Like a Love Story

by Abdi Nazemian

  We make it through side A of the record without doing anything but tongue-less kissing. I get up and turn the record around. Side B begins. We are shadows of the night now. The lights are dim. The city is dark, and I think of all the couples all around this city who must be making love right now. I feel empowered. I tell Reza that I have a surprise for him, then I remove my sweater. And my jeans. I stand before him, in my slip and garter, offering myself up to him.

  “Oh wow,” he says.

  “You like it?” I ask, desperate for validation.

  “You look just like Madonna in the ‘Express Yourself’ video,” he says.

  I smile. “That’s the idea. I figured since you like her so much . . .”

  “Wow,” he says again, which I try hard to convince myself is a good response. It’s better than gross or ew. But my heart is sinking a little. I’m all too aware of everything he’s not doing. Like pushing me down on the bed, passionately making out with me, ripping the slip off me.

  I sit down on the edge of the bed. He lies next to me, looking sideways at me. Neither of us moves. “It’s okay to . . . touch me,” I say, my voice shaking now.

  “Okay,” he says, but he does nothing.

  “Have you ever, you know . . .” I don’t say more. Instead, I say, “It’s my first time, too. I’ve never done anything with a boy except practice kissing with Art.”

  Shut up, Judy. No guy wants an image of you making out with your gay best friend.

  “I mean, he doesn’t count, though, since he’s gay. You’ll be my first.”

  “Okay,” he says again, his voice dry and distant.

  I feel like he’s miles away from me, and I want desperately to pull him back into this moment. I take his hand and I place it on my waist. “Is that okay?”

  “Yes,” he says, but still his voice and his gaze are somewhere else. Somewhere far away. I wish I knew where so I could go there with him. All I want is to feel close to him, and instead I feel like we’re floating away from each other, like we have no gravitational pull.

  I move his hand up to my breasts. Art told me that men would go nuts for them someday, and this is that day. I’m ready for him to go nuts for them. He doesn’t. His hand just sits on my left boob, limp. No heat in his touch, no electricity. I feel a void inside me growing bigger and deeper. I’ve never felt so desperate for anything. I would give up so much just to have him want me right now.

  “I love your feet,” I say. “I remember seeing them the first day we met, and thinking, those are perfect feet.”

  You sound like a lunatic, or like some kind of foot fetishist.

  “And I also love your back,” I say, stammering, trying to save this clearly botched attempt at sexiness. “Your skin is so . . . soft.” I pause, and then, my voice shaky, I ask, “Which parts of my body do you like?”

  He doesn’t answer the question. He opens his mouth once to try, but no sound comes out. Maybe it’s for the best. I don’t think I want to hear what he has to say. And then he pulls his hand away. Covers his face with it in shame.

  “Judy . . . ,” he whispers from beneath his fingers, barely audible. “I can’t do this.”

  “I’m sorry,” I say quickly. “I’m so sorry. I pushed you too far. I’m sorry.” I know how pathetic I sound. I know he’s rejecting me, and I think I know why. But I want to keep him. I need to hold on to him as long as I can.

  “Judy . . . ,” he whispers again, and now he takes his hands off his face and holds mine with them. His eyes are welling, no tears yet, but the formation of them, like a looming threat of what’s to come. “I am the one who is sorry.”

  “No, don’t be sorry,” I say. “Don’t even say anything else. It’s okay. I can wait!”

  “I can’t do this to you anymore,” he says. His eyes are fuller now. A wave is coming to the surface of his face, about to explode.

  “Let’s just go watch a movie,” I say, trying to escape this conversation.

  “Judy,” he whispers.

  “What do you want to watch?” I interrupt him. I don’t want him to utter another word. “My parents don’t have a lot of options, but I think they have Police Academy. Have you seen it?”

  “Judy, you know what I’m about to say,” he says, with kindness that enrages me. If there’s one thing I don’t want from him right now, it’s kindness. I want passionate, animalistic lust, or the promise of future passionate, animalistic lust. Instead, I get kindness, and worse, pity.

