Chapter Text
“Aujourd'hui, maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas.”[1]
Jean had hoped that he would not be late, but someone was already reading out a passage of the assigned book when he opened the door labelled “Advanced French Literature Club”, leading him into a small back room of the local library.
A scent of books and old carpet greeted Jean, and then a quiet gasp. The room was filled with a circle of roughly fifteen chairs, although many of them were empty. Right across from the entrance sat a Black woman just a few years older than Jean, who had just read out the sentence in a Parisian accent.
To her left sat Kevin Day.
He was dressed casually, in dark jeans and a simple grey hoodie, as if he belonged here. As if there was any reason for Kevin Day, who was still playing exy in Phoenix the last time Jean checked (it had been two nights ago, when Kevin had yet again saved his team’s ass in an important game). Phoenix, which should be comfortably far away from Los Angeles.
And yet here he was, with his irritatingly green eyes and a look of utter confusion on his face, as if Jean was the one casually appearing in a public library in the wrong state, not the other way around.
Jean hadn’t seen Kevin in person in well over a year. In Jean’s last year at USC, after Jean and Jeremy had made their relationship public, his relationship with Kevin had gotten worse. After Jean had called him with the announcement, Kevin had continued to act perfectly normal, but Kevin was first and foremost an actor. He had his perfect masks and public personas and was always capable of having a normal conversation, even bleeding, even heartbroken, even on the brink of a panic attack. Kevin was an actor, and still, Jean had been able to look at him and see the truth: A man who had been trying his best to make sure that Jean was locked out of his emotions. Thankfully, although it had taken time, in the years following their graduations, they had started to develop something that was more akin to a real friendship, with proper conversations and no fake smiles. The two of them had never been good at keeping in contact, but their work had brought them together in comfortable intervals. Banquets, charity galas, Moriyama-arranged photo shoots, trainings with the national team, and shared game days had made them see each other at least every few months. They had talked and exchanged texts and hugged each other, sharing awkward but sincere touches. But these times were over.
Kevin had sent Jean a letter when Jean had announced his retirement from exy, and that had been it. Not even a phone call. No further text messages. It had hurt, although Jean supposed he should not have expected anything else from Kevin. Kevin Day only ever understood relationships in relation to exy. Despite Jean doing his best to rationalise this, it had felt like losing Kevin again. And at that, Jean had gone into mourning. He hated how present Kevin was still in his life by association, how friends brought the name up every so often. He despised all the interviews and tried to keep the TV off whenever anything exy-related was on; seeing Kevin’s face and hearing Kevin’s voice, even behind the curtain of his media mask, had been painful.
For the longest time, Jean had not been able to wait for his exy career to end. At some point, the underlying currents of pain had become stronger and stronger until he had hurt when he had got up in the morning and had hurt when he had gone back to bed at night and every hour in between. His doctor had told him that this wasn’t surprising, considering what his body had been forced to handle while growing, nonetheless. It had been disappointing to hear it back then when Jean still had some debts to pay. But last year, they had finally released him. Jean had counted down the days until he knew he would never have to lift a racquet again. It had been a relief.
Unfortunately, after the relief had ebbed down, hollowness emerged. Jean assumed the emptiness had always been there, but between practices, games, and forced outings, there hadn’t been a lot of time for him to let these feelings fester. And now, suddenly, there had been so many free hours.
Jean had been a loyal attendee of therapy; he had learnt all the necessary coping mechanisms, and yet, the sudden exy-shaped hole in his life had managed to throw him off course. After having spent a full month barely getting out of his house, a month of recurring nightmares, and feeling empty even with his friends around, Cat had staged an ‘intervention’ and sat down with Jean and a computer in order to find him something else to do.
