by John Goode
The Valium I had taken when I got home had kicked in, so I wasn’t as upset at her words as I should have been. “Aren’t you supposed to be on my side?” I asked her.
“I’m on your side when you’re right or when I don’t care. Past that you have to convince me, and after that story, you are a dick.”
I had caught her in a rare break from gaming, which meant I had her undivided attention. I’m not quite sure that was a good thing. “He called him!” I pleaded with her.
“Oh please,” she said, sighing. “Tyler is not He Who Shall Not Be Named. Let me ask you this. Have you even bothered to tell Kyle the reason you loathe the man so much? Or did you just warn him to stay away from him without adding one specific reason why?”
“I hate you,” I said, taking a sip of wine.
“No, you hate being wrong,” she corrected me. “I just happen to be right.” Her voice grew more concerned. “Look, Mario, if you insist on staying in that godforsaken town, then why don’t you actually take someone into your confidence? Of course, in this case it’s a high school kid, and normally I would be all Chris Hansen on you, but you need to talk to someone about this, and since you are acting like the target demographic for a Disney family series, maybe Kyle is your best bet.”
“I have friends.” I tried to argue with her.
Huge mistake.
“No you don’t. You have people you drink with at the place where your boyfriend was killed, and you have people you talk to when you are medicated enough to go out and gather supplies, but you haven’t had one friend since Riley died, and you know it.”
I put the glass down and leaned forward on the couch as if she were actually in the room. “Actually, the last friend I made watched as Riley died in the middle of the road, so maybe I have a good reason not to make friends.”
I could hear her moving, which meant she was probably doing the same thing. “If you were that concerned about trusting people and making friends, then you would have moved away from there instead of haunting the goddamned town like a hag in a horror movie. Look, either kill the damn kids who go up to Crystal Lake, make friends, or move. Those are your three choices, oh brother of mine. Anything else and you are just slowly torturing yourself for no reason at all.”
We both sat there glaring at each other over the phone, glad the other one couldn’t see it.
Finally, after almost a minute of silence, I asked, “Did you see Glee this week?”
“God, what is wrong with that show?” she asked loudly.
We eased back into talking about nothing, but she had been right, and we both knew it. But even that wasn’t my problem. My problem was the still unread letter on the coffee table and my inability to see what was written inside.
THE NEXT day I called Kyle at home and told him to come down to the store. It was a Sunday, which meant the store would be relativity quiet until church let out. Which would give us a chance to talk.
I had left the envelope at home because if I had it around me, all it would do is give me another panic attack, and I did not have enough Valium to keep passing out indefinitely. I straightened up as I waited for him to get there, practicing my speech the whole time. Finally I turned on some music and let my mind relax.
He walked in the door slowly, looking like he was expecting me to throw something at him. Once he saw I wasn’t rabid, he came inside carefully. “Everything okay?”
“Oh, stop it,” I said, turning the music down. “You act like I have an oven in the back to cook innocent children.”
He took his backpack off and sat down. “I assumed you kept it at home.”
I gave him a withering stare. “You know, I was seconds away from treating you like an actual person instead of a smart-ass teenager….”
“Okay, okay, okay!” he said quickly. “Do actual people find out why calling Tyler is such a bad idea?”
I hated the fact this kid was so smart. And then it hit me: he reminded me of Nikki a little.
Well, okay, a lot.
“Look, do you want to hear this or not?” I asked him.
“Well, technically I don’t know what this is,” he said, using air quotes. “But if it explains what happened to you yesterday, then I’m all ears.”
And for the first time since I’d told the cops at the scene, I began to go over the events of the night Riley died out loud. I explained how I had met Riley, we got together, moved here, and tried to be happy. I went into how Riley and Tyler knew each other from school, and the way we invited him to be friends with us since he wasn’t out of the closet yet. I skimmed over how close the three of us were and how much I liked seeing Riley and Tyler together because it was like being able to see Riley before we met in a way. They were both overgrown kids in muscle-bound bodies, and listening to them argue over sports just cracked me up for some reason. I shied away from going into detail on Riley’s and my attempts at setting Tyler up with single, gay friends we knew. And when I got to the end, where Riley got hit by a car full of drunk homophobes and lay dying in the street, we were both crying.
