Chapter 3: 3 – War

His question hit me entirely out of the blue. Happy about what exactly? Being snowbound in an airport? Accidentally bumping into him, opening a part of my past I'd rather keep hidden behind locked doors? The itching under my skin that now constantly reminded me that my friends might think of me as a terrible person? What a question! I can't tell him I am not happy, whether it is true or not.

"I'm happy I got to see my Grandparents for Christmas."

"That's not what I mean." Conor narrowed his eyes, which made him appear more worried if that was even possible. "More like, in general."

Droplets of condensation water on my glass formed into one significant drop and ran over my hand. But that couldn't distract me from Conor's efforts to look into my soul. My Cola was already half empty, but I kept drinking as if I would never have another one again.

"I don't know how to answer that."

"Well," he kept staring, "for example, I am happy I ran into you today."

So you didn't answer your own question in the way you just told me you meant it. That is what I should have said, but my foolish mouth went with an almost shy "Why?"

Conor leaned his elbows on the table to support his head. His ambiguous face harbored a sad smile for a short moment before he replied, "No reason."

I waited for him to move the conversation forward, but he did nothing of the sort. His eyes didn't move. Only the corners of his mouth winced slightly. So we are back to being weird already?

"Do I have something on my face?" I drew an imaginary circle with my hand in front of my head, laughing insecurely. Conor gawked as if he was studying me. Just like a taciturn criminal is analyzed by a detective. Maybe I should have just left. But that would give him the satisfaction of having broken me. I am not the one to be forced to the ground.

I felt as if I was under attack. Wait a minute. What if he is not trying to freak me out but to recreate one of our most empty-headed yet fondest games? Is this an invitation to a staring contest? Like we held them so often in fifth grade? I had to test my thesis. So I put my elbows on the table, supporting my head, and started staring at him. Our faces were quite close now, and I began to feel his breath on my skin the longer we sat there this way. That's good. It means he should be affected by my breath too. This is the heavy artillery I need now. I exhaled as hard as I could, trying to tickle his face, but Conor didn't move a muscle. Fuck. He is way better now at this than four years ago. We kept our eyes locked on each other as we both knew that the first person who would take their eyes away or laugh would lose. Conor counter-attacked by also breathing heavily.

The air leaving his lung flew right into my nose as I breathed in, reminding me of our sleepovers at his place when we were younger. We shared his twin bed as we were still small enough, and he always kept stealing my part of the duvet, so I had to snuggle in closer to him to avoid freezing to death. For a second, the corners of my mouth wanted to wince into a smile, but I forced them to stay put. I can't lose because of a memory like this. Stay focused!

"Here we go, gentleman."

The what's-his-name-waiter was back, balancing two large plates on his right arm. The Burgers, fries, and coleslaw salad couldn't wait to be demolished by us. But Conor wasn't impressed by him, and my pride compelled me to stare too.

"Okay, what is happening here? Could you please make some room on the table?"

I felt sorry for Joshua, being caught in the middle of our whatever that was. For some reason, Conor stuck out his tongue slightly, wiggling the tip of it between his lips. This was killer. I couldn't hold it any longer and burst out in laughter. What a move to end the game!

Before the service dude called security, I leaned back, making room for the dishes. Conor also slowly moved his arms away from the table, smiling victoriously.

"Thank you." Joshua rolled his eyes and threw the plates in front of us before he ran away with a short "Enjoy."

Conor inspects the food by turning his plate like a DJ scratching a vinyl record. "Looks good!"

"Hell yeah." We both dug in. Like two lions starving in the desert for days, now finally able to hunt down a zebra.

I bit into the biggest crinkle-cut fry I had ever encountered, savoring the salty dough-like texture slowly dissolving on my tongue.

As I watched Conor enjoying his fries, I thought about how this little contest made me feel as happy as I wasn't in quite a while. I wish we both could go back to how it was. I mean, it's not like I haven't missed Conor in the last year. We spent almost our entire elementary and middle school time together. Every day we said "Hello" to one another when the school bus picked us up in the morning and almost clung to each other until his or my parents brought us back home after training. I haven't had that with anyone else after he left. And it's not like I wanted our friendship to end. Not like that. It just... happened.

