by Roan Parrish
“What did you say?” Rex asks evenly.
“I said no,” I say, studying his face for a reaction. But he looks as calm as ever.
“How come?”
His voice is casual but his expression is intense. Like he’s trying very hard not to lead me in answering.
“I—because I… we—I guess I thought we—I mean, I don’t know… maybe we’re not….”
“You said no because we’re dating?”
I wouldn’t have necessarily put it like that. Rex is not Richard, I repeat over and over in my head, as if Ginger were yelling it at me. I nod miserably, but a warm smile spreads across his face.
Rex speaks slowly, like he’s considering his words very carefully.
“Because you don’t want to date anyone else? Or you do, but you’re just not interested in Jay?”
I grab my wine and swallow a few gulps.
“Both. I mean, no. The first one. And I’m not interested in Jay. But, I mean, you can—date other people. Like, because we haven’t had that conversation, I know.”
“I think we’re having it right now,” Rex says. He scoots closer to me in the booth, so our knees are touching. I look down at his thighs, let them take over my whole field of vision. There is no conversation. There is nothing but Rex’s powerful thighs.
“I don’t want to date anyone else, Daniel,” Rex says. His voice is low and possessive, his hand covering my thigh. My head jerks up. He’s looking at me tenderly and my heart starts to pound. I swallow again, my throat dry.
“Neither do I.” It comes out like a whisper.
“Lucky me,” Rex drawls, smiling.
I grin at him and start to laugh, totally relieved.
After that, we don’t have time for dessert if I want to get us to the movie in time, so Rex says we’ll go back to his house later and he’ll show me how to bake something. Just the idea of watching his big hands and powerful body as he bakes sends a flush of arousal through me. I picture him peeling off that heavy sweater and doing it shirtless in those tight jeans.
Rex throws an easy arm over my shoulder as we walk to the movie, pulling me into his warmth. Suddenly, I can’t believe that this is my life. I have a… there’s no other word for it: boyfriend. I have a boyfriend and we’re out on a date, and he has his arm around my shoulder. I don’t even have a frame of reference for this feeling.
The theater is in the basement of a building on campus that I’ve never been in before.
“It’s an old movie from the seventies. A film series,” I tell Rex as we walk downstairs. As soon as the words are out of my mouth all the stupid self-satisfaction I felt at picking something Rex would like fades away. It’s just a movie. And we went to dinner. I took Rex to dinner and a movie. It’s literally the most clichéd date of all time. “I just thought you might like it,” I finish lamely.
Rex just smiles at me. A soft, intimate smile. He cups the back of my neck and pulls me in.
“Thank you,” he says softly, and kisses my ear.
Oh. Well, that’s okay, then.
Once we’re seated, Rex takes my hand. There are only about ten people here and I’m relieved to see that none of them are my students.
“Am I allowed to know what movie it is?” Rex asks.
“The Phantom of Liberty,” I say. “Have you seen it?”
He shakes his head and runs his hand through his hair.
“Thank you for tonight.”
“It’s kind of the least I can do,” I say. “I mean, you carved me something out of a tree with your bare hands.”
“Not really,” Rex says with a warm smile.
“Seriously, Rex. I don’t know why I didn’t think to ask you before. I just, you know, I’ve never asked someone out on a date before. I mean, obviously, I know that’s what you’re supposed to do, but it’s never been part of my life at all, so.”
“I know that,” he says, stroking the back of my hand with his thumb. “There are no rules for relationships, Daniel. There’s no one way things are supposed to go. You know that, right?”
I nod. But… aren’t there? I mean, not like Leo’s sister’s dumb kind of rules, but aren’t there things you’re supposed to do, like take your boyfriend out to dinner? There’s that word again.
“None?” I ask.
Rex looks at me intently and I can see him really thinking about it. He shrugs.
“If you care about someone then you look out for them, right? You’re careful with them. But it’s the same as with friends or family. Those are just people rules, though. There are no rules for me, no. I mean, no rules like: you have to buy me flowers or cook me breakfast in bed. No greeting card rules.”