And through those tears, I told him how I’d seen Tyler in his car look me dead in the eyes as I screamed for someone to help… and then drive away in the night out of fear. Neither one of us talked for a while after that. Finally Kyle got us some tissues and asked, “You’re sure it was him? I mean, you know he saw Riley… um, hurt and drove off.”
I wiped my eyes and dug through my pile of CDs to find some upbeat music somewhere. “No, Kyle, I am sure he saw Riley was dying, and he drove off. And I never heard from again. Not a call, not a note, he didn’t even show up to the funeral. He just vanished like the coward he is, and it was as if we never knew each other.”
I slipped in the soundtrack to Mamma Mia! If there was anything that could dispel a bad mood, it was ABBA. Lisa Stokke began to sing “Honey, Honey” and I felt some of the darkness recede for the time being. “So calling him was the very last thing in the world you should have done, but you didn’t know, so all is forgiven,” I said as cheerfully as possible. “But if you do it again, I will cut that pretty face from ear to ear.” I saw him pause as I leaned over the counter at him. “All you’d need is white face paint to go as Heath Ledger’s Joker for Halloween. We clear?” He nodded mutely. “Awesome. So, you hungry?”
I pulled out a stack of takeout menus from under the counter. “Pick a cuisine from Foster’s own illustrious restaurant row.” I fanned the menus out like a deck of cards. “I’m buying.”
Since three of the menus were from Nancy’s, it was no surprise we ended up with burgers for lunch.
A COUPLE of days passed, and I had heard nothing from Kyle.
His gay-alliance thing was Monday, and I had been curious about how it went over. The whole thing sounded like some weird gay-superhero thing to me, but the boy had insisted it was a huge first step for Foster High, so I was as supportive as I could be for something that sounded like an excuse to cosplay. By the time Friday rolled around, I had almost forgotten about the whole thing and had gone back to obsessing about the envelope.
Stop—don’t judge me. Of course, I hadn’t opened the damn letter yet. It was like a ghost reaching back from the past, and I was simply too terrified to take its hand. Also, it was the last new thing Riley ever said to me. I know it sounds stupid, but after he died, I refused to change our voice mail message because his voice was on it. I still hadn’t deleted the videos I had taken of him on my phone where he yelled at me to stop filming him. I had memorized every second, every minute detail of those moments like I was afraid if I didn’t they would just fade away.
That letter was the last new thing I would hear from him, and I didn’t want it to end.
I know it ended, but shut up, it’s complicated.
So anyways, by Friday afternoon, the envelope had crept back into my thoughts, and I felt myself rolling into a weekend with Prince Valium. I thought of sending the letter to Nicole FedEx and having her read it to me over the phone, but even that seeme
d too chickenshit to me. So instead I sat behind the counter and stared at it, willing it to jump and roll over or do some other trick besides making me miserable.
So imagine my shock when Tyler came barging into the shop.
“You have some fucking nerve,” he said, his face red with anger. “You just can’t leave shit alone, can you?”
I slipped the envelope into my back pocket as I mentally donned my armor. Yes, it does resemble the armor Wonder Woman wore in Kingdom Come and there is nothing wrong with that, and why don’t you pay attention to the story instead of what’s going on in my mind, huh?
“Excuse me?” I said, standing up, letting the stool fall behind me. “You did not come crashing through my door all Hey! Kool-Aid style, screaming like I owe you money. I told you last time to get out, and I meant it.”
“You know, if you hate me, hate me,” he said, ignoring my words completely. “I get what I did was wrong, and there is no way to fix it, but do you have to poison everyone else on me too?”
