The next time that my thoughts had time to catch up was the night we got trapped in the Lada by a violent downpour for multiple hours.
Don't worry, this time I won't go into a depressive, egocentric rant but rather explain Tschick to you, through the lens of basically a stranger, as I have barely known him for more than two days.
The obvious thing about him, that which catches the eye, is his cheekbones. They're very high up on his face, squishing his eyes into a sort of constant squinting. Despite all the racist remarks, they don't look Asian.
Of course his complexion is as pale as a russian boy's can be and his boy-long curly hair isn't especially stereotypically asian either, but his eyes themselves aren't the right shape. He just looks like he has high cheekbones, not asian in the slightest.
What's more interesting about him though is his clothing style, or rather, his lack there of. Although he would make fun of Isa for her way of dressing, I wouldn't tell him then but I would think it; he isn't far off either. A band shirt with neon yellow sports jeans, or a red tracksuit top and black jorts were both equally probable to come out of his closet.
It actually says a lot about his character: chaotic.
But it did help me decipher his music taste a bit which would go on to become something to bond over. His music taste lined up pretty well with mine (before it was nuked by Beyoncé) and I ended up lending him CDs very often. I mean, who doesn't love russian dark wave?
But as I'm sitting here in the Lada and I can barely hear molchat doma's music over the thunderous rain on the hood of the car, I find myself looking at him as he rests his eyes and I realize something else: I know basically nothing more. He's a total enigma. And I just agreed to travel Europe with him.
Our first meeting was almost mysterious on his part (I would've probably understood it more had I actually been in a mood any less shitty than I was.) He complimented my jacket. After not talking to me the entire year.
In hindsight, he was braver than I ever was with my own crushes and I do applaud him for that. I must've looked especially unapproachable that day and yet...
Or maybe he was just that socially unaware.
I guess I've yet to find out. Like most things about him.
Did he really have a grandpa in the Walachei? Why did he drink as much as he did? What happened to his parents? What made him want to leave?
We hadn't talked that much up to this point, other than a couple of days before the start of our journey, when we played Halo until late into the night, but even then the main topics weren't anything deep or personal.
Once I'd found out anything else about him, literally anything else, I swear I'll update you, dear reader. But Tschick really kept his cards close to his chest and he probably would until I revealed my own. Ugh.
You would never guess based on the first chapter, but I don't actually like telling people about myself. Especially anything personal. That is way too much power that someone could have over me, and currently in my life I don't have anyone who I could possibly trust that much.
So I guess I'll go on, waiting for Tschick's walls to tumble without tearing down my own.
Maybe I'll get out of this whole deal unscathed, both of our walls stay up and nothing changes, I learn nothing and we stay barely-more-than-strangers. And even with hate for vulnerability, that's not what I'm hoping for. I want to know more and I might also want somebody to trust, someone to tell myself about, and maybe this could be him.
But that's a tall ask. Almost as tall as my walls themselves, so I'll keep to myself snd give him time. All the time he needs to take the first step. I'll wait forever because I sure as hell won't be first.
But soon my trust issues would need to be forgotten for a bit as our first real adventure was about to begin.