In the following weeks, they had tried hard to find something fitting for Jean: he had denied the community garden project, he had visited a pottery place a few times but hated it, and he had refused to go to a meet-up for ‘Queer Art Enthusiasts’ whenever it was brought up. He had even obediently attended two dates, which had all been fine but not great. After months of trial and error, he had settled on enrolling in the French Literature Club. Everyone had been excited for him, talking about how this was his chance to meet new people. If he was being honest, Jean had not been interested in meeting anyone, but he had been enticed by the idea of having a chance to speak his mother tongue with other people, to finally read in French again, and to learn how to express academic thoughts in that language. He had never been given the chance to develop a more elaborate use of French than that of a teenager, and he wanted to change that.
And yes, it probably was a good idea to get out of the house more often. Jean was not alone; by living in Los Angeles, he was still relatively close to Jeremy, to other old friends, and to past teammates. But sometimes it was lonely. Everyone was busy with their own careers and families, and Jean’s own apartment remained empty more often than not. Jean harboured no resentment for his busy friends, the same way that he harboured no resentment for Jeremy after they both decided that there was nothing left in their relationship a few years back.
Sometimes, the person you meet when you are at your lowest turns out to be exactly the person you needed. Sometimes, the person you meet when you are at your lowest is not the perfect partner, especially years down the line, when everyone has changed. After some wonderful years, the break-up had been necessary and amicable. Their relationship had kept both of them back, hindering them from growing out of whoever they were when they had met years ago. Therapy had helped, taking a break had helped, but ultimately, nothing had been able to make them feel like romantic partners. These things happened, and while Jean had lost a lover, he never felt like he had lost a friend or a partner in the widest sense. Breaking up with Jeremy hadn’t been fun; there had been tears and sleepless nights and endless phone calls, but there had never been a real sense of loss. It hadn't been like losing Kevin.
Even after everything, Jeremy was still in Jean's life, but when Jean had stopped playing exy, Kevin had cut contact for the second time; he had just dropped out of Jean's life. It had felt as if Kevin had died while still appearing on the TV at least every other week. Kevin had been gone, and Jean had gone into mourning.
And now Kevin was here, sitting in a library chair, holding onto an already well-read copy of L’Etranger.
“You must be Jean, oui?” The woman who had been reading stood up and crossed the room with long strides. “We had been in contact. I am Meg, the founder and kind of leader of this course. But we don’t have a strict hierarchy, no worries. I am so sorry that we started before you arrived. I wasn’t sure if you had decided against joining us, and you hadn’t put down a number, so I couldn’t reach you.” Her English was perfect, with no hint of being a native French speaker despite her outstanding French accent. Jean found it disappointing.
“Yes, I am sorry. I underestimated the evening traffic.” It was somewhat of a lie; Jean had been nervous to leave the house and then missed the window to get ready on time.
She laughed. “Oh, I understand. I lived here for over six years, and I never got used to the traffic. Do you have a copy of the book?”
Jean nodded. After signing up for the book club and exchanging two emails with Meg, he had made sure to purchase a copy of the book in order to not embarrass himself. He was not an expert in literature, but even he knew that Camus was notoriously difficult to understand. After reading the first few pages, he didn’t find it too difficult; however, he thought it was extremely bleak. Hopelessness was a feeling Jean was extremely familiar with, and he hadn’t really needed to read a book steeped in it.
“In that case. Sit down.”
Jean took his time in making a decision about where to sit. There was a free space right next to Kevin, which he instantly rejected. Another one directly next to Meg—apparently, no one else was as much of a teacher’s pet as Kevin. Who would have thought it? Apart from Meg and Kevin, there were only four more people in the room: A pale young man with brown hair in a suit kept a two-seat space between himself and Kevin and was typing on his phone; next to him was a woman roughly Jean’s age who reminded him a lot of Laila, not because of her warm brown skin, but because of her sharp yet kind eyes. Unfortunately, there was no space next to her, as directly next to her was a blonde young woman who already looked bored. In the end, Jean sat down three seats away from Meg, to the right of an elderly man who smiled brightly and introduced himself as Henri, French on his father’s side.