  “I don’t know, and I don’t want to know,” I say harshly.

  “That night,” he says. “That night I brought you the flowers . . .”

  Now I’m thrown. “That night?” I ask.

  “Art and me, we . . .” He trails off.

  “Art?” I ask, my face tense, my hands shaking. “What does Art have to do with this?”

  I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I feel humiliated and alone. Art. And Reza. Did something happen between them? I was ready for something else, maybe, but not that.

  “He gave me a flower,” he says, choosing his words carefully. “And we . . . I can’t explain it, but I think . . . I think I like men.”

  “Okay, back up,” I say, annoyed now. “You like men . . . or you like . . . Art? Because one of those options is a lot worse than the other.”

  “I am so sorry,” he says, with even more pity. “I love you, Judy.”

  Somehow hearing him say he loves me just makes it all so much worse. This hurts so much that I want to be angry, because at least anger will mask the pain I’m feeling. “You didn’t answer the question,” I snap. “If you’re going to say something, then just say it.”

  “I like men, and I like Art,” he says, like he’s amazed he just said it out loud. “And I love you.”

  “Stop saying that!” I yell, pushing him away from me. I stand up, turn away from him. “You can’t love me and do this to me. You don’t get that privilege!”

  I grab for my sweater, for the comfort of hiding behind fabric again. I was an idiot to think a guy who wasn’t gay could like me. How could I have been so blind to all the signs right in front of me?

  “You can go now,” I say as I put my pants on, my fingers trembling.

  “I feel horrible,” he says earnestly. I know he means it, but I don’t care.

  “You should,” I say coldly. “You should go rot in hell for what you did to me.”

  “I will,” he says, anguished.

  “Good, now that we agree, can you leave?” I say bitterly.

  Pat Benatar is still singing, but I pick up the needle and turn the record player off. It’s quiet now. Nothing in this room but his duplicity and my humiliation. He stands up and faces me. He doesn’t say anything. He just looks me in the eyes, and tears flow down his cheeks. I turn my face into steel.

  “Go,” I whisper. I want him out before I start crying myself. He doesn’t deserve my tears. What was I thinking dressing myself for him, when I’ve known all along that the only person anyone should dress for is themselves? How did I let myself lose so much of myself in him?

  “I don’t want to leave you,” he says. “I want to be here with you. I want to be your friend.”

  “You’re not my friend,” I say icily. I want to hurt him like he hurt me.

  “Okay,” he says. “I will go.” He doesn’t move.

  “Go, then,” I say. “Why are you still here? Go!”

  He opens his mouth to say something else but stops himself. He moves toward me, probably to give me a pity kiss, but I flinch.

  “Reza, I don’t want you here. Get out.”

  Finally, he leaves.

  I want to throw on every outfit I have in my closet. I want to wear so many layers that the broken heart underneath the lingerie is deep below the weight of fabric, deep enough to lose all sensation.

  I used to love being alone in this apartment. I would look forward to the rare night when both my parents were out, when I could blast any record I wanted and design anything my imagination
dreamed up without interruption. But I’m not just alone anymore. I’m lonely too. I get the difference now.

  I replay the last few months in my head, and it all makes sense now. All those awkward moments between them, between us. Art lied to me. His best friend. His parents are at the theater. He might be alone at home too.

  Like a zombie, I head to the phone. I dial Art’s number.

  Three rings. Ring, ring, ring.

  “Hello?” he says.

  I just breathe.

  “Hello, who is this?” he says.

  His voice. I knew that voice before it cracked, before it knew how to tell a lie.

  Say something, Judy.

  “Um, okay, bye,” he says, and hangs up, leaving me with nothing but silence.

  #63 High School

  There may be no harder place to be queer than high school, a place of bullies and slurs, a place steeped in rituals of heterosexuality. Who’s dating who? Who kissed who? Who will be homecoming king and queen? Who will be your prom date? And you have to play along, because if you don’t, your difference has a spotlight on it.

