Freestyle Love Read online

  “There you are,” Shane said, exasperated, as he came up behind Malachi. He cupped his hands to Malachi’s shoulders, shaking Malachi gently. “Thought we had lost you.”

  Malachi turned his head slightly and said, dryly, “I’m still here,” and finished off his beer. He turned around, forcing Shane to let go, and reached past Shane to set his empty beer bottle down among the collection of empty bottles and glasses on the plastic patio table behind him.

  “And where’s your friend Chad?” Shane smirked, and then gave a little laugh. Shane followed Malachi’s eyes as they fell on the guy standing to Malachi’s right, and Shane’s expression became serious as he assessed the intent look shared between Malachi and that stranger. Shane cleared his throat and said, “Am I interrupting —”

  “Not at all,” Cole said, holding his gaze to Malachi. Cole pushed himself off the railing and looked at Shane, “I was just leaving.” Cole looked at Malachi again. Cole’s eyes narrowed as he and Malachi stared at each other with the same intensity as on the first night they had met, when, wrapped in each other’s arms, they were held in a world of endless possibilities. Cole walked away.

  “Cole…” Malachi took a step forward, and when Cole spun around, Malachi’s mouth drooped open. Malachi held his hands out in front of him, as if to gesture something, but said nothing. Malachi shoved his hands in his jeans pockets, and he and Cole stared blankly at each other. Cole was shaking his head, and smirking again, and then disappeared into the crowd.

  “That was Cole?” Shane’s voice brimmed with an odd mixture of excitement and anxiousness, as if he had finally met the man who had replaced him in his lover’s bed. “So what happened?”

  “Nothing,” was Malachi’s abrupt response, and he took up his earlier position against the railing.

  Shane went over to Malachi and said, with a hint of insincerity, “You’re just going to let him walk away like that? Not even explain?” Shane was relieved when there was no response, simply an indolent shrug of indifference. He wrapped his arm around Malachi’s neck, like he had done as they waited to enter Urbane, and offered an encouraging smile. “We’re downstairs if you want… All right, I can take a hint.” Shane removed his arm and moved off, dragging his hand down Malachi’s back.

  When Shane had left, Malachi buried his face in his hands, and drew in three deep breaths in quick succession. He uncovered his face and, feeling exhausted, sat down at the table he had set his empty beer bottle on. He leaned back in the sturdy plastic patio chair, folded his arms, and stared up into the dark night sky. The noise around him seemed to dissipate, as if he had blocked it out even though it was very much still there. There weren’t any stars in the sky, just an expansive blackness that blanketed the earth. That blackness was in him, a heaviness that he carried deep in his chest, and that he could not discard. It had everything to do with Zach Brennan and little to do with Cole Malcolm, so he thought — and somehow Chad was tangled up in it. Shane showing up when he did had scared off Cole just when Malachi felt himself about to say something. Stop feeling sorry for yourself. Malachi leaned forward and stared at the collection of empty beer bottles on the table. Constantly searching out the meaning of life is not happiness. I need to let go of him, I know I do. Malachi pulled out his wallet from the back pocket of his jeans and counted his money. “One more drink,” he thought, and pushed his chair back from the table. As he went to stand, he found himself being pushed back down into his chair.

  “What do you want from the bar?” Cole asked, gently.

  Malachi looked hopelessly at Cole. “A Corona.” He slipped his wallet back into his pocket, his eyes glued to Cole’s jeans showcasing that firm cyclist’s arse until Cole was lost to the mob. Malachi recalled with nostalgia how he had paid great homage to Cole’s firm cyclist’s arse.

  Cole, for his part, standing in line, could see Malachi searching the crowd for him, the nervous agitation in those penetrating brown eyes. Cole smiled. There remained, despite the separation between them, a connectedness that pleased Cole, that he knew was somehow necessary to both of them. Cole did not know what it meant, or how it would play out, only that it was significant. Lost in his thoughts of him and Malachi curled up, naked, under the bedcovers, and after repeated prompting by the bartender, Cole floated back to reality and ordered two Coronas and returned to Malachi. Cole set the bottles down on the table with a hard, dry clunk that echoed into the night, and which startled Malachi. Cole sat down and held his doubting eyes to Malachi’s.

