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Leah
“You feel like going to Brisbane Saturday?”
“Why?”
“We already talked about it. We could go to the college, see the campus, walk around…”
“I don’t know… Plus I’m leaving Sunday.”
“We won’t be back late. Come on, say yes.”
I smiled. I couldn’t refuse, so, three days later, the two of us were in his car headed to the city. The trip was almost two hours, so I relaxed, taking off my sandals and turning the radio to a local news program. Axel drove slowly, one arm leaning out the window and the other on the steering wheel. He was wearing dark sunglasses and a cotton T-shirt with the image of a palm tree in the center. I remembered how it felt to sleep there, leaning against him, embracing the warmth he emanated. If only…
I looked away and noticed the colors we were leaving behind: the green of the leaves of the trees, the blurry gray of the asphalt, and the snatch of sky reflected in the rearview. The world was too pretty not to want to paint it…
“What are you thinking about?” Axel turned down the radio.
“Nothing. The colors. Everything.”
“That’s ambiguous enough.” He laughed. I loved the sound of his laughter.
We didn’t talk much before reaching Brisbane. The city greeted us with its wide streets and ample vegetation. Axel drove toward the university, and I felt something strange in my stomach, because it made me nervous to see all that and think that in half a year I might be there alone and far from everything I knew and loved.
“You ready?” He had just finished parking.
“I don’t know.”
“Come on, I know you are.” Axel got out of the car, walked around, and opened the passenger door. He reached out his hand. I took it and pulled softly. “Open your mind, Leah. Just think of everything you used to want to do, okay? You owe that to yourself.”
I followed him in silence. We walked around the campus. Axel’s eyes gleamed when he started to remember his student years there. He showed me the place where he used to sit with his friends to have lunch in the cafeteria and the grassy spot beneath a tree where he’d escape to read awhile with a cigarette between his lips when he skipped class. He told me anecdotes about his professors and what happened in that place full of stories.
The people we came across seemed easygoing. There were lots of students with art materials entering and leaving the classrooms and walking down the halls. I swallowed remembering the times I had imagined myself there, learning, wanting to do it all, feel, reveal, represent the world…
“You all right, Leah?”
I nodded.
“Let’s go grab a bite.”
We sat down in one of the cafeterias and ordered two vegetable sandwiches and two sodas. We ate in silence. I couldn’t stop looking around, soaking everything in, the laughter at the next table over, the boy drawing in a corner with his headphones on, lost to the rest of the world, the independence that seemed to envelop us.
“I would have loved to be here ten years ago,” I whispered, “living here with you, sharing everything… Why is life so unfair?”
Axel smiled and turned his head. “You can’t imagine how much you seem like a little girl right now.”
“You don’t have to make fun of me; it’s just a thought.”
Axel grabbed my wrist over the table, and his thumb traced circles on my skin. I got goosebumps.
“That’s not how I meant it. Hasn’t anyone ever told you you’ve got to keep alive the child you carry around inside you throughout your life? Don’t ever lose that child, because the day you do, part of you will be gone.” His eyes descended to our joined hands. “I would have liked to…to have shared this with you too. But it would have had its bad sides.”
“Like what?”
“You’d be the bookworm, the teacher’s pet. I would have tried to copy off your tests after skipping class for a month, and you’d probably have told me to go fuck myself.”
I laughed. I moved my fingers and they grazed his. He breathed harder, but he didn’t move away. His skin was soft, his fingernails short and masculine. “It’s not true. I’d have let you copy.”
“How considerate. Is that all? Would you have agreed to a date?”
