Benji and the Wireman

by Charlie Winters

  “That dress she’s wearing… she’s worn it before, I think. It was a really long time ago and I’m sure I’m forgetting where, but my Grandma Nancy loved it. I’m sure that’s why she’s wearing it now, you know, so that Grandma Nancy can find her. Anyway, my Oma and my Grandma Nancy were married for, like, a million years, only it was never legal because Grandma Nancy died before they legalized gay marriage, but basically they were always married. They had this, like, not like a medicine woman, but like a lady priest marry them way before it was cool to do that, so having gay parents wasn’t exactly the in-thing, you know? But my mom always grew up with two mothers and she turned out perfect. She’s the best mom anyone could ever ask for. And my Oma? Oh my God, she was like the perfect person. I mean, just look at her. Doesn’t she just look like the perfect person?”

  Ben looked over at my mom and smiled. My mother met Ben’s gaze and smiled back.

  “She certainly is vibrant,” she answered. “That makeup is—”

  “Crazy, right? We kind of cracked up when we got here because she never wore makeup like that in her real life, but I swear she did it for us. Like as one final joke? My Oma and I constantly watched these shows on TV, you know? Like the Emmys or the Oscars and talked about who wore it best or whose makeup was to die for or whatever… well, in real life, Oma hardly wore any makeup, but as you can see… I guess she really wanted to go out with a bang.” Ben laughed loudly. “I swear she did this for me. We used to watch this show, Drag Race. Anyway, she loved this queen, Alaska. On one of the episodes, her makeup was pretty similar to this. Well, as similar to this as you could get. Actually, Alaska was pretty beautiful when she was made up, but whatever. Oma was eighty-eight, so…”

  My mother smiled at Ben. Then, she turned and walked toward Bridgette before extending a hand. “I’m Carrie Solomon, Jesse’s mother.”

  “Oh my God,” Bridgette exclaimed. “I had no idea. I… oh my goodness. Well, thank you for coming.”

  “I’m sorry to hear about your mother,” she said quietly. “Ben is… a very nice man. He’s very… spirited.”

  “Spirited,” she deadpanned. “That’s a new one. He can talk your ear off, that kid. But your son… oh, that Jesse… we just love the crap out of him.”

  My mom nodded. “Oh… um, yes. He’s a… good man.”

  A good man. I don’t think she’d ever said that to me before. Honestly, I wasn’t even sure if she believed that, but we were taking small steps as she’d said. And, she was trying. She was here.

  “He loves my son,” David said proudly.

  “Ohmigod, Dad,” Ben spat.

  “What?” David admonished. “He does. Don’t you?”

  “Yes I do.”

  My mother looked down at the worn carpet quickly before glancing back up. “Well,” she said softly, “I just wanted to come by and pay my respects. I really should be going, I think.” She turned toward Ben. “It was nice to meet you, Ben. I hope we see each other soon.”

  Ben’s voice was different now… less exuberant. “Yeah, Carrie. You too.”

  She pressed a short kiss to my cheek, not even bothering to follow it up with a hug. “Be well,” she whispered.

  “Yeah, Mom… you too.”

  And before I could say another word, she was gone.

  Ben cried twice.

  The first time was when Oma’s nurse showed up. She wasn’t wearing scrubs this time. This time, her red hair was pulled up into two complicated buns on the top of her head with the front strands twisted into a thick braid that framed her pretty face. Where her skin was scrubbed-free at the nursing home before, she wore makeup now, thick golds and dark kohl smudged eyeliner framing gray-green eyes. Light pink cheeks, ruby red lips. Cheryl really was a beauty, only I hadn’t noticed it before in her oversized linens and oatmeal-sticky ponytail.

  But as she stood in front of us, clasping both of our hands, glancing between me and Ben as she spoke, I felt blind for not noticing it before.

  “Anna loved you more than anyone else, you know that?” she told Ben with a smile. “She told me this story once. It was about your first kiss.”

  Ben looked at her quizzically. “Candy?”

  Cheryl shook her head. “No. Um, his name was—”

  “Cory Fenton,” Ben finished quietly. “He was a dancer in my troupe.”

