The Orchestra - Sinfónia Lifsins - 68. 66 - Just Friends

Arnar was waiting by the door when Karen parked her car. “How was your rehearsal?” He helped me take the cello out of the passenger’s seat and turned to her. “Would you and Gísli like to stay for dinner?”

“Thanks, but we have other plans.” Karen grinned. “Dmitri is sleeping at Gunni’s, so we’re going to enjoy having the house to ourselves.”

“Karen may or may not have invited a few friends to ‘drink responsibly’ the night before a concert,” Gísli did the literal air quotes as he spoke. Karen made that face that would have led to a kick to the balls if Gísli was not safely out of reach on the backseat.

“Have fun, then.” Arnar rested my cello on the ground and hugged me with his good arm. “I understand the plan is for me to return Siggi on Saturday morning?”

“Yeah, that’s when Dmitri will be coming back too. We’ll keep your son for the weekend, and I’ll bring him back on Monday after the rehearsal.”

“And would you and Gísli like to stay for dinner then?”

“What’s with the sudden obsession with feeding everyone?”

Arnar looked at me like he did not expect such a question. “I’m just trying to spend time with my friends. We can’t see each other every rehearsal now, so I have to find other ways to socialise. I think I’m doing well enough nowadays that I can handle social interactions without letting bad feelings about the end of my career take over.” He smiled despite his words. “Besides, Karen and Gísli are your housemates. It’s the least I can do when they’re helping to take care of my son.”

“I want to say I’m old enough to take care of myself, but we all know what a load of bullshit that is.”

“I don’t think it’s about being old enough.” Arnar shrugged. “I think everybody could do with having someone to take care of them. I don’t necessarily mean it in a literal sense like helping to shower or spoon-feeding lunch, but rather that it’s nice to have someone we can run to when something goes wrong or even when we just want company. It’s not that I don’t ever want to see you living on your own or that I don’t think you would manage living alone, but I do feel better knowing you’re among friends at home.”

Karen and Gísli drove off to the sound of more niceties from Arnar. He led me inside and followed me to my room, though he waited until I had put my cello down to distract me with conversation. “How did the apology go?”

“I couldn’t finish it, but I had enough people tell me they knew what I meant and appreciated the effort that I’m inclined to believe it worked.”

“Good.” His arm wrapped around my waist. “Did you apologise to Gunni too?”

“He came to talk to me afterwards. We’ll try to start again with the whole ‘professional relationship’ thing, and I made it clear to him there’s no chance I’ll ever have the sort of feelings he seems to have for me. I was even trying to say it without sounding like I was enjoying the put down, but he cried anyway, so I don’t think that worked.”

“If you’re rejecting his feelings, he would’ve cried even if you coated it with a mountain of sugar. You don’t have to feel bad about it.”

“I don’t. I don’t care about that kid outside of the rehearsal room and for as long as he’s not hurting Dmitri.”

“You should hear yourself saying that next time you feel like you don’t deserve your friends. You want to do whatever it takes to make Dmitri happy, right?”

“I’ve been trying to protect his arse since Gunnar came along. A lot of the mess happened because I tried to look out for him. So I don’t think I’ve been doing a good job of it.”

“I’m sure it’ll get better once you and Gunni start to work together.” Arnar moved towards the door, but I didn’t follow. “Is there anything else you want to say before we go for dinner?”

“Maybe? You talked about Dmitri, and… there are some things… I don’t know what to make of them.”

“Like what?” Arnar guided us to the bed and sat next to me with his usual ‘let’s-encourage-Siggi-to-talk-about-difficult-things’ smile.

“Dmitri said he loves me, though not in the way he loves Gunnar. He has this plan to see our relationship like it’s based on actual love so he’ll convince his instincts that Gunnar and I are equally important to him. I don’t understand this, but I don’t think that’s how feelings work.”

“So are you just confused, or you think he’s lying to you, or lying to himself?”

“I don’t think Dmitri would lie to me. He’s one of the few people I trust not to, and he’s a terrible liar anyway.”

“Then what is troubling you?” Arnar put his hand on my shoulder. My body leaned against him before I could stop myself.

“I don’t think I understand my feelings for Dmitri anymore.”

“You think you might be in love with Dmitri?”

“I think I don’t know what love is. You suddenly realised you were in love with your long-dead best friend, then Dmitri decided on a whim that he’s going to love me, going as far as to say he loves me while we were fucking, and Gunnar cried because I broke his heart even though he knew it was coming. How am I supposed to know how this shit works?”

Arnar smiled and pulled me for an even stronger hug. “I think part of your confusion might because there are different kinds of love. For example, I love you and I’ll do anything I can to make you happy. But this is a father’s love. It’s not about romance and it’s definitely not anything sexual.” He made a ridiculous face that made me chuckle. “The love I have for Ágústa, on the other hand, is all about romance, about how I want her to be my partner for however long we’re alive, or how it makes me happy to wake up and see her lying next to me in bed every morning. And then there’s my love for the ISO, for my job, and how playing with them gave my life a kind of meaning I couldn’t find anywhere else.”

