Running from Life - 5. Chapter 5: Joshua

It’s still an hour before we arrive in Wolgast, and Kevin and I have talked about almost everything already. Finally we decide silence isn’t necessarily a bad thing.
I’m scrolling through Couchsurf profiles while our destination is slowly getting closer. There are remarkably less couchsurfers here than in a big city like Hamburg, but still I find twenty-nine. Let’s hope at least one of them replies positively. I guess I can always stay at Kevin’s, but I’m not so sure about that. For some reason I like the certainty of the Couchsurf website, you always know the host is trustworthy. Even though I spent the last few hours in his car I still wouldn’t trust going to his house. Maybe I won’t be so suspicious when I’ve been travelling longer.

I send a message to all twenty-nine of the hosts, even though not all the profiles are finished and some of them have a response rate of zero percent. An hour later we arrive in the small town.

“Here we are,” Kevin announces, smiling.

“I see. Thank you so much, Kevin.” I get out of the car and grab my bag. Kevin gets out too and I shake his hand. “Good luck to you, and you know, hang in there.”

“I will. Thank you for the ride and the company and good luck on your journey!”

Just as I walk away and hear the car drive off behind me, my phone beeps. I take a look. A reply from a couchsurf host. That isn’t good news necessarily, as I got many rejections before, but still, someone responded this fast. That’s could be good.

It’s a message from a woman called Becky. I have to admit, I didn’t really read all the profiles when I sent messages, that would’ve taken too long. If someone replies positively I’ll read it though, to make sure I know everything about the person I need to.

“Hey Adam,

What a lovely message you sent! I have bad news, however, as we have couchsurfers tonight already! Wolgast isn’t that popular on CS, so you really got unlucky today. Sorry.

Try to find another host around here, even though there aren’t many. If you really can’t find a place to stay, we can improvise something with sheets on the ground, but I think you’d prefer to sleep on a real bed.

You can always come here this afternoon and have dinner with us and the other couchsurfers. I noticed you’re about Joshua’s age, so he’d love that.

Let me know what your plans are.

Becky.”

Huh, who is Joshua? Her son? I didn’t see anything about that when I hovered over the profiles. I open the profile, and yes, there it is.

“I’m Becky. I live alone with my son Joshua (17) in a small city close to the sea. I joined CS because I love to meet people from different cultures. As there aren’t many travelers going to Wolgast, anyone is welcome! Just send me a message in advance, so I can plan everything with my work.”

Woah, there are even parents on this website, that’s insane. I sit down on some weird stone next to the road and reply to the message.

“Hey Becky,

So far I didn’t find another place to stay yet, so if it stays that way, some sheets on the ground are good enough for me! I’m planning on spending at least two nights though, so I wonder if it’s maybe possible to get hosted for the second night too?

As for the offer to visit earlier, I’d love that! I don’t have any plans right now and it’s only 2 p.m., so maybe I can come now? If that’s not too much of a problem, of course. I can entertain myself just as well.

Thank you for the offer, I’m new on this site but I already figured out that the people on here are great!

Adam.”

I start walking towards the center of the city, but only two minutes later my phone beeps again. I put down my bag and read the reply.

“The other couchsurfers will only stay one night, so you can stay as long as you want! (Well, don’t stay for a year, please). You can come by the house now, but I’m at work. Joshua is home and I already called him to ask if it’s alright, which it is. Maybe he can even give you a little tour of the city, if you ask nicely. I normally give couchsurfers a tour and he joined us often enough to do it on his own now. I guess I’ll meet you when I’m done with work.”

Isn’t that a little weird? To go to someone’s house when she isn’t even home herself. She let a stranger go home to her son. Well, of course I already have a reference from my last night, so in some way she should know I’m trustworthy, but still.

And should I go there now? Isn’t that a little awkward. It’s a seventeen year old boy, however. Who knows, maybe he’s cute?

I chuckle to myself and enter the address in my navigation.

The little city of Wolgast is spacious, yet very gloomy. I can clearly see the post World War II building style, which I don’t dislike, but I wouldn’t want to live her either. It’s all too dark, but maybe that’s the effect of the cloudy sky above me. It is still pretty warm outside; I don’t need to pull out my sweater from my bag. Easefully I make my way to Becky’s house.

