Baroque

Baroque (Part 2)


The hallway was cold and black, frightening, almost, in the heavy sense of desolation that defined it. Serge hurried on, groping frantically along the wall to guide himself to the stairs. He knew where it was situated, but the darkness simply made him feel as though he were somewhere completely foreign and uncharted. And somehow, the darkness also rendered his goal unreachable, and what was usually a point in the hallway that took him a mere minute to reach in the dim light of day now seemed a thousand miles away.

But Serge eventually found the stairway without losing his footing in his virtual blindness and pitching forward into the night. Carefully shuffling to the other side for a more secure grip on the balustrade, the boy then proceeded to half-run, half-stumble down toward what he believed—or, rather, hoped—was Carl’s room.

He reached the bottom before he knew it, and he hurried forward, instinct more than anything guiding him in the dark. He remembered where the class president’s assigned room was on the ground floor, and he managed to find it fairly easily enough.

“Carl!” he cried, shattering the stillness that weighed down on him as he fell against the door with the familiar bronze plaque on it, banging desperately at the wood. “Carl! Help!”

The sounds of his frantic calls and the irregular yet insistent thumping of fist against wood almost shook the hallway, and he almost missed the sound of a nearby door opening and an angry yet sleep-heavy voice call out, “Hey! Shut up! Can’t you see that people are trying to get some goddamn sleep around here?”

Serge paused and looked around, but he couldn’t find the source of the angry call in the dark. “I need Carl!” he cried. “Can you tell me where he is?”

A quiet curse followed that, and the boy was soon treated to the vague sight of a tall, disheveled boy carrying a pen light, weakly flashing it at him.

“That\'s Carl\'s office. His bedroom can be found in the west wing—along with the building monitors’,” the stranger replied brusquely as he squinted in the dark in an effort to get a better view of his companion. “He’s had a pretty rough day, so don’t even think of bothering him if you value your hide.”

“I need to see him,” Serge insisted, his eyes straying to the staircase as his mind continued to be filled with the image of Gilbert lying pale and still on their bedroom floor. “Please, it’s an emergency.”

The other boy continued to regard him with a scowl, sleep now clearly leaving him as understanding slowly sank in. “Are you the new kid?”

“I—yes, I am. Please, can you help me find Carl?”

“It’s Gilbert, isn’t it?”

Serge fell silent. He stared, wide-eyed, at the other boy, who nodded knowingly and then motioned for him to wait. “I’ll be back. Hold on. Don’t go anywhere.” Then he turned around and shuffled off with a loud yawn, appearing several seconds later in his robe, a pair of glasses now perched on his nose, one of his hands now holding a black doctor’s bag—the old-fashioned kind that Serge had seen in books before the 20th century.

“Right,” the other boy said as he placed a hand on Serge’s shoulders and firmly turned him around. “Lead the way, kid. I’m right behind you.”

Serge moved forward without hesitation, and the two were soon back in Room 17, staring at the lifeless figure on the floor.

“What’s happened to him?” Serge whispered fearfully. “I didn’t see any blood—he’s not —but—but…”

“Help me carry him to the bed.”

Serge didn’t ano another urging, and he bent down to help the other boy turn Gilbert on his back. Then, securing the invalid’s legs, he stumbled to his feet and gingerly carried his roommate to his bed, where the other boy began to strip him of his uniform and shoes before covering him with his blankets, firmly instructing Serge what to do to help. The worried boy took Gilbert’s uniform from his companion, eyeing his stricken roommate one more time before walking off to throw the soiled clothes the the small hamper that sat inside their shared closet.

“How did you know that Gilbert’s in trouble?” Serge asked as he stood at the foot of the bed to watch the proceedings. His companion was examining the naked boy closely now,ing ing hold of Gilbert’s hands and giving each a careful scrutiny, sighing heavily on occasion. And with a shudder of horror, Serge realized that his roommate’s wrists were marked with faint bruises. In the dark, he hadn’t even noticed them, but then again, he was searching for obvious wounds and injuries that required a more distasteful breaking of the skin.

These bruises were subtle—so subtle, in fact, as to render them all the more ominous and frightening.

