we've been together and that terrible month we were apart. And that was only two days ago, already. It feels like weeks.
I smile at the drawing and return to my sketchbook, still unsure what to draw, but feeling more than okay with that. Erik returns carrying several bundles of wrapped flowers, setting them down carefully, as thoughtfully as he did that first day. He looks at me, eyes open and charming and pleased, getting to work on his art. I watch him for a while, focused on the grace of his hands and the dazzling care they take to make the flowers and the leaves come into harmony together. I watch him, and I know what I want to draw.
….
Erik doesn't tell me what Mr. Khan said to him, only that it'll never happen again. I don't want to pressure him, seeing the pressure Mr. Khan apparently already laid on him, but it stresses me out that I can't help. Then again, he seems to forget the added stress himself, and I do too, eventually.
Weeks pass, and I come by just about every other day before or after work. Slowly, he opens up, asking questions about things that seem common and boring to me, but must seem alien to him, given how he never leaves the building or the garden.
Which bothers me. He acts like he's not allowed to leave, and he refuses to tell me otherwise, blatantly dodging the conversation. I keep letting it go, but I know it makes him nervous and it feels like the answer is hanging over our heads, ready to drop at the worst possible moment. But I won't push him. He has questions I can't answer either, and it's not fair of either of us to not let the other keep their secrets.
Even with the odd situation, it's blissful when we hang out. When I come in the mornings, he works and I draw, or talk to him about all sorts of things. We can talk about anything and everything, or nothing at all. I show him my music, he shows me his. At first it's apparent how different our tastes are, how broad mine is and how narrow his are, but we grow to appreciate a lot of each others'. I teach him how to use his cell phone, something he'd literally never used before I handed him his, and he teaches me about plants, something I could never seem to keep alive before.
When I come over in the evenings, we have dinner and take care of his garden and the shop together. The more I do it under Erik's supervision, the less scared I am that everything will wither if I touch it. He gives me complete care of one of the plants, and I've kept it alive by myself for a week now, only having had to ask for assistance or opinion a couple times. Grooming the garden and nurturing his plants makes me want some of my own, to give my tiny apartment some life, but I worry that an enclosed environment with no windows would definitely be the end of anything I got. Erik assures me there are some plants that do well under electric light, if they give a certain kind of light- 'After all', he says, 'We have plants alive in the back of the shop and they have been there for many months!'. Still, I don't feel comfortable confining any living thing to that tiny apartment, which is why I haven't gotten a pet before.
"See if you may start a garden on the roof!" Erik suggests one night. He says it suddenly, chipper, a mood that's become more and more prevalent over the past few weeks. We talk about sad things, sometimes, but never for long, and there haven't been any instances of one or both of us really needing it, either. It's not that we're ignoring our underlying problems together, it's more that they're not bothering us as much.
"What?"
"If your building has one of those modern, flat roofs, you would be able to have a small feeder, like mine, just higher, I suppose. I would have a rooftop garden myself, but my roof is gabbled. I know you don't own your building or have a special agreement with your landlord, but certainly you could at least petition for somesuch."
"I.. hadn't thought of that. I'll ask my landlord! Maybe it could be like a community thing.. Everybody could try to help out.. or maybe that would make a mess of things. Aw, but I can just imagine it, all alive and bright.. Too bad I can't plant a tree up there, though. I'd love to have a tree." Erik chuckles at the imagery, and with that thought in my head, I feel determined to make it happen. Not that I don't adore sharing the work of Erik's garden, just that I want to show that I can do it myself, and spread the life in the city. Erik seems proud that I want a garden so badly, now that I know what I'm doing at least a little. We continue weeding and pruning in silence, one of our phones playing one of our songs.
"You won't forget to come see me, now, will you?" He jokes as one song ends, but I've come to learn that sometimes his jokes hide very real concerns. He's got a small, hidden waver in his voice, his eyes not quite meeting mine. I lean up against him, head tilted across his shoulder.
"How could I ever forget my peerless tutor? Don't worry. I'll come crying back to you when I somehow kill everything." I joke. As if I'd ever leave him at all.
"You could never kill everything." He jokes right back, meaning it. Maybe it's just his faith in me as a sort of student, or maybe it's that spark of something more that we don't seem to talk about anymore.
I don't know what to call us. We're more than just friendly, but we haven't brought back any conversation of moving on or labelling our relationship, so are we anything more than friends? Do labels really matter if we're happy, anyway? I don't know, and I don't want to care as much as I do. But I do. I guess I just want clarity, after so many heartaches due to a lack of clarity, to make sure neither of us is misunderstanding the other, but no moment really feels right to bring it up with him. No moment isn't not good enough that I can't bear to ruin it with questions..
We finish the planter, and I decide it's time for me to go home for the night. I want to draft an email to my landlord before I got to bed, and I should probably clean my own apartment just a little. We wash our hands of the dark soil, I collect my things, and I give Erik a deep hug before I go. As always, he emits this tiny sigh of contentedness, and I almost do the same. We've had many of these pleasant little moments of closeness, but every time I press my head against his chest, every time he tucks my head under his chin, every time we seem to breathe as one, it feels as magical as if we'd never done it before.
"See you." I say, turning away, bag in hand. I hate to go, but he hasn't offered to let me stay since that first time, and I would never impose myself anyway. I feel like he wants to offer, but is just as unsure as I am about where we stand and what we feel is acceptable in this early stage. So, I go.
"Until next time." He waves, watching me as I let myself out. I bike home as the sun sets, speeding through growing shadows and snippets of fading light, humming happily. I do my dishes from the morning, put away the food Erik packed from dinner, which will make a marvelous lunch tomorrow, and tuck myself in bed, setting my phone to play 'Fur Elise' on repeat.
The next day is wildly uneventful, all of my appointments going smoothly, Erik and I texting in between them. My lunch is, as predicted, perfect. My design presentations with a couple clients go well, one of them deciding today, the other asking for one more large revision before being satisfied. I work on the revision for the one, and set a date for the other to get their tattoo done. A couple teenagers walk in, asking for piercings, and they laugh and shriek and joke about their 'aesthetic choices', leaving satisfied. I think. So, a normal day. Well, it's normal until, in the middle of Meg and I talking about ideas for a new tattoo for her, Andre comes in.
"Christine?" He asks for me, leaning in. He never seems to actually come in when I have a meeting in here.
"Yes?"
"There's a fella downstairs for you. He's got a big armful of flowers." He jabs a thumb behind him, and I gasp, turning to Meg, who's also got her mouth wide in surprise and hope.
"I'll be right down, thanks." He nods, giving me a thumbs up and moseying along. Meg and I jump to our feet, hands on each others' forearms.
"Is it him, is it him?" She asks, squealing.
"I don't know! Who else could be, here and with flowers?" I squeal back. "If it is, you have got to meet him." I say, pulling her downstairs with me.
"Finally!" She says, letting me drag her.
He's never come to see me before, never ventured from his house, especially not in the middle of the day, but really who else could it be? My only other real friend is Meg, and she's already here.
I see the flowers before anything else, rounding the corner entirely too fast.
"Erik?" I gasp hopefully, balancing myself out, but then I see the face, the height, the build, the clothes, and I shrink back, knocking into Meg.
"Who's Erik?" Asks Raoul, his smile fading.
"... Awkwaaaard." Meg singsongs, hands on my arm.