Fading, Like the Stars

Some say that if you ignore what bothers you for long enough, then it will simply go away, and I had to admit that I found some truth in these words, no matter how strange it might actually sound. As days passed, I forced myself to forget about that discussion about politics and revolution, and not to think about the questions that had arisen. And it worked, because at some point I completely forgot about it. And soon everything returned to what it had been in the beginning, it was nothing more than wonder and amazement, because the place was after all the most amazing place in the world, and for a moment, it was ours, and ours only. It was the place where we could hide our secrets, and speak more freely than we had ever spoken. We were away from the world, out of it, and seemingly also out of time. The consequences of all our actions, it seemed, were too far away for us to care.

Everything was good. Well, it was good for some of us, at least. Dan seemed to become a little grumpier, but no doubt it was to attribute to the time that passed and that kept us away from the circus and kept him away from Émilie. The situation with Cécile was not evolving much. I attributed it to her shyness. After all, she was not talking much to Dan either. It was only with Rufus that she seemed to be a little more confident, but it was all very understandable. She had known him for a while, and I knew how it felt. There was something about Rufus, once you knew him well enough, that made you feel safe, that made you feel like you could trust him, like you were protected. It was one of the things, one of the many things, that made him such a great person.

So, apart from Dan’s occasional grumpiness and Cécile’s persistent shyness, everyone was happy. Arnaud seemed to be more than delighted with our prolonged stay. I had been afraid that he would have been annoyed by it. I had feared that at some point we might become a nuisance, be too much of a difference in his life. But there was nothing of that sort. He seemed delighted to have people to talk to, more people to care about. He was constantly making sure that we were fine, that we had everything we needed, that our life was as easy as it could be. He came up with stories that he thought we would like to hear, found the books that he figured we might enjoy reading while we here, was constantly trying to do his best to have us pleased. One could not have wished for a better host.

But the one person that made my time in the library really stand out was Rufus. After our talk, after he had made me see that a relationship needed to be worked on, I rediscovered him. It was just as it had been in the beginning at the circus. He was there in a way that made me feel incredibly safe and confident, with the addition that things were much easier in the library. In this place we had time for ourselves, we were safe, there was nothing to fear, and without the worries of the outside world, without the thought of any possible consequences, I was able to give more of myself than before. It was harmless. We were in the library. We were in a bubble. The world that we had known was so distant that it almost seemed that it did not exist. Time had frozen and nothing could touch us.

We could talk about anything we wanted without the fear of being overheard, we could make up the most foolish of plans, sometimes, because how could the world crush it when it was so far away? We could imagine a future that we would never even have dreamed to have if we had been out there. Deep inside, we both knew that it wouldn’t last. Just like Arnaud was so kind and attentive to us because he knew that at one point we would leave again, Rufus and I both knew that outside the library, we couldn’t even dream of the things we were talking about. So there was a rush to it, the need to enjoy this as much as we could because it would soon end. That brought a hint of bitterness to everything that happen during the last part of our stay at the library, but even with the bittersweet feeling brought by the knowledge that everything that was happening wouldn’t last, I can honestly say that those days were amongst the freest and most carefree that I had ever experienced. In the library I learned again that it is possible of waking up without being afraid of what the day could bring. I learned that it was possible to stop looking over your shoulder and look ahead. I learned how to make plans, how to imagine a future that did not involve hiding or running away, even if there was little chance that this future would eventually come true. And, finally, I learned what it was like to wake up with Rufus not somewhere in the circus, not even somewhere in the caravan, but right next to me, and to know that he would be there come tomorrow, and the day after, if we were blessed enough to still be at the library. And that, no matter what was to come after, was something that I would always be thankful for. No matter what the future had in store for me, or for us, I had experienced the feeling of being utterly happy and content, of being filled with that amazing feeling that nothing bad could ever happen that we usually lose round the age of six, when we eventually learn what death truly means. I had experienced that wonderful feeling that I was, even for a moment, complete, and exactly where I belonged and where I needed to be.