“To continue our discussion—” Meg now switched back to French. It was perfect, sounding like she had swallowed a French textbook, like a cleaned-up version of Paris. At least it’s not Canadian, Jean mused. “The first sentences of this book are very well known. How do you feel about it?”
Silence settled into the room. Everyone turned to Kevin, apparently awaiting his input. He stayed quiet for a moment, staring at the book on his lap, but raised his head when Meg gently nudged him. For a brief second, his gaze was oddly vacant. Then, his mask fell into its place. He nodded with a perfectly smooth smile, all Kevin Day, the public persona. Jean despised him for it.
“Please excuse me, I was caught up in my thoughts,” he started, “but I think these first sentences are perfect. They introduce the core trait of the main character: his emotional indifference, and they do so by him merely reporting his mother’s death as a plain fact, with his focus being on a seemingly trivial matter—the day of her death.”
The Laila-reminiscent girl spoke up instantly, seemingly very ready to pick a fight with Kevin, discussing how this could not speak of an actual emotional indifference but a deep-rooted grief. The two of them quickly fell into a passionate discussion, seldom interrupted by others. It seemed evident that this was a well-practised song and dance.
In their bickering lay the proof that Kevin felt protected enough to share his opinion here. There was a happiness to him that seemed foreign to Jean. It made Jean oddly jealous of everyone who had had the pleasure of watching Kevin’s happiness without knowing how precious it was. It made Jean feel regret for all of Kevin’s smiles that he had missed. Kevin belonged to this group, enough so that the group waited for him to start discussions and enjoyed listening to him ranting—even if he was just ranting about the most surface-level analysis of the book.
Jean scoffed. He knew that Kevin could do better in terms of analysis, but of course, Kevin would be obsessed with defending the idea of emotional indifference. Jean wasn’t stupid enough to think that Kevin had ever felt anything like indifference in his life. Kevin was too driven, too ambitious, too Kevin for that. But Jean also understood that indifference was what Kevin had always been trying to achieve. To be able to state facts and not fall apart after. To be a little bit more like the coldness of their owners. Kevin was most likely the only person in this room who yearned to be like the main character of the book.
At least if Jean didn’t count himself.
The years after the Nest had treated him well, and he had taken off the armour of nihilism and death-like acceptance. Jean had healed, and with healing, he had allowed his anger, his passion, and his unbridled emotions to be felt. However, he could still relate to the urge to close down when faced with pain. Admittedly, this happened right now. Jean felt hurt, but he did not look at Kevin and instead tried to ignore the passionate ramblings in a French that was far from perfect and sounded way too much like a Marseille accent. Jean knew that if he opened his mouth, his words would be pronounced the same way. He tried to not be hung up on that fact. He had learnt to live without Kevin once, twice, and a thousand tiny times before, after, and in-between. Jean’s life had been fine without Kevin. Different, colder maybe, but there had been a freedom in not depending on the gentleness that was so rare to find in Kevin.
Jean had no interest in reopening any wounds, so he did not intervene in the discussion, even when he felt like he had ideas worth sharing. It seemed like his silence made Kevin forget that Jean was even around; he started to open up, to speak louder and more unrestrained. He evidently enjoyed himself, and Jean had no intentions of being a part of Kevin’s enjoyment. He wouldn’t know how to back out of it again. And worse, he was not interested in losing Kevin again. Better to never have him.
“We already touched upon it, but maybe for the rest of the group, what about the following sentence?” Meg finally interrupted the group. “Jean, do you want to read it for us? Don’t be afraid to mispronounce anything; we are all learning here.”
Jean’s hand was shaking slightly when he opened the book. He was not afraid of mispronouncing things, but he did not want to lay himself bare. Didn’t want to share his accent or his thoughts. Still, he read. “J'ai reçu un télégramme de l'asile: Mère décédée. Enterrement demain. Sentiments distingués. Cela ne veut rien dire.”[2]
“Marseillais?” Meg asked with a smile, then continued in English. “Oh, I haven’t heard a proper accent like that in forever. Kevin here kind of sounds like that, but yours is perfect.”