“Carl a saw saw him among the trees this afternoon,” his companion replied grimly. “He wasn’t feeling well and didn’t bother to wait for me, so I could help Carl take him back to this room.” He glanced over his shoulder to stare at Serge. “Did he say anything to you when you found him?”

“N—no. He passed out just when I got out of bed. I mean—I felt him hold my leg, but he blacked out before he could say anything, I think.”

The other boy nodded and turned his attention back to Gilbert. “He’s got a fever. That’s all. I’m leaving you some pills that you need to make sure he’ll take. He’s just had a bit of a shock.”

“But from what?”

“He’ll need to rest for the next couple of days. Be sure to keep him in this room, no matter what.”

“But…”

“Did you understand me?” the newcomer cut in, his voice now loud and harsher with an almost desperate firmness.

“Yes, I did,” Serge stammered, his face heating up. “Sorry.”

A heavy silence fell on the two, and for a few seconds, Serge wondered if time had stopped altogether as they stared at each other in some confusion. Finally his companion softened, the stern crinkling of his brows smoothening out and replaced with a vague little smile.

“You must be Serge Battouille. Pleasure to meet you. I’m Pascal Biquet—resident smart ass, atheist, and future brain surgeon.”

Serge couldn’t help but break out into a relieved smile himself as he nodded. “I know. Carl told me when I asked.”

Pascal cocked an eyebrow, and Serge stammered, “That was when you fell asleep during Latin, and you were starting to snore in your notes. I couldn’t concentrate.”

The taller boy shrugged before standing up, yawning again as he placed his hands on the small of his back and then arched, grimacing as he stretched. “Latin’s just dull. Dull, dull, dull. The school should’ve done away with it since it’s useless. Would you be using Latin once you get out into the world? No, you wouldn’t. It’s a pointless class.”

“So—if you’re an atheist, what’re you doing in this school?”

“I wasn’t an atheist when I first started,” Pascal replied dryly. “Go figure.”

Serge blinked but thought it more prudent to hold his tongue as he watched Pascal wipe Gilbert’s damp forehead with a handkerchief before placing a hand on the pale, burning skin.

“Definitely a fever,” he noted as he straightened up and then motioned for Serge to follow him to one of the writing desks. There he placed the doctor’s bag, digging into it to pull seveseveral paper sachets and dumping them in a pile beside Serge’s books. “These are all pills to help with his fever,” he said. “Give him one at least twice a day till the fever goes away. And make sure that he eats. Christ almighty, he’s gotten skinnier by the day, and if this keeps up, he’ll just disappear into thin air—literally.”

Serge nodded. “I’ll keep an eye on him. I promise.”

“Good.”

“But—what’re those marks on his hands and his arms? Did he fall off something? Is anything broken?”

“Nothing’s broken, trust me.” Here Pascal paused and hesitated, watching the smaller boy with an expression that Serge couldn’t clearly define. “Gilbert just gets into a few scrapes. That’s all.”

And with that, Pascal closed his bag and secured it with its latch before patting Serge on the shoulder and walking toward the door, pausing at the threshold to t a q a quick glance at the other boy. “Don’t worry too much about Gilbert right now, Serge. The only thing you really need to concern yourself with at the moment is to make sure that he rests and gets well. All right?”

“All right. Thanks, Pascal.”

“Anytime.” Pascal grinned, waved, and then disappeared into the darkness beyond, his footfalls nothing more than quiet whispers on the floor.

Serge shut the door quietly and made his way back to Gilbert’s side, his eyes wandering over the still figure and taking in the sight of shallow, rhythmic breathing that eased his mind. His gaze strayed to an arm that was limply draped on the boy’s midsection, and he felt his jaws clench tightly at the light bruises that encircled the wrist.

His aunt had grabbed hold of his hand several times in the past as she swung him around for a sound flogging, and the bruises that her fingers left on his wrist always took a while to fade. Serge shook his head in a determined effort to erase the memory before walking back to the writing desk to extinguish the light and then crawling back into bed, succumbing to the pull of sleep and having his dreams invaded by a red-faced, snarling woman bending over him, her small, sunken eyes accusing him of sins for which he wasn’t at all responsible, her thin mouth contorting to form hateful words that had now grown to define whom he was.

“That gutter trash your father married has brought nothing but shame to this family, and I can see that you’ll do no better someday!”