This was what Rufus gave me, at the library. And I took it all, even though I feared that I could not do for him half of the things that he did for me. None of us was good at speaking our feelings and inner thoughts out loud. But at least Rufus was showing it. I could only hope that he knew.

The rest of our time at the library, even if it passed quietly, in a slow and comforting manner, was not entirely devoid of surprises and revelations, though. There were talks that surprised me, and there were words pronounced that would have consequences, even if no one realized it when they were said. But we did not know at the time. We did not think much of whatever was going to happen, and even when we did, we made plans that were much too careless, much too shiny to ever exist in reality. But that was what the library also did to you. It allowed you to dream bigger dreams than the ones that you could have on the outside.

I wasn’t the only one, I soon found out, who was trying to stop unwanted thoughts and worries from plaguing my head by throwing myself forward, though. There were some things that made Rufus doubt just as there were things that made me question myself. There were some things that kept him awake at night too, some things that I did not know of yet. Some things that I learned about just before we left the library.

“Rufus?” I asked one day, as I was examining the books on the shelves of one of the rooms, reading their titles and the summaries at the back when they were provided, and he was lying on his back on the bed, staring at the ceiling.

He did not answer, barely moved, and only indicated that he was listening by a very vague wave of the hand. I could tell that there was something on his mind, but like so many times, I had no idea what it could be. That was part of the mystery that Rufus could sometimes be. That seemed to be the one truth that I was to learn about him, the one thing that never changed. No matter how much I learned about him, no matter how many times I observed him and how much he let slip about himself, I could never really guess what was going on in his head.

I put the book that I had been holding, on the pile of the many ones that I wanted to read if I had enough time in the library. This one had a story that seemed tempting enough, the extract on the summary page was so well-written that it immediately drew you in. the story, in short, promised to be full of action and drama. I would gladly have opened it immediately, but instead I placed it with the others, and turned away from the shelves to concentrate my attention solely on Rufus. I stared at him for a moment before he even remarked that he was being observed – or if he did remark anything, then at least for a long moment he pretended not to and did not react. If it hadn’t been for his opened eyes, I might in fact have believed that he was asleep. But he wasn’t, and the ceiling seemed to have acquired an interest that I did not know it had.

I opened my mouth again ready to call his name once more, but he didn’t give me the time to emit a single sound.

“Yes? What is it?” he enquired, sounding perfectly awake.

Even though he sounded perfectly awake, I asked the next question. “Are you tired? Cause if you are, I can just…”

“I’m not.”

I was though, but in the same time, I absolutely didn’t want to sleep. Yet it had to be night already, I thought. It was quite hard to tell, of course, in the library. There was no indication whatsoever of what was happening outside, which also meant that there was no way to know if the clocks were right, or if, when it indicated four, it was four in the morning or in the afternoon. We followed the indications given by Arnaud, but it was a strange way to be living. Too many days had passed again since we had ventured outside, and the tiny breath of fresh air that we had enjoyed was only just a memory. The outside world with which we had so briefly been in contact again, was at new reduced to a simple memory.

“Okay.” I left the books on the shelves and came to sit at the end of the bed.

“So, what is it?” Rufus asked, “because you know I am not tired, and I know that this wasn’t really the question that you wanted to ask.”

“Oh, you know… really? If I didn’t want to ask it, why did I do it, then?”

“My guess?”

“Yeah. What would you say?”

“I’d say that you wanted to know if I was in the mood for a conversation,” he said, sitting up. There was a small smile on his face that told me that he wasn’t annoyed in the least to have been distracted from his thoughts. In fact, he even looked like he welcomed the interruption.

“And why would I want to know that?”

“Because obviously you have another question that you want to ask.”

“I could just be bored and want to talk. Maybe I can’t sleep and I want something to distract me, and that’s it.”

He laughed. “No, you haven’t got that look on your face.”

“That look on my face?” I raised my eyebrows. “I’m not sure I get what you’re saying, but what look have I got on my face, then?”

“The look that says that you have a question that you want to ask, and that it could potentially lead to a conversation that could last all night.”