It was meant as nothing but a polite observation, but Jean couldn’t force himself to smile; he just nodded. “Yes.” It was just his rotten luck that even here, he would end up being put in the same box as Kevin. Everyone looked at him, hoping to learn more, to catch up on missed introductions. Everyone but Kevin. Kevin just stared at the wall behind Jean, his face nearly catatonic.
“Well, enough of accents,” Henri finally said, breaking the tension. It was an understandable sentiment coming from Henri, considering that his French sounded horrendous. Nonetheless, he started to talk about the book, and that was enough to pull Kevin away from whatever thoughts had held him captive. As soon as Henri took a breath, Kevin interrupted him.
“Like I’ve said. We see the discussion about the day the woman died. And the main character being… upset that the telegram does not provide any information about the date of his mother’s death?”
“Is the date of death relevant at all?” Henri asked and thus encouraged Kevin to start a new rant, this time about time, being removed from others in space and time, and the inaccuracy of said concepts.
It became too much for Jean to bear.
“I think we need to read this more broadly.” He was surprised to hear himself start speaking. This was exactly what he had promised himself not to do just minutes ago. Do not interact with Kevin Day, and Kevin Day may forget about your existence again, and you can forget about your broken heart. But nothing was ever easy when it came to Kevin and Jean’s stupid bleeding heart.
“What”, Jean continued, “if the character is actually implying that the thing that doesn’t matter isn’t the time? But the fact that his mother died at all. His mother died, and the character introduces the idea that human existence has no meaning.”
Kevin stared at him, then shook his head. “No, I do not think so.” Jean waited for a moment, but Kevin did not provide any further commentary. Of course, Kevin would simply object just to be contrary. Jean knew that Kevin did it so he could nudge Jean into saying more. It was a familiar tactic, one that Kevin applied in interviews when he wanted others to talk as well.
“Are you disagreeing just to be difficult?” Jean asked, full of annoyance. There was a shadow of protest on Kevin’s face, then the right corner of his mouth ticked up. It was barely visible, but Jean had spent years becoming fluent in reading Kevin Day. It was true amusement and therefore an answer. Kevin wanted to fight.
“I do not think this is about meaninglessness at this part. Maybe it is acceptance,” Kevin replied.
“Acceptance?”
“There is only one inescapable fact of life, no? Death. Humans die.”
“True. Mothers die. Brothers die, too. Does this make death easy to accept?” Jean spoke his words calmly, without any passion, but he chose them carefully. It felt like loading up a gun, and he saw that his shot had hit by the way Kevin flinched.
Silence settled in the room. Jean had forgotten about the audience, but the audience had kept listening.
Kevin averted his gaze, but Jean kept looking at him. He wanted his eyes to challenge Kevin, but instead, he caught himself studying the beautiful face in front of him. The straight nose, by some sheer luck never broken; the soft lips and the sharp cheekbones; the long dark lashes around bright green eyes; and, of course, the chess piece. It was big, and it was dark, but it was never the first thing Jean saw when looking at Kevin. There were so many more interesting things about him.
Jean had learnt to live without Kevin, and he wanted to keep living like that. Life without Kevin was a bit lonelier and a lot more muted, but it was safe. Still, seeing Kevin after so long in person was addictive, and Jean wanted to take more and more and more.
There is only one inescapable fact of life? Kevin had been wrong, and maybe that's why Jean had lashed out at him. For Jean, there was at least one more inescapable fact. There were two things Jean wouldn’t be able to run away from: Death and Loving Kevin Day.
Even during the months that he hadn’t spoken with Kevin, so many parts of his life had been about Kevin. The art he looked at, the books he picked up, the way he played exy, and the way he taught himself chess. His dreams and his nightmares and the most painful therapy sessions. He still remembered how he had kept going in circles of explaining to his friends why he had no interest in seeing Kevin ever again, just to go back and defend Kevin’s behaviour. Cat had been the one to point it out a few months back: how Jean allowed no one to talk shit on Kevin, even though he was the one who always brought him up, and usually not with kindness.
