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One of the things Adam expected once he started living alone, was quietness. Quiet meant the lack of sounds, meaning silence when there is no one to talk to, no other person filling in the gaps. Perhaps the most quiet he had experienced was in the hospital room when recovering, eerie silence, almost deafening.
Then there is quiet, meaning lack of sound, but not lack of noise, as Adam had realised how truly unquiet everything was when he heard noises of various things, of nature and machinery forming itself into ambience, and Adam found himself drawn into that ambience, and repel from the utter silence that came when he deactivated his auditory system.
And Adam likes to process the ambience of leaves ruffling outside, the washing machine running past midnight laundry, the slide of the shower door as he exits, the friction of the towel as it moves against his hair and body.
In a way, Adam found solace in them in his state of lonesome.
Setting the towel aside, Adam leaned onto the sink, decides on brushing his teeth and starts the task. Usually, he would have taken his meds before, but he had already taken them some hours ago— when he attempted to sleep, failed to do so, got up again, ate some cereal, and wandered around aimlessly.
It’s been two years, and Adam feels like he had accommodated to certain aspects of his body, like the sensation of his forearms opening, the mechanical sound of his spine operating, and the consciousness of his eyes.
Therefore, Adam knows the feeling of someone connecting to his eyes, like right now.
Someone who (could— but) did not bother to make this connection go unnoticed.
“Francis.” Is what Adam says, but with a toothbrush in his mouth, what came out sounded morelike Fwamsish. There is a breath of a chuckle, barely picked up but it’s there and somehow it picks up the nasally tone to its owner.
Simply, at the intrusion, Adam drinks a mouthful of water and spits it out.
“I never took you for a voyeur.” Addressing his (not unwanted) intruder, Adam initiates the conversation as he stares ahead at the closed blinds, well-aware that what he sees is directly transmitted to the other line. If there was a mirror, maybe, he would have elaborated his statement with a visual.
“You flatter yourself too much,” a familiar voice replies back with ease, same as always, “usually people don’t stroll around completely naked.”
“It’s my apartment.” Adam counters the complaint as easily, “feel free to sign off from my eyes,” he feigns irritation, just like how Francis feigns his back, “if that bothers you.”
“Maybe I will.” Francis, of course, lies.
And of course, he doesn’t.
Shaking his head with amusement, Adam resumes his wandering around, finds that the washing machine has finished, and quickly discards all the contents in the dryer for another time. As he turns around, Adam catches a faded reflection of himself on the shower’s glass door, soon he finds metal fingers trailing on glass, then on his chin. Does he need to refine his beard? Adam can check this in the reflected image and does so, and he almost forgets about the InfoLink being active until Francis comments on his actions.
“Look at you,” there is a sigh, maybe there is mockery, maybe there’s genuinity, “put a black and white filter on you, and you might as well be in a noir film.”
Maybe it’s the way his InfoLink works, directly into his mind— that even with the voice distortion— Adam can imagine Francis right there behind him. Body leaning, head leaning even further at the doorframe, comfortable clothes for the night, hair in a loose ponytail (maybe, a towel if it was wet, if he had called a bit earlier) a soft smile on his lips— only because it’s out of Adam’s sight.
“The brooding loner ex-detective,” each word pronounced with a sing-song tone to it, the smile still there, “lost in his own equally brooding thoughts of his dark past.”
But of course, Adam’s replies would be to an empty room.
“And what does that make you?” Adam doesn’t linger on the thoughts, focuses on the voice instead, “the ever so persistent ghost of mine? What was it called again, the femme fatale?”
“The lost lenore, you mean,” Francis jumps on the chance to correct him, an ego that couldn’t be rivaled.
“Is that really a noir trope?”
“Of course it is, albeit not used as commonly.”
“I’m not up-to-date with the clichés.” Two metal fingers drag on barely-grown hairs, barely pricking under the pads of them; the sides are still too refined to need any adjustments, no need for a shave, and Adam decides to leave the bathroom, leaving the laundry for tomorrow.
