Futile Wars

Chapter 1

We clicked goddamn near perfectly.

Ryan

I gaze the square. Maybe I won't recognise Brendon. It has been a year; he could have gained 100 pounds and dyed his hair blonde for all I know.

But I recognise Brendon instantly. The way he walks, the structure of his body is forever imprinted in my mind.

Brendon's hair is longer. He looks good. He's walking towards the bench and he's grinning like an idiot. I can't help but grin back, because quite honestly, it feels pretty damn good to see him again. I get up and the situation feels absurd.

Brendon stops in front of me and smiles. "Hey," he says softly and his eyes shine.

"Hey," I smile weakly.

Brendon moves towards me and I shoot my hand out. Brendon stops on his tracks and frowns, but takes my hand. Once my hand is shaking his he pulls me closer and puts his arms around me in a hug. And I let him. Dammit, I promised myself not to hug him, but I really don't seem to mind either. Brendon still smells the same.

It's not an intimate lover's hug, body pressed against body, but a friendly hug that lasts longer than most. One of the reasons why our break up was so hard for me was because Brendon was my best friend. We were together for nearly three years and he knew me better than anyone else. He was my best friend for longer than that. So surely for the sake of having been that close to each other we can justify this hug.

We pull apart and Brendon's still smiling.

"So you made it," I say in order to say something. Brendon immediately tells me how he got lost and thought he knew where the square was. He seems so at ease, like the situation isn't awkward at all.

The last time I saw Brendon was at the airport in his hometown Seattle. I was flying back home and we both knew that it was over. We were crying and when we said goodbye we knew that it was a new kind of goodbye, something we were not used to.

Brendon says I look good. I return the compliment and say that I like his hair like that, longer than what it was. He looks more than good, he looks downright gorgeous, but I'm not going to say that. I feel relieved that I don't feel an urge to throw myself at him, throw myself around his ankles or throw myself in front of a bus - I am walking next to him with confidence, walking with my own two feet, as my own person.

Lovers are disgusting in that sense. They no longer want to be individuals, there is only "us" and "we". That's exactly what we were like. Brendon and I had a fucked up relationship coloured by greed and jealousy, possessiveness and neediness and we were so damned obsessed and in love. For a while, at least. But with hindsight I am glad it ended. It was not a healthy relationship and I think I'm a better person these days.

"So, what do you want to do?" I ask Brendon. I'm guessing we'll have a few hours before he'll head back. In my email I think I invited him for 'a hot chocolate, a pint or whatever'.

"There's this one good pub down the road," Brendon says and immediately launches into a story of a time he got drunk there with a friend of his. I merely note that he seems to have decided that alcohol is the way to go for our get-together.

We walk up the street, doing small talk. Brendon, I learn, is taking a year off as he is trying to figure out what to do with his life. He worked in an insurance company for a while, but hated it and quit. He's now been out of a job for a few months, and though he's enjoyed the freedom he's running out of money and needs to get a new job.

Brendon appears to be comfortable around me, which I was not expecting. I thought it was going to be awkward, too many lies told, too many tears shed, too many times someone got hurt. But it feels so easy that it confuses me.