  I tried to play along. I took a girl to the prom. I kept my eyes on the locker room floors when other boys were changing. I talked about my crushes on the girls with the biggest breasts. Still they called me a fairy. Still they beat me up. Still they left notes in my locker that read “die, faggot.” And still my dad asked me why I didn’t just fight back.

  But high school ends. Remember that, even when it feels eternal. And when it ends, there are places to go. The Village, Provincetown, San Francisco. Pockets of cities and towns where boys take boys to dances and dance their nights away, writhing their bodies against each other in a primal effort to shed all the trauma of their past. Places where girls settle down with girls, places where boys can dress like girls on the street and get high-fives instead of fists against their gorgeous faces. Maybe someday high school will change. Maybe someday there can be two homecoming queens, maybe someday girls can ask other girls to the prom, gay boys can enter locker rooms without fear. But if it doesn’t, then just remember that high school ends. And that there is another life waiting for you, over the rainbow.

  Reza

  It’s Sunday morning. The Sunday morning I have heard Art talk about with so much anticipation and excitement. The day of the church protest. It’s freezing outside, so bitterly cold I think my eyelashes will freeze as Tara and I walk to meet DJ Starburst for an early breakfast.

  Once we sit down, I can’t stop staring at DJ Starburst. He’s undeniably good-looking, and clearly enamored of my sister. But he doesn’t look like he should be named after bright, gooey candy, with his long black hair, brooding eyes, and all-black clothing. At some point in the conversation, I have an idea that he should change his name—perhaps he could be a dark chocolate instead. Something like DJ Skor. But I don’t suggest it. Instead, I listen as the two of them relive their courtship for me.

  “I was on the dance floor when we met,” Tara says, talking way too fast, like she’s still drunk from the night before. She snuck out last night. She does that a lot, and no one but me notices. “The music was so good. I think it was a remix of Duran Duran singing “All She Wants Is” with some house beat behind it, and I was freaking out. I looked up at the DJ booth to see who the genius was.”

  “And the genius was me,” Starburst says in his Italian accent. He speaks deliberately, each syllable oozing charm. I can see what she sees in him, but I wonder if what my mom says about women you have fun with and women you want to marry applies to men. I wonder if Starburst is a man you have fun with.

  “I think I blew him a kiss,” Tara says. “Did I blow you a kiss?” She looks at him coyly.

  “You did. And it was like the strobe lights created a spotlight on you,” Starburst says, oozing lust for her. Then, turning to me, he says, “Your sister’s eyes were like lasers to my heart.”

  “Oh,” I say. “That’s so sweet.” Also, a little weird, but I’m trying to keep an open mind.

  “I knew right then I could love her,” he continues.

  “And I knew I could love him,” Tara says.

  He kisses her, she kisses back. Their tongues are sloppy and passionate, and they are probably tasting each other’s breakfasts: eggs Benedict for him, blueberry pancakes for her with loads of syrup to sate her sweet tooth. I never kissed Judy like this. She probably wanted me to. I wonder what I would do if Starburst did to my sister what I did to Judy. Would I be able to forgive him?

  “Obviously, I made my way up to the DJ booth to make a request,” Tara continues.

  “She requested New Order,” he says. “Which made me realize not only was she beautiful, but she also has taste.”

  “Then we basically made out for the rest of his set,” Tara says, with no hint of shame.

  I force a smile. “Great,” I say, trying hard to act like I want to hear about my sister making out with a DJ all night.

  And they don’t stop there. He reminisces about their first dates, their shared dreams, her promise that she would move to New York to be with him. She shows me a ring he gave her on their second date, metal with a small skull on it. He shows me a tattoo on his lower back, her name written in Farsi script. She says she was going to get a tattoo of his name but chickened out, too afraid of the needles. I feel grateful for that. I can only imagine how our mother would react if she discovered a tattoo on Tara’s skin. They make out again. I can taste their passion. It all seems so unbelievably fast. How can two people just look at each other through the glare of strobe lights and know they are in love? How can they be so sure? And if this is possible, is it possible for me?

