by Jason June
Most of my gay stats research talked about our issues living in a heteronormative society, but it looked like straight people weren’t the only ones who needed to examine their problematic behavior.
“Thanks,” Albert said. “Honestly, that comment you made on the first day of school? The stat about vending machines killing more people than sharks? It was such a dorky thing to say, and—”
“Ugh, I am such an idiot,” I interrupted.
“No, no,” Albert said. “I don’t mean dorky in a bad way. It was perfect.” His eyes practically pulsed with sincerity. It took everything in me not to tilt my head up and kiss him. “It felt like such an authentic statement. Like you were being unapologetically Jay. It made me think that I could just be myself around you.”
It was a relief that Albert liked it when I embraced the stats-loving geek that I am inside. I didn’t have to do all the romance equations of these words + this flirtatious action = sexually attractive Jay when I was around him.
“The feeling is so mutual,” I said. We stood there, staring at each other with stupid grins on our faces. I think we both could have stood there all day, but Albert eventually pulled his eyes away, and led us down the street. “So, for our date, I thought you might want to see the city from the Space Needle.”
It was like Albert could read my mind and knew the landmark was on the Gay Agenda. Visions of making out at the top while a rainbow appeared over Mount Rainier flew through my mind.
But then a whole new vision joined it: It was Jimmy Arlington in fourth grade coming back to Riverton Elementary after spending spring break in Seattle. It was a big deal when anyone went somewhere we deemed far away (any place other than Spokane). Jimmy had bragged about going to the coolest video game arcade he’d ever seen. A plan began to form in my mind that I thought Albert might like.
“There’s someplace else I’ve been interested in seeing too,” I said. “I think it’s called GameWorks?”
Albert’s mouth fell open. “Seriously?”
“I’ve never been, and I’m not sure if it’s still around, but I’ve heard it’s a great place to play video games.”
Albert looked like he was finally getting a puppy after begging for one for months.
“It’s this really cool arcade that is three floors of games,” he explained. “It’s one of my favorite places. You really want to go?”
“Absolutely. If it’s your favorite place, let’s do it. I want to see Albert’s Seattle.”
This was not the first date I’d expected when thinking about crossing it off the Gay Agenda. But this feeling of wanting to make a boy I liked happy was new and exciting, and I wanted to see where it went.
“I do have to warn you, though, I am not a gamer at all,” I added.
That smoldering look came over Albert. “That totally won’t be a problem. I can teach you.”
We sprinted the last couple of blocks to GameWorks when it started to pour, providing the optimal rom-com environment for a rain-drenched kiss. In my hunt for real-world stats, I’d found that a very large number of people’s highest-rated kissing scenes include rain because 1) it adds drama to an already heightened emotional moment, and 2) it makes people’s clothes cling to them so that dramatic moment suddenly turns sexy. I totally got it as Albert’s shirt wrapped closer and closer to his torso with each passing second.
The exterior of GameWorks was pretty nondescript: it was all beige stone occasionally streaked with gray from city soot clinging to the constantly wet walls (I guess rain doesn’t make everything sexy, after all). But when Albert held the door open for me, the inside was a totally different story. It was tech overload. There were beeps and boops and blasts coming from every direction, with flashes of light going off as people blew up androids and aliens and Death Stars or whatever. In the center of all the arcade games was a three-story video wall. People in roller-coaster chairs were hoisted up and down the three levels as they shot at zombies coming to maul them.
“Whoa,” I breathed.
Albert put his hand on my shoulder and my whole body buzzed. “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” he said, gazing longingly at a Grand Theft Auto game.
My attention was entirely drawn to his face. “Yeah, it is.”
We stepped up to buy tickets. The bored attendant grunted out that it would be $150 for two two-hour unlimited play passes. Holy hell! I had no idea video games could be so expensive.