“I won’t, Auntie, I won’t! I promise!”

The terrible mask stiffened, and the voice fell to a cold hiss. “That’s what your father told Mama—right before he ran off with that filthy strumpet.”

**********

Carl was apprised of the incident, and he was relieved on Gilbert’s account, thanking Pascal for his quick help and his much-needed reassurance directed at Serge.

“God, will you stop fussing over me?” the boy said testily though Carl was amused to spot a faint flush and a fleeting light of pride animate Pascal’s very (and as Pascal himself had once noted) intellectual features. “I did what anyone else could’ve done under the circumstances. Just—shoo, will you? Shoo!”

The sophomore class president could only laugh, ruffling Pascal’s hair (something that the other boy had always detested) before leaving his friend grumbling and yet beaming with no small pride.

Once alone, though, Carl felt himself unnerved by odd sensations—thohat,hat, he was extremely reluctant to admit, were roused by his last run-in with Gilbert.

He’d been distracted in all of his classes, his mind wandering off to places to which he dared not venture before. He’d fought hard to control its restlessness, but the more he tried to lay a firm grasp on it, the more it struggled to free itself, and it would fly out of his fingers with a defiant burst of energy, only to settlto mto more disturbing thoughts until Carl was forced to fumble in his bag for his bible, trembling fingers bumbling their way through dog-eared and well-annotated pages for passages that had eased his spirits in the past.

In the middle of history class, while his professor had his back turned to the students as he wrote on the blackboard, Carl was fighting against the unsettling sensations he felt as he peeled back the flap of Gilbert’s uniform two days ago, exposing the other boy’s shoulder and arm and a small part of his chest. He remembered eyeing the bared skin, even remembered with horrified certainty the vague thought that crossed his mind at that moment—of wondering how the skin on Gilbert’s shoulder would feel under his hand. The thought was fleeting at best, but Carl felt its influence much more keenly than any other thought that filled his mind in the past, and he frantically sought the bible’s protection from the temptation to which a mere brief memory was subjecting him.

He also remembered the way Gilbert stood before him, injured yet still defiant, pulling his hair back in such a way as to momentarily rearrange Carl’s world as the dark-haired boy was treated to the all-tomilimiliar sight of gently arching brows, green eyes that alternately burnt and froze, and a mouth that seemed carefully carved—almost obsessively so—from soft marble, mesmerizing in the way it slowly curved into a derisive smirk while hurling a final baleful word before disappearing from Carl’s sight.

And there he sat in wretched silence, unaware of anything else but the growing, insistent restlessness that now had both his mind and his body in a punishing hold, his eyes wide and barely seeing the words of virtue and spiritual exaltation that littered the book before him.

None had noticed his odd behavior, thankfully enough, and Carl made sure that he’d fight his sordid tendencies every minute of the day, whether or not he was in company. He was the class president, after all. He was the model on whom his peers had placed all their hopes. He was the paragon of virtue in the academy’s eyes, and he certainly wasn’t interested in Gilbert or in any other boy.

And so it was that Carl spent the next two days drifting in and out of a near half-daze, barely minding his classmates as he walked past them in the hallways or sat with them in the common room or ate with them in the dining hall. He’d walk quietly among the crowd, his eyes fixed thoughtf on on the floor, his features just slightly pinched into a pained expression of conflict that wracked his insides.

The second day after meeting Gilbert among the trees found Carl isolating himself from the rest of his classmates, his bible in hand. The final bell had rung, and the students had scattered to their respective dorms, with a few of them taking to the chapel for some personal meditation time as Carl had always done.

The chapel itself was sequestered from the rest of the buildings, safely ensconced between trees and rich, flowering shrubs, as though purposefully removed from the more earthly pursuits that carried on in the dormitories, the main academy, and the administration buildings. It was, literally, a spiritual retreat to which Carl had always run after a difficult day dispensing his duties.

The boy was lost in thought as he picked his way through the trees, avoiding the main path and thereby avoiding other students who’d li pla plague his nerves with incessant chatter. No, he needed—desperately—to be alone.

The fates, however, decreed it otherwise.

“Carl…”

The boy froze on his tracks, feeling the blood drain away from him at the sound of the voice. And almost immediately, his heart raced as he turned to the find the source.

