by Roan Parrish
“I love you,” Ginger says to Rex. “I love him,” she says to me.
Me too, I think, before I can even process the thought. Fuck me.
“The father was a black hole of spinelessness except when he was kissing the mother’s ass in the hopes of some small crumb of encouragement, approval, or affection. It was nearly vomit-inducing, except that I couldn’t possibly give the mother the grim satisfaction of thinking she’d turned me bulimic.”
Rex’s hand has found its way onto my thigh and its warm weight is comforting. I hand him the whiskey and he takes a few swallows.
“The sister attempted to break down all known laws of physics by simultaneously being completely self-centered and totally obsessed with what everyone else thought about her. It boggles the mind how one human being can possibly speak so many sentences about herself in a row and still have it seem like she’s saying mean things about you. Truly, she has apprenticed at the feet of the master. In related news, she and the mother got matching haircuts, so the sister now also looks like the fifty-year-old president of a Chabad house. The end.”
I pass Ginger the bottle silently.
“I know what we need,” she says. She walks over to the record player.
“Tom Waits,” I whisper to Rex so Ginger can’t hear.
After that perfect static smear, Tom Waits counts off, “1, 2, 3, 4,” and the opening strains of “Ol’ ’55” start.
“Called it,” I say, and Ginger raises the bottle to me in a mocking toast.
Then Rex’s stomach growls so loudly that I can hear it over the music.
“Sorry,” he says. “Are you guys hungry?”
It’s after ten and poor Rex hasn’t eaten anything since we stopped at a rest stop outside Pittsburgh. I shrug.
“I could eat,” Ginger says. “Here, I’ll order something. Or, do you want the tots?” she asks me.
“Ugh, no, not tonight, sorry,” I say. There’s this bar a few blocks away that makes these diabolical tater tots that they kind of treat like nachos, with Cheez Whiz, some meat that I probably don’t want to know about, and horseradish ketchup.
“I can make us something,” Rex offers.
“Good luck,” I say. Ginger waves him into the kitchen, winking at me.
“Jesus,” Rex says from the kitchen. “You’re as bad as Daniel.”
“I’ll get the menus.” Ginger has a folder of menus from every restaurant within a thirty-block radius, organized by current level of favor.
After we eat, I’m sleepy and a bit drunk. I feel a little raw from all the talking about feelings and shit, and also a little shy with Rex, like maybe he’s mad I didn’t tell him what I told them in response to Ginger’s prodding.
“Tell me something happy,” I tell Ginger. Whenever we talk about heavy shit, we always end with something happy, like conversational dessert. “Tell me about Christopher. The burrito holder,” I say to Rex.
“He smells really good, but like a grown-up,” Ginger says.
“That’s important,” I say, nodding.
“He holds eye contact for the exact right amount of time, so you can tell he’s focused on you but it doesn’t feel creepy.”
“Mmm.”
“He called me Gingerbread once and I only hated it, like, 65 percent.”
“Whoa.”
“Yeah. You can meet him, maybe. Tomorrow?”
“Maybe. Tomorrow’s the funeral. Tomorrow night?” She nods. Rex’s arm tightens around me when I say the word “funeral,” like it’s an emotional bomb against which I need to be supported.
“Tell me how you guys met, Rex.”
“You didn’t tell her?” Rex asks, and he sounds a little hurt.
“No, I did,” I say. “She wants to hear how you tell it.”
“Well,” Rex says, “I was out walking in the woods around my house. I’d heard wolf howls the night before, so I wanted to check it out.”
“You said you were hunting!” I accuse.
“No, you asked what the gun was for. I’ve only been hunting once. You just thought everyone in the country goes out to shoot their dinner every night. Besides, sweetheart, it was dark.”
Oh yeah. It was dark. I grumble and gesture at him to get on with it.
“Point is, I was worried about running into a wolf or something, when I heard this awful sound. Couldn’t tell what it was, but a while later I heard this guy talking to himself. I shined my light toward the sound and there’s this man holding an animal. When the light hit his face, I froze because I’d never seen someone so beautiful.”