I rushed to pull out my wallet. A couple people had asked me at Riverton, “But, like, who pays on a gay date? You’re both guys so there’s no chivalry. Can you be a gentleman to another gentleman?” Even with no experience, I had always insisted that each person could just pay for themselves. I was about to put that into practice now that I was actually faced with who would be paying for who. It seemed like a lot to expect Albert to pay seventy-five dollars for me to play games I knew absolutely nothing about. But Albert waved my wallet away.
“This is on me,” he said.
“I couldn’t ask you to pay that much!” I was extremely aware of other people’s money now that Lu didn’t have any. “Besides, it was my idea to come here.”
“I’d like to do this for you,” Albert said.
Turns out, you can be a gentleman to another gentleman, gay chivalry does exist, and there was no limit to the amount of times Albert could make me swoon.
“Thanks.” Our eyes met and we were grinning at each other like dumb kids all over again. How long would it be until our grins were on top of each other while we kissed?
“Do you guys want the tickets or what?” the attendant asked, totally killing the moment.
Albert’s cheeks flushed. “Sure, yeah.” He handed over two hundred dollars and walked away.
The attendant waved a few bills at Albert’s retreating back. “Don’t you want your change?”
“Oh. Whoopsie.” He actually said whoopsie!
Albert snatched the cash and shoved it into his pocket. “You’re making me nervous,” he said. “I’m never nervous. What are you doing to me, Collier?”
This was actually happening. After almost eighteen years of waiting for another boy to make it super clear that he liked me, here I was standing next to a guy who said that I made him nervous. I knew that with Tony I had already done so much more than what I was about to do, but that didn’t stop my heart from racing with excited jitters.
My hand shook a little as I took a deep breath and grabbed Albert’s hand.
Technically, hand-holding was already crossed off the Gay Agenda, but this moment felt even more monumental because I had taken the lead, and it was extremely intentional. Was my hand way sweatier than I wanted it to be? Yes. But even still, there was something so magical about standing there with a hot guy’s hand in mine, all of our attention on each other instead of having to dodge six-foot-tall fire hydrants like I had at the Lambda Chi party.
Albert looked down at our hands, then back at me, then back at our hands. Maybe I should have waited longer; I had always planned for ninety minutes to be the appropriate hand-holding wait time. But I’d rushed it within the first ninety seconds we were in GameWorks, and now I’d totally freaked Albert out. He probably thought I was some obsessed kid who was going to start calling him my boyfriend from this moment on.
“Sorry,” I mumbled, loosening my grip.
“No,” Albert said. He squeezed my fingers so I couldn’t let go. “I like it.”
“Whoa. Whoa! Oh frack! WATCH OUT!”
Albert and I zipped up and down the three-story video wall, my stomach lurching every time my seat whipped up another level. It turns out I’m a very vocal video game player. I screamed whenever a zombie popped out or my seat moved, and each time I shot a monster’s head off, I whooped in victory. The latter happened very rarely. I was lucky Albert got us unlimited play cards because I was getting eaten by zombies more often than I was shooting them to pieces.
“Albert! On your left!” I had already been knocked out by an undead little girl, but Al
bert had made it to the boss level. If he made this shot, he would win the game.
Albert held his plastic blue gun like he was an actual marine sent to destroy the zombie hordes invading America. He whipped to the side and decimated that rotting bastard.
“Gotcha!” He holstered his gun as a military head honcho congratulated us (read: Albert) on our heroism.
Our seats lowered to the first level and we walked back to the game floor. “I don’t know how you play that without screaming,” I said. “You’re so calm and collected when zombies try to tear out your throat.”
“It just takes practice,” Albert said. “You’ll be a pro in no time. We’ll just have to keep coming back.”
My mind burst into squeals louder than a Shawn Mendes concert. EEEEEEEEE! Keep your cool, Jay. Keep your cool.
“I’d like that.”
Albert looked at his phone. “We only have ten minutes left before our play runs out.”
“What should we do?” I asked.
“I know just the thing,” Albert said, and grabbed my hand. We had reached the point in the date where lacing our fingers together had become our default position. How had my hands ever functioned outside of his?