“Fuck!” I say exaggeratedly. “Was I supposed to bring you flowers?”
Rex smirks and puts his hand on my thigh. He touches me all the time. It’s almost like he doesn’t notice it. Like I’m just an extension of his body and so of course he would touch me. But, no, that makes it sound thoughtless. It’s like when I’m near him he decides that it’s his right to touch me. It makes me feel so connected to him.
At first, every time we touched I wondered if it might be the last time. I felt greedy about those touches because I wasn’t sure when the next one was coming. Now, it’s like whenever he’s touching me he’s telling me that I’m his. That he’s taking me on as something within his purview.
“We can make our own rules, cowboy,” he drawls as the lights dim.
I laugh at the French translation of the title, Le Fantôme de la liberté, realizing it’s a play on the line, “a spectre is haunting Europe—the spectre of communism,” from The Communist Manifesto, fantôme being the French for spectre. That makes me start thinking about the chapter I’ve been working on and I make an effort to clear my mind so I can pay attention. There may not be greeting card rules to dating Rex, but I’m pretty sure you’re not supposed to be writing your book in your head while you’re on a date.
The movie begins and Rex’s hand tightens on my thigh. I glance at him and see that his jaw’s clenched.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, fine,” he says, and pats my leg.
The movie is definitely weird, but it’s interesting. I have no background in film. Like I told Rex, I never even watched many popular movies as a kid. Superheroes and some horror movies and that’s about it. But I’m glad Rex likes them because I’ll be happy to get an unofficial education.
After a half hour or so, I notice Rex glancing over at me more and more often. At first it was sweet; he seemed like he couldn’t keep his eyes off me. Now, though, it seems like he may just hate the movie.
“Are you bored?” I whisper.
“No, no,” he says quickly, and looks back at the screen.
About twenty minutes later, though, his hand is back on my knee and he’s tracing complicated patterns closer and closer to my crotch, which is making it hard to pay attention. Not that I need to pay particular attention because the movie’s kind of disjointed. A boy and his aunt are making out and Rex is stroking my leg. Some people are sitting on toilets at a dinner table and Rex leans down to softly kiss my neck. I pull away a with a shiver and shoot him a dirty look because I don’t want to get all riled up in a theater at the school where I teach.
He kisses my cheek chastely and looks back at the screen, but he seems off. Fidgety and tense. Did I offend him?
I’m still wondering when the movie ends. The end is actually really beautiful, with the sounds of a riot at a zoo and the only thing on the screen a puzzled ostrich’s head bobbing back and forth seeking out the sound.
As we walk out, I cast a look at Rex. He doesn’t look mad, I don’t think, but he’s got his fists jammed in his pockets and he’s staring at his shoes.
“Weird movie, huh?” I say stupidly as I start the car.
“Yeah. So,” Rex says as if to change the subject, “ready to learn how to bake?”
“Sure. What are we making?”
“Do you like gingerbread?”
“Yeah, I love it.”
“Great.”
He sounds cheerful, but his knee is bouncing and he’s holding on to the seat with both hands. I’m not that bad a driver, I don’t think. Although, I’ve never driven with him before, only ridden in his car, so maybe this is how he always is as a passenger.
“I googled the director before the movie,” I say. “I didn’t realize he was the one who made this famous short movie with Salvador Dalí in 1929. The one where they cut open a woman’s eyeball?”
Rex doesn’t say anything and I find myself rambling on in the silence of the car.
“I loved the end. And the thing about the inversion of consumption and evacuation at the dinner scene was really interesting. I mean, that’s culture, right? Just a set of customs that tell us it’s polite to shove food into our faces in front of each other but not polite to take a shit. And it could just as easily go the other way, like in the movie. It makes total sense, you know? Like, what’s so special about the things we hide away anyway? Would they become unimportant if we just did them out in the open? And vice versa the things we think are fine. It doesn’t actually take that much for something to become taboo. Or, at least for us to stigmatize things and give people total complexes about them.”