  “Yeah.” She nodded. “She said you called her right after it happened and that you were crying.”

  “I wasn’t… crying,” Ben said with a sigh. “Okay, maybe I was, but it was just because I liked him so much and I knew I’d embarrassed myself. I saw him looking at me one day after practice and… I mean, he was always so nice, you know? I thought he felt the same way about me, so I just… I kissed him and—”

  Ben halted the story, immediately placing his fingers to his lips and glancing over at me nervously.

  “You okay?” I asked.

  Ben nodded and finished, “He pushed me away. He wasn’t mean about it. He just said he was straight and that he didn’t think about boys that way.” He let out a harsh laugh. “Which is kind of funny because he’s married to a man now, but whatever. Details, I guess. He just made me feel so stupid.”

  “Not to her,” Cheryl said softly. “You were her hero that day. She said you talked about that boy all the time. She said that you liked him and that you did something about it. You were just a boy, she told me, and you put yourself out there enough to kiss another boy, not even knowing how he’d react. She said it took real courage to do that. That it took her until she was in her thirties to be who she really was… and here she was, looking up to a boy, wishing that she was fearless like that. That’s what she always said about you, Ben. That you were fearless.”

  Ben sucked in a quick breath and painted on a mock smile. “Thanks.”

  Cheryl leaned in and whispered, “What you’re wearing here today says that. I love it. You look great. Then again, you always do. You look like you’re attending your own wedding.”

  Those were the first tears of the day. They came quickly. One minute, Ben’s mouth was open as if to reply and the next, he was gone and I was left in his place to stare at an apologetic Cheryl before I excused myself to follow after him.

  I found him in the men’s room, splashing water against his reddened cheeks.

  “What did she say?” I asked quietly.

  “Why did I wear this?” he asked back, tugging at the button of the jacket. “She said I looked like I was attending my own wedding. Like I was celebrating!” He paced the small room. “I’m not celebrating. I… I’m—”

  “She didn’t mean it like that. You know what she meant.”

  “Do I?” he asked. “What could she have meant?”

  I turned his back against the wall and caged him in, placing my hands on either side of his head. “Quiet. Be quiet, okay? Just stop talking.”

  Ben’s wild breaths began to slow, his blue eyes locked on mine. “What?”

  “She meant that you’re a warrior,” I said softly. “She said as much. The comment about your clothing meant nothing. She just likes what you wear. She just… likes what you wear, Ben. Everything else she said came straight from Oma’s mouth. You are a fucking fighter.”

  A soft sob escaped from his throat as Ben’s forehead collapsed onto my shoulder. I wrapped my arms around him tightly and squeezed as a few more cries slipped out, but he was done after a few minutes, splashing a bit more water on his face and dabbing it with a dry paper towel. He clasped my hand, cleared his throat, and made his way back to the land of the living.

  The second time was in the parking lot. The morning was over. He had survived. Ben had spoken to countless people and done so with a smile on his face and a gracious reception. We were done now and were headed back to my house, as Bridgette had said that she had wanted to meet—the four of us—that she had something for all of us to discuss.

  In that parking lot, on the way to the car, he’d seen a bird. It was one of those male painted buntings tha
t he’d liked so much, bringing him to a screeching halt as he’d stared at it. It was gone just as fast as it had landed, but Ben was frozen, staring at its wake as if he’d seen a ghost. When I reached for his hand, he pulled away from me, looking at his fingers as if I’d dipped them in hot wax.

  “Ben?” I said. “You okay?”

  He politely and quietly sat down onto the concrete curb next to the parked car, pulling his knees up to his chest and resting his chin there, staring blankly at the side of the building. I joined him a few seconds later, choosing to study him rather than the brick surface.

  A soft wet tear slid from the corner of his eye when he blinked, moving quickly down to the corner of his upper lip. He ignored it, continuing to focus on the building before us.

  Typically, I broke the silence, but this time, I was going to wait him out. He seemed to need those extra minutes, finally opening his mouth to let the words come crashing out.