Gilbert sat on the limb of a nearby tree, perched almost effortlessly in spite of the massive branch’s awkward configuration, his figure slouched lazily, his back pressed against the trunk, and one leg dangling and swinging idly in the air. He regarded Carl with a complacent little smile.

“Gilbert,” Carl began cautiously. “What’re you doing here? You’re supposed to be in bed still.”

“I’m bored,” came the quick reply. “There’s nothing to do in my room but stare at the ceiling all day and listen to my roommate prattle on and on about what he’s done during the day.”

“You don’t like Serge?”

“He’s amusing enough. He has his purpose, I suppose.”

Gilbert shifted and leapt off the branch with practiced ease, brushing dirt off his uniform with a lazy flick of a wrist before sauntering up to Carl, hands clasdemudemurely behind him. Carl held his ground as he mentally drilled into himself that the boy shouldn’t be feared—that Gilbert was just a plain tease who simply got his thrills from throwing others off their guard.

“So you’re feeling much better now, then?” he asked after several aborted tries and feeling his throat itch from the sudden dryness that assailed it.

Gilbert nodded, tilting his head to the side as he regarded the taller boy in amused silence. Carl couldn’t help but watch the way the sunlight spilled on to his exposed throat. “I am, thanks—thanks to you and Biquet, that is.”

“Me…”

“Yes, you. I’ve been thinking—back in my room—that you’re really a good, decent person, Carl. I’ve never seen that before—actually, I’ve never really acknowledged it. That’s what happens when I get too caught up with my personal issues, and I’m sorry.” Gilbert paused, brows furrowing a little as he pondered, before he finished with “I’m too selfish. I’m sorry.” His voice fell as he spoke, and he sounded almost childlike.

Carl swallowed as he watched his companion regard him with wide-eyed earnestness, his expectation for forgiveness, it seemed, making him almost shrink before Carl’s eyes. Gilbert looked almost fragile, sending a warm surge of protectiveness—or was it possessiveness—through the dark-haired boy’s system, and he softened, breaking out into a small, reassuring smile.

“It’s all right, Gilbert. Really.”

“Then—you’re not too angry with me?”

“No. It’s strange, but I can’t find it in myself to be angry with you.”

Gilbert stepped forward, a little smile of relief lighting up his features. Carl watched a stray curl of gold hair get itself caught in the smaller boy’s lashes, lightly shadowing the eye that they protected, and before he knew what he was doing, he was gently flicking it away. Gilbert neither blinked nor flinched—merely watched him closely, expectantly.

“Friends still?” came the quiet inquiry.

“We’re always friends. You know that.”

Gilbert nodded, his smile widening. “Oh, good.”

Then he leaned forward and kissed Carl squarely on the lips, moving his to gently massage the other’s partly open. Carl’s mind slammed itself shut at the sudden whirl of confusing sensations that suddenly flooded it as a small, warm tongue pushed inside his mouth, flicking at his own in playful invitation. The boy didn’t feel his body sag against Gilbert’s—didn’t feel his hand loosen its hold on his bible, allowing it to drop almost soundlessly at his feet—didn’t feel his arms snake their way around Gilbert’s waist to pull the other boy closer—didn’t feel his mouth reciprocate the teasing attention being showered on it.

He didn’t hear the soft sounds of need bubble from his own throat when Gilbert pressed himself insistently against him—didn’t hear his quiet whispers of lust-riddled praise when he broke from the kiss to explore the pale shell of Gilbert’s ear—didn’t hear his half-coherent, garbled demands murmured against the skin of Gilbert’s neck when he slid one of his hands down his partner’s back, resting itself firmly against the other boy’s backside and forcing it forward till their hips ground against each other.

He didn’t feel himself fall—didn’t feel the terrifying darkness that enveloped him.

He didn’t feel…

Carl’s eyes snapped wide open, their vision momentarily blurred by mist before clearing to stare in abject horror at the pale features on which he was showering eager attention—the disheveled mop of gold hair, the green eyes that peered out at him from under thick lashes—expectant, cold, and triumphant. And when Carl’s mind finally caught up with the moment, he discovered that they were now lying on the leaf-strewn ground, with Gilbert mockingly pliant under him, the top buttons of his uniform now undone by Carl’s own hands.

