Troyler short stories

13 things I want you to know

1/ I want to rent hotel rooms with you and spend more than half our time being outside.

You said take me to the end of the earth where land meets sea and every horizon is more sea and the breeze from the waves knocks all the thoughts from your brain. I said surprise and packed around your desk, the wall still lit far into the night, that blue glow that could be mistaken for sea, or sky, or a police light. When I fell asleep, curled to the mountain that rose from my case, you packed around me and by morning you had prepared toast and tea and had our tickets in hand and the kind of smile that told me you were trying (to forget about this and that and so much else.) We just about made the train on time and I held your hand in mine (to stop it fidgeting) and watched through the window as a city was built backwards, collapsing back into the land, into ragged edges and forests; a world from our world, wiser than ours. The first thing you did was climb the hill and let the wind drown out the noise in your head, let your body surrender to the great force of the ocean, the endless, infinite, sky. We rented a room – like we did that first year we met, remember? And never even slept because we were by the ocean all night till morning, when the sun rose over our naked flesh, the visible tops of our heads and shoulders, skin numb and shivering, laughing; alive.

2/ I want to get lost while we're driving because I can't read maps and you are too stubborn to ask for directions.

You were always as stubborn; refusing to say you were cold, refusing to go see your therapist, working without break because it's important. Back when we met, on that spontaneous trip as 'friends', having rented the first hotel we happened upon, having never left the bed because I can't get enough of you, because suddenly it's like you're the most important thing in my life, Troye; taking your old car out down country lanes, coastal paths, a map folding out as big (no, bigger) than my body, and a frown on your forehead, too stubborn to ask. I pointed as people passed but quickly stopped because only sheep were left and you were so funny, arguing along to yourself – I loved teasing you. The scenery was beautiful – you got upset and I pulled us into a lay-by, and swung over into your lap. I hurt my forehead on the ceiling and you panicked about the windows (I hid us behind the map) and we made it steam (even your glasses) and that was funny and I kissed you with so much love I couldn't kiss you harder, not even when you found the sign you'd been looking for, back where we started, pointing us to where the trees stood back and the stars shone down as if close enough to grab and a view was to be had, if it hadn't been dark, which it was, but then only the stars were witness to us when maybe we're moving too fast but I think I'm in love with you.

3/ I want to eat drive-thru food with you on the floor of our first apartment.

You always feel like a child sitting cross-legged in the middle of an empty floor, an empty room. There I was – selfish and arrogant – cold, and cold where I was, even in my jacket, and my socks, and shoes. Take-out on the floor, that Styrofoam stuff, hot, greasy and slippery in my gut, now cold too on the plastic fork. You were in your car – too proud, so jealous, that same old temper – the same old car, our suitcases loaded, your arms crossed. I remember looking at the walls, the pearly white spots where furniture had been, and then there we were, young and only just arrived, spinning in sunshine because the room is so big! There we were; cross-legged but together, happy with take-out, oily kisses and sticky fingers, too lazy to stock the cupboards, no – we pulled out the mattress, and slept on just that. We were still in that time where we cuddled. Even sweaty. Older, and alone, I wondered for the first time if you wouldn't come back, if you'd simply drive off. You didn't, but I had to go back outside and knock on the car door. We posted our keys through the letterbox, but you wouldn't kiss me.

4/ I want to get drunk in public and have you take me home while I hit on you.

You wouldn't kiss me when I was drunk but that night it was different, when I was freshly-fucked and pretty, pretty enough for you to hold me closer at the waist. When the bus didn't come, or the second, or maybe we were at the wrong stop, but it didn't matter because you kissed me, you kissed me anyway – I'd been begging, I begged for more, and you put your finger to my lip. You said people were staring, I was being embarrassing, I needed to go to bed; but all of it you said with this smile that kept catching in the streetlamps, in the headlights, turned from my view because I wasn't to be encouraged, not in this state. I said all sorts of compliments and pretended we'd never met just so I could flirt with you again. And then I fell asleep on your shoulder, on the upper deck of the bus (that eventually came) and next I knew we were home, and I was in bed, and you wouldn't kiss me again, but only because your mouth was full of toothpaste.