“How would you know there’s no way to fix it?” I shouted back at him. “You never tried! You just ran away and then lived your life like it never happened. And I have no idea what you’re talking about.” It was true, I had no earthly clue why he was yelling at me, but I knew I wasn’t going to let him.
“You made it clear you wanted me out of your life, Robbie, so I gave that to you.” His voice was husky with emotion, and he looked as upset as I was, which was impossible. “I fucked up that night, and I did what you wanted. I left you alone. I never said a word, good or bad, about you to anyone else. I never warned anyone about you. I let them come to their own decision about you, and I thought you’d do the same about me.”
“I made it clear?” I tried to catch my breath, but I was too far-gone now. “How in the fuck did I do that, Tyler? Telepathy? Smoke signals? Did you get a telegram from me? You know, if you have absolved yourself of the sin of what you did that night, fine, but don’t come in here yelling like you were being the bigger person by ignoring me. I didn’t out you, did I? I didn’t scream from the rooftops that you were a fucking fag just like me, though I should have. I didn’t bring you up to the cops when they asked if there was anyone else there who saw a thing. You did what you did for the same reason you do everything, Tyler. To make yourself feel good. That’s it, and if you think it’s going to be any different with your little spy of a boyfriend, you’re nuts. Because you are incapable of loving anyone else, because you’re too busy hating who and what you are.”
“Do not bring Matt into this,” he warned me.
“Why? Maybe he could get hit crossing First Street, and you could look up and see me drive off instead.”
It was easily the worst thing I had ever said out loud. I mean, to even make light of that, much less make a joke? Well, suffice it to say there are many reasons I’m going to hell besides liking men.
“I’m sorry,” he said after a few moments of silence. “It was wrong, and I was stupid. But you have to get past your hatred of me because it’s affecting the kids.”
I looked at him three different kinds of confused for a second. “Are you trying to be funny, or did we have offspring at some point?”
“Brad and Kyle, jackass,” he threw back at me. “It’s bad enough they’re in a fight, but you whisper in Kyle’s ear about me, and he charges into the store and confronts me on it.” I paused because I hadn’t thought about it even for a second. “So now he hates me. Is that what you wanted?”
It wasn’t at all, and he could tell by the look on my face.
“He is in a bad place, Robbie,” he said, his voice imploring me. “I don’t think he’s going to take Brad back, but I do know there is no chance of them working it out if they end fighting about us too. I’m not saying we need to bury the hatchet or become friends, but we need to find a way to let them know we can agree that they should be together.” He paused. “You do agree they should be together?”
I had no idea what to say to that.
Tyler opened his mouth to press the point, but his phone beeped before he could. He read the text and looked like he was going to throw up. I opened my mouth to ask him what that was about when my phone went off too. I glanced at the text and knew instantly.
I wanted to throw up too.
“Come on,” he said, shoving the phone in his pocket. “My car is faster.”
I followed him out and locked the door behind us. “What exactly do you think we can do?”
Tyler stopped before getting into his car. “I don’t know. I’ll figure it out on the way.”
I got in the passenger seat and closed my eyes as we pulled out of the parking lot.
It was the first time I had prayed since Riley died.
BRAD
FML.
I know it isn’t eloquent or as descriptive as most people would like, but seriously? Fuck my life. Here I am, inches from going to the state championships, an offer from A&M for a full ride, all the popularity I had lost when I came out back tenfold, and I was miserable. That word doesn’t really get how bad I feel right now, so you’ll have to trust me that “miserable” doesn’t even begin to cover how horrible I felt.
In fact, if you had asked me, like, four years ago for three wishes, I would have said a perfect baseball season that would lead to state, a chance to play ball at A&M, and to be the most popular guy in school. I have to be honest with you—fourteen-year-old me was a pretty sucky guy. I mean, who the fuck cares about baseball or a stupid college when you can’t share it with the most important person in your world? I guess I can’t fault fourteen-year-old me too badly; if I had a fourth wish, I might have gone with being the fifth ninja turtle or owning a Charizard.