“I can relate to that last one.”

“And how do you feel about me?”

“Like I can’t imagine existing if it wasn’t for you. Like I owe you everything I have now. Like you’re the one fucking person I can’t bear to be away from. Is this one of those forms of love?”

“I would hope it is.” Arnar kept pulling me closer, until I gave up lying against his shoulder and settled for resting my head on his lap. My legs were too long and awkward to fit on the rest of the bed so their search for a comfortable position continued through the conversation. “And how do you feel about Dmitri?”

“He understands me in a way nobody else does. I trust him. I get angry when I see he’s destroying his life and not realising it. I don’t want him to get hurt. What is the difference between love and friendship? Or what that kind of love Dmitri said he has for me that’s not really love? Or is it the same thing?”

“I think the answer is not as objective as you think it is. Look at me, I took twenty years to realise my deepest friendship was actually romantic love!”

“But how did you do it? How could you separate the two?”

“The way it happened for me was that once the possibility occurred to me, and I re-examined our time together, framing everything as romantic love felt like the missing piece of the puzzle that made everything feel right. It made sense, it explained why I got so reluctant to spend time with him and why I felt so weird when he called to say he was getting married. Everything just… fit.”

“But it doesn’t help me when I don’t know how it’s supposed to feel like when it fits!”

“I’m sorry, but that’s all I can say. The way we make sense of our feelings is different from person to person. Maybe you and Dmitri actually feel the same way, but he’s expressing his feelings in a different way because that’s how it works for him. If he’s sure it’s not romantic love he feels for you, then he should know what he’s talking about.”

“Why are things so complicated?”

Arnar made a futile attempt at tidying up my hair. “Have your feelings for Dmitri actually changed after he told you those things?”

“I don’t think so. I guess I’m happy he’s sort of back to his old self and we’re fucking again. I missed having him around like that. So I guess I’m… relieved? But I don’t know if it changes anything.”

“And what does it feel like to think you love Dmitri?”

I had to think about that more than I would have liked. “Weird. We’re not romantic. Romance is… disgusting? I don’t want Dmitri to be my boyfriend, and not just because of the way he treats Gunnar. I don’t think I want to be anyone’s boyfriend. Ever.”

“I see.” Arnar kept playing with my hair. “I suppose it does mean you don’t love Dmitri romantically either, which is probably for the best. I don’t want to make you more confused, but the way you talk about not wanting to be anyone’s boyfriend… it makes me wonder whether it’s because you think of yourself as a horrible person not worthy of being in a romantic relationship or if you’re just aromantic.”

“Aromantic as in ‘asexual, but about feelings’?”

“Sort of.”

Thinking about it again took too long. “You’re right about me not being boyfriend material. Nobody deserves the kind of crap I come with. You and Dmitri deal with enough as it is, without the extra romantic bullshit. But as far as being actually aromantic… I don’t think I can think of myself that way yet. How can I decide whether I’m actually capable of having romantic feelings when I don’t understand most feelings in general? Maybe it’s all part of being aromantic and that’s why I struggle with this whole shit, but it’s still much more likely to be because I didn’t get to learn about this crap as a kid. I think I should figure out which one it is before I go about slapping some labels on myself.”

“That’s very mature and thoughtful of you.”

“Would I be too much of a failure if I was aromantic?”

“Of course not!” Arnar smiled. “You won’t be a failure whether you have fifty boyfriends or no boyfriends. You won’t be a failure if you never settle with family of your own, or if you want to live alone or with me instead. And, for that matter, you won’t be a failure if you never learn to figure out your feelings. Do you understand that?”

“Yes. Thanks.”

“That’s another feeling to add to your pile: unconditional love. That’s loving you for who you are, good bits and bad bits and everything else that comes with you.”

“You mean the feeling of achieving the impossible?”

Arnar frowned, but his face relaxed once he realised I was grinning. “I guess I’ll just have to live with the knowledge that I’ve achieved the impossible, then.” He smiled. “How about we put our complicated feelings aside for a while and concentrate on the feeling of emptiness in our stomachs instead? Dinner is probably ready by now, and I would hate to leave Ágústa waiting…”

“Fine. And… thanks again, I guess? I love you, for all it’s worth…”

“It’s worth the world to me.”

Thanks for reading!
And sorry it's a bit late. I spent the whole weekend with a friend in London to d my civic duty and keep the fascists away vote in the Brazilian election. Stood in the queue for 2.5 hours, but it'll hopefully be worth it. 
(Please send us some good vibes, particularly if you're in the USA and knows what Trump is like. We've got someone worse who's too close to being elected)
Anyway, on to the much nicer matter of this chapter:
Do you think Siggi could be aromantic as Arnar suggested? What do you hope it will be like if/when Siggi gets a better grip on this "feelings" stuff? (he's trying so hard... )
The next chapter will be another little hearty talk of feelings, this time with Gunni and Dmitri, and will be posted here on 20th October.
My patrons will see that on the 13th of October, though, so if you're still up for a belated birthday present, you know where to find me.