The Time Traveler's Guide to Modern Romance

by Madeline J. Reynolds

  Eli immediately scoffed, “I beg your pardon, but I could out-drink any of you lads—or ladies”—he winked in Rachel’s direction—“if given a proper ale or some wine. This is…swill!”

  Tyler laughed.

  Scott opened a new can and poured some of the contents into Eli’s cup. “It helps if you hold your nose,” he advised, probably only half kidding.

  Someone offered Tyler a cup, and he reluctantly accepted. The “swill” wasn’t all that enticing, especially after watching Eli nearly choke on it, but he was here and it was what you were supposed to do at a party. Sometimes you had to suffer for your art, or at least, that’s what he told himself as he suffered through the first few sips before going back to documenting the party.

  Most of the night revolved around Eli socializing with the others while Tyler just stood there, leaning against a tree, capturing it all on his camera. He was worried that someone would once again call him out or think he was being a creep, but no one really seemed to notice or care. At one point Sasha Ainsley caught sight of him recording, but instead of freaking out she drunkenly made kissing faces to the camera and started dancing.

  Tyler was used to being the one observing while life was happening for those around him, usually through the lens of a camera. Even with both Vanessa and Charlie in attendance, Tyler found his attention drifting more toward Eli.

  After a couple hours had passed, Eli suddenly seemed to remember that Tyler not only existed, but had also accompanied him to the gathering. He wandered over, leaning against the opposite side of the tree Tyler had been occupying. Tyler’s skin felt warm, his nerves tingling, and he took another sip of watered-down beer to ease them.

  “Having fun with your new friends?” Tyler hoped he didn’t sound jealous.

  “I am, in fact. Thank you.” Eli had the glazed eyes and the goofy smile of someone enjoying a pleasant buzz. His hair had also become more tousled throughout the course of the night, something Tyler couldn’t help but notice, and he had to admit, it was a good look on him. He looked carefree. Eli continued, “None of the people my own age back where I’m from ever seemed to care for me much, but here? Here I am highly sought after—a commodity even. I don’t think I’ll ever leave. I told you I could fit in!”

  Tyler was caught somewhere between the fear that something terrible might happen if Eli were to stay and the fear of having Eli disappear and never getting to see him again. He didn’t really know the right thing to say in this situation, so rather than make an attempt, he forced down another, larger gulp of his “swill.”

  Eli nodded across the way, a confused expression causing his brow to furrow. “Who are they?”

  Tyler followed Eli’s gaze until his eyes landed on a pair of pretty girls holding hands. One had hair that special shade of black that almost gleamed blue in the sunlight, like ravens’ feathers, cut into a neat bob. She wore Doc Martens and an army jacket with a lace dress and ribbed tights. The other girl had honey-blond hair and eyes that were each a different color: one blue and the other a warm shade of brown that was nearly amber. They were both giggling, and the girl donning the army jacket moved to brush a blond curl out of the other girl’s eyes.

  “That’s Trissa and Kat,” Tyler explained. The school hadn’t known that when they’d paired the girls together in the same dorm room they were actually playing matchmaker. The two had been inseparable for the past year and a half now.

  Eli’s eyes were glued to the pair, fascinated. As the girls moved closer to each other, Eli added, “Are they also bisexuals?”

  “No, they’re gay.”

  “I can see that—they seem quite gay.”

  Damn semantics. Tyler laughed.

  “That’s not…they’re lesbians. It’s a term for girls who like other girls.”

  “And by like, you mean that they prefer the company of other girls?”

  “Yep.”

  “Like in a romantic sense?”

  “Mmmhmm.”

  “So, is there a term then for men who strictly prefer the company of other men? Like bisexual or lesbians?”

  “Yep. It’s…well, what I said before. Gay.”

  “Ahh, I see.” Eli’s eyes were still wide and seemed bright as a young child learning about the world around him. “And this is genuinely accepted by your society?”

