Over & Done With ☑️

Directions

Alicja wasn't going to let unanswered questions stand. The following days, she managed to get access to Internet multiple times and she gathered documentation, papers, pamphlets, videos on asexuality. Andy was less than happy about her digging into his personal background and turning it into a curiosity. There was angst in that emotion: what if she found out he wasn't only quirky? That he had this cold place inside of himself that had allowed him to kill without remorse for a good part of his life? If anything, he didn't want to be studied too closely.

He knew Alicja's research was harmless in itself, but she was treading on a path that, according to him, led to much worse.

"I didn't know you could be this obsessive," he said. She was once again scrolling on her phone near a bar that had free Wifi. She had no SIM card for Spain, but Internet worked just fine.

"I'm not obsessive," she said, "I want to understand. I have read a lot. Asexuality is a real thing. It is big and... varied." She paused, still reading, then looked at Andy. "Plus, I don't know why, I don't think of you that way. So it's handy."

"Yeah," said Andy in a mock approval, "collecting facts about someone you're trying to get off your mind? I'm not sure it's the best way."

Alicja laughed, reading her phone again. "You know, it's not about you. I read because there are people out there, they say clever stuff about this. Oh, they have a meeting tomorrow night, we should go! What do you think?"

"Mmm, no," said Andy, slightly creeped out at the idea. "No-sex anonymous is pretty far from my idea of fun and I certainly don't feel like being in the spotlight right now."

"It is not a support group, it is a meeting. What you have is not an illness. You don't have to be in therapy just because you live different. How come you are weird and judgemental at the same time, Andy?"

"Blah," said Andy. "I appreciate you going out of your way to try and help me, but this is my life you're messing with. I'm the only one allowed to make myself crash and burn or get better. It's on my terms. And I don't think I want to work on this part of my life right now. I'm not pained from being without a relationship, I don't need people to pat me on the back and I am not baring my soul in front of complete strangers. Give it up or I'll get angry for real."

Alicja frowned and dropped the topic reluctantly. "You're a grumpy old man," she said. She put her phone back in her backpack and grabbed her guitar.

"Fair enough," said Andy. They resumed playing for a good part of the afternoon.

With the possibility of a love life out of the window, a spell broke. They were at the same time closer than ever and counting the days. It was a bit of a paradox.

They had this strong sense of intimacy that made them able to talk about anything. Andy was very much against cuddling, but they would spend some time within cuddling distance. At the same time, the love talk had been a fork in the road. Andy was a man in his fifties whose main goal was to keep bumming around among relatively friendly human beings. Alicja was a young woman who thought of herself as a professional musician and wanted to find a person she could tie her soul around. At some point, she was gonna stop running, or he would find a new thing to do and their little trip would come to an end. They were on a last tour before it's all over and they enjoyed it that way.

They were in a village near Granada when the next thing happened. They were playing for longer that day, because they wanted to get the money for a youth hostel and take a shower. Comfort was lacking when you slept in a car. They would take a good, warm shower and get some decent rest for once.

They took a few breaks to eat, rest their fingers and arms, heat up as the winter wasn't getting any softer. A short time after noon, a group of people in their twenties stopped and listened for a while. They all gave an outdoorsy vibe, wearing wellingtons and practical outfits. After ten minutes, one of them, a lanky guy with brown skin and a goatee got a sort of wooden flute out of his backpack and asked if he could join. He was called Jon. They had difficulties understanding what he said but were more than happy to jam with someone else. It hadn't happened so often. Alicja thought it was because it was winter: people were much more likely to join the band on a beautiful summer day.

The flute joined them and meshed with the guitar, the ukulele and the two voices. It knew where to pick up, when to wind down, how the melodies should be woven. It was beautiful, simply. Both Andy and Alicja got carried on the sound. They exhausted the songs they knew, played them again, made up new songs when they were done.

The night was almost upon them now. They were getting hungry, and the group of strangers they had spent hours with invited them to share their meal.

The group was composed of Jon and his friends, Ivan and Gabi. Without his flute, he wasn't very talkative. The English of the two others was way worse than Alicja's, but they all came to an understanding. They were Spanish and hadn't traveled so much, which explained their difficulties.

"We come here for food," said Gabi to Alicja, "but we live other place. You have one car?"

She was trying hard to get through the guy's accent. "Yeah, we have a car," she said. Until now, the three of them liked speaking with her better. They said Andy spoke too fast. "Andy, what do you think?"

He shrugged, serene. The best music session of his life had left him floating on a small cloud of happiness. "You mean about dinner? Why not, yeah, we can do that if you want to."

"It would probably be pretty nice," she said.

"All right then," said Andy. He turned towards their three new friends. "We can follow you with our car," he said, deliberately slowly. Come on, they weren't gonna not speak to him because his English was too good! He had his pride.

The evening was turning int something quite unexpected. Alicja and Andy followed the three out of the village, into the countryside of Granada. It was vaguely mountainous and planted with olive trees all over, like polka dots on a dusty dress. After twenty minutes on a rather straight road, they turned left and parked near what looked like an old farm. A couple of buildings painted white with a tiled roof, surrounded by low trees. It was pretty obvious that they had a hard time growing there: anything would. Winter was OK, but from the landscape you could tell there was not a lot of rain throughout the year.

Gabi and Jon showed them around while Ivan carried the supplies they had been shopping for. They called the place 'La casa de nadie' which apparently meant 'House of no one' or 'for no one', this detail was lost in translation. Two goats looked at them tour the house, the small garden, the warehouse where they worked on stuff. Ivan was a tailor and Gabi worked as smith, crafting wrought iron pieces and repairing tools for the neighbours. There was a fourth person living there, Daniela, but she was absent at the moment. From the way they talked about it, things didn't seem to be going well with her.

Andy was amazed by the place. It was a big an quiet piece of land, with its inhabitants living semi-autonomously. From the farm, you could see the dry slopes of Andalusia. The mountains were close, the sea just beyond the mountains, it had everything! Gabi laughed when he said that, explaining that they cooked on a stove and that they had only dry toilets. Still, Andy was impressed.

This was the moment when he realized what he wanted to do next: he wanted to live just like that, tend to the garden, take long walks through the hills, have friendly people around. He wanted a commune.