“Oh, dear God!” the boy cried out as he wrenched himself free and staggered to his feet, shrinking away from the icily smiling figure that remained on the ground—on its way to being naked, surrendering to his lust with condescending pleasure.

Gilbert continued to watch him from the carpet of leaves—terrible and beautiful, repulsive and desirable, taunting and enticing, his smile unwavering in its condemnation of Carl’s moral ineptitude. His mouth presently moved, but no sound came though his sentiments rang loudly and clearly in Carl’s tattered mind.

“Screw me.”

With a small, choked cry, Carl tore his gaze away from Gilbert, and he dove for his bible, snatching it up and running off into the trees, his ears barely registering the quiet burst of laughter that filled the tiny clearing he’d just abandoned.

Dead leaves crunched under his feet as he tore through the maze of trees, bible held tightly against his chest almost like a talisman over which darker powers held no sway. Carl could still feel Gilbert’s mouth against his—could still taste the other boy’s tongue—could still feel the warmth of tender skin under his lips. But what tore at him with relentless fury was the lingering memory of undeniable arousal that enlivened his body when he moved against the other boy’s. He could remember the pleasure—almost painful in the way it coursed through his system, firing up nerve endings that had long lain dormant and frightening him with its intensity.

Guilt gnawed at him as he broke out of the trees and laid dimmed eyes on the chapel—pretty and contemplative with its whitewashed walls and colorful, mullioned windows. No other students were around, to his relief, and Carl staggered onward to stop several feet shy of the chapel’s front steps. There, with trembling hands, he opened his bible, murmuring desperate prayers as he did.

He could barely see, what with the tears that had begun to form, but he fought them, running a sleeve across his face impatiently as he searched for a passage that he hoped would save him from his blacker and more terrifying tendencies. Dark, short hair clung to the sweat-dampened face that was now devoid of blood.

“Glorious St. Michael,” the boy stammered under his breath as he stood in the sun, “Prince of the heavenly hosts, who standest always ready to give assistance to the people of God…”

Worn pages continued to flip back and forth—from Genesis to Psalms, from St. Luke to St. John.

“…who didst fight with the dragon, the old serpent, and didst cast him out of heaven, and now valiantly defendest the Church of God that the gates of hell may never prevail against her…”

Carl’s eyes fell on highlighted passages, but none made sense at the moment—none could help him. They were failing him; the bible—the church—his faith—were failing him, and he couldn’t understand why. All he could see was an unending jumble of words that taunted him with faded ink, daring him to dig deeper and grasp unspoken messages.

/Read us—understand us if you can—and your soul will be saved,/ they seemed to whisper mockingly.

“…I earnestly entreat thee to assist me also in the painful and dange con conflict, which I have to sustain against the same formidable foe…”

He pinched his eyes shut when the image of Gilbert lying sprawled and disheveled on the carpet of red and gold leaves suddenly forced itself into his mind, and he choked back a sob, his prayer floundering weakly before dissolving altogether. Raising his head, he grimaced at the chapel’s façade and, with a mighty heave, flung his bible at the intricately-carved doors and watched it hit the wood with a loud thump before exploding in a hundred worn pages of useless gibberish.

“Sonofabitch!” he screamed, his voice tearing through the ascetic calmness before fading away as the boy sank to his knees, burying his face in his fists.

**********

Pascal sighed heavily as he watched his hand move, English translations slowly taking shape line by line under his pen.

“I hate Latin,” he grumbled as he rested his chin on his hand, momentarily raising his eyes to rest them on the one figure that had been giving him some concern lately.

Carl sat a few chairs apart from him, studiously—as he’d always been—jotting down notes and his own translations as their Latin professor read off phrase after phrase in his iblyibly monotonous tone. Serge sat beside him, wide-eyed and eager as he fought to keep up with the dictation, his face lightly scrunched up as he concentrated hard on his work.

Carl, however, was pale, a shadow dulling his eyes. He’d scribble for several seconds before stopping suddenly. Then he’d place his pen carefully on his desk before bowing his head and burying his face in his hands as though to collect himself. Then, with a clear air of renewed determination, he’d pick us pes pen and continue with his exercises before once again succumbing to something that was clearly wrenching his mind into undesirable directions.

