THE WARM BED, IN A way, reminded Adriaan of one of the first lazy Summers he and Daan spent together.

They met in the late winter of 1980, before they were even ten years old. Life back then was simple, so Adriaan never bothered to recall much of it. It was a good kind of boring; the kind people looked back on with regret, and jealousy. The boring days should have been savoured more, one would realise after the harsh truth of ‘things can only get worse’ smacked them in the face. Both of their parents easily welcomed the newfound companionship between them, since Daan was new to Hatert and Adriaan never really had any friends in the neighbourhood to begin with. He did spend some time with the kids living in the surrounding area, but only for short bits of time before the others got tired of him. Adriaan wasn’t a particularly interesting child, nor was he very interested. There was no real pleasure to be found in tag and hide-and-seek in his eyes, and the other children — sometimes even the parents — found him quite dull.

Daan was similarly reserved. In primary school during recess, they wouldn’t sit at the desks of other students and socialize during break. Instead, they spent most of the time at their own desks, reading books or drawing. When they got to play outside they would both go to the swings, which were never busy. It was strange for Adriaan to meet someone with a routine so similar to his own. Even though they didn’t go to the same primary school, Adriaan found comfort in the fact that while he sat alone at his desk, Daan would do the same. It made him feel like less of a recluse. So when they happened to stumble upon each other at the playground, which was otherwise empty because of the cold weather, they quickly bonded. They enjoyed speaking, not playing, and never minded the fact that they didn’t often have much to talk about at all. Their silences were always comfortable anyways.

The first memory he has of a Summer together with Daan took place in the early weeks of sweltering heat, somewhere in 1982. His Tante always came around to their house at that time, since the sun was shining nicely, but it wasn’t hot enough for sunburn to be almost unpreventable. Tante Lynn didn’t have her own garden, since she lived in a flat, so she always stayed for at least a week. The pool would be set up for her and Adriaan’s parents, but Adriaan himself wouldn’t be able to use it until she got home. Lynn didn’t enjoy sharing a pool with a rambunctious boy. Neither did his parents. He would have the pool entirely for himself after her leave, though.

The memory took place shortly after Tante Lynn’s departure. The pool had been drained so his mama could clean it properly. It was still wet, causing leaves to stick to the vinyl sides. Dirt caked up around the corners. At the bottom, he and Daan laid together. His parents were only a few metres away, his ma was tending to the bushes while his pa cleaned up their plastic set of garden furniture.

Nothing made the memory exciting at all. He found the furniture blocky and an ugly shade of gray, and his mother tending to the bushes was nothing new. Daan barely spoke to him. Yet he decided to remember that day and scratch the details of it into his brain. It couldn’t have spanned more than a few minutes in reality, and yet it felt like they laid there together for days, years even. So long that the other boy’s body became as familiar as his own.

Whenever he thought about that day, he could vividly picture the redness of Daan’s skin, the way his light eyelashes fluttered against his cheeks. The boy’s eyes were clenched shut and twitched periodically, his chest was a shade of pink that could have been found in a baby girl’s nursery. A leaf was stuck to Daan’s calf the whole time, but he made no move to remove it.

Was it the sheer proximity that caused him to keep the vivid picture in mind for over a decade? Surely not, they always laid together like that; shoulder to shoulder, nearly every inch connected. It wasn’t that important, in the grand scheme of things.

The mystic feeling of it all was broken quickly, though, when his mother shouted his name. The sheer volume of it forced Daan to open his eyes, and at the sight of this Adriaan could do nothing but look away with shame.

“I want to start cleaning the pool, boys,” his mam stated. “I expect you guys to go upstairs and wash all that grime away. Be ready before dinner time comes around.”

Daan stood first, and for a split second Adriaan allowed himself to watch the other’s pale, glistening back. Once again, he found himself truly interested.

A hot sensation found a place within him that day. For years, it continued to dig deeper into the soft muscles of his heart. Some day, it would beg to be allowed out.


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tante = aunt.