by Seth King
Outwardly, I went about my life like the independent kidult I was trying to become, but deep inside, I was torn apart. Nobody had ever liked anyone like I’d liked that boy. And he wouldn’t let me in.
Hey.
The text came while I was watching some home decorating show and trying to follow some Pinterest roast beef recipe. The mixture in the pot looked more like a pile of horse turds, though, and I was halfway to giving up. Looking down at my phone and seeing his name on the screen felt like drinking water after a week in the Sahara. It felt like validation.
It also made me see the homeless woman’s eyes, two little haunted houses inside a human skull…
Hi, I said, but then I deleted it. What did I say? That I didn’t know how to live without him anymore? That my world had stopped happening? This hadn’t felt like a breakup. This had felt like someone taking away all my oxygen and then telling me to sing the national anthem. I did not want to live without this boy’s music in the air.
So I called him. He didn’t answer. I called again, and he picked up on the fifth (!) ring.
“Hiii,” he said, and his voice was smiling. “Hi, Coley. Sorry, I got tangled up in my mom’s worthless little dog’s leash and couldn’t answer.”
I stared at my ceiling. What was I doing, besides pressing my finger on a hot stove and expecting not to be burned? “Hi. Where have you been?”
“Oh, you know, sorry. I’ve always been a bad texter.”
What a load of shit, I thought. People who said “I’m not good at texting” might as well have just announced “I’m an asshole who saw your text and chose to ignore it” and saved everyone the charade. He just didn’t want to talk to me.
“Whatever. So…how goes it?” I asked him.
“Um, it’s going. You?”
“Oh, I’m spectacular.” Silence filled the space on the line. “So are we going to talk about things?”
“What things?”
I didn’t respond. He knew.
“…Yeah?” he asked, still playing dumb.
“Maybe about you leaving my house? Or ditching me? Or publicly ignoring me?”
“Hold on,” he said, his tone lower.
“What?”
“I need to find some privacy.”
I heard some shuffling around, then a door slamming. The background air seemed to close in, like he was in a closet or something. “My mom is visiting again. I can’t hangout this second.”
I felt smaller somehow, younger, and old at the same time. “Okay…okay. I guess we can hang out some other time. There’s this dinner delivery app I wanted to try out tonight, anyway, and that show on Netflix I’ve been neglecting…”
“Coley Furman, are you crazy, or just stupid? We’re hanging out as soon as she leaves. Why did you think I texted you?”
“Um, I don’t know,” I said. “Why did you?”
He hesitated, but only for a moment. “Because my lungs won’t work without you anymore, Coley. This has been the worst week of my life. I missed you, and I never want to miss you like that again. No matter what I do, I just can’t leave this thing alone.”
“Why not?”
He sighed. “I don’t know. But whenever I close my eyes and picture what I want from this life…well, lately all I see is you.”
“Oh,” I breathed as my chest lit up with something that felt like the sun. “Okay. Be there soon.”
The sex that night was the hottest and most explosive I’d ever experienced. He was TNT and I was a mountainside – he moved me. He let me sleep over after that, and then we spent one gorgeous day on the beach. I was so glad to be back by his side, despite everything. I know most Floridians would murder me for saying this, but I’d never been crazy about the whole beach thing – I hated sand, and being wet was my own personal purgatory – but I’d be happy anywhere he was. He brought a blanket and his iPhone’s music player, and I got some pink wine with my fake ID.
It was the last weekend of summer, and we were both trying desperately not to think about it. I could feel everything changing around me, and I hated it. Summers in my part of Florida were hot and muggy and temperamental, pleasantly sunny one hour and lashing rain the next. Today was sort of hazy and in-between. He put his leg next to mine at around three, just staring down at our skin, and that’s when I knew what he wanted. So I grabbed his shirt and led him toward his house, never stopping to check who saw. And that’s when I decided to do whatever I had to do to keep him from leaving again. Because people always left me, but Nicky wouldn’t. And this became my mission: I would not let the Jonathan situation happen again to me. If Nicky drove me away, I’d drag him back harder. If he’d get bored, I’d offer him sex whenever he wanted it, even when it hurt. I would not let this slip through my fingers again.
We didn’t come up for air until after dinnertime. When we did, we just lay there in bed for a few minutes, hating different things while we stared at each other’s faces. I didn’t know much about the world, but everything I really needed to know was being answered in his eyes.
Finally I sighed. “Wow. Today was…interesting,” I said, and he laughed a little.
“Yeah. Especially when that old guy from the donut shop saw us sitting together under the pier. I swear he was going to shoot us down, right there.”
“Tell me about it.” I stared at the ceiling, and something in me changed, shifted. We could barely be together for five minutes without letting the fear drive us apart again, and I was so over it. “Ugh. Sometimes I just wish we could…leave. Get away from this shit. I’m so sick of this.”
“I’d run away with you,” he smiled.
“You would?”
