What scared me most was that, on several occasions, I caught myself searching for reasons that might justify his admission. Disgusted with myself, I decided to steer clear of him for good. For the next ten days I did my best to ignore him and kept communication to a minimum, responding to questions with “yes” or “no”, or sometimes just a nod. I spent most of the time holed up in my bedroom studying, and when I had to go to classes I made sure we sat far apart. Unfortunately, there was nothing I could do about the ride to the university and home again. Alex wouldn’t hear of us going by bus, so I regularly had to hold him from behind on the single seat of his bike. Every time I clutched him tightly I’d feel a slight tremble in my fingers, like an ex-addict tempted by a fix. Alex acted as if everything was perfectly fine and didn’t once comment on my technique of avoiding him. ‘The conversation’ from the other night wasn’t mentioned again, and in some ways it was like it hadn’t happened at all.