  “Thanks,” Malachi mumbled as he reached for the bottle.

  The music streaming through the speakers over the rooftop patio held them in a sort of suspended animation. They exchanged glances, but often let their eyes rove — as if this were the first time they had met and were embarrassed to show the other that they were, perhaps, the object of their affection. They both felt uncomfortable, wanting to speak but not knowing what to say.

  “This is awkward,” Cole said, pulling his chair closer to the table.

  “A little, yes,” Malachi said and added, frankly, “I don’t think that we could expect it to be otherwise.”

  “No, I suppose not.”

  “The aftermath of one-night stands,” Malachi said, and gave a dry laugh. “It feels so good in the moment. It’s afterwards, in the morning, when we’re trying to live down our shame of it, that we try to see it for more than it really is.”

  “Spoken like a true philistine,” Cole said, rolling his eyes.

  “Not quite.” Malachi sucked his teeth, and turned his head to the right and then to the left, like he was searching the crowd for someone he was waiting on to help him escape this extremity.

  “Can I ask you something?” Cole checked the time. It was ten minutes before midnight. He fidgeted with the paper coaster that he had set his beer bottle on, and with this gaze on the table, said, doubtfully, “Do you ever wonder if there’s anyone out there who is happy? I mean really happy?”

  “No,” Malachi said bluntly.

  Cole traced his index finger around the top of the bottle, and still looking at the table, said, “I wonder sometimes what they’ve done to get there,” with a hint of scepticism. “How have they stayed there in that happiness? Did they risk their soul and what did it cost them?”

  “I didn’t realize that happiness had a cost,” Malachi said, “but I’m just a philistine, so what do I really know.”

  Cole lifted his gaze to Malachi, who was staring menacingly at Cole, and Cole immediately felt remorse. Cole had made a judgment about someone whom he really did not know and could see how that had wounded Malachi. Cole certainly wasn’t doing anything to bolster his position with Malachi, for whom he still could not decide what he felt. Cole said, ruefully, “Everything has a cost of some sort,” and patted down his dark brown hair. “To know what happiness —”

  “I’m not interested in debating the metaphysics of happiness with you. I don’t care if other people are really happy. That’s for them to decide, and to live with.”

  “Why is it so impossible to talk to you?” Cole said in a loud voice, leaning forward. “It’s like there’s this huge force field around you that repels everyone and everything.” He leaned back in his chair and shook his head. “Christ! I don’t understand guys like you —”

  “Guys like me?” Malachi gave a little shrug and, in a calm voice, said, “Guys like me tell you how it is, straight up.” He tapped his index finger into the tabletop with each point he made. “We had sex. No stress, no mess. I made it very clear that I wasn’t looking for anything beyond —”

  “Yet you agreed to have dinner with me,” Cole shot back.

  Malachi dropped his gaze, and his heart was beating faster. He waited until his breathing normalized and then, without looking at Cole, said, “I think I’m going to call it a night,” and pushed his chair back from the table.

  “I’m sorry,” Cole said, with a sense of urgency. “I just wanted us to talk.”

  A loud, crowing laugh s
oared across the rooftop patio. Cole and Malachi, like many of the other patrons, turned their attention to the group of guys near the bar who were doubled over laughing. Malachi adjusted himself in his chair and reached for his beer. Malachi looked at the brick wall of the building that fenced in that part of the rooftop patio. Cole jockeyed for Malachi’s attention, but Malachi continued to look past Cole.

  Cole said, “I would like to take you out to dinner,” and gulped the rest of his beer.

  “I’m not sure that philistines make good dinner companions,” Malachi said, and stood.

