Knife's Edge Pt. 02

"Do you like it?" I asked eventually, because my screen was getting worse and I was just scrolling anyway, absorbing nothing.

"Don't like the guy." Joel grunted.

"Me either." I said.

"Do you see yourself as the woman, or the magpie?" He asked me. I put down my phone and stared at the table.

"Neither." I said slowly. "I see myself as an outside observer, allowed a glimpse into a life."

"I kind of vibe with the magpie." Joel said.

"You do?"

"Yes." He looked at me. His eyes were locked on mine and I wondered if he was trying to tell me something.

"A bottle." Kurt arrived, sounding annoyed. "That's all right, you two just sit there drinking expensive free booze while I work my ass off."

"Nothing is ever free." Joel said, inspecting the label.

"I wouldn't know, I'm just HANDS." Kurt poured the wine after sniffing the bottle. "Sorry, Rubes." He offered me the glass and I shook my head.

"I trust you." I let him pour it.

"So why has Romeo let Rapunzel out for a night?" Kurt asked conspiratorially as he finished pouring the wine.

"That's a very mixed metaphor." I said.

"Trouble?"

"Or good communication." I suggested.

"Well. That's an improvement." Kurt hrumphed. "So no more talk of making you into a stay at home dependent?" Joel's head snapped away from the book.

"No more talk of that." Which was true.

"Ok. Be done in an hour. I would say save me some but...." Kurt whistled as he strolled away.

"He wants you to stop working?" Joel put the book down.

"Not you too." I sighed. "He actually wanted me to audition again, for orchestras. I was in the National Youth Orchestra but I stopped last year. The only problem is, it takes a lot of practise staying good and you can't run a restaurant while doing it."

"Do you really want to play in Orchestras?" Joel asked. "I thought.... Given your taste in music... you'd be more all over like... a metal band."

"Don't know any."

"I know people." Joel said. "I know some great guitarists who could use a drummer."

"Really?" I sounded as unconvinced as I felt.

"Seriously, trust me! You have Mondays off right? Let me put you in touch. A jam session."

"Ok." I heard myself. Well. Ok? I mean, why not? I could feel a little crackle in my stomach. It actually sounded... kind of... exciting.

---- --- ----

Joel was very good at geography.

"Not as thick and boring as I look." He grinned at me after the round. I tipped an imaginary hat to him.

"Consider me humbled."

"Oooooh we actually might win!" Kurt squealed. "Don't you DARE let us down on music, Rubes!"

"Oh fuck, I'm so rusty." I rubbed my eyes.

"You'll be fine. Get him another wine, he's better when he's tipsy." Kurt directed Joel. I half heartedly protested but I wasn't exactly mad when the bottle plonked down on the table.

It was a good crew. Mostly people from work which meant Joel and I were a little outside the group. When you're the boss you have to step back a little. It's no good for you and it's no good for your staff to see you making an absolute drunk tit of yourself. I'd been counting the wines. I was pleasantly buzzed, but not pissed. Joel was maybe a little more dozy but he'd had a sesh with Ramon and Charlie from the smell of it. Even so, he was sticking by me, and being very pleasant. He even seemed to know everyone's names after all.

He totally carried us through geography. The rest of us had a frankly embarrassing awareness of the world I guess. Kurt could probably have managed literature by himself, but Uni students are a well read group and most restaurants are staffed by Uni students so we cleaned up either way. Charlie was a godsend in sports and all of us had a lot to say in the food and drink round. I could see some of my staff glancing at me as they shouted out the answers. I felt something weird in my chest. Almost like I was going to cry. No one had ever looked at me like that. For approval. So I gave it in spades. And I silently decided maybe we'd do our own weekly quizzes, with little prizes for the top answers. Little shout outs on slack.

Music rolled around, my round- according to Kurt. I couldn't actually imagine I had a lot to offer. I like music but I tend to play around in some slightly weirder genres. And I hadn't been paying attention to anything other than scant new releases I might vaguely like for the last few months. All the theory- and even practice- I'd ever done at Uni felt like a sad memory at this stage.

The first question felt like a softball. 'What disaster did Gordon Lighfoot sing about in 1976?' But I guess not everyone had a folk phase in high school because no one else knew.

"Gordon Lightfoot?" Joel stared at me. "Guessing he's a literal muppet based on your Alvin and the Chipmunks thing?"

"Remind me to introduce you to Psychostick." I grinned at him as I looked up from the paper. "I can only count to four."

"Spare me."