I raised my hands in a gesture of surrender. “Fine, I give up. How did you know?”

“I’m starting to know you, you know.”

I winced. “Right.” Then, after a moment’s pause “Would that bother you?”

“Would what bother me?”

“If my question indeed lead to a long discussion.”

“Well… It’s not the first thing that I’d want to do at this hour, but yeah, no, it wouldn’t.” Then he laughed again. “Why all the precautions, all of a sudden? Is that such a serious question that you want to ask?”

“Not even. You just got me sidetracked.”

Again, he smiled. “Oh, I do that, do I not?”

I pretended to lean forward to hit him. “Oh shut up.”

Rufus laughed, but quickly became quiet again. “So,” he said very softly. “Your question was?”

“It’s stupid really,” I muttered. “It’s… Well… I was wondering. What’s the thing that you really want? Above all else?” It all stemmed from the realization that Rufus had changed my life so much. He’d made it better in more ways that I would have imagined before. All good things that had happened – I had friends, I had the circus, I’d seen the play, I was at the library, people cared about me – all of these things, it was he who had brought them into my life. Even the simple fact that I was still alive, that was Rufus. And I wanted to do something for him. Something better than just responding to his love, something that would bring him what he had brought me. Something that he would remember for a long time. But I didn’t know what Rufus aspired to. I didn’t know how I could change his life like he had changed mine. So I had to resort to stupid, embarrassing questions.

Rufus smiled at the question. The smile was wide, a little mischievous too. It was mine. That smile was mine. I had never seen him smile like that otherwise. There was something in his look, something that was just between us. Other people in the circus didn’t get that smile. It was typical to the library too, or, even more specific, it was typical of these last few days in the library. It was a smile that I was only receiving now that we were comfortable with each other.

“What do I really want?” Rufus repeated slowly, never stopping to smile. “You mean what I want now?”

I shook my head, because I knew perfectly well what he was implying. “Rufus,” I protested, but it was simply to play along. We both knew he wasn’t going to embarrass me with what he said. “I was actually very serious, you know,” I said.

Rufus sighed. “I know.” Then, after a moment: “You sometimes have the strangest questions. I don’t know what to answer. No, really, I don’t,” he added when I was ready to protest. “I could try to get away by replying that there’s nothing I want right now – I mean, we’re in this wonderful place, we’re together…” It was both strange and sweet to hear Rufus say those overly lovely things. It was not often that he voiced out what he felt, even though he was not shy when it came to showing it. But hearing it was different. He seemed to realize that it was out of characters for him too, because he soon ruined it. “And of course, that door is locked,” he added with a smile, that quickly disappeared when he became serious again. “But if I said that, it wouldn’t make you smile and you wouldn’t be satisfied with the answer.”

“It might make me smile. And then I’d ask my question again. What is it that you really want, what is it that’d make you happy, or that would lift a weight off your shoulders?”

“Lift a weight off my shoulders?” He seemed to debate with himself for a few seconds. “It can be something immaterial then? I guess… I guess I…”

His face changed completely at that moment. That smile full of complicity and other things was gone, and he was grave and serious, and even if I could never figure out what Rufus was usually thinking, I knew then that I was about to see a part of Rufus that was usually buried deep.

“I want forgiveness,” he said, and his voice was just a whisper. “I’d want to know that I’m forgiven for things I’ve done.”

“Rufus…” There was a look in his eyes… haunted. This was the part of Rufus that kept him awake at night. That kept him quiet for hours, that made him go silent and look preoccupied. I wished I could find the words to make him smile again, but there was nothing that came to mind, so I just delicately touched the side of his face. “You’re a beautiful person, one of the best I’ve ever had the chance to meet. What could there possibly be that you’d need to be…” That was typically the type of things said to make someone feel better, yet in Rufus’ case it was perfectly true.

There was half a second during which Rufus looked like he had said too much, like he regretted that he’s spoken so freely. Then he smiled again, but it wasn’t the same. “You say that because you love me,” he said, and it sounded like a protest.

