Rubens is the kind of person who casually digs up what’s been buried. He possesses a subversive and cunning tongue. The gaze that looked at him as if he truly didn’t know what the question meant was stained with damp desire. Bernard emptied the wine glass in front of him a bit more.
If it were before, Bernard might have been wretchedly swayed by such words. He might have harbored fleeting expectations and foolishly thought that perhaps this time would be different. But now he didn’t want to be swayed. He knew that the person swaying him was definitely not a good person.
“No.”
The refusal was pressed down by unclear pronunciation. Bernard’s face as he spoke twisted. It felt like hot tears were surging up from inside, but he didn’t want to cry even in a moment like this.
“There’s no need to even hypothesize about a moment of choosing again.”
If someone who knew everything had seen it, they might call it deception. However, Bernard straightened his back to appear like the most moderate person in this moment. It would be a lie if he said he wasn’t afraid. He was afraid to the point where it seemed like he’d topple over if touched right now.
“I don’t have the talent to satisfy Hurt-ssi like Elliot does.”
He had chosen Bernard’s brother. He’d picked the most brilliant one who would seem perfect to others, and Bernard understood that to some degree. In every moment, the one chosen was always Elliot. Bernard decided to think that Elliot was enjoying his rightful position. He had harbored vain dreams. He had wanted something that wouldn’t come true, and surely he’d received the price for it.
To be clear, on graduation night he had loved this man. Enough that if someone sneered asking if love could sprout from such a small thing, he could answer calmly that it could.
Bernard’s life was dry. In a life like parched, crumbling dust, even just that much attention given by someone he had feelings for could make him dedicate tearful devotion. The thrill of that day became bitter lingering attachment that clung endlessly, but the time had come to stop all of this too.
“I like you. I’ll come find you.”
“…Are you confident? Even though I’m not… the person you know…? Mmm!”
“Once I find you and meet you. Then… shall we try dating passionately?”
The voice that night had been painfully affectionate. That’s why the shabby feelings dragged on. But the two of them were only that kind of relationship. Perhaps in the very distant future, Rubens might learn everything. He might rage saying he was deceived. When that time comes, everything will already be irreversible.
Elliot was already the lover who had spent graduation night with him. Bernard would end up as nothing more than a spare key to his sickly brother. He would gradually let the remaining sadness flow away, so he only hoped that even if this man learned the truth in the future, he too could let that anger flow away.
“…So don’t waste your time on useless things.”
His voice was weak. However, Bernard’s dark green eyes were as unwavering and firm as before, stirring up the feelings of Rubens who watched him.
The wine glass soon revealed its bottom. The meal seemed to have met catastrophe. No matter how luxurious a meal might be, what use was it if those eating had no mind to enjoy it? At the table where a chill somehow lingered, Bernard felt his throat constricting once again.
Rubens caressed the rim of the wine glass with his fingertips. He didn’t get angry contrary to expectations. He just silently looked at Bernard, then emptied his glass all at once in an uncharacteristic manner.
“You don’t seem interested in the meal, so let’s get up.”
The man’s voice was calmer than expected. It seemed like he would always be that kind of person. He’d never thought he’d be shaken by something like this, but still, he’d thought he might give some reaction in part. However, he’d only confirmed that in the end, the only one whose heart had been dug up during the past time was Bernard himself.
Rubens put down his utensils completely. The sound of the chair being pulled was faint. Without a single change in his complexion, he pressed his hands on the table and leaned his upper body forward. Bernard couldn’t hold back and asked.
“…Is there some problem?”
“You seem to be mistaken.”
The eyes looking beyond the glasses were persistent. Rubens seemed to be smiling, and also seemed not to be smiling. Bernard’s Adam’s apple bobbed. As time became a bit more late into the night, the scent of cologne from him faded slightly. His breathing reached Bernard’s ear. Having completely lowered his head, he whispered with his lips touching Bernard’s earlobe.
“You’re included among those who are like beasts.”
The words he’d wanted to avoid stabbed at his insides. The color drained from Bernard’s face.
***
The ride back was quiet. It could be said that him opening the car window to smoke was somewhat exceptional. The profile of him driving while holding a cigarette seemed lost in some worry. Today had been a day unlike him throughout. Because he acted like someone expressing belated affection, Bernard couldn’t shake off the feeling of sitting on pins and needles the entire time.
He felt the weight of the ring on his right hand. The day would come when this ring too would have to be completely taken off. However, right now he didn’t feel confident enough to do so. But just because right now was difficult didn’t mean the future would be the same. Time would slowly create footholds within this reality like an abyss. If he stepped on all of them and climbed out, he would be able to make the right choice.