My heart beats faster and I look up at Rex. He looks a little embarrassed.
“Clearly a city guy, wearing a suit and all, but he looked so out of place or something. Not just in the woods, but in the suit. And he looked terrified. At first I thought he was just really worried about the dog, but then he was looking at me like I was something out of a horror movie.”
“You had a gun,” I say weakly.
“When I got close to him to take the dog, he started babbling about whether the dog was a boy or a girl. It was adorable. I liked how he talked. Like I was smart and could understand whatever he was on about. He was just… different. I thought, if I can help that dog, maybe this guy will give me the time of day. So I brought them back to my house even though I never bring people there. I was trying so hard not to check him out that I took about twice as long to fix the dog’s leg as I needed to.
“When I ran a shower for him, I felt like a total pervert because here was this beautiful kid who’d gotten in a car accident and all I could think about was how to get him out of that ugly suit. When he took his shirt off and I saw those tattoos, I was done for.”
Now I can tell Rex is really talking to me.
“You took my shirt off.”
“Whatever,” Rex says, smiling at me. “He got drunk on a couple shots of whiskey, and then paraded into the kitchen with my pants so close to falling off that I almost swallowed my tongue.”
“They were too big,” I say, elbowing him.
“I made him a sandwich and he told me a bunch of stuff about the job he was interviewing for. I thought, shit, this guy is smart and gorgeous. And, from what I saw with the dog, a sweetheart. But he clearly thought we were in the middle of nowhere, so I knew there was no way he’d ever be back.
“He let it slip that he was gay and I thought he was going to pass out. I could see how scared he was, but he just stared me down like he was daring me to have a problem with him being gay. It was… hot. So when he started freaking out, I couldn’t help myself. I kissed him. I knew I’d only get one chance, so I figured I may as well go for it when he was incapacitated with fear.”
He winks at me and I roll my eyes, but my memory of that kiss is still vivid.
“Then we were on the couch and he was all drunk and warm and adorable.”
Rex shakes his head.
“When he kissed me it was all I could do not to rip those damned sweatpants off and—um, you know. But he was drunk and he’d been in an accident and it wouldn’t’ve been right. It killed me to do it, since I knew I’d never see him again, but I went to bed and left him on the couch.
“The next morning, he was dead to the world, sacked out on the couch with my sweatpants practically falling off. Like he’d been put on that couch specifically to show me what I could never have. I banged around in the kitchen for a while, hoping he might wake up, but he was out.
“I had to take the dog to the vet before I went to work, so I left him there. I wanted to program my number into his phone. Get his number and put it into mine. Leave him a note saying if he ever came back through Michigan he should look me up. But it felt pathetic. In a day or two, the guy would be gone, back to Philadelphia or New York City or wherever, and he’d never be back.”
I can’t help but notice that Rex mentions New York, where Will moved, as well as Philly.
“And anyway, I didn’t want to leave a note—even one to say Take care, because I d
idn’t want him to think I was stupid and spelled everything wrong. Which I do.”
Rex trails off.
“Got home that night and he was gone. Spent the next few months cursing myself for not leaving my phone number. Or something. But then, just when I’d convinced myself I’d never see him again, there he was.”
“There you were,” I murmur, my eyes closing.
“Come on, you narcoleptic,” Ginger says, shaking me. “He always does this,” she says to Rex. “We’ll be listening to a record or something and he just conks out like a baby in a fucking car seat.”
“I know,” Rex says. “At first I thought he was constantly sleep deprived.”
“Nah, he’s just always keyed up. Then, when he finally relaxes, he just falls asleep before he even notices.”
Rex seems to contemplate this while Ginger takes the whiskey away from me and clears the trash from dinner.
“You guys take the bed,” Ginger says, and Rex immediately protests.
“Oh, stop,” she says. “I’ve slept on this couch a hundred times. It’s fine. No way are the two of you going to fit on it. Unless”—she waggles her eyebrows at Rex—“you want to ditch this sad sack and cuddle up with me.”