I rolled my eyes at him as the next question was called. He rested his head on his hands and grinned. Ah. Winding me up. And it worked. I shouldn't let myself be baited like that. I focussed on the next question- which I actually knew the answer to as well, because I had a really good memory and a friend at Uni who had a debilitating pop obsession. 'Which Canadian pop singer found fame on 'Canadian Idol' and went on to play Cinderella on Broadway?'

"Presumably not Justin Beiber." Maria wrinkled her nose.

"Do you know?" Charlie asked me.

"Yeah. It's ah. Carly Rae Jepsen." I winced.

"Ohhhh I should have known that!" Joel thumped the table to laughter.

"I'm not a fan." I said, but no one heard me, because they were fake mocking Joel for being fake into Carly Rae Jepsen. I stared at my drink. Sometimes I couldn't help it. I just hated being gay. I hated my whole fucking being for finding men attractive. If I was straight and I knew the answer to that everyone would be impressed. I probably just confirmed the worst of what people saw in me though. Soft, effeminate, overweight, pathetic. And single I guess on top of that. I was spiraling, but not so much I couldn't correct Amy on how many cello suites Bach wrote, and that Hildegard von Bingen was probably the most prolific monophonic composer, and that Charlie Parker was known as Bird. Actually. I kind of perked up after that one. Because so far I'd been batting 100. Maybe Kurt was right?

"This band was formed after the dissolution of heavy rock band Kyuss. They originally started playing under the name Gamma Ray. Who are they? Bonus points for every member you can name."

"Current or past?" I yelled out. The announcer grinned at me.

"Go hard." He said with a drawl, not unlike frontman...

"Josh Homme, Alfredo Hernandez, Dave Grohl, John Theodore..."

"Slow down!" Kurt laughed.

"I'm barely through the drummers." I grinned. "Troy van Leeuwen, Michael Schuman, Dean Fertita, Nick Oliveri..." I paused. "Fuck, I know there are more... Joey Castillo!"

"What's the fucking band?" Ramon asked.

"Queens of the Stone Age!"

"Ohhhhh." Maria grinned at me. "LOVE them. You're a fan?"

"No, he's just a nerd." Joel answered for me.

"Fuck off." I grinned at him. "You going in March?"

"Yea!" She grinned. "So keen!"

"Any more names?" Kurt hustled me.

"Oh man, I dunno! Oh did I say Matt Cameron?"

"You did not."

"I think I'm out." I sighed. "Pretty sure more people have played with them, but I'm out."

"Fuck, you're a god!" Maria clinked her glass with mine.

I was almost feeling like it. The next three were easy wins for me:

- This band, formed in 1984, is known for suicide, murder, alleged cannibalism, and were some of the founders of Norwegian Black metal. Who are they?

"Mayhem." Me, and Charlie, and Ramon all answered. The others blinked at us.

"It's a really good Wikipedia read." Charlie offered.

- The complete Master Works', 'Rize of the Fenix', and 'Post- Apocolypto' are albums by which band?

I gave everyone else half a second to answer but my fingers were tapping. Joel leant forward and raised his eyebrows pointedly, glaring at my hands.

"Do you know the answer?"

"Yeah, I do."

"Ugh." He sighed. "I don't know any of these!"

"Yeah but I thought the Rialto Bridge was in the wrong fucking city so there's really no need to be embarrassed."

"True enough." He sighed. I turned to Kurt to see he's already written down the answer.

"Big fan of comedy music." He shrugged. "Ooh, they're touring this year too!"

"What?!" Maria jumped, reading the paper. "Why the fuck are they in NZ?!"

"Well..." Ramon opened and closed his mouth. "Ah. Never mind. I signed an NDA. But let's just say that project I have a short contract on that may or may not be in Auckland this year may or may not involve one or more members of Tenacious D..." He mimed zipping his lips shut.

- Name the drummer for American rock band Aerosmith.

"The drummer!" Joel glared at me. "Did you write these questions?"

"Does it matter?!" My eyes widened. "We put double points on this round yeah? Joey Kramer." I nudged Kurt. "And I don't listen to Aerosmith." I found myself telling Charlie and Ramon- because I feel like I'd scored a few cool points with Mayhem and I feel like being into Aerosmith was a sure way to lose those.

"Oh, I do." Ramon giggled. "Up there with Queen, and Metallica and Foo Fighters and Alice Cooper..." Oh. I so shouldn't have worried about those cool points.

"Oh my god." Maria clutched his arm. "I have a spare ticket to Iron Maiden."

"Wait, for real?" Ramon turned to her and I found I had to look away really quickly before I was blinded from the sparks I suddenly saw flying.