  “I don’t believe in plans, you know? Like fate or things happening for a reason, but you know how they always say that if you didn’t turn left that morning or if you wouldn’t have run out of coffee filters and had to get up and go to the coffee shop, like, your whole life would have turned out differently?” Ben turned to face me, his wet cheeks glistening in the sunlight. “You know what I mean?”

  “Yeah, Ben.”

  “Well, I usually don’t believe in that stuff, I guess, but I mean, there is sort of a science behind it. Like everything happens not necessarily for a reason, but if we wouldn’t have done one thing than another thing wouldn’t have happened. I guess my Grandma Nancy getting sick wouldn’t have brought them here and so even though I was brokenhearted about that for a really… really long fucking time, I guess, ultimately, it brought me here. And if I wouldn’t have bought that nightmare of a house—”

  “You may not have met me,” I said quietly. “Or maybe my dad would have sent my brother that day.”

  “I’m glad he didn’t.”

  I nudged his shoulder and let out a shallow laugh. “Me too.”

  “But I really wish this wouldn’t have happened so soon. God, I wish, Jess… I just wish I would have gotten more time with her. I know I got a lot of great years with her and I shouldn’t be so selfish, but is it wrong for me to just want a little more?”

  “No, Ben, it’s not.” I put my arm around his shoulder and squeezed. “You ready to go back to my house? Your mom wants to talk to us.”

  “Okay,” Ben said with an exaggerated groan. “I’m so tired and all I want to do is get out of these clothes and get into bed with you.”

  “Soon enough.”

  Twenty-Three.

  Ben

  My mom and dad sat across from us on Jesse’s cramped loveseat while Jesse quietly kneaded a cramp out of my foot. His hands really were like magic as I tried not to close my eyes and groan aloud. We did have company after all.

  “What’s going on?” I asked her. “What’s the big secret?”

  “There’s no big secret,” she returned. “It’s just… Oma… wrote something.”

  “Wrote something?” I leaned in. “Like what?”

  “She wrote us each… a letter.” She dug into her purse and retrieved four envelopes, each one sealed with shaky handwriting across the front. My mom carefully dropped each one on the table. “There’s one for all four of us.”

  My eyes immediately went for the one I least expected to see.

  Jesse.

  She’d met him for one day, which meant that the day she wrote it was the day she died.

  I leaned down to take mine just as Jesse bent to grab his. We both locked eyes, each of us wondering what awaited us inside.

  “Do we, I don’t know, read them here?” I asked. “I mean, it seems like it should be private, maybe.”

  My mom nodded. “Yeah, I know. I don’t think I can read mine in front of anyone. I mean, it’s probably just her giving me a recipe or something,” she said with a sniffle. “Wouldn’t that be great? Maybe she finally tells us what’s in those marshmallow bars.”

  “It’s just marshmallows and peanuts and butter,” I returned, relaxing into Jesse’s touch. He was rubbing the back of my knee now, his thumb massaging over my tired muscles. “She told me a few years ago.”

  “Oh, you asshole,” she spat with a wide grin.

  “So, when should we, like, read them?”

  My dad leaned in and pressed his hands to his knees. “That’s up to you, Ben. We brought you here in case you didn’t want to be alone when you read yours. But if you do, that’s up to you too. If you want to be with Jesse alone, that’s your choice as well.”

  I looked over at Jesse. His gorgeous brown hair hung in his eyes as his gaze drifted over my legs while he continued to work his hands over them, seeming to let me drive the conversation alone.

  “Jess?”

  “Hmm?” he asked, continuing to peacefully eyeball my thigh or whatever the fuck it was he was doing.

  “Hey,” I returned, snapping my fingers in front of his face.

  He looked up, a smile crossing his lips. “You’ve got great legs, you know that?” he murmured.

  Clearing my throat, I returned with, “Um, hey, guess what, my parents are here.” I raised both eyebrows and quickly glanced toward my family. “They’re, like, right there.”

  “I know,” he replied lazily. “I can give my boyfriend a compliment, can’t I?”

  “Um, I guess.”

  “You’re so beautiful.” Jesse smiled shyly and went back to my bare foot, casually picking it back up and kneading the arch like he was just knitting a sweater or changing the channel.

