by J. C. Lillis
My eyes well a little and uh-oh, the mood is shifting. It’s like the safe car we were in just hitched itself to a roller coaster and we’re click-click-clicking up a hill, that first one that’s always the steepest.
“You changed me too,” she confesses. “I listened to a song called ‘Walking on Sunshine’ today. Without breaking out in hives.”
“I listened to Transitive Properties!”
“Ahh! Which one?”
“The Wreck of a Perfect Idea.”
“Oh no, that’s their third best album. Get Don’t Start Believing.”
“Okay.” I scribble it on a napkin.
“Also,” she says, “I’ve made two dorky to-do lists this week thanks to you.”
“Oh, yay!”
“And you made me realize that traditional song structure is sometimes an elegant building, and not a tight corset.”
“Aw.”
“And the old me cast a suspicious eye at formulaic choruses. But you make them sound, you know…” She thumbs a cracker crumb off her lip. “So good.”
I gulp.
“We make them sound good,” I say. “Together.”
“These s’mores are amazing.”
“Totally,” I murmur, even though I don’t like mine. “Like, improbably amazing.”
A tremor runs through me. The roller coaster teeters at the top of the hill.
“Welp,” Ava says in this goofy voice. “Good on ya, partner.”
I laugh. It’s a relief to laugh. “Where’d you get that expression?”
“Johnny.” She pulls a curl out straight and lets it spring back. “He said it last night when we jammed together.”
“You jam with Ukulele Johnny?”
“Yeah. A lot, actually. He’s a good guy. Voice like a goat, but a good guy. We jam in the Zen garden at night, after everyone’s asleep.”
“Oh, man. Don’t tell the Johnny’s Angels on Twitter. They’ll sabotage you.”
“Right, yeah. We’ll keep that undercover.”
I picture them in the garden, twining their harmonies on the koi-pond footbridge, and I can’t help it, I have to know: “Are you guys an item?”
“What does that mean, ‘an item’?”
“Like, do you…like him?”
“Do I want to cover his potato head with kisses and take him out for a milkshake?”
“Ah…”
“No. I don’t want Johnny for a boyfriend.” She licks chocolate off her finger. “I don’t want anyone for a boyfriend.”
“Yeah. It would kind of kill your brand.” I spoon up some s’more-flavored glop.
“That, and…” She makes a megaphone with her hands and whispers through it loudly. “I like girls.”
I freeze. A strand of artisan marshmallow fluff stretches from the spoon to my lips, and then breaks.
“I won’t mention it on the show. I’ve decided.” She holds up a hand. “Don’t give me shit about it, I’m being practical. They’ll make it the center of my ‘narrative,’ which is super gross, like it’s my one defining characteristic? Plus they’ve never had an out lesbian in the top 5 and I’ve already lost the racist shithead vote, so I’ll wait until I win and then…” She sees whatever my face is doing. “Uh. Hey.”
“Hm?”
“Is my lady-love a problem for you?” she says.
“No! Not at all.” I swipe fluff off my face with the side of my hand. Gross, Barrie. “You just never mentioned it.”
“I never mentioned my middle name was Mariposa, either.”
“I guess I assumed the person who broke your heart—”
“Was D-A-N-N-Y and not D-A-N-I? Why’d you assume that?”
“I…don’t know.” I rub the fluff on my right hand with my left hand and now both my hands are sticky. “It’s cool, though. I mean, not cool like it’s ‘especially cool’ or like you needed my blessing, but cool in a regular way. I mean, I’m surprised. Not that I should be! I’m kind of…” Babbling. I’m babbling. Because a brick wall has crumbled before me and in my head I’m stepping over the ruins, walking toward her, sitting beside her by a crackling campfire and whispering sweet indistinct things as she leans closer and closer and oh Lord the roller coaster is rattling down the hill like the cars are going to fly apart and I’m mixing metaphors now and ugh ugh ugh, Abel was right.
“You’re kind of what?” Ava wants to know.