  “So?” Tara says, picking a blueberry out of her pancake and flinging it at my face.

  “Ow,” I say, but I pick the blueberry off the table and eat it. I have barely touched my own omelet, my appetite a distant memory since I broke Judy’s heart.

  “We need your advice, little brother,” she says. “You’re the only person who knows all the players, and who isn’t predisposed to hate me. It’s time for me to tell the fam that I’m staying in New York and moving in with my man. How do we handle this delicately?”

  Tara handles nothing delicately. Even if you gave her a feather, she would find a way to turn it into a weapon and stab you with it. “I don’t know,” I say. “Maybe go back to school first and . . .”

  “No, that’s not an option,” Tara says curtly. “I’m staying in New York. I’m living with Massimo.” Hearing her use his real name somehow makes their relationship, and their plans, a lot more serious.

  “Do you . . . do you have enough money to live . . . in case they . . . ,” I stammer, but I know they understand what I am saying. In college, Tara’s life is taken care of. If she chooses to quit school, there is no guarantee.

  “I make okay money as a DJ,” Massimo says.

  “But then you have to spend most of what you make on new records,” she says to him.

  “I’m not quite at the level where labels give me free records,” he explains.

  “But he will be,” Tara says, beaming with pride. “And I can wait tables, or bartend. We’ll be fine.”

  I nod, taking this in, imagining the look on my mother’s face when she finds out my sister is going to quit school to become a bartender and live with a DJ.

  “I’m trying to change, Zabber,” she says to me. “I’m trying to handle this differently than the old Tara. The old me would’ve just blurted this out, probably after a few drinks, had a huge fight with Mom, put you in the middle of it. I don’t want to be that person anymore. I just want to love who I want to love and be who I want to be.”

  It’s all I want too. To love who I want to love. To be who I want to be.

  “I know you understand,” she says.

  I know she does, too. She asked me that first night if I thought Art was cute, and I nodded. I did not say anything else, just a nod. But it was enough. And she only said one thing to me after I nodded. She said, �
��I always knew and I think it’s great.” That was enough too.

  “I think you should tell Mommy first,” I say, “and alone. Just you and her.”

  Tara looks over at Massimo apologetically, and after kissing her twice on the hand, he says, “It’s okay. I don’t need to be there.”

  “And then,” I continue, “I think you should ask Mommy how she would choose to tell Abbas. You should make her part of the plan and the decision.”

  “Okay, that’s good,” Tara says pensively, like she’s taking mental notes. “Thanks.”

  “Also, I think you should find a college in New York to transfer to before you—”

  Tara bites her lip hard, then stops me. “I can’t transfer to college here.”

  “Why?” I ask.

  She bites her lip again. “I never showed up to class in Toronto,” she says casually. “I just . . . it’s not my thing.”

  “But Mom was paying!” I say, a little too strongly, annoyed on behalf of my mother, who worked so hard to raise us before Abbas was in her life, who sacrificed the prime of her life for us.

  “I didn’t waste the money,” she says. “I managed to get a refund . . .”

  “Did you give it to Mom?” I ask.

  “No, of course not—that’s my money. If she was gonna spend it on college for me, then I can spend it however I want.” She flares her nostrils at me, defiant. This is the old Tara. This is the kind of terrible decision she makes. “And it’ll tide us over until I get a job here. It’s not easy to get a job in the States without work papers.”

  “That’s like stealing from her,” I say.

  Then I have a flash of me rummaging through Abbas’s pants, taking money from his pockets, spending it on Madonna posters, records, magazines. I’m no better than her. I just know how to hide my wrongs better. At least she is open about who she truly is.

  “We don’t have to bring that up,” Tara says dismissively. “I like your advice. I’ll have a calm one-on-one with her, I’ll make her part of the decision . . .”