“Well, yes. But that doesn’t mean that I can’t be objective.”

“It does. What if I abandoned you?”

“Well, I’d be pissed…”

“What if I left simply because I found it too hard?”

I sighed and took his face in both hands. “This, this is about your family.” It was a statement, not a question. I might not have been able to tell what Rufus had on his mind most of the time, but I recognized guilt when I saw it. I had no idea it bothered him so. I though… I just assumed that he was okay with what he’d done – as anyone else would surely be, he had the right to live his life too, after all. But it did bother him. “Rufus?”

He sighed. “It’s not something that I like to talk about.”

“Not even to me?”

“Especially not to you. Because I was a coward that abandoned people he should have been helping.”

“Rufus, I ran away too.”

“You had no one left. I turned my back on people who had raised me.”

I could see that it was making feel bad, and I had no idea how to make him feel better. I had first asked the question in the hopes that I would learn something about Rufus that would allow me to do something for him. The only result was that I had brought out the guilt in him. Once again I was failing him. “You didn’t turn your back on them,” I argued. “You did what was best for you.”

“You know that I never returned,” he said.

“So you said.”

“They were my parents, my brother. They were my family, and families are supposed to stand together.”

“Rufus; not in this world. Look at Oliver. His parents left him for hell knows what reason. You know so yourself, but the guilt you’re feeling’s what keeps you from seeing it in this situation.” My arguments were perfectly logical, but for some reason Rufus didn’t see them as such.

“I have a younger brother,” he insisted. “I was supposed to serve as a role model. What kind of role model is that? What kind of older brother does that?”

“Rufus…”

“I had nothing against them. It’s just the rest that I couldn’t stand. The soldiers, the misery of all those workers at the farm…”

“Rufus, you don’t need to justify yourself. Not to me, and not to anyone else. I’ve never met a better person, and I’m honest when I’m saying this. You did not turn your back on them. Not in any way.”

“But I did though. And I don’t even know what happened to them after.”

“You did what you had to do. And sometimes it implies leaving, and that’s it,” I said categorically. “And you’re not responsible for the rest.”

“I’m not so sure,” Rufus replied slowly. “So I try not to think of it. Yet it doesn’t change how I feel when I do think of it.”

“Well, I know one thing for sure,” I said, and it was the very last thing I could think of saying. After that, I would be clueless as to how make him feel better. “If you hadn’t done what you did, I’d be dead right now. So I selfishly approve of your decision.”

“Really? You approve?”

“Yeah, I approve. Listen, you changed my life. And I’m not saying this because… Honestly Rufus, you made me see the world in a different way. You gave me hope. I thought the human race was worthless, I did not trust anyone. You made me see that I was wrong and that people were capable of kindness. Ever since I met you, I’ve grown up. And I know it sounds silly because I was already grown up, I was an adult when we met. But you changed me. I feel like I’m more now than I was before. It’s not just about… this,” I indicated the two of us, “I know it’s not just that, because you’re not…” I looked down, at the bed for a moment, embarrassed. “You’re different,” I said eventually. “And I don’t know what to say to make you understand that you have nothing to feel guilty about.”

He was silent for a very long moment, and when he eventually broke the silence it was in a voice so soft that maybe he wasn’t talking to me at all, maybe he was talking to himself. “Just don’t let me abandon you.”

“Rufus, don’t…”

“Don’t let me abandon you, even if I feel like turning my back on you, because you’re the only person who can make me feel better about this.”

“So you’re feeling better?” I asked, immensely relieved.

“Yes.”

“Not guilty anymore?”

“I’ll always feel guilty about it. It’s something I got to live with. But you’ve just made living with it easier,” he replied, making a move to get up from the bed, a sign that to him this conversation was over.

I wanted to say something that would make the ‘living with it’ really easier, but there was nothing that I could think of that could make a difference in such a short time. And so, as there was nothing that I could say, I gently pulled him back and kissed him. I really wanted him to forget about this, and words failing me, this was the only way that I could think of doing that.