"When you're black and white there's no use hiding in a field of colours," his umber eyes so solemn, "Anthony T. Hincks."
But when Cillian looked at Oliver, he couldn't help but disagree, because to Cillian, Oliver was all the colours o...
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X OLIVER HAD PUT ON a brave face in front of his boy in black, but now that he was completely alone, he cried. It was inevitable. He had felt his tears before they had even been shed. That wet hotness. It collected in the corners of his eyes and slowly rolled down either cheek. How very anticlimactic. He watched the teardrops' reflections in his hotel room's bathroom mirror as they did the same and watched him back, mocking. Silly boy, silly young boy.
Now, be brave Oliver, he told himself. That was all being alive was to Oliver; to have life tell you "Now I will ask you to be brave. Now I will ask you to be brave. Now I will ask you to be brave," over and over again. Now Oliver had to be brave. But his cheeks were streaked with red.
He washed his face in the sink and smiled at the mirror. He was meeting his boy in black today, surely that should give him some courage. Putting on his shoes, he told himself to be brave one last time, whispering it into the cotton of his scarf. Many a secret is stored in the fabric of one's scarf; its threads woven of perfunctory curses and shopping lists uttered under the breath; shit, milk, eggs, bread, be brave.
As he passed through the hotel reception, he called to let Cillian know of the favour he was to ask of him. He wasn't worried, but he also knew it wasn't a small favour. He didn't want to spring it upon the boy with no forewarning.
"You want to turn my loft into a conservatory?"
"You said you wanted to help. Not in so many words, but this is the only way I'll let you help me. Will you?"
Cillian was still in bed. It was a Saturday and he didn't have any obligations this morning. "You want to turn me into a conservatory." It wasn't a question so much as it was a statement; through this Oliver knew he had already won.
"I have someone ready to collect my things from the shop, then we'll be headed over to you. Will we be received at the door? Will you help me, Cillian?" It was cheating to throw in Cillian's name like that, and Oliver knew it.
Will you help me, Cillian? The question reverberated through his phone, reaching his eardrums in the form of a hymn or miserere, echoing through the vast caverns of his mind's cathedral. It was more similar to a divine commandment than a question posing the possibility of refusal; within it was already contained his answer. He arched his neck back, his phone still pressed to the side of his face, Oliver's breathing in his ear, the crown of his head touching with the wall behind his mattress, like the touching of one's forehead to the floor in prayer; sublime (so sublime it was almost sacrilegious), pious deference. You know I will, Cillian thought to say. Yes, I know, would have been Oliver's reply.
IN SPITE OF THE MANY TRICKS his mind had already played on him in conjurings of Oliver amongst various backdrops, Cillian had never once imagined the florist inside his own apartment. His apartment wasn't a place he thought he could ever envision the boy. To do so would require a facet of self-reflection he preferred to neglect in its entirety; would Oliver see the way he lived and think him mechanical, uninteresting, dysfunctional?; would he interpret Cillian's lack of belongings as a lack in his very person?; would Cillian himself be able to rest knowing all the places Oliver had been in his apartment, knowing the way Oliver measured up to his kitchen counter, knowing the way he looked lying prone on his bed? If he saw Oliver in his apartment, would he ever be able to see his apartment without him? To incorporate someone into the intimate and gory innards of your life is to notice their absence.