But now that he was in front of me again, sticking his fork into the coleslaw salad, I couldn't hold back a smile.

"You know, to you, it probably doesn't seem like it, but... I'm also happy we met again."

Conor kept chewing on his salad as he looked at me, thankfully blessing me with a smile of his own. Maybe, we can't just go back in time or have an everyday life again thanks to living on opposite coasts. But we could use this night to have some fun. And luckily, I knew what we could do.

---

"So, when does your flight take off?"

"8:20 am," he replied.

"So we both have to stay here the whole night." I leaned toward him and lowered my voice to ensure no one could hear what I was about to ask Conor. "Wanna make things more interesting?"

Conor's eyes told me he was heavily interested. He leaned toward me and said in the same silent voice, "Why are we whispering?"

There wasn't exactly a reason for that. It felt like the thing to do because that's how we talked as kids whenever we didn't want one of the grownups to overhear our plans. I guess he was right. No parents anywhere near us. I cleared my throat and leaned on the backrest of the bench.

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"How about we make some game out of this night? We could take turns and decide on fun things we could do and then... do them."

"Like what?" He took a sip of his Coke before he moved the fat-dripping burger to his mouth.

"For example, let's say... I suggest we change our plates. We then do that without thinking further about it."

Conor raised his eyebrow, "does that mean I have to do anything you suggest and the other way around?"

"Exactly."

"And you can't decide anything until I did?"

"Yup."

"I'm in."

We shook hands to seal the deal.

"So, you suggested we change dishes. Let's do that, and then it is my turn." He took three big bites out of his burger, so only a tiny bit was left, and threw it back on his plate, quickly exchanging them. His eyes sparkled as he clenched his lips to hide how amused he was by his trickery.

"That wasn't an actual suggestion," I complained, but Conor announced that I was "too late!"

I stare at his measly leftovers. I only bit into my burger one time! Conor snickers and puts the burger from my old plate, now his, back on his former dish, now mine.

"I can't be so cruel to let you stay hungry the whole night."

"No, you played that game just like it was meant to be played!"

I grabbed my old burger and held it toward Conor. He glared at me and, instead of taking it, just took a bite out of the burger while it was still in my hand. Shocked, as his teeth also tried to bite off parts of my fingers, I flinched back, letting the burger go. And while about half of it hung out of Conor's mouth, the other half flew through the air.

Our table looked like a battlefield. We both made a face as if we had just trashed the whole restaurant, trying to hold back our laughter as well as possible, so no one noticed the mess we had just made. It was especially hard for Conor, as he still had to chew. He tried his best but, of course, choked on the burger. I handed him his Coke, and he drank some of it, but it didn't help. He was gagging harder. I got up and walked over, striking him on the back with all my might. That worked. He panted.

"Woah, shit," he gasped. "Who would have thought that it would be that easy to get you to hit... on me."

"No problem, I can hit you even more if that turns you on."

"I'm good, thanks."

I let myself fall back onto my seat. "You all right?"

Conor nodded and washed down whatever was left in his gullet with a big sip of his Cola. Of course, our ruckus attracted the waiter, and as soon as Joshua saw our table, he rolled his eyes.

"Everyone still alive?"

"Barely," Conor laughed, ashamed. "Can we order one more burger, please?" asked Conor. Joshua nodded without saying anything else and left us with a face as long as a fiddle, probably already cursing inwardly that he would have to clean up this mess once we left.

"You are crazy, man," I said to Conor, and we smiled at each other. For a moment, it felt as if nothing has ever happened between us. As if we had just traveled two years back in time. Everything was just so easy.

"It's my turn to decide on something to do now, isn't it?"

"Let me just hit the restroom real quick," I said and stood up. But the way Conor suddenly glared at me erected my neck hair. He has to be up to something.

"What is it?"

"What about we go together and... compare how big we have gotten?"

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