Free The Letter Opener by Kyo Maclear

‘Draw the curtains next time or I might think you’re sleeping.’”
    Andrei touched his newly cut hair as an epilogue to the story. Then something seemed to catch his attention and he traced a finger along the base of his skull. “I am turning into my father, how do you say it, spitting image? These dents at the back. I’m like a bowling ball!” Then he smiled in a way that seemed forced.
    I struggled to convince Paolo that our current arrangement was the best way of ensuring our relationship would last. As a consolation, I made an extra set of keys and invited him to keep a few of his things at my place. Despite the offer, he didn’t end up storing much—a toiletries bag, some extra clothes, a few CDs, a bottle of chimichurri sauce, some Maalox.
    I made one other concession. I let him do my laundry when he needed to fill out a load. I know “let him” is an odd way of putting it, but everyone has chores they like to take care of by themselves and it took a while for me to get used to seeing Paolo stuffing my sheets and clothes into the washer, measuring soap and setting dials, waiting for the whoosh of the water into the machine.
    My friendship with Andrei was something that Paolo took a long time to accept. In Paolo’s mind, Andrei’s arrival coincided with my rejection of his proposal that we live together. As he saw it, the closer I gotto Andrei, the more my attention toward him seemed to fade. There was no doubt that it shaped his attitude toward Andrei.
    On the rare occasions they saw each other, usually when Paolo came to meet me after work, Paolo acted distant, almost conde-scending toward Andrei. The tension in the room was palpable, but I refused to be on edge as I often was when I tried to hinge people together. I did not want to be a connector or a message carrier, something I had announced long ago to my parents. So I left it to them to sort out their differences, and over the summer their relationship seemed to improve. Paolo behaved more sociably toward Andrei and Andrei eventually returned the gesture by inviting us to join him at his apartment for a meal.
    The dinner took place in October, right around Thanksgiving. We got off to a strained start, but by midnight we had settled in. The dirty plates were soaking in the sink. We were lounging on the floor around a glass-topped coffee table. The pie that Paolo and I had brought was warming in the oven. I was feeling happily wine-drunk. Paolo and Andrei were immersed in a discussion of the music they liked. Delta blues. Charlie Patton. Robert Johnson. A cassette played. Scratch and hiss. Sliding steel strings. Johnson’s rasp rising into a flickering falsetto howl. I was so relieved that they had found something to talk about, I left them alone and floated around the apartment, tidying, nudging newspapers back into stacks, stopping at Andrei’s desk to note a copy of Time magazine beside an open Oxford dictionary, peering at a familiar mother-and-child Klimt picture pinned to the wall beside a postcard of two men seated on a camel. The smell of baking apples sweetened the air. I offered to run to the all-night store and get some ice cream, and was gone for about fifteen minutes. We ate our dessert and Andrei opened a bottle of port he had been given by a Portuguese neighbour.
    When we left that evening, Andrei gave us each a hug, and then kissed me on the cheek. For a second I thought he wanted to say something, but the second passed and he raised his hand and gave me a goodbye salute. Paolo and I walked slowly down the stairs, both lost in our own thoughts. As we wove our way down the street, the night was filled with the smell of raked leaves and wood smoke.
    I have often wondered what happened after we left. Did Andrei begin washing up? Did he switch on his television or turn on the radio? Did he contentedly fix himself a cup of tea? Or did he have a troubled, sleepless night knowing that he would soon be leaving us all behind?
    I asked Paolo