The waiter comes with the check and discreetly lays an extra napkin by my plate. I’m making a total jerk of myself and Ava’s looking at me like I’m a nutball and I know I have to Cinderella myself home right now. I can’t believe I’m going to end a full day of creative collaboration and confidences like this, but I have no choice.
“I—have to go. I think I left the oven on,” I say. “I don’t want to start a fire.”
Chapter Sixteen
On the bus back to Abel’s, I sit next to a young man in overalls who’s convinced the world will end next Thursday. He’s saying many alarming things about numerology and Pythagoras and for a minute it’s a welcome distraction from the truth:
It’s happening again.
It’s the feeling I got at age fifteen, when my friend-love for Chelsie free-fell into passion while we choreographed a dance in her bedroom. The feeling I got last year, when Mick backed me into the shoe room at the bowling alley and kissed me by the size-sixes. When I crush on someone, it comes on strong and fast, like an Olympic runner or a bad case of food poisoning. More significantly, it is a surefire envy repellant. I can think of nothing but the other person’s happiness and prosperity. I dwell in eternal anguished bliss. My face is infected with dopey dreamy smiles, which come out of nowhere and are impossible to scrub away.
I FORBID THIS, Evil Barrie rages.
I rest my head on the seat before me in despair. Doomsday Overalls Man pats my shoulder. Why do things have to get complicated? Nemeses perform a very useful function in narratives. There’s a reason why Superman didn’t crush on Lex Luthor (except in fanfic), why Counselor Tripp kept antagonizing Dad’s character for three whole Camp Creekbottom sequels. If they started making s’mores and campfire googly-eyes, everything would be ruined.
I look up Mariposa on my phone. I know I heard it before in Spanish class—tree, maybe, or flower.
Butterfly. Wow. It’s Spanish for butterfly. That’s beautiful. Ava Butterfly Alvarez.
I WILL BOIL YOUR BONES, shouts Evil B.
“Twelve days left,” says Doomsday Overalls Man. “Get your shit straightened out, yeah?”
I nod a million times and offer him a stick of Arctic Blast gum.
“I will,” I promise.
***
When I’m back at Abel’s I fully intend to crash in the shed so they can get down to business, but it’s a cold night and maybe I could sneak in for a blanket if they’re not in the throes of passion. Throes of passion are the last thing I need to stumble upon right now.
I unlatch the door quietly and nudge it open. A warm romantic cinnamon-vanilla smell envelops me. I suspect cookies are baking, not that I’d know since I never bake sweets and the only thing Mara Krumholtz puts in the oven are pans she doesn’t feel like washing and the occasional batch of “special brownies.”
Soft moans of ecstasy greet my ears. Oh damn—
“Barbarella?” Abel calls, as I’m sneaking back out. “That you?”
“No—yes! I’ll go away.”
“Sadly unnecessary.”
The moaning stops and a strange male voice—suave, cartoon-robotic—says Captain: I believe you’ve blown my circuits.
Oh.
I venture into the living room. Abel is slumped on the couch, arms knotted over his chest. On the TV, two half-dressed men are heavy-breathing on the bridge of a starship. The whole set looks constructed of cheap painted plywood and Christmas lights. I recognize the characters from Brandon and Abel’s fanboying: they’re the android Sim and space captain Cadmus. Except th
ey’re the cheesy porn versions, so they’re probably like, Slim and Chadmus.
I sit down beside Abel and mirror his slump. Sim and Cadmus action figures perch on his armrest.
“How was the mac and cheese?” he says.
“Incredible,” I say gloomily.
Let’s put this in hyperdrive, says Porn Cadmus. If you know what I mean.
“Where’s Brandon?” I ask.
“I dunno. On a walk.”
“Whatcha watching?”
“CastaGay Planet.”
“Cool.” My face burns. I feel instinctively that there are certain appropriate things to say when watching an adult film, and “cool” is not one of them.
“Bran and I used to watch this one together, way back when. We’d like laugh at the first ten minutes but then we’d get ideas.” He arches an eyebrow.
“What happened to the other movie?”
