Chasing Africa By Gregory Black
DISCLAIMER
If you are uncomfortable with relationships between two consenting parties who are of the same gender then I suggest you leave and do not continue reading. If it is illegal for you to be reading materials which contain sex between two males then leave. If none of the above specifications refer to you, then please continue on. Questions/comments/queries please send to grigoi_canadian@yahoo.com
It was 7:30 Monday morning and I was waiting for my friend Krick to show up. I was sitting in a musty little coffee house off third street, engulfed in a giant overstuffed armchair that seemed to dwarf my body size, no mean feat since I was 6'2".
I was still just sitting around scowling by 7:36 (Krick was supposed to be here at 7), I was starting to feel outraged at Krick's audacity for making me wait. I hate that he's my friend, when you're as good-looking (or simply just as conceited) you don't ever have to wait for your boyfriends if they're late, you can just leave. Friends you have to wait for.
So maybe I was a bit of a drama queen, my anger would be completely justified if I was bleeding to death and Krick was my last chance at survival. And I was alone in the wilderness. Being chased by zombies.
So maybe I'm overreacting just a little. But zombies really are creepy, Krick would be extremely sorry if he came and was already too late, Krick was like a brother to me. When we were growing up we could have passed for twins, we had the same dark hair, so dark it was almost black, and light, honey brown eyes. Now that we were older, I was an inch or two taller, something I constantly used to my advantage in arguments, and the fact that Krick's hair was now dyed in a rainbow, ranging from red on his right ear to violet on his left (remember ROY G BIV?). I guess that's another difference between us, Krick likes to advertise that he's gay, I don't.
He was now 38-1/2 minutes late and I was starting to critique my reflection in the glass covering the picture across the table, freaking out cause my hair was sticking out at odd angles. Damn Krick for getting me out of bed this early, does he not understand the concept of a weekend? Fuck, we already have to get up for school five days out of the week, but then he keeps me up `til three the night before by going to some dumbass party so he can get laid. Who the hell does that? That's Krick in a nutshell.
I was starting to get dizzy watching the milliseconds pass by on my digital watch, so I started to inventory the patrons of the coffeehouse. The lady in the trench coat at the front of the line had a sock static-clinged (cling, clung? Who cares?) to her panty hose, the guy behind her had a hard-on and was trying to read porn that was hidden on the inside of his newspaper (what a complete idiot!) The teenage girl with the lip piercing who was serving the coffee kept throwing the guy pouring the whipped cream suggestive looks and the two of them had managed to take 3 ten-minute breaks in the 45 minutes that I'd been sitting here.
After another few minutes of watching all four of the people in the coffee house and I was bored. The static lady applied her lipstick to her nose, the exhibitionist guy made a mad dash for the bathroom (without ordering any coffee) and the teenagers put the `Back in 10 min." sign back up. I resigned myself to watching the numbers go by on my watch.
"Are you Kay?" I jumped up at the sound of a guy's voice. "Krick asked me to tell you that he has to meet you at his apartment." I found myself looking up at this phenomenally attractive guy. He was one of those people that it hurt to look at simply because they were so damned gorgeous. It was like knowing that someone that attractive existed suddenly made you less of a person. He had this kind of square chin that seemed to contradict his rounded and soft lips to the extent that I just wanted to touch him, everywhere, just to make sure that my hand didn't pass right through. He had the kind of features that would look stupid on anyone else but worked for him. He made me get this sickening feeling in the bottom of my stomach that almost felt like a mix between anxiety and lust. A whole hell of a lot of lust.
"I'm Francis, can you talk?" He gave me the same kind of goddamned smile that Kindergarten teachers give their retarded students, a mixture between pity and distaste.
"Yes, now that you mention it, I am capable of linear thought." I gave him my best false smile, just sarcastic enough that the recipient is offended, yet still subtle enough that they can't mention it. After the first glance, my companion's appearance was almost comical. He was too perfect to be real and yet here was standing in a coffee shop. He looked like he belonged in one the children's television shows for a rousing game of `What one of these things is not like the others?'. He looked like he was a creation of Da Vinci, who was a renowned lover of beautiful men.
He was just not at home in this era of fast food and no exercise.
"Sorry you just seemed kind of stricken, you know the deer in the headlights thing."
"How cliche." I looked down my nose at him while I said that and damn did it feel good. Okay I was being catty, but you try being nice after four hours of sleep and then confronted by a guy who makes your insides contort.
"Yeah, whatever, don't shoot the messenger, bitch." He looked kind of disgruntled and I kind of felt bad for this Dorian Grey guy (You know the story by Oscar Wilde where the beautiful guy doesn't age, but his portrait does?). Judging from the fact that he was sent by Krick, he probably got even less sleep than I did. Krick could really turn into a crazy nymphomaniac when confronted with a handsome guy.
"Sorry, it's just that I've been here since 7 and I didn't get much sleep last night. I guess I must be bitchy when I'm sleepy." I gave him a wan smile.
"Yeah, I would've been here earlier it's just that every time I tried to leave this morning, I got kinda distracted." He blushed a blotchy crimson colour that made him look comical, almost like a cherub with all his golden hair.
"And let me guess, after that you were distracted again and again and again." I trailed off enjoying the play of emotions on his perfect face. First there was surprise, then a dreamy look and then there was just a shit load of embarrassment, further distorting the colour of his face.
"Let's go." He offered his hand and helped me up from the recesses of the chair.
"Why didn't Krick come to tell me?"
"He had some trouble walking this morning." He flushed an even deeper red and I started to enjoy how easily he embarrassed.