The book club moved on quickly after a short break, accepting the disagreement but oblivious to the years of pain that Jean carried, oblivious to the newly acquired gunshot wound in Kevin’s soul. If anyone realised that both Kevin and Jean stayed quiet for the rest of the meeting, they didn't mention it.
When the meeting finally ended, people actually wanted to talk to Jean. The brown girl introduced herself as Zoulikha and explained that she had been born in Algeria, like Albert Camus himself. She spoke in a quick French that sounded so unlike anything Jean had heard before, trying to prime Jean for the theme of colonialism in the book so that they could discuss it in the next meeting. Her tone was challenging, and she did not hold back on her own beliefs, but Jean found her opinionated and extremely educated ideas endearing and agreed to exchange phone numbers. When she went back to her car, the majority of people had already left.
Just Kevin and the man in the suit were left, standing next to each other but not talking. The man had turned out to be a Canadian named Sébastien who had moved here for some kind of undisclosed business and had been too cold towards Jean and oriented himself too much towards Kevin. Even now, Jean caught the man’s pale blue eyes skipping between his phone and Kevin. Yet, as soon as Kevin saw that Jean had been left alone, he walked over, not even looking back at Sébastien.
Kevin’s first steps had been full of determination, but he slowed down the closer he came to Jean. Finally, he stopped awkwardly far away.
“Jean,” he said quietly.
“That’s me. What are you doing here? I thought you lived in Phoenix.”
“Yes. Yes, I am.” Kevin started massaging his left hand, a telltale sign of being anxious. Jean wanted to reach out to soothe Kevin, and hated himself for the urge. Kevin hadn’t been his to soothe in over a decade.
“So why are you here?” Jean kept pressing. He was afraid that Kevin came to be close to him, although that was an outlandish thought. Outlandish, yet enticing—him haunting Kevin’s mind the way that Kevin haunted his.
“I looked for something to do, and I wanted to train my French.”
“Surely there are other French clubs between Phoenix and here, somewhere along those 400-odd miles.”
Kevin answered with a self-deprecating laugh. It was real, but not pretty. “Many. But in most of them, there is at least one person who knows who I am. Or the people are really bad at French. Or really stupid when it comes to literary analysis and not willing to take criticism.”
Jean wasn’t even surprised. Of course, Kevin had to bother Jean in Los Angeles simply because Kevin was too much of a bitch to be tolerated by any other French-speaking book club in the Southwest of the United States.
“Does it bother you that I am here?” Kevin asked when Jean didn’t answer, still massaging his formerly broken hand. Jean couldn’t stand it anymore. He stepped forward and gently slapped Kevin's hand.
“Stop doing that. And no. You were here first. Do I bother you here?”
Kevin’s right corner of the mouth twitched for a second, then he took a step back. “No. No, of course you don’t. But… I have to go.”
And there it was, a new smile, shy and unguared in a way that made something in Jean’s stomach tense up with the sudden urge to protect. Kevin had been many things: a God and a Prison, prideful and desperate, but never shy. Yet another new emotion.
“See you next time?” There was hope in Jean’s voice, and he couldn’t swallow it.
“Probably.”
~~
Kevin was not there at the next meeting.
The book club met every other Tuesday, with one week being an introduction to the book, and the second meeting used to discuss the book after everyone was supposed to have read it. Considering how passionate Kevin had been in discussing even just the first three sentences, it was somewhat of a surprise that he did not turn up to share his opinions.