  “People now…for the most part, if they’re decent people, have come to understand and accept that there are men who love men and women who love women. Same-sex marriage is legal here, and we have pride parades and festivals, celebrating a wide spectrum of sexualities aside from straight.”

  “Straight?”

  “A guy and a girl…man and a woman. Heterosexual. What most people would consider the norm or conventional. There are people who are more ignorant and think relationships should only be that way. There’s been a lot of progress—especially recently, but it’s hard to change people’s minds when they’ve already closed them off. Still, being gay or lesbian or bi is more accepted now then it was…say…in the nineteenth century.”

  “Ahh,” Eli mused, “that’s very interesting.”

  Tyler closed the viewing screen on his camera and shut it off. He figured it couldn’t hurt to turn off director mode and be a little social. Besides, Eli had yet to make any major faux pas, so he wasn’t exactly getting the “gold” he had initially been expecting anyway.

  “The culture shock getting to you yet?”

  Eli grinned, “Honestly, I think what’s the most shocking is seeing unmarried people kissing.”

  “Is that really such a big deal where you’re from?”

  “Well, it’s just…acts of affection are not done so…casually, so openly.”

  “It’s just a kiss,” Tyler said, as if he truly believed it were that simple.

  “Then show me.”

  That definitely hadn’t been the response he was expecting.

  “What?” Tyler asked, adjusting his glasses as if somehow his impaired vision was also affecting his hearing.

  “You’re supposed to be showing me around this new world and helping me get acclimated to your customs. If kissing really is such a normal, casual occurrence, then prove it to me.” The corner of his mouth had quirked up. “Show me your ways.”

  “You actually want me to kiss you? Are you sure?”

  Eli smiled and nodded.

  The rapid fluttering of his heart and the sweat making his palms sticky was completely contradicting the idea that kissing was nothing to get all worked up about. His first kiss was with Wendy Harrington in the fifth grade during a game of Truth or Dare. After that, throughout middle school he had had a couple “girlfriends” but each relationship lasted only a few months at most and mainly consisted of passing each other notes and having someone to go to school dances with than it did of any actual kissing. As soon as he got to high school he dedicated himself entirely to movies and filmmaking. He was so out of practice—what if he was a terrible kisser? From what he could tell, this would be Eli’s first kiss, and it would be Tyler’s first kiss with another guy. This could be terrible for both of them.

  Tyler grabbed the back of Eli’s head in a way that he hoped looked cooler than it felt. He allowed his fingers to trace Eli’s soft curls before pulling his face in close and pressing their lips together. Soft but firm. Curious and inviting.

  As Eli’s face slowly pulled away, the music, which was already fuzzy due to the quality of the speaker, blurred entirely, and the lines of the trees and the figures of other students became hazy. Tyler’s heart rate took off in a full gallop, and his breathing was stilted and uneven. Most people describe the feeling as butterflies right after you’re kissed, but these were more like fireflies. Not only were his insides jittery, but it felt like he was glowing from the inside out. For a few fleeting moments, it felt like he and Eli were the only two people in the woods.

  But they weren’t. The sound of a glass beer bottle breaking snapped him back to reality. Everybody already knew he was bi, but he st
ill felt oddly vulnerable with so many eyes on them. Some of the expressions on people’s faces were giddy, as if they were in a drunken state of euphoria, others (most of the girls at the party, actually) looked disappointed, but a few other expressions were horrified ones.

  “Ew, Tyler,” Vanessa started. “Isn’t he like your cousin or something?”

  Damn it. Damn it. Damn it. How could he have been so stupid? How could he have forgotten that was the explanation he had given them? If he could have kept this story straight and just stuck with the exchange student thing, none of this would be happening right now.

  The judgment from all their stares was searing into him, and it was more than he could take at the moment. He whirled around and started making his way out of the woods at a full sprint.

  “Tyler…Tyler, wait!”