Pascal frowned. Carl hadn’t confided in him lately—had kept all subjects of conversation on everything academic. He was clearly disturbed by something, but no amount of goading or prodding on Pascal’s part could encourage the other boy to confess anything, and he was at a loss. Carl simply managed to deflect all inquiry with a determination that astonished him, and even with his characteristic generosity and earnestness, Carl couldn’t manage to completely hide the disquiet that was clearly consuming him.

He tried to keep out, convincing himself that his friend was simply going through one of those temporary mood swings—the doldrums as he’d noted—and hoping that this phase wouldn’t linger too long. Carl, after all, had begun to grow lax in his duties, walking around distracted and lost in his thoughts more often than not. He’d even forgotten to return the students’ math tests the previous day, and had it not been for his classmates’ anxious clamoring, Pascal was certain that Carl wouldn’t have given them back at all.

“Mr. Mise, are you paying any attention?” came the vexed bark from the front of the lecture hall.

The sound of pens scratching on paper immediately stopped, and several heads turned to fix curious eyes on Carl’s bloodless and unsettled figure. Pascal sighed, throwing his professor a look of no small annoyance.

“The last thing he needs, sir, is to be lectured like a wayward kid in front of the whole damn class,” he muttered darkly.

“I’m sorry, sir,” Carl replied brokenly from where he sat, his figure almost drooping. “I’m not feeling too well at the moment.”

“You should’ve gone to the clinic before class.”

“Yes, sir.”

Pascal rolled his eyes. “He didn’t go to the clinic, sir, because of your damned attendance policy, that’s why. Christ.”

“Go on and see the nurse. Don’t bother returning, Mr. Mise, unless you’re ready for class.”

Carl stood up obediently as he gathered his books and notes. “Will I be marked absent, sir?”

The professor looked momentarily baffled before barking, “Of course, young man! You’re not staying for the entire class, are you? It’s an absence!”

Carl merely nodded and stuffed his things in his bag before stalking off, giving a clearly anxious Serge a reassuring pat on the shoulder. Pascal watched his friend walk down the steps toward the exit at the bottom, disappearing through it quietly.

“Going back to the exercise, gentlemen,” the professor declared as he cleared his throat and droned on. “From Luke’s gospel: Quoniam quidem multi conati sunt ordinare narrationem, quae in nobis completae sunt, rerum, sicut tradiderunt nobis, qui ab initio ipsi…”

Pascal scowled at the aging figure standing at the podium. “Fuck this,” he hissed. Then, stretching his arms high above his head, he suddenly broke out into a loud, obnoxious yawn, making sure to smack his lips and scratch his chest noisily.

That did the trick.

The drone abruptly stopped, and his name was angrily called.

“Sir?” he cooed with feigned innocence.

“Is this class boring you, Mr. Biquet?” tan dan demanded.

“Well—yes, sir.”

“What?”

“You’ll have to admit, sir, that Latin’s impractical in the real world. No one would be using it in his line of work, right? Unless, of course, he happens to be a Latin profe. Bu. But all in all, what’s the use of expending so much time and energy on something that we won’t be able to use?”

Pascal watched thiray ray eyebrows draw tightly together with every line he’d uttered until he was practically staring at a wrinkled cantaloupe (as he so fondly described it, much to Carl’s chagrin).

“I think we’ve had enough of your rants, young man.”

Pascal stifled a broad grin. He’d just been kicked out of class for the principal’s office. He simply couldn’t have it any better.

**********

Carl’s tall figure emerged once Pascal had run past those confounded trees, and he doubled his pace in order to catch up to his friend, who walked with a heavy, dragging step.

“Mise!” he called out, and the other boy stopped, glancing over his shoulder in surprise. “Wait up!”

“Wh—what’re you doing here?” Carl demanded as Pascal jogged up to him, grinning broadly.

“Got kicked out.”

“What, again?”

“Yes—great, isn’t it?”

Carl shook his head, frowning his disapproval. “You’re going to get booted off this school if you keep this up, Biquet. You know that. Or has it been your plan all along?”

“Nah. Just wanted to take a walk, that’s all.”

Carl sniffed and moved on.

