Pay and Pay

Chapter 10

"Hi Kev." He stopped and actually giggled.

Kevvin did not smile back or return the greeting. He felt no desire to have anything more to do with Mike. He was happy to see that things seemed to be improving for him, and he was even a little curious to find out the explanation, but he was not going to get involved again. Mike continued to stand bobbing before him, smiling and inviting.

It was Mike's whole manner, not just his new clothes, that seemed to have changed. There was something almost boyish in his excitement. The sullen, stolid, wordless Mike was gone. Kevvin almost felt like he didn't know the man in front of him anymore. He finally managed to speak.

"Hi, Mike."

Before he could go on and explain that he had to leave, Mike started talking, almost chattering. He had never done that before.

"Things have really changed, Kev. Look at me. Things are looking up." He posed before the older man.

Kevvin could see that. He was equally certain that Mike himself had had little to do with the transformation. He could not imagine anything that Mike could have done to change so much in such a short time.

"How about an interview, Kev?" Mike asked. It almost looked like he winked when he said it, as if he were making a joke.

Kevvin was torn. His curiosity was getting the better of him. At least Mike's appearance was not quite such an embarrassment. He answered as casually as he could.

"Why not? I was just going in here."

Entering the café, Kevvin led them to a free table in the middle of the room. They had just sat down when a waiter arrived with menus. Kevvin was happy with such prompt service because it offered a reason not to say anything to Mike yet. He really was not sure what he should say or ask. Kevvin ordered a danish and a cup of coffee. Mike ordered the club sandwich again, along with a large Coke and pecan pie-he called it sugar pie-for dessert.

After Kevvin had adjusted his camel hair coat to his satisfaction on the back of the chair, he slid his parcel to one side. He had simply set it in the middle of the table before sitting down, and the waiter's arrival had stopped him from moving it. As he did, the wrapping paper came loose and one side of the package fell open on the table. Mike cocked his head and read the words on the spine.

"I know that guy."

Kevvin almost quipped that the man had been dead for almost sixty years, but he knew what Mike meant.

"We read some of his stuff in school. In French Lit in grade 11."

Kevvin was surprised.

"You studied French Literature in school?"

"I had to. It was a French school. We read lots of stuff. I read Le Petit Prince. I didn't like it, the way the guy has to keep dying." He paused and frowned.

"We read Candide too. That one was funny. I never finished it. That's when I left. That guy was gay, you know."

Kevvin gave a small superior smile.

"I highly doubt that Voltaire was gay, Mike. He was rather famously..."

"Not him, Proust. Everyone knows that. Our teacher told us. She said that that was what inspired him. He had..." Mike stopped to think. "She said he had ennui." The use of the French term surprised Kevvin a bit, even though it was perfectly natural for Mike to use such a term.

"Anyway, I am quite certain that he was not gay either. When Proust was a young man, he challenged someone to a duel simply for having intimated that he was involved in such a thing."