Abel sighs and rubs his face. “So it was going well. It was going great. We’re quoting the same lines at the same time, our knees are touching, he’s reaching over me for duck sauce and letting his arm like, linger across my chest.”
“Promising.”
“Very. So we get to the part where Cadmus and Sim are lost in the Grimgem Desert and they’re talking about how people we love can feel like home, and that’s our scene, right? And our hands find each other in the dark and I know he’s feeling it too, because he literally says ‘I’m feeling it too.’ And then right as our lips are about to touch, he like springs up and goes in the bathroom forever, and when he comes out guess what he tells me.”
I’m pretty sure I’m not actually supposed to guess.
“He was all, ‘If we hook up tonight, I’d be doing it for the wrong reasons.’” Abel makes a whaaa? gesture. “Like I fucking care what the reasons are!”
“Maybe he feels like he’d be using you.”
“So? He can use me! I want to be used.”
“Really?”
“No.” He sighs at the TV, at the heated communion of Porn Cadsim. “But—to me it seems so simple. We still love each other. We can feel how good this would be. Why can’t we just let it happen?”
“Maybe he needs to protect himself. Because he’s been hurt.” I see Chelsie watching me stonefaced from her open window, her red hair rustling in the breeze as I biked away from her house forever. “Maybe he’s scared.”
“Of what? Me?” He splays a hand on his chest. “I never hurt him. Not on purpose. We hurt each other once because we were young and we were dummies, but we wouldn’t now. We wouldn’t again.” He knocks his head against the back of the sofa and lets out a long arrggghhh. “God, why do feelings have to happen?”
My thoughts exactly.
“Was he your first boyfriend?” I ask him.
“Huh-uh. He was my best, though.” He blinks at the ceiling. “Maybe you always see your first real love with rose-colored glasses, but I don’t think so. I think we really were that awesome.”
“How did you, ah…” I fiddle with the loose sequin on my jeans pocket. Act casual, I cue myself. You are asking for perfectly innocent reasons. “How did you know you were falling in love?”
Abel exhales slowly. He toys with his Cadsim action figures, which makes me smile despite the sadness because it reminds me there’s no expiration date on fandom. “I knew pretty early on. We had Castaway fandom in common and that lit the fuse—like, if you share this consuming thing no one else in your life understands? That’s huge.”
I nod fiercely.
“I had this Castie fan vlog, the most ridiculous indulgent thing you can imagine—and then he came on as my partner, and it became like, legitimately entertaining. We wrote funny recaps together. We did these little skits and songs sometimes. And like…I wanted to be something more than myself, for him. I wanted to work hard and be focused and sharp and witty. And every week, when we did a new show, I wasn’t this off-the-wall kid who bounced from thing to thing and never saw a finish line. I was this cool, creative person who could make something actual people liked.” He links the captain’s hand with the android’s.
“It’s intimate,” I say. “Creating with someone.”
“It’s the most intimate thing you can do.” He sets the action figures between us and leans back on the sofa cushion, his fingers traveling his A+B tattoo. “Even if what you’re creating is goofy, or seems silly or trivial to the rest of the world. It’s that universe-of-two thing. Comfortable and challenging all at once. You know?”
“Yes.” My throat aches. “I think so.”
“He’s not just my friend, he’s like the mirror of my best self. And to this day, every time I try something new or scary, like when I quit my job and poured my inheritance into St. C’s? I always imagine he’s next to me. Because he helped me…”
“…become who you were meant to be?”
He turns his head, looks at me hard.
I become enthralled by the sofa crack.
“What happened tonight?” he says.
“Nothing.”
“Because if you’re denying yourself something for fucked-up reasons, I must kindly request that you stop that shit.”
We lock eyes for an endless second and his face is so kind and I want to tell him everything but then the oven dings.
“There’s my consolation cookies,” he says. “Hang on.”
Abel springs up and goes to the kitchen. He leaves the action figures on the arm of the couch, their plastic hands snapped together like puzzle pieces. Their onscreen counterparts are gearing up for round two, this time in a cave made of papier-mâché. I feel like I should give them privacy but I can’t stop watching, can’t stop thinking about everything Abel said.
