“Just the fact that Gilbert is ranked fourth best though.”
“I feel that.” Liam said.
“I mean like, there’s a lot of f***ing guitarists alive right now.”
Liam’s coldness was something to which his friend Justin remained oblivious. The young man’s mind had preferred to bend itself toward its idolization of Paul Gilbert, the guitarist over which the two friends had obsessed for a long time.
“Honestly bro, I don’t know why people look down on this s***. I mean like, just from a logical standpoint.”
There was a long pause after he said this.
Over the course of two years, Liam and Justin had developed a silent agreement that, except for in the most extreme situations, they were not to voice to each other anything which resembled genuine feeling. It was a by-law, part of a sporadically upheld code of conduct that had formed the foundation of their friendship. Still, even when emotions were not discussed, they never went unnoticed.
“Real s***.” Liam said finally.
“Word, like if someone wants to dispute that, my first inclination is to direct their ass toward a book.”
*             *            *
Her text read: “No, I’m fine.”
Liam tried to find contempt, annoyance, anything.
“Haha cool, and don’t worry about the record, as soon as you can get it back to me is fine. Guess i’ll talk to you later….”
“Yeah”
...no, she’s not a b****. She has her reasons...
As though by surprise, the knowledge of his surroundings suddenly sprung back into Liam’s mind. As soon as his eyes looked up from the phone, he allowed the collected refuse-childhood toys and books-which had sought refuge in the room to find new shelter in the banks of his mind, taking it all in as though for the first time. He looked over to the lamp on his desk, remembering after a moment that it was no longer functional, and had not been for a few years. The desk itself was unusable, and not only because of all the stuff which sat on top of it. It was unusable because of the fear Liam felt whenever he looked at it for too long. It was a commodity, one he had no use for, yet knew he could not function without. Even the chair to its side was no longer of real use to him. It was the chair she had sat in...….
“Dinner!”
“Coming!”
Again, Liam could flee to safety.
As he came down the stairs into the kitchen, his mother came into view.
“Hi honey,” she asked, “Did you enjoy yourself at Justin’s?”
“Yeah, it was fine.”
“You look a little fazed.” She probed again, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, im okay.”
Blatant lie.
Liam had gotten used to hiding inside of himself. When those around him asked if anything was wrong, it had become a healthy habit to morph into a slippery saint, a flawless vision of contentment that he had forced to the outside.
“Well as long as you’re okay.” A brief silence followed as Liam obsequiously set the table. Mom tried to break the tension.
“So, I talked to your brother earlier today--he made the Dean’s List!”
“Oh, really?”
Nice, more pressure.
This was Brian’s second year in college, and right now, Liam missed him. The two had been no more than decent to one another for most of their lives, but as soon as Brian had left for college, Liam realized how much his brother’s presence gave him joy, brought about a familiar warmth. It was only October, and Brian would not be back home for another two months. As it stood, Liam did not think about Brian often. His mind had begun to rearrange his priorities for him. However, he knew he needed that warmth, the warmth that for whatever reason his parents could never really provide him.
*             *             *    
“What’s up man?”
“I found the vinyl in my mail yesterday.”
“S***.”
“Yeah, it was just sitting there, on like the kitchen counter.”
Walking into his kitchen the day before had been like walking into a recently used powder room. The record Liam had assumed would be returned to him by hand - having asked for it back after realizing it was still at her house - had been mailed to him without warning. There had been a note attached to it which read “Happy Listening.”
Yeah, happy listening.
Liam didn’t own a record player. She did. He had bought the record a few months ago - Jethro Tull’s Thick As A Brick - for them to listen to together whenever he came over. The album consisted of a single 44-minute song. The song, written and composed by one man, was almost impossibly beautiful. When one listened, the song could seem to go on forever, but this eternity was one which Liam had always relished:
“I really needed this,” she said, moving closer as they lay recumbent on her couch, allowing the singer’s vocals to fill the room.
Liam breathed a sigh. “Yeah, me too.” he replied. It seemed to him as though he could feel every emotion at once. Despite his own confusion however, he knew one thing for certain, and this was that he was as happy at this moment as he had ever been.
“Man like…….” Justin tried to say more, “I-”
“Nah, its cool.”
Justin knew the amount of pain Liam was facing. He knew Liam was scared to talk to him about it. He knew Liam was forcing himself not to think about talking to him about it. Today though, Liam had not even shaken his hand the way he always did. Receiving only a forced glance when Liam had arrived at his doorway, Justin had had the sense to force his way through the thing which had stood between them for so long: pride. He was glad that he had.
“Nah man, that actually sucks. If you need to talk, you know I got you.”
Liam hadn’t ever felt this kind of relief. Justin had always been a figurehead to him, the entity to which he could confess but never find solace; the familiar marble walls of a church which promoted a religion in which he himself did not believe. Though now, he could see the figurehead finally revealing his face, the walls peeling away from the cathedral to reveal the sunlight which had hid behind. He felt as though he was speaking to a friend.
*                 *                   *
It had been a long, awkward day. She asked to go for a walk. She was feeling warm.
“You´ve been acting weird.” Liam said.
“What do you mean, like, today?”
“Nah…I mean yeah, but also like the past couple of weeks. Is there something on your mind?”
Somehow, she looked more beautiful than she ever had before. Her makeup was blotchy, she was visibly sick, but she was still f***ing beautiful.
“It´s just, I have a lot going on now, and I know I won´t be able to talk to you as often when I go off to school. And like, I know we´ve been fighting a lot lately, and i´m afraid that once I leave we´ll only be fighting more. So like, I think we should...break up for a while.”
“Oh, okay.”
Liam felt nothing at that moment, not even shock. The emotions would come later.