The next question stumped me though. 'Name 5 albums from American pop queen Taylor Swift. Bonus points for naming all.'

The table giggled and Kurt pushed the paper over to me.

"I... yeah this one's beyond me." I pushed the paper back.

"Oh come on, no judgment." Kurt rolled his eyes. Which was petty damning judgment. I so should have flunked the Carly Rae Jepsen question. I sighed. I wrote down Folklore, Evermore, and 1987. I'd never listened to Taylor Swift in my life, but one absorbs some things by osmosis. I shrugged and stared at the group.

"That's all I got."

"Oh well." Joel cracked his knuckles. "Lucky one of us has decent taste in music." He took the paper off me and scribbled out 1987, correcting it to 1989. He wrote out 8 more, putting little stars beside some of them. "The re records." He informed me.

Our paper was collected and I was still staring at him.

"What?" He said grumpily.

"Let's go for a cigarette." I said.

The din faded and the chill set in as we stepped outside. I was suddenly very very aware I'd just made a choice. We make choices all the time. If you never made a choice you'd never... do anything. But awareness of them can be paralysing. It's why I like the comfort of the between.

But things fell silent and we stepped towards a heater. My brain was racing and I was trying to catch it. I just... there was something I wanted to understand.

"I just don't get you." I said. The wine was making me hot and I was saying things without thinking them through. Joel nodded.

"Yeah. I didn't get you either." He mumbled. I missed that. My brain was too busy thinking and not listening.

"Who watches Sideways and loves Taylor Swift?" I lit a cigarette and stared at him.

"You of all people should get that." Joel chuckled. "Not Taylor Swift." He quickly corrected himself. "Space cadet- Rueben- people are usually at least a little complex."

"That's more than a little."

"And you?" He raised his eyebrows. "You run a restaurant, you're an innately good handyman, you're a drummer, and you listen to Carly Rae Jepsen and Queens of the Stone Age." Joel tapped his glass absentmindedly. "If you're fitting neatly into a box, I can't say I see it."

"That doesn't make me particularly complex."

"But me being a Swiftie does?"

"You're different."

"You're self deprecating and insecure." He sighed.

We sat in silence, smoking.

"Why do you identify with the magpie?" I asked him eventually. He blinked. I saw him relax a fraction.

"Oh. Well." He stretched. "I just started the book, and reading comprehension was never where I shone in high school so don't be mean."

"I'm not." I frowned at him. "I like the magpie. I wish I was more like him actually."

"Oh." Joel sighed. "Hold on. Gotta pee. I'll be back, space cadet." He stood up. I waited for him in the almost silence, listening to the inaudibility of inside and reveling in my not quite soberness.

He plonked another bottle down on his return.

"Right." He poured me a huge glass and lit a cigarette. "Well. Are your parents supportive?"

"My... yeah." I might not have said that two weeks ago. But they took me in. No mention of board. No questions asked. With absolute love. "Incredibly supportive." I said.

"My dad slapped me when I was 13, because I said I wanted to be a chef, and he said that was gay." Joel said.

"Oh. Fuck." I poured him a glass as big as mine. "Ok, go on."

"My old man, he's not a bad man..." Joel sighed. "This will be long."

"I'm not in a hurry."

"Ok. Dad. He just grew up in an old part of the country. He's very... sharp. Whittled down, you know? He's old. They should really stop you from shooting when you're old. He was 60 when he knocked up my mum. He's nearly 90 now." Joel stared at the table. "He is a product of the world. The world was mean and cruel and he's bony and hard because of it. He didn't hate me because he was scared I was gay. He just knew what being gay would have meant for him. He was trying to protect me." Joel paused. I made little murmurs of commiseration. My heart was aching. "And that's a part of me." Joel said. "But I have dipped my toes out of his world. And I can see softness. Kindness. The soft white belly of unconditional love. And call me selfish and greedy and lazy and stupid for wanting it, but fuck I want it." He closed his eyes. "I identify with the magpie because I crave that. I yearn sometimes for the old places and old ways and my whanau... but I'm not happy there. And I am warm and safe with people like you. I yearn for that too. And I want... someone to treat me like a king, with kindness, because I love them and I give them what I have, and that's enough."

I could feel the sting.

"You... ahhh...." I wiped my eyes in the pretense of a yawn. "You have pretty good reading comprehension."

"Maybe." Joel shrugged.

"I'm sorry." I mumbled. "I didn't know all that about..."

"Well, I never told you." Joel said. "I never tell anyone that."

I opened my mouth to ask him why he'd told me. But he told me because I asked. And I asked because I was warming up for the real question I wanted to ask.

