Chapter Text
The sun is beating down, heating the tables and chairs in the courtyard. People chattering and laughing as the tinkling of wine glasses and the sound of cheers echo through the post-workday Friday evening. In the past, he has come here to pick up hot men, sometimes just to dance and have fun with friends, old and new, but today, Charlie’s sunglasses hide a multitude of heightened emotions as he chokes back the tears that threaten to fall.
It’s been a day of failure after failure, settling under his skin and threatening to drag him under. He’s almost ready to let it, his last grasp of resolve teetering on the edge with weakened, broken nails.
He began the day with a light breakfast before pulling on a new suit that made him feel far too much like he was a boy trying on his father’s clothes. He had taken the Tube and arrived at the tall glass office building, which felt far too imposing to a hungover, sleep-deprived, and nervous man. Business people rushed past, important and clutching briefcases like they were guarding the world’s secrets. He fumbled through the worst interview of his life, after which he begged his short-term boyfriend to take him out and soothe his frayed nerves. Now he sits, his heart trampled once again. His spirit is broken, and the early May wind cuts through him as the heat of the sun wanders into evening, sticking two fingers up at him by casting shade over his seat.
He watches, hidden behind his glasses, as Isaac approaches him, his eyes fixed on Charlie, concern written across his features as they sweep over him. He appears to relax slightly when he assesses that Charlie is indeed unharmed, but his voice croaks out a concerned, “Are you okay?” as he pulls his best friend onto his feet and into a hug. Charlie’s body collapses into him, the relief of letting go as his face contorts, and quiet sobs are poured into Isaac’s shoulder. He’s shaking with cold, or perhaps the constant stream of disappointment, maybe even the lack of meals today, giving him much-needed warmth.
“I can’t take any more shit news, Isaac.”
“I know, darling, I know. Let’s get you home, sweetheart.”
Isaac settles the bill, his arm around Charlie’s waist as he steers him home. It’s a mere ten-minute walk from the courtyard of restaurants and bars to their apartment, a quiet area away from the main busyness of the centre, and Isaac is grateful for that as he pulls Charlie into him and half-carries his sad friend home.
He’s had a few drinks, is probably slightly inebriated, but not as bad as Isaac assumed he’d be, considering the past couple of months he’s had. Losing your job is hard enough, having multiple interviews and getting rejection after rejection is hard enough, but on top of all that, he’s now been dumped by someone who never deserved him in the first place. Isaac is just grateful they were only together a few short months, before that dick could weasel himself properly under Charlie’s skin. Isaac still can’t quite understand how Charlie never saw it; the parasite barely disguised himself. Charlie seemed happier and freer when he was sleeping around, generally carefree and unattached.
They get up to the apartment, and Charlie bundles himself like a sad sack of old potatoes on the sofa and takes out his phone. Isaac makes a grab for it.
“Maybe we’ll leave the phone down until you’re sober?”
“No,” Charlie grumbles, making a weak attempt to stop the confiscation.
“Charlie, please. Can’t we just watch a comfort movie?”
Something in his voice catches Charlie's attention as he watches Isaac’s features shift with sadness. It feels too settled, worry carved into lines between his eyebrows, the power of it turning his lips down involuntarily. Charlie’s body turns cold; he’s doing that to Isaac. He slowly puts his phone down on the cushion beside him, his loose, drunken limbs finding it hard to act like anything but wet spaghetti.
He nods and mumbles, “Yes, let’s watch a comfort movie.”
An emotion far too close to grief hits Charlie in the chest as Isaac’s face transforms into sunshine. Has he abandoned his friend and dragged him through the current and down into his whirlpool of shit?
He knows the answer. He knows he’s dragged everyone down with him, even Elle and Tao, despite them no longer living in the same country. Something needs to change.
Or maybe he needs to disappear on his own for a while.
Isaac glances at Charlie. He can’t help but continually look at him throughout the movie as he watches each scene play out on his friend’s face, tears turning quickly to laughs and back again, but each emotion feels too stilted, too surface-level. He’s not feeling things like he used to. And given Charlie’s poor mental health in the good times, nothing worries Isaac more.
“Shall we call Tao and Elle?” Isaac asks quietly, his hand gently resting on Charlie’s ankle.
He doesn’t know what to do to keep Charlie focused when the world is insisting on kicking him every time he rises. His friend has been through enough. It’s time to call in reinforcements.
He watches Charlie, whose head is buried under a cushion, his sunglasses discarded on the floor, as a sniffle sounds through the room. Isaac stands and pulls open the heavy balcony door to allow some other sounds in—happier sounds, the sounds of life moving on—willing them into his best friend’s brain.
“Fine.” Charlie mutters, “Let’s call Elle and Tao and see their perfect life.”
Okay, maybe it wasn’t the best idea after all. Their best friends are currently living a blissful life in a small village in France. They’ve visited a couple of times and loved the quiet, peacefulness of the life Elle and Tao have built there, in contrast to their very public life as an Artist and Film Director. The world is too invested in their relationship, so London didn’t work for them when they crave privacy. France has afforded them as much anonymity and privacy as they need; locals either do not know or care about the fact that they are considered a ‘power couple’. They just see them as Elle and Tao, the newcomers who don’t speak French very well.
