in this velvet daze

On Your Street

From then on, instead of The Ivy, or the library, Felix keeps asking that they hang out at Avery's place.

Which is fine because;

he starts bringing high-quality snacks,

it's comfortable, she doesn't have to sit or walk but can lie down,

no one else around so endless gossip and yelling and singing.

And not so fine because;

now Avery has an excuse to stay inside all day and have just as much fun, which becomes a habit and she doesn't want to leave even when she absolutely has to.

There is also the fact that Felix is electric and cannot be confined, so being in his presence for so long becomes suffocating. And the fact that he naps constantly, watching TV or sitting at the kitchen table, he eats weird, gets too embarrassed over trivial things and guilt trips like a pro, shows up one day with a see through shirt, and because it's summer and he usually walks the distance between their houses, he is often flushed when he arrives which is unbearable.

It makes him look so young and innocent and normal. A reminder that he is human also, there is blood and fat and muscle underneath.

The first -and the only- time they drink at home, he turns into a cuddly, emotional mess. Avery locks herself in the bathroom for 20 minutes. She puts him in an Uber and sends him home. He doesn't show up the next day.

He only wants to get drunk at home for some reason, not even entertaining the idea of going to the Powerhouse. Which is fine, Avery isn't really dying to hear Olly's liberal takes on her new friendship anyway. Or how she isn't spending as much time with him anymore.

It's upsetting becoming accustomed to Felix's quirks, like the way he pinches his bottom lip during the high tension movie scenes, or the way he lays on the couch with a book Avery left on the coffee table and doesn't look up for hours, the way he cooks with so much ease, whistling and humming. It all becomes familiar and comforting.

There are more than a few times where Felix would stay over if Avery offered and she knows it, he is always so obvious, so easy to read. But she doesn't offer.

Come September, all his friends will be back and he won't be around anymore. Which is fine, it's only natural. But he is already practically living with Avery and if he stays for more than 12 hours at once, it's going to become something else and she doesn't even want to think about it. She also won't think about how it's going to feel once he's gone, when he is not attempting crosswords at the kitchen table or channel surfing on the sofa.

One evening, he keeps going through the school brochures Avery keeps leaving around the living room, picking up one, reading it in detail for long minutes, then moving to another. Avery knows he wants to ask about it, and that he is barely containing himself.

"You graduated last year, right?" she asks in the end.

"I have, yes."

Avery forces her brain to remember bits and pieces of conversations that she decidedly did not listen to, where Felix talked about his major and some friends and professors and possibly which university he went to.

"Are you going to do anything?"

Felix shrugs. "I don't know, I've been thinking. I don't know what... what I should be."

He becomes more fidgety and uncomfortable as he speaks. Understandable, Avery thinks. Who really knows what to be, really?

"I actually dropped out, did you know?"