Adrian
After the park, we ate and played PS5 and then watched crap shows on Netflix. Archie did more pacing than watching, but we'd probably watched the whole series a dozen times anyway.
Archie drove silently, not even fiddling with the stereo. I could tell he was anxious. Oddly, he thought the same thing about me. "You seem a little out of it," he observed. "And I have a feeling it's gonna be an interesting night."
"Arch, you're getting way ahead of yourself?" An Interesting night was Archie's euphemism for sex. If I knew him, and I did, we'd be swinging by Walgreens to pick up a box of condoms.
"No." He shook his head, adamant, confident. "Couldn't you tell? She wants me. Bad!"
I was going to ask him if all guys thought that way. Archie was classically attractive, with perfect hair, a perfectly angular jawline, and a profile to die for and he was fit. He had no difficulty in attracting the girls. "Maybe she wants me."
Archie shook his head. "I hate to disappoint, but that's not even true and you know it. If anyone wanted you, it was that Silas guy. He probably didn't even know I was there. You put a spell on him."
I laughed. "What?"
"It's cool. If you're into that kind of thing."
I laughed. "That kind of thing?"
"Yeah. Guys. If you like guys."
Dumbfounded, I stared at Archie with his quirked eyebrow. He knew! I never told him. I just played the wingman to his womanizing. He wasn't a scoundrel as my mother often put it, per se, but he liked girls. A lot. I didn't say anything and the awkward silence in the car in the lot across from the coffee shop was louder than any denial or obfuscation that I could provide.
I wonder when he worked it out. Archie's attentiveness was questionable when it came to me. Aloof didn't quite cover his behavior because it felt as though sometimes I was the center of his universe and other times he seemed to work at being cool and detached.
He leaned across the console between the seats. "I'm just sayin'. I love you, man." He gave me a quick nudge then climbed out of the car, glancing back with that, you-comin'-or-what look. "I don't care. Boys. Girls. It's all love, man."
We'd arrived at Caffeination with nary a wrong turn or assistance from Alexa, which was odd. Archie was directionally challenged. I followed a step behind him, pondering this nugget of information and wondered what was going on with him. I started laughing as soon as we approached Caffeination. A sandwich board outside the entrance announced their 5th annual poetry jam. Archie doesn't do poetry. Archie barely does English.
"What's so funny?"
I pointed at the board and as I opened the door, I heard him groan over the noise coming out of the coffee shop.
Butterflies were wreaking havoc with my stomach and I didn't know why. Or rather I didn't understand it. I mean what Archie had said about Silas having eyes for only me seemed a ridiculous notion. But I couldn't get his words out of my head. They were on repeat.
"I don't think you have to worry about making up a poem or anything."
"Huh?"
"You seemed..." Arch shrugged.
I found myself scanning the coffee shop for Silas but didn't see him.
"There's Ellie." Archie pointed to the far wall, her name coming off his lips extremely easy. Ellie sat in the corner blowing on a coffee. Her table was covered with paper and I wondered if she and Silas were participating in the poetry jam.
A voice filled the coffee shop over the sound system. I couldn't see the stage, but the voice mesmerized me.
Oh shit! What is this? Poetry?
I think not
The words don't flow. They hardly show
The emotion or the thought
Anyone, even I, can do this.
His words rang in silence as if they were an affront to all the poets in attendance. I strained to see the guy at the mic, but the audience stood around him as he sat. He paused. I looked at Archie and he shook his head. Ellie stared, captivated, leaning forward in her seat expectantly.
The poet continued as if to prove his point.
Yesterday I watched the sun
Paint the morning as if in fun
In pinks and blues
And other hues
And drew black trees against the sky
As little starlings flitted by
The second stanza seemed out of place. Two poems mashed together yet his tone sewed the verses together.
The song they sang blew me away
As if they sang of yesterday
Of sunsets dark and wind and rain
Of tears and hurt and tidal pain
I looked up at that, the voice hollow, bereft. Was it Silas? I stood on my toes trying to look over the crowd.