“Back off, bitch,” I say, smiling at her. “Thanks, Ginge.” I hug her and she squeezes me just like she always does.
“I’m sorry, babycakes,” she says.
I strip down to my boxers without thinking about it. Nothing Ginger hasn’t seen before. Rex seems uncharacteristically shy, and crawls under the covers before he takes his shirt off, like we’re in high school or a nineteenth-century novel or something.
Ginger’s bed is a safe place, and almost immediately after crawling under the covers, a warm lethargy creeps over me, relaxing me.
“Thank you for bringing me here. For being here with me, I mean,” I say to Rex softly. I can hear Ginger brushing her teeth in the bathroom.
Rex kisses me lingeringly.
“Anything for you,” he says. Then he gathers me against his heat and I drift off to sleep, held in Rex’s arms and Ginger’s familiar bed.
15
Chapter 15
December
I wake to Ginger crawling into bed next to me while Rex is still asleep, one arm thrown above his head.
“He’s gorgeous and awesome,” Ginger says matter-of-factly.
“I know, right?” I whisper back. “What the hell is he doing with me?”
She smacks me lightly and rolls her eyes.
“Listen, Ginge, will you come with us to the funeral? I’m afraid I might murder one of the guys and then the two remaining ones will turn on me, which will make Rex kill them and really I don’t want to be responsible for Rex going to prison on top of all this….”
“Obviously, I’m going to the funeral with you, you idiot,” she says, but she smiles.
A little later, Rex runs down to the bodega on the corner for eggs and bread. After a late breakfast, Ginger calls my dad’s house to get the specifics of the funeral while Rex and I change. She figures they won’t be rude to her at least. I don’t know why she’d think that after all these years. She starts with the phone on speaker, but after Brian makes some disgusting comment and Ginger tells him he should go eat a dick and he replies, “Why don’t you get Danielle to do that since it’s his favorite thing to do,” she takes it off speaker and goes into the kitchen.
Rex lets out a controlled breath, shakes his head, and clenches his fists.
“Honestly, Daniel, I’m impressed you can even be in the same room as them.”
“I…. Brian’s not usually so bad. When I was younger, we were—well, not friends, but friendlier? We’d play catch or poker sometimes when he didn’t have anyone else to hang out with. And Sam. He calmed down a lot after he and Liza got married. He never really gave me too much shit because he was so much older.”
I knot my tie and shrug into my jacket, which Ginger took one look at when I pulled it out of my backpack and immediately hung in the bathroom to steam while we all had our showers. Rex runs his hand down my lapel.
“This is the suit you were wearing the night we met,” he says softly. I can’t believe he remembers. I was only wearing it for an hour.
“It’s the only one I have,” I say. “How do you…?”
Rex’s eyes never leave mine.
“I remember everything about that night, Daniel.”
He looks like he wants to say something else, but then he takes a deep breath and his eyes skitter away from mine and back to knotting his own tie.
Rex drives us to the funeral with one hand on the wheel and the other heavy on my thigh. He’s been so calm this whole time, so steady. I could see it in him the night we met—how solid he was.
“So what’s the deal with this funeral?” Ginger says from the backseat. “I mean, are you all secretly Jewish or something? I thought you guys waited, like, weeks before you buried people so you could do whatever voodoo you do to make bodies that can rise from the grave.”
Rex snorts.
“Fucking Vic,” I say. “He and Sam worked out some kind of deal with his cousin or something. I don’t know. They wouldn’t hear a word against him. Jesus Christ,” I say, running a hand through my hair, “I just hope this doesn’t turn into that scene in that movie you made me watch after you broke up with Stephen.”
“Oh yeah, Death at the Funeral,” Ginger says. “Ha, good movie.” Then to Rex she says, “The body falls out of the coffin.”
“Yeah, I saw it,” he says, his hand tightening on my thigh.
