Man Talk: Part 4

(Continued from Part 3)

“Oh, like at camp.” She replied, and after a few moments of racking his brain, he remembered what she was talking about. Years ago, he, Nazeli, and Paul had been counselors at the summer camp that was affiliated with David and Paul’s church - a job both their parents had encouraged them to take in hopes that their people would somehow find him less of an acquired taste. At the end of the summer, all the counselors who hadn’t returned home had themselves a party around the camp pool, a little reward for the past eight weeks of wrangling pre-pubescent monsters.

“This is gonna be a dry party, I see.” Vana, the arts-and-crafts coordinator, pouted as Raffi, one of the camp lifeguards, filled red plastic cups with fruit punch and Coke.

“No, it’s not!” Paul exclaimed, and took off running. He cannonballed fully clothed into the water, splashing everyone in the process. A few of the kids cheered and clapped, though Vana rolled her eyes.

“Hagopian!” Raffi wiped pool water off of the drink table with his shirttail. “You realize that not everybody here feels like getting wet, right?”

Paul spit a mouthful of water out and giggled. Of course he realized it, but he didn’t care; caring wasn’t his business.

“Alright, who’s next?” Paul looked around to see who else would take a plunge. His eyes landed on Noah, the youngest of the group. Eighteen and shy, he was often spared from any ball-busting that the older counselors engaged in with each other, and many of them had taken it upon themselves to build a fortress around him.

“How come I’ve never seen you swim, Noah?” He cooed menacingly, though he knew exactly why. Noah’s little sister had drowned in a lake two summers prior. That year, every young adult in The Circle - including David and Paul - had been warned by their families to be especially kind to their soft-spoken peer whose universe had been smashed open. Even the Manukyan goons were somehow capable of letting their sympathy show. At the wake, he caught Sarkis giving the boy a hug, the sight of which paralyzed David. His heart ached for the kid - how could it not? But somehow, letting him know it seemed unthinkable. With his chin resting on Sarkis’ fat shoulder, Noah could see David looking as if he had just seen Medusa. After Sarkis had left, it was just the two of them standing in the hallway of the funeral home.

“David.” Noah nodded as a test to see what David would do next. David had been carefully avoiding Noah ever since he had heard the news - feeling that there was nothing quite as cold and slimy as another person’s bereavement - but all the while, had been imagining what he would say or do when he actually had to confront him. Now, the moment was here, but all those fantasies had dried up.

Do you expect me to talk?

“ ‘Sup.” David finally uttered, waving weakly. It was all he could manage. Noah waited for him to say more, but much to David’s relief, his mother motioned for him to get ready to leave.

Now, he was Medusified again, as Paul winked at him. His conscience was telling him to stand up for Noah, but he told himself: think meteor showers. Think yellow tape hung inexplicably. Better yet, don’t think at all, at least not with the little muscle that thumps.

“I don’t want to -“ Before Noah could finish his sentence, David, on autopilot, rushed over and shoved him into the deep end of the pool.

“Swim! Swim! Swim!” He and Paul cheered, and the rest of the group looked on in horror as Noah sputtered like a half-dead fish. The trained lifeguard in Raffi kicked in, and within a few seconds, he was under the water, trying to rescue the boy. When he had gotten him out, Raffi patted his back as he coughed out pool water onto the lawn.

“What the hell is wrong with you?!” Nazeli shrieked at David, at which point everything died down. She and Raffi then tended to Noah, stroking his forehead and asking him questions to make sure he was still lucid. David thought of apologizing to the kid, and the ability to do so was lurking inside him, like a disease in remission, but instead he and Paul laughed, loudly and obnoxiously as Raffi and Nazeli helped him up and led him away towards the camp infirmary. Now, sitting at his computer, David replayed that evening in his head, wracked with guilt that he would never admit to experiencing.

Back in the present, David checked his phone again; it was almost noontime and he had still not heard a peep from Paul. What could he possibly be doing? Did he meet someone in the lobby and spend the night with them? Like he may or may not have done with Nazeli? Just the thought of that burned him up. When he arrived at Paul’s room, he tapped on the door, and waited. A minute later, Paul arrived at the door bare naked except for a towel around his waist, with an aura of soapy steam about him.

“What are you doing?” David asked as he walked in, looking at the storm of sheets - which had probably seen things he didn’t want to envision - on Paul’s bed. “It’s past noon.”

Paul went over to the mirror and slathered some Old Spice on his armpits. "You know the limo's not coming until one-thirty, right?"

"I know. I’m the one who reserved it."

"Aren't we spicy today?"

"Don’t talk like that.” David said, looking as if he had just tasted a bitter plant.

“Talk like what?” He held his towel with one hand, waiting for an answer, and when David didn’t give him one, he pointed to the window. “Close those curtains, will you? I don’t want all of Miami to see me naked.”

“What about some of Santa Ana?” David smirked as he pulled the curtains together.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

The second he heard the sentence, Paul threw his head back and cackled.

“So she told you?”.

“All I know is that you two talked.” David examined Paul, like a parent calmly waiting to catch a child in a lie.

“That’s technically true.” Paul said, giggling to himself. When David bored holes into him with his eyes, he straightened up and shook his head. “What, you like her?

“I don’t know.” The question stopped David in his tracks; thinking about it stirred up things that he had built a wall to keep out. “Maybe”.

“Could have fooled me.” The corners of Paul’s mouth turned up in mock amazement. “And her. Apparently, you’re ‘callous’ and ‘closed off’. Other things, too, that I can’t remember.”

“Really? She told you that?”

“Well, I knew that. But she reminded me.” Paul buttoned up his starched collared shirt. David put hands in his pockets and exhaled, sensing the beginnings of a fight brewing within him.

“Maybe she deserves you, then.” He said, taking heavy, deliberate steps towards Paul.

“Yeah, she does.” Paul was now face-to-face with David, so close he could see his nostrils flaring. “What are you gonna do about it?”

The quiet anger overpowered the room, with neither man speaking for several minutes. David glanced at the closed curtains that still allowed a sliver of light to peek in.

“Kick your ass right on that balcony.” He softly growled.

“Go ahead,” Paul asserted, and David retreated into a boyish shell. No, no, he wouldn’t. Paul knew it, too; he turned away and chuckled to himself while taming his wild wet hair with a comb.

“What happened to everything you used to preach?” David murmured, facing the wall.

“I’m not seventeen anymore, that’s what happened to it.” Paul “And it just gets exhausting sometimes.”

The two men walked the whole way out of the hotel without looking at each other; into the elevator, into the marble hallways decorated with pictures of celebrities, into the waiting area for cars where guests practically cooked in the Florida sun. The limo was taking a millennium to arrive, and being forced to share a space with Paul only seemed to make the wait drag on. As he often did when bored or anxious, David climbed into a daydream - one about camp, seeing himself watching two countries’ flags get raised on a dreary gray morning, with one head counselor whose name he had long forgotten attaching each flag, and Raffi’s hands working together in a delicate ballet to pull the ropes.

There was something about a flag raising that was supposed to wake up what was written in bones, to call forefathers who were now nothing but astral dust. Everybody else around him - campers, fellow counselors - even the wildlife around the campground seemed to be making way for the weight of the moment. But nothing was happening for David, and it frightened him. He turned to Nazeli, who was standing next to him, her hand resting on her chest.

“What are we supposed to do?” He whispered to her, but she only shook her head, leaving him to look at the worn fabric against the clouds and challenge himself to look for something buried deep that couldn’t be shot down without blinking.