We passed racing games with people riding life-sized motorcycles, then veered left at a row of Skee-Ball machines. We finally stopped at a little fort-looking game that you had to climb inside to play. “Jurassic World” was plastered on the side with bloodthirsty dinosaurs chasing A-list actors.
Albert pulled me inside without a word. Suddenly it was just the two of us, the flashes and lasers and other gamers disappearing as we sat together in our own private cave. All the sounds of GameWorks were replaced by Bryce Dallas Howard explaining that we were dino hunters looking to stop the Indominus rex. I never knew that talk of a carnivore hell-bent on eating every human in sight could be so romantic.
With a gentle tug, Albert pulled me closer. His pressure was tender but firm, lifting me just enough so that I slid over effortlessly. Our thighs pressed together, my body aware of every single atom that touched Albert. Our faces were close enough that I could see my reflection in his glasses, but I wanted to be even closer. Albert must have felt that, too, because he leaned in, stopping when his lips were just millimeters away from mine.
“Is this okay?” he whispered. There was something about him asking permission that made my already flying heart rocket to the moon.
I nodded at supersonic speed. This was more okay than anything had ever been in my entire life.
Even though it could have only taken .002 seconds, it was like everything went in slow motion. Albert’s eyes zeroed in on my mouth. His fingers curled around a belt loop on either side of my hips. His lips parted just slightly, then he closed the distance, his mouth finally landing on mine.
Talk about tender but firm. Albert’s lips were soft as he took my top lip between his, pulling slightly with just enough pressure to make every single nerve ending pulse. He wasn’t frenzied, like Tony. He was measured and slow, taking his time to pull back before dipping his mouth again to wrap my lips up in his once more. It was like he was savoring me, wanting to taste not only my lips, but my soul. He wasn’t just putting his body into this kiss. He was putting his heart into it too.
I kissed him back, letting my tongue dip just slightly into his mouth. My taste buds flooded with the flavor of his spearmint gum. Albert gasped when my tongue hit his, then pressed his own against mine. I wanted to taste him forever.
Albert moved a hand from my belt loop onto my leg. The blood pounding in my heart moved between my thighs. My whole body wanted him, my entire soul too, and it hit me that an item on the Gay Agenda always should have been to find Albert. To find the guy who could set my spirit and my sexuality on fire all at the same time.
Nothing could make me pull away from this kiss, this moment. Nothing could make me—
“THIS HAS GOT TO STOP!”
I snapped back. “What was that?”
Albert chuckled and nodded toward the screen. Bryce Dallas Howard was screaming about dinosaur carnage.
“Sorry,” I said, the blood rushing from my crotch to fire up my cheeks. “I don’t know anything about games, remember?”
“That’s okay.” Albert squeezed my thigh and pulled me into him. “I’m happy to be your teacher.”
He took my mouth in his again, his tongue lightly brushing over my lips.
I’d take all the lessons he wanted to give.
JAY’S GAY AGENDA
1.Meet another gay kid. Somewhere, anywhere . . . please! in Seattle in, like, days!
1.5.Get checked out by a very VSB!
2.Go on any Digimals a video game date with Albert a boy at the Space Needle and learn just how much game Albert’s really got.
2.5.Hold hands within the first ninety minutes a VSB after being pulled into my first ever drag show by a queen named after a fish.
3.Go to a dDance with a boy and have my first kiss slow dancing to Shawn Mendes while getting caught in a surprise Seattle downpour.
4.Have a boyfriend, one who likes to wrap me up in his arms and let me be little spoon, and maybe smells tastes like coffee from all the cafés he goes to spearmint, and who ignites my soul and my sexuality.
5.Fall in love with a boy, but wait for him to say it first so I don’t seem too desperate, and maybe he says it for the first time at Pike Place Market or in the first Starbucks.