  He heard the rustling and crunching of leaves as Eli chased after him. None of this was Eli’s fault—he hadn’t gotten the story mixed up—and he wasn’t mad at Eli. But he just knew he needed to get as far away from the party as fast as he could, so he continued running as fast as his legs could carry him, ignoring it when his chest tightened and his body screamed at him. He realized when it came time to climb the stairs just how dumb it had been to expend that much energy that quickly. He pushed through the exhaustion and bolted up to his floor until he was safe within the four walls of his own dorm room.

  He collapsed onto his bed, wanting nothing more than to bury himself in his comforter and sheets and just disappear entirely. Eli had clearly been keeping a much more reasonable pace, and he heard the door creak open a few minutes later.

  “Tyler? Tyler, what’s wrong? Was it…was it something I did?”

  Tyler sat up. “No. It’s just…they think we’re cousins.”

  Eli sat at the edge of Tyler’s bed. “So?”

  Tyler scoffed. “I know this may be a little different in your time, but cousins, no matter how distant, are not supposed to kiss each other like that.”

  “I think you are overreacting,” Eli said. “Most of the people at that party were so inebriated, I highly doubt they will even remember.”

  “I hope so,” Tyler said, pulling off his glasses and rubbing his eyes, and he did. But right now the idea of this humiliation coming to an end felt far from possible.

  “I am certain.” Eli smiled. “And now that you and I are alone…perhaps you could show me some other kissing techniques?”

  Tyler’s cheeks felt hot. “Ya know…I’m just…I’m feeling pretty tired, so I think I’m just going to bed.”

  “Oh, of course.” Eli said it quickly, but there was definitely disappointment in his tone. This time Tyler was sure of it.

  Eli got up to turn off the bedroom light, and in the dark he began removing the articles of clothing he’d borrowed from Tyler. Tyler flipped over onto his side, his back facing Eli. He tried to force sleep to come, but it never did. If he focused hard, he could still feel Eli’s lips pressing against his.

  And he still felt the fireflies.

  Chapter Eleven

  A Reason to Stay

  Just as the previous day, Elias was wide awake before Tyler, who was clutching his pillow to his chest, with a small amount of dribble escaping his mouth and down his chin. It was hilarious but also endearing.

  Elias sat up thinking about what had transpired last night. It had all been going so well. The group of students had taken such a quick liking to him and invited him to a party—arguably the first party he had been to in his life where he did not feel ostracized or as if no one in attendance even wanted him there. Most momentous of all, he had experienced his first kiss. Something that had not ever felt like an inevitability, at least not any time soon.

  Back in London, there had not been any girls that he fancied, no one he was courting. There was only one instance where he had felt anything even resembling romantic attraction, but at the time he had felt so ashamed that he had long since suppressed the inkling as nothing.

  His parents had taken him to see a performance of the Russian Ballet whilst they were in London. During the intermission, Elias had gone out to get some fresh air. When he did, a familiar voice had called out to him.

  It was Peter, who was standing on the steps, a cigarette rolled in his hand.

  “Looking for an escape too?”

  Elias had nodded.

  Peter handed Elias the cigarette so he could take a drag. “I find these things dreadfully boring.” As Peter said that he pushed one of the golden curls away from his forehead.

  After exhaling, Elias had given him a skeptical look. “You do?” Was it possible that he and the Illingsworth prodigy actually had something in common?

  Peter gave a slight laugh. “That’s always how people react if I choose to tell them. It’s so strange, you show an interest in one of the fine arts and people just assume that you care about all of them.”

  That night at the ballet they had spent so much time talking that they lost track of the time, and Elias had to sneak back to his seat in his family’s private box well into the second half of the performance. That was the night that he knew he had never felt for a young woman what he was beginning to feel for Peter.