Charlie peeks his face out from beneath the cushion and grabs his phone, finding Tao’s number and letting it ring. It’s just seconds before the screen is filled with bright, sunny colours and the faces of Tao and Elle as they answer in their stunning garden, surrounded by trees and flowers.
Elle looks radiant, her hair in pink and white thin braids flowing down her back, her silken brown skin adorned by a small blue bikini top and a flowing colourful skirt. She’s got paint smears on her chest, and Charlie smiles as his heart squeezes, reminding him how much he misses his friends. Tao sits with a glass of wine, bright blue shades with black rims, his hair messy and long on either side of his face, like a pair of short curtains.
“Hi guys,” Charlie’s voice is weak and sad, and they immediately pick up on it. The visual of him buried in the covers certainly does not help.
“You did it?” Charlie watches Elle contort herself so she doesn’t smile as she asks, and despite his sadness, he laughs.
“He got there first, the bastard. As per usual.”
Elle giggles and pulls her face straight as fast as she can before giving him a sympathetic head tilt. Tao just looks confused, looking from the screen to Elle.
“What does that mean? I don’t get the joke? He broke up with you ?”
“Yes, Tao.” Charlie rolls his eyes. “Dickface McArsehole got there first and broke up with me.“
“But, why do you look so sad? You were going to do it anyway?”
“Ugh, I know, but it’s just been a shit week. Scratch that, a shit month! He was the icing on the cake. We’ve been seeing each other for three months, and well, you know what happened.”
“What do you mean ‘what happened’?” Tao asks, an impatience buried beneath his too-high voice.
“I told you last week. He tried to get us a third without checking with me and we had that awful awkwardness with a guy Ben clearly wanted an excuse to fuck.”
“What the fuck, Charlie?” Tao is comically jumping up and spilling wine as Charlie finally cracks a smile at his friend.
“Oops, did I only tell you and Isaac, Elle?” Charlie looks at Isaac, who is tittering away as he reads his book, and Elle tries to mollify her partner. Charlie charges on ahead with the rest of the story of his pitiful dalliance with ‘love’, “Anyway, Ben also kept going on about my friendship with Isaac being an ‘issue’ for him, and that got worse when I asked that guy to leave before Ben could fuck him. On top of that, I’ve had two job rejections just this week, and I’ve applied for so many jobs that won't even give me a call. I’m sick of it. And I’m panicking a little, I’m running out of money and going to have to start using the savings I built up.”
“Oh, Charlie Bear. Why don’t you come out to us for a while? Take a break from it all and chill. We grow a lot of our food, so minimal cost there, and the countryside air would do you good.” Elle’s voice is soft and comforting, “You could even earn some small cash working in a café or bar. The café in the village is looking for someone, actually.”
“Hmm, maybe.” Charlie sighs in the non-committal way that’s becoming far too familiar to him and the people around him lately. He doesn’t enjoy the person he’s becoming - despondent, losing confidence, sad all the time, it’s exhausting. Everything feels ‘bleugh’ to him, and nobody seems to get it. Maybe Isaac does on some level, but he’s content and has a thriving career, and Charlie doubts he truly gets it.
Isaac hands him a freshly made cup of tea, joining his friends and adding his two cents, cuddling up with Charlie as he sits up and lays his head on Isaac’s shoulder. They chat some more; Isaac talks about his work at the university, where he’s a professor, and Tao shares his latest experience on a movie set. He’s working with some big names that he ‘can’t share’, but he has spilled four out of five names by the time they hang up, putting Charlie in a much brighter mood.
That evening, after a rewatch of The Notebook, which Isaac said was good for Charlie to ‘let all your sads out’ to, Charlie lies in bed staring at the ceiling. He studies the paint, following a crack from one side to the other. That’s how he feels, and it feels oddly comforting to have a visual.
Since completing his master's degree in English Literature four years prior, Charlie has enjoyed a fruitful career in publishing. It was going from strength to strength for four glorious years as Charlie climbed the ranks. He’d worked in two different companies at that time on multiple teams. Some were better than others, but all of them added to his resumè. However, the world of publishing is an uncertain and unpredictable place right now, so he began to feel fearful when people around him started losing their jobs. Rumour had it that the shareholders were unhappy with their dwindling profits, being content with nothing less than 20% year-on-year growth.
Charlie was in the third round of cuts. By the time it came, Charlie was almost relieved, but he struggled incrementally with the hits to his self-esteem, confidence and wallet. His expenses are not sustainable long term, and he’d need to start dipping into the redundancy payout they’d given him. That, and his monthly savings he’d built up, would give him a cushion for a while, but his chest was tight with fear whenever he thought about having to dip into that hard-earned cash he’d saved for his future. If that goes, he’ll struggle to build it again. It had taken him four long years to get it.
Maybe Elle was right about coming over to have a break in France. Perhaps it’s time for a change of scenery. He knows Isaac could undoubtedly use a break from worrying about him.