"And I always thought he seemed like a top." The guy began choking on something and I laughed at him. Loud enough to rouse the lady who had fallen asleep on her napkin. She jumped up, looked at her watch and screamed as she raced out of the shop, running ahead of us through the door, unfortunately with the sock still firmly attached to her leg..
Krick's apartment was what would have been considered a love nest had we been living in the seventies, yet in the world today it was what you could call just tacky'. I had nurtured dreams of calling While you were out' on his ass but decided against it just in case one of his vibrators ended up displayed on national television. It would have been more embarrassing for me because he would be `out' while I would be the one who had to explain why it was there.
His apartment was actually the basement of his parent's house, yet they left him alone in it and he didn't bother them either. I had always thought that his relationship with his parents was funny, yet I know that they hadn't talked to him since he had come out to them, but at least they hadn't kicked him out.
I walked into the room that was decorated in shades of bright reds and pinks, the centerpiece of which was a heart shaped bed (Artfully designed by me and Krick with two mattresses and a hacksaw), with a naked, erect Krick sprawled on top of it. It was weird but the sight of Krick naked never turned me on. He was just like a brother to me. I saw another guy on the floor climb up from the side of the bed holding his head, probably from a hangover. Damn, Krick has an orgy and all I got to do was sleep, I'm such a fucking prude.
I was probably the only 17 year old gay virgin in existence, who wasn't monstrously ugly. I liked to fool myself that I was just waiting for the right guy, yet I knew that I was just too frigid, all the fuck I had ever gotten was a lousy hand job from some straight guy. It wasn't even that great. Sure I dated a lot but it never led to anything, I always found reason to drop the guy after the first date.
"Wake the fuck up nympho, your mast is springing a leak." I picked up of the fuschia pillows off the bed and hit Krick's head.
He jumped up, groaning and holding his head "What'd you do that for you jerk?"
"That was payback for making me wait for an hour in a damned coffee shop." I belly flopped down on the bed which made the guy who emerged from the floor dash for the bathroom. I laughed evilly, fully enjoying tormenting the non-sexually repressed. Krick groaned and rolled onto his side and grabbed me as an anchor.
"I swear to god Kay, if you don't make the damned room stop spinning I'm going to shoot someone!"
I laughed and moved out of his range. "Damn Krick, you smell like a Mongolian cluster-fuck, you better be showered and sweet smelling before you touch me again."
Krick got this evil grin on his disheveled face "So does that mean that the better I smell, the more places I get to touch you?" I laughed again. We always made sexual jokes on each other, yet at the end of the day Krick was going home with another guy (or guys) and I was alone. Okay, not alone per say, I had a cat, and my parents. Okay, you don't even need to say it, I am pathetic.
About two hours later, with both the guys gone and Krick dressed, if briefs and a t-shirt can be considered dressed, I finally got to hear what had made me get up so early in the morning.
"So I was thinking, you know." He looked at me with a mischievous look on his face, the one a five year old wears after he just illicitly discovered all the Christmas presents.
"Oooh, now that is a kodak moment!" I batted my eyelashes innocently while he gave me a sarcastic smile.
"What I was trying to say is that we're graduating in two months and we have no plans for our lives, god we don't even know what we want to do with our lives." Who was he fooling? I knew what I wanted to do with my life! I planned to grow up to have a wild, sex-driven relationship with Ashton Kutcher. If I ever got around to having sex, that is. I think for Ashton I could do it.
Okay I didn't have a clue as to what the hell I was going to do with my life.
"Maybe, you know, we could go on a trip somewhere around the world." He looked at me expectantly, leveling his eyes on mine.
"Like where?"
"Oh, I was thinking Africa." AFRICA, who the hell wants to go to Africa? Okay, I'll admit I was being sappy and thinking of Paris (where I could make out with some guy with a beret on top of the Eiffel Tower, of course) I would have even settled for Disneyland, but Africa? All I thought of when I thought of Africa was all the skinny little kids on the `World Vision' infomercial with bad skin and crooked teeth. Why would I want to go there?
"Why. why. Africa?" I kind of sputtered at him, at a complete loss for why he would want to do this. I could even understand Europe.
"Well, the accommodations are cheap and. um. they have really cheap bananas." He smiled at me, giving me the puppy dog eyes that made me laugh because it looked so silly because of his hair colour. I already knew that I was going to go, but I wanted to get to the bottom of why we were going.
"C'mon Krick, I'm not that stupid." I gave him the most disapproving look I could muster.
"I think it's love Kay." He kind of looked forlorn as he stared at the wall. This was really something strange because while Krick had had lots of relationships, he had never even mentioned the word love to me. Not when talking about his parents, his friends or his boyfriends.
"Well, can't you love whoever it is while staying in Canada?"
"Not if he's in Africa."
"WHAT! How the fuck did you meet someone in Africa?" My mouth was hanging agape. For his best friend I didn't seem to know a hell of a lot.
"It was sort of an internet thing." I cut in.
"Don't you know how dangerous that can be?" He bowed his head, I was a drama queen, no amount of head bowing was going to calm my spaz.
"What if he's some creepy rapist?! What if he's a pedifile? Need I remind you that it is still illegal to see older men? No matter how many times you disobey that law, it still exists! What are you going to tell your parents! What if."
"I DON'T KNOW KAY! I just don't know anymore. Fine you win, we won't go! There are you happy know?" He started to cry and I pulled him into my arms.
"Oh Krick, of course we're going. You know what a bitch I can be some times."
"Thanks." He was still kind of sniffling, but he was smiling.
Later that day as I was leaving Krick's apartment, it dawned on me.
Holy shit I'm going to Africa.