“Mise—Carl—will you talk to me about what’s been bugging you?”

The dark-haired boy paused in his tracks, swinging around almost violently as he regarded his friend in obvious shock (tinged with guilt, Pascal quickly amended). “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he replied steadily, but he flushed a little, and Pascal fell into a brief, thoughtful silence. “I’m just feeling under the weather, that’s all. There’s no need to worry.”

With that, he turned around, only to freeze in his tracks with a low cry, his gaze suddenly fixed on a figure peering out from a window above them. Pascal noted the way Carl’s complexion turned ashen, the way the boy’s eyes widened in dismay, the way his mouth dropped open helplessly. He followed Carl’s gaze and found Gilbert standing by the window of what he recognized to be the library. The boy was watching Carl steadily, a cryptic little smile curling his lip, his arms cradling a stack of thick books. Gilbert looked as though he was in the middle of doing some research, and he’d momentarily stopped to look out the window and admire the academy’s lush landscape when he espied Carl.

Pascal blinked. Gilbert, technically, should be in the Latin class with everyone else, not in the library. Conjectures that began to bubble up, however, proved to be unimportant at best when Pascal’s mind began to piece things together, his eyes moving from Carl to Gilbert and back to Carl. He took note of the class president’s distress and the other boy’s smug complacence, and it didn’t take long for him to conclude that something recently happened that had thrown Carl into a state of complete unease—one that involved Gilbert in one way or another.

“Or perhaps completely,” he muttered to himself, watching Gilbert’s smile broaden, exultation at his triumph over Carl showing itself in the soft curling of his mouth before the boy turned around and walked away with his books.

Carl continued to stare at the empty window, and it had to take a gentle hand on his shoulder for him to be roused from his near-stupor, giving a start at his friend’s touch and mumbling his apology before walking forward, his steps heavier than ever.

Pascal stared at his shoes in silence, frowning, as he gathered his thoughts. He presently cleared his throat and said, “Does he scare you, Carl?”

His friend didn’t respond at first. “No,” he finally said, but the tremor in his voice betrayed his lack of conviction.

“Gilbert’s beautiful, I’ll admit that. It’s only natural, in a closed environment like this, that you’ll start feeling certain things that you otherwise wouldn’t even consider feeling toward someone of the same sex.”

“I don’t need you to lecture me, Biquet.”

“You’re human, Carl.”

“Look, I’m not gay, all right?” Carl snapped, coloring even more. “I’m not!”

“I never said you were.”

“You said just as much! Just—shut up, Pascal! Shut the hell up! I’m not in the mood for your brand of proselytizing right now! I want to be alone if you don’t mind!”

Pascal inwardly winced, but he held his ground and simply regarded Carl with calm indifference—superficially, at least. He watched his friend’s features shift from anger to guilt to distress, the awareness of his outburst and its possible effects on his friend etching itself painfully through the agonized light that flickered in Carl’s eyes.

“I’m sorry…”

Pascal merely watched him.

“I destroyed my bible,” Carl said quietly. “It didn’t help like it was supposed to.”

“It’s a book of faith, not facts.”

“And you place all your hopes on facts, is that it?”

Pascal drew himself up almost imperiously. “Facts don’t betray you, Carl. They don’t.”

Carl merely shook his head and looked away, his figure still weighed down, his air still one of confusion and hopelessness. Pascal could only sigh when they finally reached the door to the clinic, and Carl walked u it it without another word.

“Carl,” Pascal called out as the boy opened the door. “Straight men get turned on by gay porn, whether they want to admit it or not. It’s a biological response, nothing more.”

Carl paused but didn’t look back as he held the door open. “Oh, really. Is that a fact?” he replied, a hint of contempt marking his words.

“Yes, it is. Think about it.”

Carl shook his head once more and walked in, closing the door behind him and leaving Pascal standsilesilently outside and staring at the spot where Carl had stood. All around him, dead leaves rustled as the wind once again picked up. With a little groan, the boy glanced up, squinting through his glasses as he regarded the gathering rain clouds.

“Goddamnit,” he growled, shaking his head. “Will you stop pissing on us? The world isn’t a giant urinal, you know!”

Shifting his bag over his shoulder, Pascal moved on, directing his steps to the principal’s office.

(tbc)