"I'm gonna go over and talk to her."
"Huh?"
"Ellie." Archie nodded in Ellie's direction. I followed in his wake as he meandered through the crowd casting curious glances toward the makeshift stage as we made our way to her.
I threw my voice into their chorus
Yelled and wailed, my heart so porous
the wind blew riot through the trees
Drowning out my anguished pleas
The silence in the coffee shop was complete except for a coffee grinder. We arrived at Ellie's table. Her eyes glistened as she watched across Caffeination. She had a perfect view. A spotlight shone down on Silas, his dark hair a halo, lit brightly.
Say goodbye and let love go
Because love did, you just didn't know
promise me forever, it never came
He just didn't rhyme with you the same
Silas looked up as if he felt my gaze. then down as if embarrassed by the intimacy of his words.
He said he didn't have his shit together
He's that friend, so fair weather
He said goodbye and let me go
Oh, shit, my life is poetry and I didn't know.
"You made it." Ellie popped up from her chair.
Archie shrugged even as she pulled him into a hug. Yeah, whatever. No big.
Curious. I watched them. Something wasn't right. Something was off. I could see Archie looking at me out of his periphery. On further contemplation, he didn't exactly make the big fuss about the poetry jam I was expecting. My distraction blinded me to the fact that something was afoot.
"Hey!" I tugged on Archie's shirt. "How did you know where this place was?"
Archie looked at me and then at Ellie. "Google Maps?"
I nodded. "Uh-huh and..." I looked at Ellie. She was already comfortably entrenched in Archie's personal space. The light came on immediately. "Oh, my god. You two are playing matchmaker," I accused. I looked back over my shoulder at Silas. "Is he in on it too?"
"No." Ellie chirped quickly. "And please don't tell him. He just had a bad breakup, if you couldn't tell, and I..."
I felt Silas behind me. "Sorry, you had to hear that. My shrink says it's cathartic. She's all about Dylan Thomas and raging and not going gentle into that good night. So I'm left with bellowing against the pain of a broken heart." He shrugged as if he mocked himself. "I think she's a woman scorned and I'm her therapeutic whipping boy."
"No. It was..." I began. Beautiful. I thought.
"It was horrible. If you say anything else, I'll know you're just trying to curry favor or get into my pants.
I smiled. "Fine. There were parts..."
Silas put a hand in front of my face to silence me. "Ah. That's enough. The dredges of an angry brainpan, nothing more."
Ellie reached over and nudged him. "Liar. He won two years ago."
Silas studied her or more accurately studied Ellie and Archie: the couple. He pointed between the two of them. "You two look awfully chummy." Silas looked at me and leaned close to me. "Don't they look cozy?"
I nodded, not trusting my voice, trying to ignore the tickle of his breath on my neck, the warmth of his near touch.
"What are you up to?" He squinted at Archie and Ellie as if sifting through their façade for a ruse.
"Archie here," she wove her arm around his. "has invited me to go for a drive."
"We just..." I started to object. Arch kicked me.
"You'll be okay, won't you Adrian? We won't be too long." Archie turned to Silas, ignoring any response I might have offered. "Silas, is it? Can you entertain Adrian while we're..."?
Silas wasn't buying it, either. I don't want to say he stared daggers at Ellie, but she was certainly: dead girl walking. He manufactured a smile for Archie and then draped an arm over my shoulder. "Don't worry. Adrian's in good hands."
"Don't get lost." I wanted to kill Archie too, but at the moment all the blood in my brain couldn't produce a single word to utter as I felt the warmth of Silas' arm seep through the thin fabric of my t-shirt. I stood perfectly still and telegraphed my anger at Archie. He played oblivious well.
"Awesome. We'll be back...," He looked at his wrist as if a watch might magically appear.
"An hour. Tops." Ellie finished.
I forced a smile on both of them. "Good. That gives us an hour or so to plot your deaths; slow painful deaths.