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Gilbert’s roommate smoked pot. Not a lot, and, having known quite a few stoners in his life (the physics department crawled with them) Gilbert wouldn’t ever consider him one, but even if you took a good look at the guy you never would have guessed it.
Matthew carried a visibly introverted demeanor, had slightly wavy blond hair that reached his shoulders when he didn’t get it cut, and rectangular glasses that were a bit too big for his face. He looked like the kind of kid you stole lunch money from when you needed something to do during free period.
But he was nice enough, and they worked well as roommates. They had actually been randomly assigned in their first year of college and the arrangement had worked so well that they decided to room together for sophomore year.
(Sharing an apartment with Francis and Antonio had also been briefly proposed before the trio realized that they weren’t quite ready to kill each other yet.)
Matthew was quiet, but he made kickass pancakes and he was really good at making sure they stayed on budget for groceries each month. (He was an accounting major.) And, he was really, really interesting when he smoked.
Gilbert didn’t smoke with him often, but he liked the blond enough to go out every once in a while and share a joint when he offered. Matthew’s voice got a distant sound to it once the high kicked in, and he spoke his mind with a lot more frequency. Most of it was poetic shit, like how the earth was just a single marble in an ocean of stars or how numbers were invented by humans just to make them feel better about owning something, but sometimes it gave Matthew the pluck to make commentary on Gilbert’s personal life.
Like now, as they were walking down the empty street in a neighborhood not far from the university.
“Um…I heard about Roderich,” Matthew said, passing Gilbert the joint as he nervously tucked a strand of hair behind his ear. It was getting long again.
Gilbert grimaced, avoiding the other’s concerned expression as he pinched his fingers around the bud. They’d only just started smoking and Gilbert felt like it was too early in their outing to be having this conversation. Thinking about last night’s party still felt like a raw, gaping hole in Gilbert’s chest.
“I’m, um, sorry,” Matthew ventured again, the nervous edge growing in his tone. “I know you two were good friends….”
Friends…Gilbert winced inwardly. “Yeah, well…it’s whatever,” he muttered, distracting himself with a long drag. It felt good to pull smoke into his mouth throat lungs, the weed a heavy taste against his tongue. He let out a slow breath and passed the joint back to Matthew, his eyes set firmly ahead.
“Who told you?” he asked the other.
“Francis.”
Gilbert nodded slowly. “Figured as much.”
“He was worried about you,” Matthew [tried to defend]. “He said you looked like you’d seen a ghost when found you outside the frat house.”
“That’s just Franny worrying too much,” Gilbert waved off. “Honestly, I could care less if that stupid priss decided he was too good to sleep with me. He can fuck whoever he wants, I don’t fucking care.”
They walked in silence for a while, wordlessly passing the joint between them. The street held the same kind of autumn stillness as the previous night, although a new chill had crept into the air. With only a short sleeve shirt on to cover his upper body Gilbert was suddenly reminded that summer was no longer their season. Damp fall weather was already beginning to set in and grades were starting to matter a little more. The carefree feeling from the start of the year felt like a distant memory.
As the high set in everything looked a little brighter, Gilbert feeling like he was walking on the bed of a clear-but-not-quite-see-through lake. The air shimmered around them as if undersea currents were pulling a haze across their eyes.
“He’s pretty,” Matthew said. His voice diffused into the water on Gilbert’s right.
The other boy held up the very tail end of their blunt for Gilbert to take and his fingers swayed gently in the new physics of the water. Gilbert moved his arm against the weight of the ocean and pinched the roach between thumb and forefinger, one end of the paper blackened.
Gilbert fought the current to bring his hand up, the click-flame of the Bic lighter automatic and distant as he slowly watched the rest of the blunt become consumed by ember-orange, burning the tips of his fingers.
“Yeah,” Gilbert said, “he’s pretty.”