  They looked at each other, with misgiving and desire. They were each caught up in separate, entangling webs that reeled them back from the edge of the daring vistas that held the promise of love and possibility. They were both in search of something that would give their lives meaning — for Cole that was love, for Malachi it had yet to reveal itself.

  Looking down at Cole, Malachi said, coolly and with emphasis, “You were wrong, you know.”

  “Wrong about what?”

  “I was never waiting on happiness. You don’t wait on happiness. Happiness waits on you.”

  “I never said —”

  “You suggested…”

  Dean came into view, and stood near the table between Malachi and Cole. Dean looked suspiciously at Malachi and coolly at Cole, and then Dean lifted his beer bottle to his mouth. Dean said to Cole, with an edge, but looking at Malachi, “I wondered where you had disappeared to.” Dean’s round blue eyes gleamed with sadness.

  “I should have…” Cole pursed his lips. “I’m sorry.”

  “So am I,” Dean said and walked away.

  Cole stood, and as Malachi went to walk away, said, “I wish you wouldn’t go,” and moved around the table and stood directly in front of Malachi.

  “You like to imagine what happiness looks like,” Malachi said, and shoved his hands in his pockets, “but it has to be in view.” He licked his lips, and staring intently into Cole’s narrow blue eyes, said rather harshly, “If you’re not happy, do something about it. Try seeing yourself within that truth,” and started to push his way through the crowd.

  “I’m glad we’re not debating the metaphysics of happiness,” Cole shouted after Malachi. A number of people turned and looked oddly at Cole, as if he had had too much to drink.

  Malachi spun around and searched Cole’s eyes hopelessly for understanding where there was none. Then, without saying another word, Malachi walked away.

  Admiring Malachi’s round backside as he wandered off, Cole felt love and frustration. Cole was a man desperately looking for love, to be loved. He easily developed affections for others, and wanted to immediately look after them, pamper them. Cole wanted that with Malachi. Cole was sensitive and easily affronted. Malachi’s words had wounded Cole. Cole was not happy, and he did not know what to do about it.

  There was, every morning when Cole woke up, a heaviness that swept over him, that there was something sinister about his world. He was alone. The tragic death of his younger brother possessed him, left him scarred and he was convinced that his survival depended on him “rejecting” society, finding a way to somehow live outside it. But positioning himself outside society would be difficult for someone like him who needed to fit in and feel like he was doing something meaningful with his life. He still attended Knox Presbyterian Church on Sundays, when he wasn’t travelling for work. It was the church he had attended with his parents and siblings growing up in Oakville. At work, he contributed to all the various fundraising campaigns for local charities and was given a little plaque recognizing his philanthropic efforts. Connections were important to Cole, and Paul was Cole’s connection to a world that held him on the brink of madness, and now he had none. No one to ground him, steady him, in a way prepare his heart for harvest.

  Cole swallowed hard, and the loneliness that swarmed over him in the mornings again enveloped itself around his body. He had lost his nerve when he wanted to be strong but nothing he had said had come out right. He was wishy-washy, weak, and had lost another connection that was important to him. Just like he had lost his older brother Owen, who had married a very pious woman who refused to condone Cole’s homosexuality and forbad her husband from having any contact with his brother. Cole and his younger sister, Leslie, had had a terrible row shortly after their mother’s death — about what he could not recall — but after nine years of not speaking they were now completely divorced from each other. And, despite everything, they were the only family Cole had left. Malachi was a connection that offered hope, that peeled away the madness of Cole’s world, that missing link, and Cole was desperate to hang on to it. It had all managed to slip through his fingers. Forced to take a step forward as someone squeezed past him, Cole grunted as he bumped into the plastic chair in front of him. He aggressively shoved his way through the crowd towards the narrow stairwell, eager to get out of the club, and made for home.