“Indeed. I don’t know how to quit you. You’re like a drug made just for me.” I groaned. “What?” he asked. But what could I say? How could I put all this into words? You’re too perfect, and nobody’s ever said anything to me like that, and this all built to fall apart, and why can’t I walk away from this?
I just said, “I enjoy you, that’s all. And the fact that this might not work out…well, sometimes it makes me want to not exist anymore. That’s why I want to leave.”
He reached over and wrapped his hand around my leg, above the knee. He didn’t have to say I was treasure to him. In that moment, I knew it. So I just studied him. Looking at him was like staring at autumn leaves and banishing the thought of winter. Nothing that came after mattered, not while you had such vivid reds and oranges and yellows to enjoy.
Then he sat up, his veins popping. “You know what? Screw this place. Let’s do it. Let’s run, like you said. Screw all these stupid, ignorant, provincial assholes. Let’s go.”
I hesitated. “Nicky,” I said calmly, “I was half joking about that. We’re nineteen. We have no money. Where would we go?”
“Savannah.”
I sat up, too. “As in your hometown?”
“As in, my hometown. I would love to show you Savannah.” He paused, his shoulders falling a bit. “But wait. We need rules. We gotta have rules. No touching in public, for one. My family could be anywhere.”
“I can live with that,” I said, even though I couldn’t.
“Okay. And…no gay bars. No gay movies. No gay clothes. No gay jokes. No gay anything.”
“Okay. Anything else?”
My beautiful boy didn’t say anything. Instead he just reached over and tightened his arm around me and sort of smirked up at the fan in a dangerous way that told me he was in the business of killing the lights in peoples’ eyes. “Nah. But we’re going to Savannah! We’re really going! For real!”
“Yay!” I said. This was insane, but I didn’t want to pop his bubble. We were all allowed to have our bubbles. “But, you know, what if they…”
“Realize I like penis?”
“I mean…yes.”
“They won’t. They would never suspect…this, if I’m careful. I think.”
The doubt in his voice was obvious. “And if they do?”
“We’ll just have to de
al with it, won’t we? But I’m not letting go of you again – that’s all I know. I’ve never been able to be this honest with anyone in my life.”
I just swallowed. I wanted to be excited, but I was so scared for him. This thing was going off the rails, and I had no idea how we were going to keep it hidden now, especially in the same town as his family. The closer we got, the harder this was to hide – and we just couldn’t help how we looked at each other anymore.
12
And so we set out under a cloudless sky the next morning, clunking along in his ugly old hand-me-down Pontiac from his dad. But I didn’t care. For weeks I’d been forced to adore him in his bedroom, my living room, my shower – places that didn’t move. But when I fell into his car and smiled as he took a deep, freeing breath and pulled out of his driveway, I felt my whole body opening up. Our world started moving, and the whole weekend rolled itself out before us.
As we passed the Georgia state line, I fell asleep. When I woke, we were pulling out of a gas station and his hand was on mine. I’d never been so comfortable. At a stoplight we paused next to a straight teenaged couple, and I looked into their car, their life, their world. They looked so…easy. They sat talking and laughing, and even their silent stretches seemed weirdly non-awkward. They were good at dating, and it made them look like adults.
Then I looked over at Nicky. He was buried in his cell phone as he drove, his body language miles away, save for his hand. I looked at his wavy hair, his green eyes, the way he seemed strong like the sun and delicate like sunrays. How did people date?
“So…what are you thinking?” I asked, figuring that was a good place to start.
“About my snails. And how lucky they are to have shells to disappear into.”
“Oh, come on. Man up,” I smiled, but his face turned acid.
“Don’t say that phrase.”
“Why?”
“Because it pisses me off and, reminds me of how homophobia is rooted in our language, and shit.”
“Excuse me?”
His lips disappeared into his mouth. “It’s just that you sound like my father. Phrases like ‘man up,’ ‘get some balls,’ ‘grow a pair’ – these are all meant to further the idea that males need to be strong and aggressive, aka straight-seeming, and any male who doesn’t fall under that category is somehow less than other males. Just the word ‘gay’ – do you know where that word comes from? It meant silly, happy, jovial before it was applied to dudes. Why do gays have to be sillier, and therefore taken less seriously, than everyone else?”
“You’ve thought a lot about this,” I said after a second. I guessed the idea of seeing his father was making him angry already. “More than I ever expected you to.”
“Lord knows I’ve had a lot of time to think.” He bit his tongue, then held his breath. Soon he exploded. “Okay, you know what? I like guys, but I’ve liked girls, too, and the whole damn situation pisses me off. The world gives people three choices: straight, gay, or lying. And I’m sick of acting like it’s okay, like I’m not mad, like it’s not messed up that nobody will ever acknowledge…what I am. Nobody will ever make space for me out there.”