I trail off as we pull into Rex’s driveway. Rex unlocks the door and as we walk inside, he sighs.
“You hated it, right?” I ask.
He shakes his head.
“Well, then what did you think.”
“It was interesting,” he says vaguely.
“Okay….”
He crouches down and pets Marilyn, who trotted over when we walked in.
“Okay,” I try again. “Well, I’m sorry if you didn’t like it.”
“I liked it fine,” Rex says, standing. He definitely sounds mad now. “I just don’t have a thesis about it to tell you, okay? I don’t have a clever theory to share or anything. All right?”
Where the fuck did that come from? Jesus, I must have sounded like a total pretentious asshole in the car to have pissed him off that much. That’s the problem with nervous rambling. People think you’re attached to the things you say rather than talking out of your ass.
“Jesus,” I say, putting my hands up. “I just meant that you didn’t have to pretend to like it if you didn’t. I was just trying to do something you’d like. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to do?”
Rex doesn’t say anything.
“Oh, right,” I continue. “There are no rules. Well, that’s fine for you. It’s really easy to throw the rules out if you already know them. But I don’t. Anyway, if you hated it, it’s fine, but you don’t have to be such an asshole about it.”
“All I meant—”
“Oh, I know what you meant! You think I’m being the pretentious professor who thinks he’s so fucking smart. Well, screw you. That’s not what I think.”
“You don’t actually know everything that I’m thinking, Daniel,” Rex says, his voice scary. “You can’t read minds! I know you think that you can just look at everyone in this town and know what they think about you or about politics. But you can’t.”
“I don’t think that!” I say, furious and frustrated. “I’ve never said that. Is that what you fucking think of me? That I think I’m smarter than everyone else? That I think I know everything? Because if that’s what you think you had better say so right now.”
Rex says nothing, the look on his face unreadable.
I storm into the kitchen and pour myself a glass of wine from the bottle on the counter. Am I supposed to leave now? Is that what you do when you have a fight with someone who you can’t hit? Fuck! There’s another rule that doesn’t exist, I guess. So, then, how am I supposed to know what to do?
Rex comes into the kitchen.
“I don’t think that,” I say to him again, leaning on my elbows on the counter. How can I make him understand? This is what people always think. My brothers, my father. That I think I’m better than everyone just because I went to grad school. But it isn’t what I think. I just like talking about books and movies. And I notice when people look askance at me for it. That’s all.
I drop my head down between my shoulders, but I can feel Rex’s heat at my side. I’m so furious with myself for this lame date that I want to punch myself in the face. Or punch a wall hard enough that my knuckles will be swollen tomorrow in reminder. And I’m fucking embarrassed. I guess Leo was right not to look convinced.
“Fuck, Rex, I suck at this! I’m shit at romance, or whatever the hell a date’s supposed to be. I don’t know how I’m supposed to act. I don’t know what I’m supposed to say or do! I don’t know how it’s supposed to go, and don’t tell me there is no supposed to because I know there is. I know there is because if I were doing it right you wouldn’t be looking at me like that right now. I wouldn’t have pissed you off and…. Dammit!” I yell.
I hit the counter with my fist, since I’m relatively sure I won’t break it. The counter, I mean.
“I can’t even take you out on a date without fucking the whole thing up. I should never have taken you to that stupid movie. You’re right, it was fucking pretentious of me and of course you hated it!”
“I didn’t hate it!” Rex yells. “Would you stop? I didn’t hate the movie, Daniel. I didn’t… I didn’t fucking understand it, okay?”
He puts his hands over his mouth, like he’s just said something he can’t take back.
“Oh, well, I mean, Surrealism’s pretty disjointed, so—”
“No. I mean—shit,” he breaks off shaking his head. “I couldn’t read the subtitles. I can’t… I don’t read very well.” He shakes his head again, like he’s frustrated with what he said. He looks up at me as if it takes a lot of effort. “I’m dyslexic,” he says. “Severely.”