But all of this was nothing to me, because Kyle kept ignoring me.
Jennifer at first assured me he needed space, and sooner or later he would come around. Well, it was later, and he had enough space to fit the Astrodome in, and still nothing. I should have known it was going to be worse than I thought when, that first Monday back at school, Sammy came and gave me Kyle’s iPhone back, box and all. She said she was sorry it had come to this, and it looked like she meant it, which was something. When I turned the phone on, the lock screen was empty; he had deleted the picture of us I had put on it.
That one action made me cry more than all the times I had bawled during Field of Dreams combined.
That week we lost our first game, and it was my fault. I mean, if I had been on their team and infiltrated our team as a spy, I couldn’t have done as much damage as I did in that one game. I dropped balls, let easy pitches sail past me, and worst, I just sat in the dugout without trying to cheer my team up once. It was a quiet ride home that night. Even in my funk, I knew they were all glaring at me in the dark. When we got back to school, I waited because I was pretty sure Coach Gunn was going to kick me off the team or something. Only Josh talked to me afterward. He patted me on my shoulder and said quietly, “He’ll take you back. Be patient.”
It was hands down the nicest thing a straight guy had ever said to me.
Coach Gunn didn’t even look at me as he walked past me into the locker room. “Go home, Greymark. We lost. Nothing you can do about it now.”
“You aren’t mad at me?” I asked him, shocked.
He paused in the door and turned around. “Son, I have gone to state and won. I have had perfect seasons, and I even went to college. Nothing you do on that field is going to change that. If you were waiting for a lecture from me, I am fresh out. What you should be thinking about is the fact that the rest of that team follows your lead, and if you don’t care to play anymore, they won’t either. You may not care if you get into college or not, but I’m betting some of them do.” I felt my eyes sting as he leveled a look at me. “I am not the person you should be playing for—it should be them.”
He closed the door on me, leaving me to sit in my car, screaming at myself as tears rolled down my face.
The next day at practice, I put a wall up
around my heart and ignored my problems.
We won the next game and the game after that. I put all my effort into winning and tried to forget that something inside of me was dying. I had a job to do, and damned if I wasn’t going to do it. Even with my newfound zeal for baseball, I had a lot of extra time on my hands, time I spent with Tyler in his shop. He didn’t mind the help or the company, so it was a good fit.
What wasn’t a good fit was his new boyfriend, Matt.
Matt wasn’t thrilled to have me hanging around Tyler all the time, though he never said a word to me about it. It was just the way he acted when he came in and I was there, a coldness that just made me feel like I was doing something incredibly wrong. When we were alone in the shop, I asked Tyler about it, and he just nodded and looked embarrassed. “It isn’t you,” he assured me. “Well, it is you in the fact you are young, in great shape, and are stunning for your age….” I felt my face grow warm at the compliment. I had no idea Tyler even knew what I looked like outside of help around the shop. “I am not hitting on you,” he added when he saw my reaction. “I’m just saying why Matt is so standoffish. He just came from a world where a lot of guys my age would jump at the chance to date someone like you. Straight guys get red shiny cars and try to date strippers when they hit middle age. I guess some gay guys go after young guys in an effort to prove they still got it.”
He shook his head, obviously disgusted with the entire concept.
“So he thinks we’re fooling around?” I asked, kind of shocked that someone would think that.
“No,” Tyler said, getting up to get us a couple of Cokes. “He’s just insecure about where we are, so it’s messing with his mind. Don’t stress about it, Brad. He’ll come around.”
His words did nothing to cheer me up as I mumbled, “Yeah, you said that about Kyle too.”
He gave me a sympathetic look as he handed me a Coke. “Don’t give up faith yet.”