6.Make out with Albert, or Tony, or you know, any guy who keeps himself in my personal bubble, with tongue, and hard enough that I’d get a little burn from his stubble. run my fingers along that perfect jawline. the hottest snowman this side of the North Pole.
7.See another penis besides my own, IRL, and do fun things with it!
8.Lose. My. Virginity!
9.Become part of a super-queer, super-tight framily by impressing everybody with my epic costumier skills, erasing the “new kid” label, and becoming homecoming royalty.
10.Figure out a way to make my gay dreams come true and not destroy my bestie’s life.
17.
Finally Get Through Call Waiting
“HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” Dad pounded on my mattress with both fists, his classic go-to method for waking me up. He’d use it when I wanted to sleep in on the weekends, but he wanted me to help with chores around the property. I so did not miss country living.
“Whassat?” I rubbed the crust from my eyes and tried to muster enough energy to sit up. I was exhausted. I’d been thinking about Albert for the past thirty-six hours. I hadn’t slept Saturday or Sunday night reliving that perfect kiss with him—and maybe imagining what doing more with him would be like too.
Dad held out an everything bagel with strawberry cream cheese, my favorite combo. A candle perched in the hole of each half. “I wanted to catch you before you head out to school,” Dad said. He sat down on my bed, looking at me with big, very un-Dad-like doe eyes. “Eighteen years old. You’re officially an adult.”
“Yeah.” I yawned. “I can buy cigarettes and gamble.” And buy porn, but I didn’t need to bring that up to Dad.
“Both of which you won’t do,” Dad said, flicking my knee. “But you can and will vote.” He handed me the plate. The smell of freshly toasted bagel was enough to give me the boost I needed to sit up.
“Thanks, Dad.” I blew out the candles, wishing for a fully crossed-off Gay Agenda with no casualties. Number ten was especially on my mind. I still hadn’t heard from Lu, and it was really freaking me out.
I took a bite of the perfect mix of savory and sweet to lift my spirits. “Where’s Mom?”
“She had to go into work early again,” Dad said. “Apparently there’s been a mix-up on milk orders at the Fresh Savings in Bellingham.”
I gasped. “Not a Dairy Disaster!”
“And there’s only one woman for the job,” Dad mumbled. The slump in his shoulders could only mean the Dairy Disaster led to a Depressed Dad.
“You miss Mom, don’t you?” I knew he was super
proud of her for getting this new job, but the romantic in him hated that she’d been traveling so much.
Dad waved his hand dismissively. “No, no. She’s doing what she needs to provide for this family.” He paused, his forehead furrowing deeper by the second. “Okay, maybe I miss her. A lot. We’re in a whole new town and I’d love to explore it with her.”
“It’s just barely been two weeks,” I said with my mouth full. “There’s still plenty of time to explore.” I swallowed, finishing the first half of the bagel while Dad grabbed the second and took a bite.
“Hey!” I tried to swipe it back.
“You’ll understand when you find the man of your dreams,” Dad said, dodging me even though his look was faraway, probably imagining some romantic getaway with Mom. “When you find your perfect match, even one day without them is too much.”
I had an inkling of what he meant. I couldn’t stop thinking about when I’d get to kiss Albert again.
“Anyway.” Dad reached into his back pocket and pulled out a white envelope. “From your mother and me.”
I opened it and saw an Alaska Airlines gift card. “What’s this for?” Mom usually had a no-gift-cards-as-presents rule. She said they were too impersonal and didn’t require thought.
“This new life happened so fast,” Dad said. He gazed out the window like if he squinted hard enough, he’d be able to see our log home back in Riverton. “We wanted you to know that you can fly back to visit Lu whenever you want while you adjust.”
I wasn’t so sure that Lu would even want me to visit. She never took more than fifteen minutes to respond to a text, let alone three days. But she’d been MIA from texts, phone calls, a “Call meeeeeeeeee” email, and when I Skyped for our digital Saturday sleepover after my date with Albert. WT actual frack was going on?
