As Haron learned through the hardcore gabber that his mum used to play when he was little, music can be a physical sensation as well. Seconds before forcing himself into the steaming mass of people, he looks at the dancing crowd and applies some lip balm, synchronising his nodding to the rhythm of the beat. It’s Sunday afternoon and he came here on his own. Dancing makes you lighter.
It’s another twenty metres or so before he reaches the speakers at the front on the left, his favourite spot. With his soles sticking to the floor with every step he takes, he wonders what that sucking movement would sound like. Gaining ground metre by metre, the smell of escapism – chemical, grand and deliciously dirty – of cigarette and hashish, becomes ever stronger. He likes how people react when they accidentally bump into him, mouthing ‘excuse me,’ slapping his back, making eye contact or stepping aside, so far as that’s possible.
He pushes past clammy bodies and bare legs, past a woman breathing vodka fumes in his face, regulars who stand on the dance floor as if every brick in the club has their name written on it, tourists with equal parts fear and excitement in their eyes (he imagines himself superior to those silly day trippers) and past the music nerds scrutinising the work of the DJ. Go dance you morons, Haron thinks.
He peels the bright pink sticker off his iPhone camera and looks at himself on the screen: whopping pupils, his skin oily and yellow, jawline tight and fleshy. He smiles at his reflection, then realises where he is and puts the phone back in his pocket. He is almost touching one of the speakers now, its sound causing his nostrils to twitch and the floor to vibrate beneath his feet, the diminishing air pressure announcing a break in the song. In the strobe light, he stretches his arms and tickles the sky with his fingers.
While smoke machines create a thick fog in the room, he feels a hand on his bare shoulder. He is offered a fag by a guy holding a packet of red Gauloises between his slim, cinnamon-brown fingers, his grey-green eyes like saucers. He is beautiful in an endearing way, delicate and tender; his hand containing the pack of cigarettes is trembling. Smiling, Haron takes one, lights one for the guy first and watches its tip turn orange-red.
Haron reads his lips and suppresses the urge to peel off the dry skin. ‘You d-ea-f?’ the guy asks, over-articulating. Haron nods, surprised that his condition is obvious. The guy puts his hand on his own chest then reaches out to Haron, a tattoo of a blue sun on the inside of his wrist. ‘I think you’re be-au-ti-ful,’ he says. Haron puts the fag between his lips, takes the guy’s head between his hands, briefly massages the skin under his spiky hair and hands him his tin of lip balm.
They dance together, minutes that feel like hours. Haron stands with his back against one of the speakers, the air vibrating against his buttocks. The guy, who is called Sasha, as he wrote in a note on his phone, moves close to him. Sasha’s earbuds betray his routine; he dances with a conviction that pleases Haron, but he smells like Le Labo, trying to be unique, like everyone else in this city.
For a moment, Haron daydreams about a life together. They sit at the dinner table in his mother’s house and eat the Indonesian soup that she has cooked. He can tell that she likes him. She doesn’t fake these things.
The DJ filters out the bass, always using the same predictable but effective trick. Clenched fists, a tangle of arms, people hugging each other, a fluttering in Haron’s stomach as he makes eye contact with Sasha. He comes closer, takes Haron’s wrist and uses his fingertips and a little bit of nail to caress his biceps, the inside of his elbow, his forearm. Haron’s member stiffens and presses against the fabric of his shorts. Sasha narrows his eyes, the tip of his tongue between his teeth. Still holding the tin of lip balm, he removes the lid, runs two fingers through the ointment and pulls the waistband of Haron’s cut-off tracksuit bottoms towards him. Sasha slides his fingers into them. Haron closes his eyes and feels the ointment on his skin. Sasha holds his dick but doesn’t move. Like a tennis player inspecting the ball before serving, his hand forms a little bowl. Haron opens his eyes and looks Sasha right in his smiling face as he withdraws his fingers and slowly lubricates
his lips.
‘Want so-me…?’ Sasha mouths, pointing at Haron, still that smile on his shiny lips, everyone behind him dancing ecstatically, ‘…thing to dr-i-nk?’
Haron takes his mobile and types:
‘Deaf, not blind.’ He copies Sasha’s over-articulating, and Sasha begins to laugh ecstatically, bending over and resting his hands on his knees.
Haron imagines how they wake up together. How he makes coffee, pops open a tin of croissants, scoops some fig jam onto a small dish, puts a flower in a vase on the tray and walks into the bedroom, where Sasha waits for him with his hand behind his head, smiling, two perfectly hydrated lips shining in the morning light, the scent of that commonplace perfume faded.
‘No, thanks,’ Haron says, as Sasha straightens up. He grabs the tin of lip balm from Sasha’s hand, startling Sasha with the unexpected movement. ‘My friends are waiting for me by the loos.’ Haron turns around, leaves the dance floor and feels Sasha’s gaze following him as he goes. Now it’s his hand that is trembling, squeezing the tin of lip balm with all his might.