Perhaps because he hadn’t taken painkillers, his left hand burned. He’d planned to take medicine and sleep deeply once he got home. He was sitting almost buried in the passenger seat, lost in miscellaneous thoughts, when his voice broke through the reverie.
“Don’t forget to keep Friday free.”
It was an emotion poured out directly with nowhere to go. It was hard to understand why he showed such one-sided emotion. He wondered if it was actually provoking his temper because things weren’t going his way, but then the behavior he glimpsed also seemed like expressions of affection. It was a crazy thought. Mocking himself for making impossible assumptions, Bernard opened his mouth.
“I can go alone.”
“Don’t make me say it twice.”
The man flicked cigarette ash beyond the open window. It was an accent that seemed suppressed somehow. Because it was clear he was holding something back, Bernard quietly closed his mouth. He didn’t want to provoke his temper in the car and get slapped again. His gaze lowered submissively.
“…Yes.”
The curt answer signaled the end of the conversation. The conversation during the meal had clearly crossed his mood. He had no intention of adding fuel to the fire here. It felt as though extreme fatigue was weighing down his shoulders. Before he knew it, the time had approached eleven o’clock.
Throughout the drive through the night streets, terrible emotions made his body weary. How could a person be worn down like this every single time?
When they reached the front of the house, Rubens stopped the car without any words. His expression as he only tapped the steering wheel with his index finger looked uncomfortable somehow, and it was also an atmosphere difficult to strike up conversation in. Enough that the foolish assumption arose that he might just turn the steering wheel and leave like this.
But he couldn’t stay in the car forever. Bernard glanced at him for a while, then quietly hugged his bag.
“Thank you for today.”
“Even though you didn’t touch the meal at all.”
“…I wasn’t hungry.”
Only then did he look to the side. The hand that had been gripping the steering wheel loosened.
“If it were before, you would have been purely happy.”
Bernard flinched at the hand that swept back his disheveled hair. The hand that came suddenly caressed his ear. It was a touch bewildering enough to make his breath stop momentarily. The hand that had been caressing his ear pressed down on his earlobe firmly with a fingernail. A faint heat seemed to rise from the rubbed skin.
“What has changed?”
His voice was that of someone lost in thought. Bernard’s lips gaped open and closed repeatedly. It was hard to grasp what question he should ask.
“While driving… were you thinking about such things?”
“It kept coming to mind.”
It was a docile answer. He’d thought he would deny it, but Bernard’s eyes widened at the unexpected affirmation.
“But I don’t know the answer.”
Rubens lowered the hand that had been caressing his earlobe and stroked his nape with the back of his hand. Clutching the seatbelt tightly, Bernard curled his toes inward.
“You seem to know. Though you don’t seem to have any intention of telling me. Still, I think I’m starting to understand a little now too.”
Rubens had become very strange.
“It’s late. Go in. I’ll contact you on Friday.”
He ended with the cliché greeting of thanks. In truth, there was nothing to be grateful for. However, it was also true that Rubens had shown him kindness and treated him to a meal, so he just left a plausible greeting.
When the car door closed, Rubens didn’t look back, and Bernard thought that was natural. It had just been a momentary whim. As always, wasn’t this man particularly capricious?
Even when he stepped down onto the street thick with darkness, there was the smell of cigarettes. He seemed to be taking out a new cigarette and putting it in his mouth. He hadn’t known he was a man who smoked this much. He thought there might be more aspects of him that he didn’t know, but he resolved not to be deeply curious.
However, Bernard didn’t know. How persistently the man’s gaze had clung to his departing back, and that his expression was worse in quality than usual…
As he opened the door and entered the house, Bernard thought about how much of a sense of debt clung to his ankles every time he returned to this house.
The lights in the house were off. His insides felt bitter at the scene where no one had waited for him. But he had no intention of blaming anyone. Perhaps it might be better for no one to have interest in him.
Even as he silently stepped up the dark stairs, he wasn’t particularly sad. If it were before, this cold night would have tormented him terribly, but now it wasn’t as tormenting as before because there were words accumulating layer by layer even within it.
It was a strange night. The man who seemed like he would always despise him had said words that didn’t suit him, and the point he’d naturally thought would be interrogated passed by as if it had never happened. It was also a night where he wasn’t sad about things he’d always been sad about. Not a single star in the sky was visible, yet something inside him seemed to sparkle like a star. Buried in the bed as he was, Bernard let out a long breath.
The man had said he’d changed. However, the words saying he didn’t know the answer made Bernard’s heartbeat quicken. Something he knew and that man didn’t know. With his cheek pressed against the pillow, Bernard blinked. His insides just burned pitch black like the night sky.
