It�s full of little doodles and vignettes about people he sees throughout the day. I wonder if he will write one about me. I hope so.
I start to feel a little nervous. I think about what he might say if he finds out that I was in his journal, and what might happen if it turns out that he doesn�t like me after all and asks me to leave. Would I call Jon? I don�t think that I could call Jon. I don�t even know if I can remember his phone number.
I realize that there�s an easy answer to this, so I poke around the apartment to find a phone, which takes a while. It�s in the kitchen, and I hold it in my hands and think �Jon.� My fingers dial the number, and I hear him pick up after just one half-ring. �Hello?�
I hang up, but I�ve forgotten the number so I call again two more times and scribble the number on the inside of my wrist. There.
Heading back into the room, I realize that maybe I should write it somewhere else, in case I forget to look at my wrist, or if I wash the number off, so I write it again, high on my leg. Then I realize that my leg is a good place to put the number as a failsafe backup, but it would be difficult to access in a public place, so I write the number again, in tiny letters on the side of my right elbow. It�s a little wobbly, but I think it will hold up. I think about lots of different places to put the number, but I write it just one more time, on a piece of paper that I stuff in my sock. This way, even if I want to, I won�t forget Jon.
He comes out of the shower, wearing a towel. I think he�s forgotten that I�m here, so I politely turn my head to the corner while he puts on some pants. And sure enough, he notices me, or pretends to, after a few seconds, with an adorable yelp. He sounds like a fox cub.
�Sorry!� he says, and I blush and say that it�s ok, that I didn�t see anything. He asks if I want some music on, and I say sure. This is a game of musical taste check. If he puts on something pretentious, I will know not to listen. If he puts on something awful, like metal, I will probably die.
He puts on a mix CD, on which the first song is a band I haven�t heard before. I haven�t heard them before, but it doesn�t sound ridiculously indie. And, amazingly, he puts the volume down low. The song is called �Avalon� and it sounds bizarre and non-English, but just right juxtaposed against this strange bedroom and me. Even when it gets hectic, I remain calm; I like what this boy does to me. I feel very normal around him.
The second song is one of my absolute favorites, ever since I was in my freshman year of college. It�s by the Counting Crows, and believe me, I know how dopey that sounds. He smiles when he sees me smile, and we start to talk again, mostly this time about music. We don�t really share much taste, but I�d be interested to hear some of his stuff. And he hates Metallica. We share an awkward high-five.
I ask the ultimate college-boy question:
�Are you in a band?� and he says no. I am relieved times eleven, and I give him a hug just because.
Some time passes, and he is very kind about sleeping arrangements. I pull out a blanket and pillow from his closet (without asking! Maybe I am too bold..) and set them up, and he asks if I would like to be on his couch or in here. I surprise myself by wanting to share a room with him. He looks a bit astonished, but pleased, and he helps me lay out a very elaborate bed on the ground. I almost don�t have to, because of the thick fur, but I feel a little weird sleeping on a bear.
I look at the clock, and it�s way past too late. So he offers me his bed again, if I would like him to sleep on the floor instead, and I turn him down. His bed is large and caramel-colored, and I worry that it might swallow me up.
We listen to the last of the mix CD, and then we drift off. I am twenty six, and he is twenty one. It is not a bad set-up, because Jon is twenty nine. I need to stop comparing the two, don�t I?
Yes, I do.
The morning is nice. He works in a gallery downtown and doesn�t start until noon, and he has a ten o�clock class, so we wake up at eight. I don�t think either of us did it on purpose. Maybe I just read his mind.
The first thing he does when he wakes up is look over the edge of the bed at me and say, sleepily, Hello, you�re still there.
The first thing I do when I wake up is say, Yes, I am.
He has bagels and fruit, which make for a pretty good breakfast. He talks a lot about his classes; he is taking Philosophy and Art Theory, and English Lit, and some geometry class I forget the name of. He says that he want to understand the proportions before he even tries to paint them, you know?
I know.
He asks where I go to school, and I wince as little as possible and tell him that I don�t. He shrugs, and tells me that college isn�t for anyone, really. I tell him about my own artwork and he sounds really interested. Lots of the time I use this spray rig that they use to paint cars with, and I like to splat things into the paint, leaving imprints. Sometimes I scratch the paint with car keys.
Jon likes my paintings, but usually I sculpt. It�s all pretty loose, actually. What one person might see as a painting might have a dress sewn into it or a big nest of wire digging out from the center, and what somebody might think of as a sculpture could really just be some twisted canvas that I never liked enough to hang straight.
Sometimes I make clothes, but I don�t have the guts to wear them so they sit in my closet and dangle from hooks in my walls.
I tried to sell some of my things, once. I took them down to the gallery, carrying them one by one, but I didn�t know much about how it worked. I sort of just hung them on the walls, and no one noticed for about an hour, when I was on my fifteenth painting or so.
They arrested me.