Three minutes later I’m standing in front of a red door. I take a look at the number on the door. Yes, it’s twenty-seven. It’s correct. I knock. No movement, no sound. I knock another time.

Is this the right house? It must be, this is the address Becky sent me.

Then the door opens gradually, revealing a cute guy. Blonde, long brushed hair, dark eyebrows and brown eyes. A smooth and slightly tanned skin, a cute little nose and a perfect smile manage to make this dark city one of the most beautiful cities I’ve ever seen.

Okay, I’m exaggerating a bit, but really, he is quite a handsome boy.

“Hi,” he greets me. “You must be the couchsurfer my mom told me about?”

“Yes. I’m Adam.”

“I’m Joshua. Come on in, I think it’s going to rain soon. Here, give me that backpack, you must be exhausted.”

I hand him my backpack, revealing the soaked back of my shirt and enter the house.

“So, where are you from?” He places my backpack on the floor and continues walking, I hesitantly follow him. The house smells a little weird, as if they recently burned some incense. I notice many little statues of Buddha, or well, I’m not sure if that’s him, but it’s a little man who’s sitting crossed legged.

“The Netherlands.”

“Ah nice! A friend of mine moved there. You want something to drink?”

“Yes, a glass of water please.”

He laughs. “You can ask me for a beer too, if you want. This is Germany.”

“Well then, give me some of that world famous German beer.”

“That’s better.” He grabs two cans from the fridge and hands me one. “Pröst.” When the cold drink slides down my throat I finally realise how tired I am. Hitchhiking may be pretty much only sitting in cars, still constantly talking with people can be very exhausting.

“So, what are you doing in this amazing city?” He has a hint of sarcasm in his voice.

“I’m hitchhiking from the Netherlands to anywhere I get a ride too. Got a ride to Wolgast, so here I am.”

“You’re hitchhiking? Damn, that’s so cool man. Wish my mom would let me.”

I laugh. “My mom didn’t let me. I told her I was going to bike around the Netherlands for one or two weeks. Then someone told me I should try hitchhiking and I did. Never told her about that, she still thinks I’m on my bike.”

“You hitchhiked all the way here while she thinks you’re still somewhere close? Dude, don’t tell my mom about that, she’d freak out and want to call your parents.”

“I’ll remember that.” I get back to observing the house. There are some very weird abstract paintings on the wall, of which I don’t even want to ask what they mean. “I gotta change this t-shirt, I bet I smell.”

Joshua laughs. “No, you don’t, but changing it wouldn’t be a bad idea I think.”

I walk to the hall, where my backpack is, and take out a clean shirt. I never felt any awkwardness towards being shirtless in front of people and I never understood why some people do, as you don’t wear a shirt when you’re swimming either. Yet, people think it’s awkward to go from the shirt-wearing state to the topless state, for some reason. Well, I just take off the soaked shirt in the hall, which is still visible from the kitchen. I notice Joshua is watching, which isn’t weird in any way, as there is a strange guy in his house. I’d keep an eye on me too.

Once done with changing I head over to the kitchen again. “What’s up with all the religious stuff around here?”

“Don’t mind that. My mom started collecting them a year ago after she read some Buddhist book about changing your lifestyle, I think. I don’t like it that much, but you know, I still get free food every day, so I stay around.” He smiles. “Is this your first time couchsurfing?”

“I did it last night too, but that was the first time.”

“Do you like it,” Joshua asks as he opens the fridge again and shows me another beer. He looks at me questioningly.

I nod, wondering if he will keep feeding me beer. I could enjoy it, but it’s only three o’clock, if we continue at this rate I’ll be drunk by five. “Yes, it’s amazing. I love meeting all kinds of people, both when couchsurfing and with the hitchhiking trips.”

“I can only imagine. Mom has been doing this for a year now. We get visitors from all over the world. Everyone is amazing, they always tell me stories about their travels. Pröst, by the way.”

“Cheers.” I open the can with a fizz. “I don’t really have any great stories to tell you, just started. But, I felt like I could have died today.”