  As Cole was being ferried across the city by taxi, Malachi was roaming the crowded main floor in search of Shane. Malachi surveyed the dance floor, and those queuing at the bar. He edged his way through the horde and eventually found Shane leaning up against a wall near the billiards tables. Shane was making out with some guy. Malachi watched them for a moment, trying to decide if he should go over or not, and then left.

  Outside, breathing in the warm night air, Malachi’s tight muscles loosened. He stood on the sidewalk for a time, staring at the bright white light shining on the sign above the entrance that read, “Urbane,” cut out in large wood letters. He was tempted to venture back inside, but for what? Shane was occupied, and he had as much use for Cory and Eric as they had for him. He decided to return to the hotel.

  “Malachi…”

  Malachi, walking leisurely northward along Church Street, spun around when he heard his name echo through the air. The black-haired beauty jogged towards Malachi and Malachi couldn’t help but smile.

  “You’re not leaving already,” Chad said when he was close to Malachi. “It’s still early.”

  Malachi shrugged. “Like I said, this really isn’t my scene.”

  They looked intently at each other, and when Chad took another step forward, Malachi glanced away. Chad touched his hand to the side of Malachi’s face, and the feel of Chad’s velvety hand on Malachi’s face made the hair on the back of Malachi’s neck stand up. Chad gently turned Malachi’s head until they were looking at each other again. Chad, smiling, leaned in and pressed his lips to Malachi’s. A couple of guys navigating around them on the sidewalk whistled at them, and one of them shouted, “Get a room.”

  Chad pulled away, and still holding his hand to the side of Malachi’s face, ran his tongue over his top lip and then his lower lip. Chad dragged his hand down to Malachi’s shoulder and down Malachi’s arm. Holding Malachi’s hand in his, Chad said, “Come on,” and led Malachi into the street. Chad flagged down an approaching taxi and a short time later they were in Chad’s hotel room, moaning and breathing deeply through their sloppy, wet kisses as they undressed each other.

  Eight

  It was the next day, mid-morning. Malachi, sat at a table in the hotel restaurant, sipped his coffee as he waited on Shane, Cory and Eric. Chad was in a deep sleep when Malachi slipped away early in the morning without saying goodbye. Malachi had scribbled a short note on the hotel stationery on the desk, and at the door, stared longingly at Chad’s sculpted torso stretched out on the bed. The white sheet covered Chad’s lower back and round backside, but his hairy, muscular legs were exposed. Malachi checked the urge to undress and climb on top of Chad, hold Chad close again and, dropping his head, Malachi opened the door and left, pulling the door gently closed. Malachi was surprised to find his own hotel room empty, that there were no signs of Shane having slept there. Was it surprise or disappointment? Malachi knew he should have stayed in Claredon, that he was now more confused than before.

  Zach Brennan and Cole Malcolm were, when Malachi considered his situation carefully and th
oughtfully, minor protagonists in a life that had been shattered many years ago. Malachi tried not to think about his past, of the pain that continued to linger, but his past was as much a part of him as his present. No matter how desperate Malachi was to escape it, outrun it, the past hovered over him like dark, menacing storm clouds waiting to unleash their wrath.

  “More coffee?” the middle-aged woman asked, smiling.

  Malachi, his gaze held to his plate, lifted his head and said, sombrely, “Yes, thank you.” He wasn’t sure why, but days like this — surrounded by strangers in a foreign place — reminded him of Taylor Blanchard, a soft-spoken brunette who always seemed to have a smile on his face. They were both students at the University of Ottawa when they met. Malachi was studying political science, Taylor had just begun his master’s in philosophy.

  “I think you have to tip it forward a little,” the voice said, taking hold of the box of wine, and tipping it forward.

  “Thanks,” Malachi said, slightly embarrassed, once his wineglass was full. “Maybe this is a sign that I’ve reached my limit.” They laughed.

  “Taylor Blanchard,” Taylor said, with confidence, and extended his hand.

  “Malachi Bishop.” Malachi gripped Taylor’s hand firmly, and Malachi’s body tingled when Taylor did not let go immediately.