“Your life is full of clichés.” Once Adam takes steps outside, metal on wooden ground, he can imagine human ones following him, right on his tail as Francis would continue to argue in the name of cinema. “Besides, I took you to enough movies to know about the basics of the basics back in the day.”
“You mean forced.”
“You could have said no.”
“Maybe I should have.” Adam echoes back, words as weightless as they are, all a familiar banter that brings anything but malice.
There is something about this, of Francis’ tonality and voice, and how Adam does not think that he is anywhere near his desk.
When he walks outside of the corridor, the ambience of the bathroom tunes out mostly, finding himself focusing instead on the white noise of the InfoLink being active, but silent, comfortable silence.
TV it is then, if sleep won’t come, then Adam will exhaust his eyes until it is forced.
Without too much thought, he finds the couch and the remote control, flickers through the channels until he settles on something.
“Baseball? Again?” Adam hears the voice cutting through the dull noise again in order to shame him, predictably, “Do you have any other hobbies?”
“Again,” reiterating, Adam hears no tapping sounds, “feel free to sign off—“
“This isn’t even live, it’s a replay.” Francis says blankly, “My god.”
Instead of responding, Adam rolls his eyes— makes sure the movement is as slowly exaggerated as possible for Francis to acknowledge.
“I can see that.”
“Yeah, that was kind of the point.”
There is silence again, but Adam can sense movement on the other side.
“I have a better idea, for the both of us.”
Adam sees the screen turn static, and Adam likes to pretend that the remote from his hand has been plucked by slender fingers for that to happen, likes to pretend that loose strands tickled his face as Francis leaned over, likes to pretend that if he turns his head, he would be able to take in the familiar oud smell of scented hair product.
Despite it all, Adam only gives an exhausted sigh, “you have one chance before I kick you out.”
“Hush.”
Childish, and Adam is kept silenced not because of being hushed.
As Francis does whatever he’s good at, Adam goes from sitting to laying full body on the couch.
The screen flickers for a bit, before it comes back in the form of a media-player, and Adam raises an eyebrow at the runtime that appeared at pause.
“Three hours? What kind of a movie is three hours?”
“The good kind, and it just so happens to be the same runtime as your match replay, including commercials and breaks.” Francis answers him too quickly, always racing to be one step ahead and prove it, in which Adam can only answer in an oh.
“And it’s Jeanne Dielman, 23 quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles.”
“Sounds French.”
“Belgian,” Francis corrects once again, and then a second passes, “I included subtitles.” and another second passes, “Keep your eyes on the TV, don’t be selfish.”
Resigning to whatever Francis has planned for the late night, Adam rests his head on the armrest, and drags the comforter as a form of warmth.
Both of us, huh?
The movie starts on Francis’ accord, and as much as the urge to annoy him rose, Adam found himself following it naturally. There is a woman, a mother, and a little bit of her movements reminded him of his own mother, and bit by bit, Adam remembers some childhood memories as he follows the chores she does with the camera following every little thing. Every chore is prolonged, but Adam finds himself observing them, focused enough to hear Francis’ commentary as a distant voice (something about the son, something about the accent) and it does not bore him.
Nostalgia takes over, and it all feels so mixed and hazy, between the movie and the memories. Adam starts drifting in between around the scene where the mother walks down the streets. There is something of graininess of the past, of an evening with groceries in his hands and of racing lights passing by on a bike ride, the sentimentality allows his eyes to rest half-lidded, and expectantly, sleepiness follows as he feels his body sinking heavier onto the couch. Adam half-expects Francis to protest it once his eyes shut, but he hears nothing but the white noise.
Somewhere within the state of wake and sleep, Adam hears a yawn, a sound he hears so near— that he finds himself holding the comforter a little bit closer, a little warmer, as if Francis’ chest was right on his back, and for a moment, it did.
Before sleep completely overcomes all of his senses, a gentle well-needed surrender, Adam hears Francis voice again, this time, in a tender tone that washes warmth all over him, of a wistful farewell:
“Goodnight, Adam.”