  Both of my parents, on the other hand, smiled at us in unison as I groaned and rolled my eyes. “Don’t start. Anyway, I think I’d like to read mine later, if it’s okay with you guys. Maybe at home, I think.”

  They both nodded. “Yeah, that’s fine,” my mom said. “Me too, I think. I’ll read mine after your dad goes to bed.”

  “Maybe she told me where the keys to the Continental are,” my dad gushed.

  My mom and I both glared at him. “Oma is dead and you’re worried about the car?”

  He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s not like she can drive it now,” he mumbled.

  I leaned over and rubbed the soft hair on Jesse’s cheek. “You ready to go back to my place?”

  Jesse smiled and leaned in to press a kiss to my lips. “I’m ready to go wherever you’re going.”

  Man, I loved him. And I knew what I wanted to do.

  I peeled off the suit and hung it carefully, placing it into the back of my closet. Watching Jesse dig through his overnight bag for a pair of sweats and a t-shirt, I smiled and grabbed a loose pair of my own pants, tugging them up my legs and tightening the waistband.

  “We’re going for a walk,” I informed him, sliding on a pair of rubber flip flops.

  “In sweatpants?” Jesse looked down at his cotton-covered thighs. “Should I change?”

  I shook my head. “You’ll be fine. We aren’t going far. Bring your letter, okay?”

  He scratched his beard, staring at me for a few seconds before answering. “You sure?”

  “Just do it before I change my mind, okay?”

  Jesse slid on his own flip flops and ran a hand through his tangled hair. He had looked so incredibly handsome all day and had gone out of his way to introduce himself to anyone and everyone as my “partner”—how fucking adorable was that?—even if I did have to keep reminding him that it wasn’t two-thousand-five anymore and that he could call me his boyfriend if he wanted to. Even more adorable was his reasoning behind it, saying that the word “boyfriend” didn’t seem to carry enough weight behind it—that he was one-hundred-fifty percent in and that he needed everyone to know that it was “like we were more than that.”

  That’s why I knew this was right, what I was doing now.

  With Oma’s letter clutched in one hand and Jesse’s fingers laced tightly in between my other, we made our w
ay down to the beach for the second time that week.

  We sat on an old blanket I’d tucked under one arm and ditched the rubber shoes immediately, settling into the sand across from one another as if we’d planned our positions in advance, sort of just staring at one another, the envelopes clutched tightly in our fingers as if we were afraid they may blow away.

  I was petrified, actually.

  What if they did? What if the last words on those papers were truly her last and we’d lost them to sea? I stared down at the note in his hands, flapping in the evening air, as I swallowed thickly and gave him a single nod.

  “Will you read it to me?” I asked quietly.

  Jesse carefully took the letter from the envelope, clutching it even tighter between his thick, shaking fingers.

  “Okay,” he said softly. “You ready?”

  “Uh huh.”

  Jesse cleared his throat and looked up at me. “It’s not long,” he said with a smile.

  “Okay.” I pushed his knee. “Will you fucking go?”

  “Don’t fucking rush me.” He cleared his throat again. “Okay, it says… Jesse. You are a big man.”

  “It says ‘you are a big man’?” I cocked my eyebrow. “She starts out with ‘you are a big man’? Please tell me it gets better.”

  Jesse laughed aloud. “That’s it. That’s all it says.” He flipped over the paper to look at the back. “It just says I’m big and then it’s over.”

  “Will you fucking get serious?”

  “Will you fucking stop interrupting me? I think there may be a point, okay? Okay.” He looked at the letter again. “Where was I?”

  “You’re a giant, giant man or whatever.”

  “Okay, shut up. Jesse. You are a big man. It was a surprise, even though Benji said you hunted and ate your own food.” Jesse looked up at me in confusion. “What is she talking about?”

  I gave him an eye roll and a wave of my hands. “Will you just keep going?”

  “… hunted and ate your own food. All I saw was a man who could protect my son. I know he will want to correct me on this and say that he is my grandson because he is always fighting me, even after I’ve died, but on this, I am right. I will always look at him as my baby. And you are the man my baby has chosen, so now I hope you can make sure he is taken care of. I meant what I said. Benji will need someone in this world to guide him through the adventures he has yet to take.