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Errands had brought Calle to the central area of town. A light plastic bag with recently purchased necessities dangled from his wrist as he strolled through one of the many small gardens that littered the city.They were well into Autumn now, most leaves had fallen to the ground and turned deep shades of orange and brown, the black branches of the damp trees bare and sharp against the grey sky. It was, in it’s way, a very beautiful day.
Sitting on one of the stone benches up the lane ahead, he saw a familiar face. He wasn’t looking around, and therefore didn’t notice Calle approaching. He held a small loaf of bread in his large hands and was crumbling it up to feed the pigeons that were crowding around in a wide circle around him. He seemed to be making sure to throw the crumbs as far as he could, as if hoping to keep the birds from coming too close. Some of them scattered away to make a path as Calle came through to greet him.
“Hei, Magnus.” He said with a warm smile when he’d come close enough for Magnus to catch his shoes in his field of vision.
A bashful, half smile was returned to him with a similar greeting.
“What brings you here on this lovely day?” Calle asked, allowing himself to sit down beside him. Magnus stopped crumbling the bread and the pigeons were slowly pecking nearer.
“Oh, well, I was actually home and going to make myself a sandwich but this bread I had isn’t quite good anymore. I went out to throw this away and buy some more but then I saw the birds and thought maybe they would like it and then it wouldn’t be a waste..”
Sometimes it was just impossible not to smile while Magnus was talking. There was something so adorably unpredictable and sweet about his train of thought, and the beauty was that he would just let you in on it, so that it eventually would be perfectly clear how he came to a certain conclusion, no matter how seemingly strange or far-fetched. Calle grinned while he told his tale, so much so that when Magnus glanced at him towards the end of it, he gave a slightly embarrassed chuckle and looked away again.
“So you haven’t actually eaten yet.” Calle concluded.
“No, I- ah!” Magnus cut himself off, jerking up his knee to get his foot away from a pigeon that got impatient with his lack of food distribution. It was a well known fact among the people who knew him, that Magnus was extremely cautious of wild animals, no matter what anyone said to ease his worries. The pigeon, however, was not discouraged by his reaction and continued to wander around between their legs, several other birds getting the same idea and following suit. Magnus raised both knees to his chest and held on to Calle’s shoulder keep himself stable, stuttering things like “shoo!” and “get away!” at the birds. Calle grabbed what was left of the loaf of bread from Magnus’ hand and threw it as far as he could across the lane. Immediately, all of the pigeons scurried and flapped after it.
“Thank you..” Magnus sighed in relief and finally lowered his legs back to the ground, though he didn’t yet let go of Calle’s shoulder. Calle clapped a hand on the other’s thigh and stood up.
“Come on. Let me treat you to some lunch.”
“Oh, you don’t have to.” Magnus said, still not standing up from the bench.
“No, but I want to. Also, I’m worried that if I leave you to find food by yourself you’ll get sidetracked again and eventually starve.” He punctuated his words with a wink, and Magnus finally got up with a smile, “Yes, okay.”
A gust of chilly autumn wind blew through their hair and flapped their scarves. With exclamations of mild discontent they each made sure their jackets were zipped up all the way and their scarves properly tucked in, before Calle slipped a hand around Magnus’ arm and they headed up the lane, huddled close together in light, quiet conversation.