There was a moment he felt flushed. His cheeks were readiating heat, he could tell without putting his hands to them or checking in the mirror.
His night had been too short and therefor the day seemed impossibly longer, almost stretching into more days, or oblivion. He stroked the winter fur on one of his cats, feeling it's thickness. The cat purred and walked after him when he moved to the kitchen to open the door.
Even though it was cold out, near freezing point, he stood in the door for a second, overlooking the still garden. All the weeds were withered but with the frostbite on them and their mencacing grey colours they took on an identity on their own. He put the door on the hook so the cats could plod an escape from the sweltering heat inside of the house and turned back to the hall. The cats fled through his legs and in their haste made the door make bonking sounds.

The hall was now emptier than this morning. Like the Danielewski House it seemed to pulse with a life of it's own, like it grew while he passed through it. A dark livingroom lay ahead of him. He now had done the bare essentials to make the appartment at least presentable. The fuzziness he left as it is would not be minded. Lars could not care less, he knew.
So all he had done was to clean the edges, the smuttiness that he would judge others on if he would visit them.

He sat down and looked back on the morning. The phonecall, interupting his dream. It had been a sexy dream. Maybe it was good it got broken off before it could descend into the nightmare world he knew so well lately.
Then he checked his downloads, while he was still on the phone, but all the files were still incomplete.

So maybe Marco left a message? Why not check while he was at it? Inbox (1). Could only be him. He wanted it to be him. And it was. He'd better write a response, he might check before going to work.
The phonecall ended, he started answering. He was aware that this conversation was something prelimenary. It was a dance. They would bounce stuff on eachother and every messgae their understanding would bring them something closer to eachother.

And sometimes he was aware he was forcing things. His infamous impatience making him pry something open, like a seagul dropping an oyster from a great height to get to the core much faster than taking it's time to enjoy the catch.
Did he move to quick into current business? Would Marco think less of him if he found out that he was only human and prone to mistakes?
He thought not; his rule of being honest upfront was always best. He would not be able to handle that sweet Italian face saddened. Better be honest then.

The wondering had left him too awake to go back to sleep now. So he slipped into his bathrobe, turned off the lights and opened the windows. It was light, but not light enough to work behind the computer. The screen would eat his eyes. So he turned on one light and opened chapter seven. Then the real world dimmed to a low shimmer, while the world in his head transfered to the screen, all lit up like northern lights could dominate a dark sky.

Then, after just a few paragraphs, his one friend reached out in a drunken state, but he was too far gone and he could not reach him. He hoped he would be alright.
Once you open the purple pages without much of time pressure, you can just banter, so banter he did.

Until Lars called. And off to the station he was...

Have a great weekend and give Lars a

i usually hang my cats on door hooks too.

Be naughty for me!!!

HamsterHuey said:

was Lars in jail...

roodboi said:

He would like so very much.



But here in Holland we gotta lotta train stations. Real weird.