The bar Jean-Philippe picked was too nice for Yves. He knew that before he even walked in because it smelled like sourdough and beecause the floor wasn’t sticky. It was some converted heritage building in Upper Grantham with exposed brick and craft beers that cost fourteen dollars and it was full of exactly the kinds of fuckheads and Toronto tourists he enjoyed making flinch. He'd arrived twenty minutes early because he didn't know what else to do with himself, and now he was sitting in a corner booth picking at the label of his bottle, peeling it in one long wet strip like skin off a sunburn.
Calme-toi, câlisse. C'est juste un souper. He'd taken half a Xanax in the Uber. Just enough to sand down the edges without going full zombie. JP had been specific about that, all “Don't show up drooling, mon gars, I need you charming.” And Yves had said “since when am I charming” and JP had laughed like that was the funniest thing he'd ever heard and then hadn't answered. His knee bounced under the table. He caught himself doing it and stopped. The silver chain around his neck felt heavier than usual, the way it always did when he was conscious of it. He'd changed shirts three times before leaving. Ended up in a loose black knit, sleeves pushed to his elbows, which was basically what he wore every day, so — cool.
Qu'est-ce que j'suis supposé dire. “Salut, mon chum m'a envoyé pour te cruiser parce qu'y est trop occupé à planifier sa fuckin' bacchanale”— A server passed and he ordered another beer without thinking. Two beers in and tú hadn't even shown up yet. He dragged a hand through his hair. He'd re-bleached his roots that morning so his hair had that chemical-bright look that JP said made him look like “a sad cartoon character, but in a hot way, don't worry about it.” Yves wasn't worried about it. He was worried about the other thing: the part where he opened his mouth and something came out that made normal people lean back in their chairs.
The freckles across his nose stood out worse under the warm Edison bulbs. He looked young in this light, almost approachable, which pissed him off for reasons he couldn't fully articulate. He checked his phone. No new messages from JP. That meant he was either trusting Yves completely or testing him. Both options made his stomach tighten in the same way. “Okay,” he muttered to nobody, thumbing the condensation off his bottle. “Fait que — be normal. Be nice.” He said the last word like it was a foreign object in his mouth.