Comfortable and challenging all at once.
I fought with Ava over the song. And it was good. When Ma’s spoiling for a battle I snap into defense mode—smile, lay low, clean the kitchen—but today I relaxed into conflict, felt how productive a fight can be when you both love the thing you’re crossing swords over. It felt safe and exciting at the same time. Even when she hung up on me, I knew she’d call back.
That universe-of-two thing.
I close my eyes and picture us face to face on a small bare stage, a warm spotlight circling us and blacking out the rest of the world. She puts Fernando down. I put Rosalinda down. Our lips meet gently at first, and then the spotlight breaks into swirling stars and the kiss goes all hands-in-each-other’s-hair intense, the way the captain is kissing the android now in the dim romantic light of the cave.
“Snickerdoodle?”
I jump. Abel is waving a blue plate under my nose—heart-shaped cookies, dusted with cinnamon and fresh from the oven. They smell like hope, like new love, like I imagine Ava’s hair might smell if she rested her curly head on my shoulder.
I stand up so fast the plate jostles.
“What’s with you?” says Abel.
“Nothing.” Then, good Lord, I blurt: “Ava’s into girls!”
Abel stifles a grin. “Is that so.”
“It has nothing to do with anything, though. I’m not into her. She’s not into me.” I stumble to the porch door. “I—should get back to work.”
“This late?”
“Sour grapes wait for no man! Or woman.”
“Okay, but—”
“Bye!”
***
Franny’s on the porch. The garden hose is stuck through the wrought-iron post and the cat is crouched below it, stalking the swelling droplet that’s about to fall from the nozzle. I give her a pat. I consider the hose. Maybe I should give myself a cold shower.
Sad notes drift over from the shed.
I sneak across the yard, push the door open. Brandon’s sitting on an overturned bucket, plucking the first bars of “Without You.”
“Hey,” I say.
“Hey. Didn’t mean to take your workspace.”
“It’s cool.” I duck through the doorway. “What’s up
?”
“Oh, nothing.” He bends a note so hard it looks like it hurts. “Just narrowly averted a makeout session with my best friend.”
“Really? Those are no good?” I unfold a lawn chair.
“They’re great, yeah,” he says. “If you like things complicated and super-awkward. And also if you love reliving past trauma.”
I sit my butt in the chair and lean in. After Abel’s rhapsodizing I desperately need to hear some bad stuff about love.
“So…can I ask a question?” I say.
He shrugs.
“You first got together when you were my age, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Why did you break up?”
“Why do you want to know?”
“I’m writing a breakup song.” The fib burns in my throat. “I could use some perspective.”
“Ah.” Brandon rests his guitar across his lap and picks idly at the strings at the top of the neck, near the twisty metal knobs. (Machine heads. I know that from Ava.) The strings are wound so taut up there they sound like mini harps, the kind that signal a flashback sequence in silly old sitcoms.
“After we got together, it was incredible for a while,” he says. “Six weeks of a summer I never wanted to end. And then we went to different colleges and I, ah…I put so much pressure on us to keep this perfect relationship going. I was so intense. I’d never done the love thing before. I thought if I didn’t do everything right, I’d lose him, so I ended up doing everything wrong.”
I nod. Yes. This is exactly the kind of disaster I would be in a relationship. Chalk one up for nun life.
“I’d call him like three times a day. I’d get jealous when he talked about guy friends. He tried to hang on because the good stuff between us was still there too, like the sweetness and the—um, lust, I guess, and our whole private language of in-jokes and Castaway quotes. But by New Year’s he couldn’t hack it. I mean, why would he? We were eighteen. Just kids.” He thunks the bottom of his guitar on the floor and wraps his arms around its neck in this cute sad way that makes me want to hug him. “God, he broke up with me in the nicest, most gentle way you could imagine, but it didn’t matter. I was a wreck. I didn’t stop crying for like three weeks. I missed tons of classes. I almost failed Intro to Psych.” He shuts his eyes. “Do you know how many times I listened to ‘The Scientist’ on repeat?”