Boy Meets Boy

“You’re not asking me just because I like you?”

He smiles. “The thought never crossed my mind.”

We don’t say any more than that. I mean, we say things – we make plans and all. But the subject of us is dropped back into signals and longing.

We make plans for after school.

I’m going to help him paint some music.

Painting Music (#ulink_758a8a21-1a87-5960-989b-6a78691b1f9f)

Noah’s house is in a different part of town than mine, but the neighbourhood looks just the same. Each house has a huge welcome mat of lawn sitting in front of it, bordered by a driveway on one side and a hedge on the other. It should be boringly predictable, but it’s not really. The houses are personalised – a blush of geraniums around the front stoop, a pair of shutters painted to echo the blue sky. In Noah’s yard, the hedges have been made into the shape of light bulbs – the legacy of the former owner, Noah tells me.

He lives close to the high school, so we walk the bendily cross-hatched roads together. He asks me how long I’ve lived in town and I tell him I’ve lived here my whole life.

“What’s that like?” he asks.

“I don’t really have anything to compare it to,” I say after a moment’s thought. “This is all I know.”

Noah explains that his family has moved four times in the last ten years. This is meant to be the final stop – now his parents travel everywhere for business instead of making the family move to the nearest headquarter city.

“I’m so dislocated.” Noah confesses.

“You’re here now,” I tell him.

If my family were to move (honestly, I can’t imagine it, but I’m stating it here for the sake of argument), I think it would take us about three years to unpack all of our boxes. Noah’s family, however, has put everything in its place. We walk through the front door and I’m amazed at how immaculate everything is. The furniture has settled into its new home; the only thing the house lacks is clutter. We walk into the living room – and it’s one of those living rooms that look like nobody ever lives in them.