On The Off Chance

The world was ending and to think it would be at 8pm on a Wednesday, purely contained within one room of a museum. But there I was entombed in silence and misery at one simple question.

“You don’t know the first thing about art do you?” echoed in my head; a sweet rhapsody, because of course I should have expected the charade to end. Useless man, you think you’re smarter than a student of art? Think you could fool him? Idiot.

“It’s really cool you’re trying to.”

What?

“I know a lot of people who won’t even touch art ‘because it's not their thing’ or some other dumb excuse. Like just pick up a paintbrush, you did it as a kid, right? So why not now as well.”

I wanted to punch the air, or myself, he was an angel, a beautiful beautiful angel sent down from the heavens to provide me with enlightenment.

“No offence but you don’t dress like an art student, you’ve got more of a business vibe about you.”

I searched for the words to say but all I could choke out was, “Yeah…you got me.”

“So how long have you been coming here?”

“Four months.”

Michael laughed and tilted his head back, I followed and looked at the moulded ceiling; a checkerboard of indented plaster with shadows in the corner making it feel almost cosy like a small burrow of a particularly well trained rabbit.

“That’s devotion. You’re definitely stubborn enough to be an artist.”

“Oh god I don’t think I could actually make art, I just want to…appreciate it.”

It’s easier if I look up and just imagine his carefree smile, looking directly is dangerous, like the sun; irradiating, like the ocean; drowning.

“Well I suppose not everyone who attends a gallery can be an artist, someone has to buy the paintings.”

“Poetic.” I chuckle, he’s being funny but I like it, I like the words he says.

“I try.”

I hear him sit up so I follow suit and steady myself hands on knees, my heart aches in the usual way but I feel like I’m calming down enough to be a person again. We sit there a little longer in silence, it's comfortable but my head is full of a thousand questions that average to a hundred decibels of silence.

Eventually, boldly, I break the silence, “So how long have you been coming here?”

“Well I’m kind of local so I got dragged here on school trips. I did enjoy it but I was a kid so I think I just liked not being at school. I did art in school when I could so I’d force my parents to take me to all the galleries in the area for inspiration. They got kind of odd about it when I said I wanted to study it at uni. Like it was too real and too unstable to pursue.”

I nod because I have nothing to add to the conversation, I was destined to be boring from birth, any aptitude was inevitable and expected. No straying from that either.

“But it's nice, I get to have my own space and all the time in the world to work on my art. It’s not very arty but I’m not against formal learning, it's a good place to start. Know the rules to break them and all that.”

“I think I get what you mean.” I lied.

“So where else do you go except here?”

“Home.”

“Well there’s your first mistake!”

I wince a little, it doesn’t sting but it does reinforce that I’m boring. I know that. I’m the human personification of grey. Like a raincloud. Or slate.

Michael continues as if I’m not supposed to cry at his words, “How can you understand art if you don’t understand where the art is coming from. When was the last time you went to the beach or a farm or…” His eyes glance across the room and he points excitedly at a medium sized painting, “Or a café.”

The painting is predominantly brown; wooden tables, wooden chairs, wood panelled walls, fill its expanse. The people are blurry, faceless, and the whole thing seems to be through the artist's eyes, a pair of hands holding a mug of steaming liquid fill the foreground a little too much for comfort.

“It’s…been a while.” I admit, hearing the defeat in my own voice.

“Well it's an easy fix. I know a place that’s pretty quiet. Why don’t we meet there instead of here?” Michael looks at me but interrupts himself, “Ah wait I’m actually busy next week, I have to prep for…something. Are you free Saturday?”

I am free every Saturday, “Yes.”

“Cool, let me get your number and I’ll text it to you later.”

I feel vulnerable, exposed, only my family, workplace and every spam caller in the world has access to that information. I carefully recite every digit to him one at a time. I know them, of course, but saying them out loud in the right order is so much more complicated somehow.

He texts immediately and I feel my phone vibrate in my pocket.

Yoohoo, Michael here, this better be Alex.

It is.

He laughs at my response which I think is good, at the very least its nice, I like his laugh its carefree, weightless but not quite musical.

“Cool! I’ll see you this weekend then.” His brow furrows in thought again, “I feel like I should be mean and set you homework…Nah you’ve had a long day, just bring your best self.”

“I can try.”

And so we part but intending to meet so much sooner the gap feels lesser. I walk a station over again so my thoughts have space to escape into the stratosphere instead of building up inside a train carriage and suffocating me.

The air is getting warmer which means soon I’ll have to go home carrying my jacket or sweat to death. I prefer spring and winter when I can carry everything on myself, unladened by bags and superfluous things. I have enough pockets for my keys, phone and wallet and need nothing else. I like having both hands free and a jacket complicates that.

I step onto the train just as I receive another text.

Looking forward to our date this weekend, here’s the place.

I don’t even register the link in Michael’s message, as the doors close behind me and the signal on my phone is cut off by a hundred metres of rocks and dirt and pipes, I sit in my usual seat and look up to the roof of the train.

I have every thought at once and none at all, all culminating in one word swirling around my head until I feel a little sick and have to close my eyes.

Date?