“What happened?” He’s suddenly very sincere, which I thought was a little out of the ordinary since we were joking around a minute ago. I tell him the story of Siddiq, forgetting that I won't be able to make a blog about it now. Well, once I’m gone I can do it, but even then, if he realises I’m the blogger, that means he could tell people about me and I’m not sure how fast news like that can spread. Sometimes I wonder if I should “out” myself as being the Anonymous Blogger, just to find out if people stop reading when they know a young guy writes the posts or whether more people would read it. I can imagine both things happening, to be honest.

“Holy shit man, that’s insane.”

“Yeah, but in the end nothing happened. Still, it was so weird.”

“You shouldn’t have gotten in that car after the weird changing game they pulled in the parking. That’s dangerous.”

“I know… But for some reason it still felt safe, even with everything that happened. I know it sounds weird, but I just waited for him and got in the car. And I’m still alive!”

“I’m glad you are.” He smiles. “So, what do you wanna do now? It’ll be like two or three hours before my mom returns from work and I can’t show you the town now, it’s gonna rain soon.”

I think about that a second. I’d love to take a shower after my long journey, but that feels a little weird now. The owner of the house isn’t even home yet. I can write my new blog, I really want to write something about the regret Kevin talked about, but I can’t do that with Joshua around. “I’m not sure. What do you want to do?”

“Well, I guess there are three options now, maybe four. We can make dinner for tonight, my mom has all the ingredients I think. We can game a little bit, I got a playstation, two controllers and a bunch of cool games. Of course, we can also watch some TV? There is pretty much only German TV here and I’m not sure how your German is, but I bet we would be speaking German if you knew some, so that’s not a possibility. I do have Netflix, so we can Netflix and Chill.” He adds a very creepy wink to that, and I burst out laughing. “We could just talk a little more, but with the lack of cool things I did in my life that’ll get boring soon, I bet.”

I should say Netflix and chill now, I think to myself, but I know I don’t want that. I fucked up my previous life already, let’s keep this one nice. “Show me your games man,” I say as if I know anything about gaming.

Joshua jumps up from the chair, grabs my arm to help me up and says with a bow: “Follow me, stranger.” We walk through the hall and into the first room on the right. It’s a medium sized room with a big double bed, a wardrobe and a TV. “Make yourself at home.” He points to the bed, so I take off my shoes and discover my socks are smelling a LOT. That’s awkward…

“Ooph, I’m grabbing some clean socks man. Didn’t realise I walked that much.” I get some socks from my backpack and put the dirty ones in the upper compartment to keep them separated. When I return to Joshua’s room, he already got out all of his games and had put them on his bed. He was laying down on his stomach next to them, which gave me a perfect view to appreciate him. He’s not tall, he’s a few centimeters smaller than I am. He does have bigger arms and legs, but that’s not too hard as I never did any sports and my arms are closer to spaghetti sticks than anything like his arms. He’s got a firm butt, which is really cute because he’s wearing fairly skinny jeans. He’s wearing two different coloured socks, but I don’t think that’s by accident. No, the colours fit his clothes perfectly. His toes are wriggling in the cutest way when I enter the room again.

“So, these are games we can play together. Some are shooters, but I got Rocket League, Rayman Origins and Trine too. And oh, I have Little Big Planet somewhere, it’s a nice puzzle game in which you have to work together a lot. Really nice to do.”

“Uh. I’m not really a gamer myself, but let’s try that big planet game then.”

“Little Big Planet Three,” he says as he gets off the bed and walks to the drawer. The TV is on. He bends forward to open the lowest drawer, and I can tell you this much, I wouldn’t mind if it’d taken him a few minutes to find the game with this view. I already said he is wearing skinny jeans, right? No, I shouldn’t be paying attention to this. These guys are giving me a free place to spend the night, for fuck’s sake. I can’t possibly fuck this up too! “Here it is.” Joshua inserts the DVD and walks back over to the bed. With one jump he’s on the bed and he lays down next to me, closer this time. Our hips and shoulders are touching.

And like this we play the fun game until Becky gets home. I’m really enjoying it and no, that’s not just because we’re laying so close to each other. I’m genuinely having fun and I start to wonder if I can finally be normal. Maybe I can be friendly towards people when I know I’ll be gone in a few days? When it’s not permanent, I don’t fuck up my life by using people, making them feel loved only to break their hearts again and blackmail them. Right now, I’m human.