I was starting to think
The world was going to end when the calendar turns
But now you’re here
I see the future, baby
JC props open the window with a thick volume of Keats and holds his breath tight like his memories. It's been raining all weekend, cold, wet sheets a slippery bath against every piece of exposed skin, and he's been trying to decide if the downpour muffles the horns on 23rd or if it just distracts him from the noise.
He counts to five times five and the smoke curls ghostly waves in the damp air as he exhales. He sits back from the glass, as if someone could see him up there on the top floor. As if anyone would care that he's smoking a joint and writing the same three lines over and over again, the words all in a different order each time, as if that was enough to make a poem out of jumbled cliches.
The phone is shattering and loud and JC flinches. It rings again while he decides between restoring silence by answering or covering his ears and waiting it out. Whoever's calling hangs up halfway through the third ring and he lowers his hand from his head.
A knock almost immediately punctures the stillness. He unfolds himself from the sill, stepping on the sharp end of a pencil. A piece of lead breaks off in his heel and he hops to the door. His reflection looks like a broken-backed camel in the spotted mirror that leans against the far wall. A dromedary. No, camel. Camels have one hump. He thinks.
The pounding is louder and somehow shriller by the time he turns the locks and opens up. Lance has been letting his hair grow. Just a little, but enough that there are more roots than tips. A few fingers' width of brown, sparkling with rain.
"It's really me," he says.
"I know," JC says, rubbing his foot.
"What's wrong with your --"
"Nothing. I stepped on something. Nothing."
Lance puts his hand back in the pocket of his long double-breasted wool jacket. "Can I come in, at least?"
JC nods and fights the head rush, blinking. He closes the door slowly, twisting each knob so the old bronze pieces clunk together like heavy gold bars in a vault. He has to turn around eventually.
Lance is sitting in a high-backed chair, weaving his hands through his hair. He wipes them on the linen tablecloth and sniffs, briefly dropping his chin into his palm. His perfect-pressed pants hang from a peaked crease as he sits up straight and says, "You're in New York."
"Los Angeles wasn't really working for me."
"Yeah, what does."
JC looks up from the green paisley carpet. "This," he says. He squares his shoulders and says, "Arthur Miller lives here."
"I'm sure he doesn't still live here. Nobody lives here once they don't have to."
JC shrugs and Lance opens his hand wide, covering an embroidered dahlia with the span of his fingers.
"I don't have to," JC says. He lowers the arch of his foot to the floor. "Why are you here?"
Lance looks to the window. "I have this thing -- " He waves vaguely. "I'm trying to get something finished up."
"Oh," JC says, and then, "do you want to get a drink or something?"
"It's three o'clock."
"Tonight, I meant tonight. Or, um. Later? Or now, we could go get some food, there's this Cuban-Chinese place on Eighth that's pretty good."
"I have to take someone to the airport," Lance says.
JC curls his toes against the thin rug. "Which?" he asks.
"Newark. No, LaGuardia. LaGuardia."
"Oh." He meant who. "I meant who," he says, finally, when Lance pushes back his chair to stand stiffly in the middle of the room.
"It's been two months, JC," Lance says, and JC nods. Lance takes a step forward and JC bobs his chin again, emphatically agreeing. Lance is right. Almost two months. "It's business," Lance says, more gently, undoing the top button on his white dress shirt and stretching his neck out in gentle circles.
"Right," JC says. He crosses his arms on his chest. "You staying for New Year's?"
Lance says, "I don't know yet." He walks over to the window and speaks with his back to JC. "Are you?"
JC lifts one shoulder, half a question mark that Lance can't see. "I'll probably just stay in. See what I can write."
Lance brushes the tips of his fingers over the open notebook splattered with rain and ashes, still sitting open beneath half-raised glass. He tilts his head. "Poetry?"
"I can hear the songs better when they're just in my head," JC says, limping over.
"JC, what did you do to your foot?" Lance says, impatient with repetition.
"I stepped on my pencil." He sits on the ledge and tries not to smile, watching Lance keep his lips steady and firm as he shakes his head.
"Where are your shoes?"
JC nods toward the bathroom. "They're still wet."
"Well," Lance says. He leans against the molding and taps his fingers on the spine of the wedged book until JC covers them with his own. "Well do you have any others?" he asks in one breath. "It's a long ride back from Queens by myself."
JC draws his hand from Lance's wrist and slides it the thick jacket, pressing the pads of his fingers to Lance's waist. Lance shifts forward until JC's cheek is flush against his chest. The inside pane is wet with condensation and the cold shocks the small of JC's back like the clear tones of a church bell. Lance's heart drowns out the street noise and JC holds his breath, counting.
END
Credits: Title/lyrics/plot from Dan Bern's "Chelsea Hotel." Anne Carson, The Beauty of the Husband. In my head this is all shot with blue filters like Chelsea Walls, but that's kind of predictable. Read-throughs by kel.