She left him alone in the apartment again. Didn't she know he was lost without her? No, she didn't know because he never explained it to her. It would be too much like opening up. He couldn't. Yet every time she left him in the apartment the absence in the room was so intense and he could feel the loneliness plaguing his entire existence like a hollow mothball.
The mess she left. The crumpled bedspread, the unwashed dishes stained with her morning English breakfast of sausages and beans, the dirty towels she's left on the bathroom floor. These details made him desire a profound sense of order and yet made her absence a lot more bearable. Maybe he could immerse himself with tidying it all up. Maybe that could take his mind off her.
He always did have a heightened sense of hygiene. He knew that as he progressed to washing up the dirty towels she left behind. He felt obsessively immersed in her dirt. He was nauseated but he needed it. It was a reminder she was there. The absence begins to feel a lot more bearable as he immerses himself with her chores. Scrubbing up the breakfast-stained dishes. He touches the saucy breakfast stain she's left upon the plate and he licks it. He's aware he has a secret. He's aware there is something he's not told her. His desire for intimacy. He could not fill this void without her.
The clang of metal keys as she opens the lock:
'Calum?' She says. 'Calum, what have you done here?'
The room possesses a heightened sense of order and cleanliness. He's tidied up. The television's off and the room is so quiet, it would seem like nobody's there. The clothes neatly stacked inside the cupboards, the polished floor, the neatly vacuumed rug in the middle, the whitened window ledges. It was all so... clean. Maybe too clean.
Calum's neatly seated by the side of her bed:
'I am lonely,' he says.
He notices as she casually dumps her light brown bag on the floor besides his bed. In two more strides she is sitting on her bed besides him. She shakes off her brown stiletto shoes and comfortingly places her hand upon his shoulder. He can't tell her. He can never tell her.
The room disappears and the only thing he is conscious of is her presence beside him. He can feel the bed. It's the only thing he can feel besides her presence. He stiffly moves a cold, robotic arm and slowly brushes a lock of her black hair away from her pink face. This is the moment now. This is where he desires emotion, where he wants her to feel. He closes his eyes as he begins caressing her lips lightly with his own. If she moans, it's a good sign. it would mean she's feeling. However, she doesn't moan. Is she not feeling? She's not feeling. That's the problem. Cold kisses lacking emotion. She abruptly pushes him away. Gradually, he begins to recall her name...
'Marissa,' he says.
She detaches herself from him. She says she needs to use the bathroom. He removes himself from her single bed and takes to lying down on his own bed. No, they do not sleep together. They sleep separately. With his back upon the bed he stares up at the scrubbedclean cream ceiling. No longer hollow. No longer absent. No longer lonely.
She carefully washes her face in the bathroom. Her breathing is steady. She glares at her pale reflection in the mirror in front above the basin. Droplets of water running down her face. She picks up a towel and dries it, keeping her gaze on the mirror steady. Why does she feel like there's something he's holding back? Why does that feeling never go away? She wants to confront him. There is so much she wants to say but the words never come out when he's there. She's rehearsed it in her mind so many times.
She can't have been in the bathroom too long, yet when she comes out, he's already napping. Take today, for instance. The way he reacted was like he never knew she goes to work every day. It was like he needed reminding again. It was like everything she had to say needed repeating.. again.. and again.. and again.
She glances at him as he naps away peacefully. Angel.. she thinks. The deep understanding she feels for him. His naivety. Yet the quiet that pervades the room is his silence. It's his choice not to open the television in the room or to break that absence. It's the reason he sat there so long appearing not to know when she was returning. Her 9-5 job at the office. She gets home at around six o'clock every week day. It was no different today. Yet the way he sat there waiting in oblivion to the schedule. This man was a perfect specimen. He had no schedule.
She picks up the remote control and turns on the television breaking the quietness. Although the sound is on low, Calum stirs. Marissa looks at him waiting for him to open his eyes. He doesn't.
Her attention turns to the TV screen. The daily news. A woman is refused abortion by the doctors because her decision is based solely on the baby's gender (not revealed). Recent advances in science makes it possible to form the first ever android babies. A discussion on cloning.
Marissa has opinions on these stories. She wants to tell Calum about them. It was difficult having to keep to herself about everything. And that was because he was so quiet. It was because he wouldn't open up. Those gorgeous blue eyes. What were they hiding?
Continue tomorrow.....