"Why did you try to kiss me?" I couldn't stop myself. Too much wine. Joel stood up. Then he sat down again. He lit a cigarette. He put it out. He sighed and lit it again.

"Honestly? I hated you for so long. I thought it was was my ego. Jealousy. Or maybe I just couldn't stand you because you're so weird. Then I realised I kind of liked how weird you are. I liked how nothing I ever said to you seemed to stick. I could be the world's biggest ass and it slid right off. Then, I guess one day, I realised it didn't slide off, you're just really good at hiding it... and I think that's when I realised I really like you. You're made of steel. You don't win fights by being the best. Or the fastest. You stop the fights before they happen, and everyone leaves in a good mood somehow. You're a fucking wizard."

He sighed and opened his eyes wide. He took my hands.

"And I want to kiss you because of none of that. I want to kiss you because I'm a shallow bastard and you're pretty."

---- ----- ---- 3.

"Uh. Almost done here." Joel winced at me as he sat some distance from me on the bench tables. "Ordering, rosters..."

"Take your time."

"Oui." He muttered.

The shift had gone by ok. It was weird, naturally, but we'd had a pretty solid yelling match over table 5's food going out late which felt pretty close to normal.

.... We'd been sitting inches from each other. His hand had reached out. He'd tucked my hair off my face in the way AJ sometimes did.

And then, of course, Kurt burst outside with a jug, singing that we'd won. We sprang apart. And nothing else happened...

I was gnawing at my finger trying to finish the novel. It was so close to all going to hell. I had to put it down. I couldn't bear it. I hate unhappy endings.

I glanced at Joel. He was focussed on his screen and his eyes looked far away. I ran my eyes slowly over his baggy t shirt. The tattoo poking out at the top of his neck. His scarred and burned arms and his fingers which were rhythmically tapping. He glanced at me and his eyes widened as he saw the intensity with which I was staring. He turned back to his iPad and shrugged his shoulder a little. He had an old injury there he'd mentioned and it seemed to flare up every now and then.

My hands were clammy, but both of us were covered in the layer of heat and grime and sweat that the restaurant provided. I didn't really want to talk, or think, or anything like that at all.

I cleared my throat and got up. I got myself a glass of wine. I got Joel a beer. I sat down next to him and he grunted his thanks. I stared at my phone. I slowly moved my hand from where it was resting on the table and let it fall to his thigh. Joel paused in tapping and grew a little stiff. I moved my hand up a fraction. He turned his head sharply and we made eye contact.

And suddenly everything was sharp and crisp: like I'd woken up. Joel grinned at me. I smiled back weakly... and he wasted no time at all. He pulled me towards him and wrapped his arms around me. His hand snaked in my hair and he pulled on it a little, making me moan as I exposed my throat to him. He dragged his tongue up, over my adams apple and moaned as he caught my bottom lip, biting on it- not so hard it hurt but hard enough I could see exactly who he was and how he wanted this. I parted my lips and let him take the lead, pushing me back against the seat and grinding his crotch into mine as he kissed me. He was soooo hot, the way he just... took me at the slightest provocation. I could tell he'd been dying for me from the way he was touching me; grasping at my skin and kissing me like he was desperate for it. I moaned and he pulled away briefly, taking a strand of my hair and tugging at it gently as he fixed me with a look.

"You don't seem like the type to cheat on your boyfriend?" He asked slowly. I closed my eyes.

"No." I agreed, my heart thundering. "I'm not."

"Well. That's good." He grinned and ran his hand up under my shirt. He twisted my nipple and I moaned, my head falling back in pleasure. His hand trailed over my stomach so I went to help him and peel my shirt off. He stopped me with a laugh.

"Cameras." He said.

"None of them work." I panted.

"Really?!" He grinned. "You never told me that." He slapped my thigh gently.

"Didn't trust you not to steal booze." I grinned and finished taking my shirt off. Joel grunted and his eyes ran over my body. His hands moved to my hips and he squeezed them.

"Do you trust me not to bend you over and take you over the pass right now?"

"I'm counting on it."

Joel grinned triumphantly and lifted me off the seat and slammed me down over the pass. It hurt but I was aching now. AJ hadn't touched me in weeks or maybe even months... and I was so desperate to be held... and, well... fucked. Joel wrapped his arms around my waist, ripping my trousers off and moaning as his hand sought my cock and he started to play with it. He pinned me down. His hand was wrapped tightly around my cock and he stroked it. My knees went weak.

"You have to stop." I begged. "Please... I'm... so close..."