“Knowing Vic, he might bury Dad even if he’s not actually dead just to make a buck,” I say, going for levity, but it just comes out a little shaky.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, Dandelion turns morbid when he’s uncomfortable,” Ginger says to Rex, leaning forward to stick her head between our seats. Rex smiles at her in the rearview mirror.
“Yeah, I’m getting that,” he says, rubbing my leg with his warm hand.
“Dude,” I say, “you’re kind of turning me on. Do you want me to show up to my father’s funeral with a hard-on?”
Rex shoots me a dark and filthy look that says if he had his way he’d have me showing up everywhere with a hard-on, but he just pats me on the knee and puts both hands on the wheel.
“Brian said there’s going to be some kind of party in the shop?” Ginger continues.
“Yeah. For everyone who can’t make it to the cemetery today. You know my family: it’ll just be a shit-ton of beer and fried chicken and they’ll drink and cry and undoubtedly those creepy twins will smoke in the shop and set a garbage can on fire. There are these friends of my dad’s,” I tell Rex, “who no one can tell apart. Like, sincerely, I don’t even think my dad could tell them apart. He just always calls them The Twins, and no one’s ever seen them when they weren’t together. They’re super skinny so it kind of looks like they’re just one person that got sliced in half.”
Rex’s hand is back on my knee, gently. It’s as if he can hear how fucked-up I feel in everything I say. I feel better than I did on the drive to Philly—seeing Ginger’s helped a lot—but now I feel kind of… sick. Just vaguely nauseated, like I’ve forgotten something important or am about to get in trouble. I shouldn’t have eaten those eggs.
Besides me, Rex, and Ginger, my brothers, Liza, Luther, and a few of the other guys who work at the shop are the only ones there. It’s a graveside service, and, credit to Vic and his cousin, my father’s body does not fall out of the coffin.
Sam shook my hand when we walked up, and nodded to Rex and Ginger. He looks sharp, in an overcoat I’ve never seen before, and I’d lay money that Liza went out and bought it for him. He holds Liza’s hand the whole time.
Brian looked okay when we started, but now he’s crying. He’s trying to stay quiet, but tears and snot are dripping down his face and his sleeve is shiny from wiping them away. He doesn’t have a dress coat and Colin made him take off his Eagles down jacket at the gravesi
de. It’s fucking freezing out here, so now Brian is shaking too.
Colin.
It’s the strangest feeling, but Colin looks how I feel. He looks sick. He has circles under his eyes, and his hair, which is usually buzzed, has grown out some and looks crumpled from sleep. His lips are chapped and cracked from the cold and his eyes are puffy. When they lower the coffin into the ground, Colin squeezes his arms around his stomach and I realize I’m doing the same thing. Trying to hold it together from the outside in. Only he’s failing.
I’ve never seen Colin cry. His eyes are scrunched up and his neck is corded and I can tell that he’s nearly puking with the attempt to stay quiet. Sam is crying, Liza holding his arm. Tears are running down Luther’s weathered face and he’s making no attempt to hide them.
I am not crying. I am not sad. I am sick and numb and guilty with not crying.
I haven’t been to a funeral since my mom’s. At that one, everyone put roses on top of her coffin. One of my mom’s friends gave me a rose. White. She told me, “Put it on top of Mommy so she can take a part of you with her.” This—of course—terrified me, and I put the rose next to the grave, hoping no one would notice. One of our neighbors walked up last, and when he turned back after putting his rose on her coffin, he kicked my rose into the grave.
For months, I had nightmares where I was just sitting in class or taking a shower and I would feel a tugging in my stomach. I’d look down and see the stem of a rose sticking out of my belly button. Then a hand would reach for it. My mother’s hand. She’d take hold of the stem, thorns cutting her palm, and she’d pull. The stem would slid out of my stomach, ripping its way through, until finally the white bloom, now stained red with my blood, slid out. She would drag me into the darkness, tethered by the stem.
I tighten my arms around my stomach and Rex pulls me into him.
“You okay?” he asks softly, his mouth next to my ear. I shiver and nod.