  He had started to feel a thrill at this little secret that he had with himself, the blossoming of the feelings that previously he had not been certain were even real, but at each subsequent party, Peter continued to raise his nose in the air and act superior, nothing like the boy he had shared a cigarette with outside the theater. What had started as attraction quickly turned to resentment, but they continued to tolerate each other due to how close their families were. The incident in which Elias had splashed wine on Peter’s masterpiece certainly hadn’t helped matters in respect to their friendship.

  At that time Elias had told himself it was for the best. It wasn’t as if anything could have come from the feelings that had formed that night anyway. In fact, it would have simply been another thing that made him different…out of place…another reason he did not belong. Another reason for his parents to be disappointed. Another motivating factor for them to send him off to a reformatory while they told all their friends he was off studying music at some prestigious academy.

  But now, here he was in a place and time where men could freely love other men, women could love other women, and people considered to be different were accepted for who they were. It felt like fate.

  If only his grandfather could know the gift he had given him.

  He looked over to the still-sleeping Tyler. That night at the ballet, Elias remembered how good it felt when he said something that would make Peter smile or laugh. There was no denying that Elias now felt that same sense of accomplishment when he elicited those things from Tyler.

  There was also no denying just how much he had enjoyed the kiss. At the time it felt like he was breaking a rule, doing something he shouldn’t, but in a way that also felt so right. And when he and Tyler’s bodies were aligned, when their lips connected, it felt as if they were two bits of machinery that were made to fit together—two cogs that interlocked.

  There was the start of something there, though he wasn’t entirely sure what it could lead to. He wondered if Tyler felt it, too. It was hard to tell after how upset he had become. He hated that the others had done that, how they had made him feel so embarrassed and had ruined what was otherwise such a lovely night.

  Regardless, there was no way that Tyler would want Elias to leave now. He would want him to stay, wouldn’t he?

  When Tyler did finally rise, Elias looked to him eagerly. Tyler looked around the room and yawned. “What time is it?”

  “I would check for you”—Elias grabbed his grandfather’s pocket watch and held it—“but I do not believe this has the accurate time, if I’m being honest.”

  Tyler laughed, and the sound lifted a weight off Elias’s shoulders. Good. He wasn’t angry with him.

  “So…what shall we do today?”

  Tyler groaned. “Ahh, lock the door and not leave for t
he entire day? That way no one can see my cousin-kissing face.”

  The idea of being alone in a room with Tyler all day was enticing for reasons he wasn’t quite ready to delve into, so he avoided the matter altogether. Plus he had already asked Tyler for more kissing practice the night before and had been rejected. He was not about to beg him.

  “But there’s still so much for me to see, to do, to learn. I did not travel through time and space just so I could sit in a miniscule bedchamber and stare at the walls.”

  “That’s fair,” Tyler conceded. His eyes then lit up as if he had happened upon the most brilliant of ideas. “Actually, do you want to help me with something?”

  Elias was ready for anything at that point. “Most certainly.”

  Tyler got dressed and handed Elias a new set of clothes. This time instead of the school’s uniform, he handed him a pair of the peculiar trousers known as jeans and a shirt that looked more like underclothes. It had short sleeves and a neckline in the shape of a V, which exposed more of his chest than he was used to, but it was also in a lovely maroon color, so he did not protest. Though the garments in this new time were peculiar, they were far less cumbersome and restrictive than what he was used to, so it was a nice change of pace.

  Once they were clothed, they made their way across the campus, which was becoming more and more familiar to Elias. From Tyler’s quick gait and the way he hung his head it was clear that he was still mortified from last night and was worried about coming across anyone, but as they continued along, Elias did not spot anyone he recognized from the party.

  What he did recognize was the building that Tyler had led him to.

  Elias groaned. “Here? Again?”

  Tyler continued up the steps to the library. “Just come on.”

  Elias followed him inside and through the main corridor of bookshelves. The space appeared to be empty. “I have been here all of three days and have been to this library each one of those days. You have that automobile of yours, could we not simply go somewhere else? Do something new?”