It takes me a minute to process this, since Rex seems so completely competent at everything, but once it sinks in, the pieces fall into place like the reveal at the end of a mystery novel.
Rex taking my phone number rather than writing his own, Rex not texting, Rex having no use for the Internet, Rex cooking without recipes. Jesus, of course. And that night with Will and Leo, when Leo wanted to place that game where you had to read things off scraps of paper, Will made excuses because he knew Rex wouldn’t be able to do it. Because he knows. And Rex never told me.
Fuck, that can’t be good.
I realize that I haven’t said anything and Rex is now looking back down at his hands. I’m not sure what to say. I can tell this is a big deal to Rex, and I don’t want to say the wrong thing.
Absent anything helpful to say, I decide to take a page out of Rex’s book and I put a hand on his shoulder. He’s shaking. He looks so tired all of a sudden; his forehead is wrinkled and his mouth is tight.
“I’m not—” He shakes his head in frustration. “I’m not stupid.” He spits out the word. “It’s just that things get all jumbled up. Especially if I’m nervous. I mean, I can read. Subtitles go too fast, though.” Every word is tight, bitten off. It’s clearly killing him to tell me this.
He walks into the living room and starts to build a fire. I follow, sitting on the couch and just watching the strong line of his back, his clever hands kindling the fire quickly. Marilyn trots over and licks my hand, then settles into her favorite spot in front of the fire. God, it must be amazing to be Marilyn. Warm, taken care of, pet all the time, nothing to do except eat and shit and cuddle and sleep by the fire. Never having to worry about whether you’re acting right or if someone’s going to misinterpret what you said. Never trying to figure out what you want.
Rex sinks down onto the couch next to me, looking at me intently.
“Sometimes I can hardly think when I look at you,” he says, almost like he’s talking to himself.
“Wha?” I garble out stupidly. He traces my eyebrows with his thumbs and then lets his hands fall away as he leans his head back onto the couch and sighs. He looks lost for the first time since I’ve known him.
I straddle Rex’s lap and put my hands on his shoulders, so I’m looking into his eyes.
“I know you’re not stupid,” I tell him calmly. “I think you’re incredibly smart. You have an insane memory. Amazing spatial skills. You can fix everything and you know how things work just by looking at them. You are anything but stupid.”
Rex lets out a breath. He seems… relieved, maybe? That he told me. His hands come up to settle on my hips. He nods, though barely.
“When did you realize it?” I ask, rubbing his shoulders. “Were you diagnosed?”
He shakes his head.
“I was bad at school, always. I understood what the teachers said, but books and worksheets were all muddled. But I didn’t know any different, so I didn’t realize it wasn’t the same for other kids. I didn’t talk to anyone. Never said, ‘hey, why are the letters all jumbled on the worksheet’ so someone could tell me they weren’t.”
The thought of Rex as a little boy, so painfully shy that he doesn’t even know he’s different, gives me a funny emptiness in my stomach.
“Didn’t your teachers ever talk to your mom or something?”
“We moved so much I was never in the same school for long. My teachers thought I was dumb, or lazy. No one asked about it, though. Why I didn’t do the work. After a while, my mom stopped keeping my records because we moved every six months sometimes. She never asked to see my homework or my grade on a test. She didn’t care about stuff like that. Didn’t know about it, really. By the time report cards got mailed home, we were long gone, so she never knew I did badly and I never told her. I don’t think she would’ve noticed if I just never went back. So….” Rex glances up at me nervously. “I didn’t. I never finished high school. After Jamie—I never went back.”
Rex looks embarrassed. I run my fingers through his thick hair, the few silver strands glinting among the brown.
“Ginger never finished high school either,” I say carefully. “She dropped out in her junior year to do her apprenticeship at the tattoo shop. Her parents were furious.”
He nods and I can feel him relaxing, his tense thighs softening slightly, shoulders unclenching.