Jean wasn’t late, so there was room for introductions. Jean liked the group better this time, even though Kevin’s absence felt like a weight on his shoulders. Besides Meg, Henri and Zoulikha, there was an elderly lady named Désirée from Burundi who instantly offered Jean a hug. She greeted him with a heavy accent and intriguing ideas and brought her best friend—or partner, Jean wasn’t sure—named Roxanne, who somehow managed to have an urban coastal Californian accent in French. Both the Canadian and the blonde woman had stayed away this time. Henri shamelessly gossiped that they had probably been ashamed for not being able to read a Camus book in two weeks. Henri himself hadn’t been able to do it either, but he said he felt no shame.
“I found the writing style bleak and detached; I didn't like it,” Jean explained when Henri asked him about the book. Throughout most of the meeting, Jean had tried to stay in the background, considering there was no Kevin to pressure into a literary analysis full of personal admissions.
“That is true. But arguably, this was the author’s plan,” Meg added, her tone soft with no judgement.
Jean thought for a moment before he answered, “Just because it is a conscious choice doesn’t make it an enjoyable experience.”
“Does art have to be enjoyable to be good?” Désirée interjected. “I think it is good. The writing style emphasises the nihilistic character of the novel.”
Her comment made the whole conversation move towards an analysis of the main character’s relationships, which were all emotionally detached, and then into a discussion of Camus, who was apparently explicitly not a nihilist. Jean did not say anything further, not particularly interested in discussing the idea of detached relationships. He had his own fair share of this with a certain exy player who had skipped the meeting.
Jean wondered what the people in this group would say about the relationship between him and Kevin if there were a book written about them. Would they pity Jean for his love, for his devotion to a person who barely looked at him, who wouldn’t touch him most of the time? Would they shame Kevin for his forceful detachment, so different yet not unlike that of one of the characters in the book? Would they praise Kevin for staying true to himself, or would they question his motives like Jean often caught himself doing?
“I think we discussed detachment in enough detail, but what about the honesty in it?” Meg asked to move the conversation forward. “The main character is honest, and it translates to him not hiding the lack of feeling when it comes to his mother’s death. And through this honesty, not detachment, people see him as a threat. Because he does not act as they expect him.”
“I loved that idea,” Zoulikha added, speaking even more quickly than usual. “Because he doesn’t grieve, society starts to see him as an outsider, as a monster. And that poses the question: are you a monster if you behave differently than society expects you to?”
Jean rubbed his face. Zoulikha know moved the conversation to the idea of the ‘other’ and whatever that meant in the context of colonialism, but Jean struggled to keep up with the discussion. He had been nursing a headache since entering the room. As if being removed from Kevin’s presence when he expected him was making him sick. Who knew that Kevin Day addiction came with withdrawal symptoms? He felt Roxanne softly brushing his shoulder and offered her a soft smile when he looked in her worried eyes. “Just a headache,” he mumbled.
He would have liked to pretend that Kevin’s absence meant nothing, but it bothered Jean. Was he the reason that Kevin had stayed away? Maybe it was Jean who was the issue; maybe it had always been him who was the issue. He had no right to dictate Kevin’s life, and he had no right to impose on Kevin’s life through the attendance of the book club. At this point, Kevin was just another stranger. A good-looking stranger, a familiar stranger, a stranger he once had loved. But a stranger nevertheless. Still, Jean missed him. After everything, he missed him. And he was worried. How was Kevin coming to this place every other week anyway? Was he driving? What if he crashed?
After Meg finished the meeting, Jean left the library without any further words. In the parking lot, he took out his phone to send a text.
21:28
Kevin?
Neil Josten, 21:29
Was fine during this morning’s call
Neil Josten, 21:29
Sent me a recipe for a kale smoothie earlier today too
Neil Josten, 21:30
At 8pm. Freak behaviour
21:30
Okay.
Neil Josten, 21:30
You’re welcome!
1. "Trans 1: “Maman died today. Or maybe it was yesterday, I don’t know.”". [↺ go back]
2. "Trans 2: “I got a telegram from the home: “Mother deceased. Funeral tomorrow. Faithfully yours.” That doesn’t mean anything. Maybe it was yesterday.”".[↺ go back]
Book: L’Etranger, Albert Camus (1942)