I didn’t say anything. Finally we were getting somewhere, even if it’d taken digging. I didn’t really believe he was bisexual, but then again, what did I know? Maybe I just didn’t want to believe it. My world would go black if he ever found some girl and started dating her. And besides, self-acceptance was a different road for everyone, and if this was all he was willing to admit, I would let him stand in that truth, even if it was halfway a lie.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “About not making space.”
“What do I mean? Okay, question time. Do you eat vanilla ice cream?”
“Um, sure.”
“And do you eat strawberry ice cream?”
“Yeah, sometimes.”
“And do you like both?” he asked.
“Sure.”
“No you don’t,” he said.
“What?”
“You’re lying to yourself. A person is only ever allowed to like one flavor of something, one type of something, and if you say you like both types, you’re delusional and wrong and lying and a coward.”
I paused.
“You see how ridiculous it is?” he asked. “A girl who makes out with another girl at a party is applauded. She’s the hot girl, the fun girl. It’s a phase, a flirtation, a passing curiosity, and a sexy one at that. Two guys making out a party would clear the room, and then get beaten into the dirt, too. If guys claim they’re bisexual, they’re worse than hated: they’re just a joke, right? They’re too weak to admit the big gay truth, and they’re just one drunken night and one train station away from Gay Town. No. Sexuality is not mutually exclusive. What ice cream store clerk ever said, ‘nope, you can’t have a scoop of each, you have to choose. One. Forever?’ Sexuality is a preference, a taste, a proclivity, just like anything else.” He paused, his veins throbbing. “And how could I ‘identify’ as something that the world tells me does not exist? ‘Funny joke, gay boy, but you like dick, so give up the charade and move to Brooklyn or San Francisco and call it a day.’ No. I’ve loved both sexes, and been attracted to both sexes, and nobody can take that away from me with their small minds and their grabby little stupid hands.”
I just stared at him as the world passed us by.
“It’s not changing,” he finally said. “They act like it is, but it’s not. LGBT people, or whatever you want to call them, couldn’t be in the military until a few years ago. They still can’t give blood. In the Middle East, they’re being thrown off cliffs while crowds cheer. In Alabama, homosexuality is still listed as a criminal act under state law. North Carolina’s law book officially says gay sex is unhealthy and dangerous. Actually, every day I see another story about some state’s governor trying to block the new laws that are passing in favor of gay rights. All the people who turn a blind eye to hatred and homophobia and say we’ve moved on – they’re lying. Where’s the freedom? Where is it?” He stopped, tried to breathe. “It’s just that, when I read history books, something like slavery – that doesn’t even seem real to me. How could society have been so messed up to have let that happen, you know? How could the act of legally owning other humans ever be considered normal and okay? It just seems bizarre and surreal. But you know what? Our kids are going to be just as confused when they open up their books and learn that it took until 2015 for the most advanced empire in the history of the world to say, Oops, my bad – two humans who love each other CAN legally get married. Sorry for the mix-up!”
He looked over at me. “Well?” he asked, a little nervous. “Are you gonna say something? Why are you staring at me like that?”
I shook my head. I had never in my life heard someone speak a truth so succinctly into existence. This was me, distilled.
“Whatever. My point is, the others get to choose who they are,” he continued. “But we don’t. In every article ever, a gay actor is referred to as ‘openly gay actor so-and-so,’ but if they’re married to a chick, they’re just described as ‘actor.’ And not only do they list the gay person’s sexual preferences, they list them before whatever the person has done with their lives.” He picked up a scandal magazine on his floorboard, which was his mom’s, I assumed. He scanned the articles showing the straight celebrities (or the ones who claimed to be, at least). “Here, let’s see what they’re calling the straighties these days.” He took on the voice of an NBA announcer. “The legendary bachelor, who is currently riding the top of the box office with his WWII drama, Crow’s Nest…Hollywood’s sweetheart, country singer so-and-so…the award-winning actor…the platinum-selling singer…the reality superstar…”
He looked up at me. “Now, here, let’s look for the freaks.” He adopted the deep voice again. “The controversial reality star, who recently came out as transgender…the openly lesbian golfer…the celebrity chef, who is gay…the disgraced bisexual actor, who lost his marriage to his TV star wife
after admitting to an affair with his male personal trainer last fall…”
Anger flickered in his glassy eyes. “We don’t even get to choose who we are, and what we’re known for, Coley. They do. The normal ones do. ‘Gay’ is all you can ever be. How will we ever be able to rise above this shit and become who we’re supposed to be, when the world has already decided who we are for us? They’re killing us and they don’t even know it. When an athlete or a rapper has an affair with a woman, they all say the same thing about it. Oh, that’s natural, he has groupies throwing himself at him, he’s only human, the wife needs to accept the diamond apology gifts and get over it. But if he sleeps with a man or a transsexual, he’s a trending laughing stock, he loses millions in endorsements, he’s a punch line on your aunt’s Facebook wall.” He shook his head. “None of this is even to mention the shit I’ve dealt with from being Hispanic in the Deep South – but that’s a whole different story.”
