Educating Simon

by Robin Reardon

  “Hey, Simon.” His smile had something intimate in it.

  I recovered as quickly as possible and said, “Michael.” I hoped my tone was as even and unrevealing as I intended it to be. For a nanosecond, I considered continuing my conversation with Maddy as though it were the most natural thing in the world that Michael was standing there, and as though hello was the be-all and end-all of what we might say to each other. But I couldn’t move, and I couldn’t drop my gaze from his face.

  “Simon?” Maddy finally realised she didn’t have my full attention.

  I yanked my gaze away from Michael long enough to tell her, “See you tomorrow, Maddy.”

  Michael said, “Walk with me.”

  “I beg your pardon?” Who does he think he is? My boss? My commanding officer?

  “Please? I’ll carry your books.”

  Ignoring his teasing tone, I glared at him. He might be gorgeous, but he was also clueless. “You’re going from bad to worse. What do you want?”

  “I . . . Simon, look. I’m just trying to make a connection.”

  “Why?”

  “I feel there’s something between us. I’d like to know what it is. Wouldn’t you?”

  “You remember I’m gay, right?”

  He grinned. “I remember. And you remember I almost was, right?”

  “That might be clear to you.” What I was thinking was that avoiding sex is hardly the same thing as changing how you feel about it.

  “Let’s go someplace where we can talk about that. Newbury Street?”

  He looked like he thought he had hooked a fish, or could at least see it approaching the bait. Maybe I wanted to be caught. “Can we sit outside?”

  Maybe ten minutes later we were at a café table close enough to the street to watch the pedestrians file past, at adjacent sides of a square table so we weren’t facing each other directly. He ordered a Coke and chips, and I got an iced tea, with a silent nod to Ned. And now that we were here, he seemed reluctant to begin. So I opened.

  “I hope you realise I don’t buy this ‘almost gay’ idea.”

  “You don’t know the power of Straight Edge.”

  “I’d bet on biology any day. And is this why you’re stalking me, by the way? You want to convert me?” I glanced sideways at him, away from the parade of people.

  “Okay, look. I’m not stalking you. And I’m not out to convert anybody. That isn’t what Straight Edge is about. It’s just that you seemed . . . I don’t know, different. Yesterday, in the gallery.”

  “I am different. I’m English, and I’m gay.” I turned my gaze back to the parade.

  “And you’re incredibly smart. You must be, to be at that school.”

  My tone sarcastic, I said, “So, put all that together and you come up with someone you can’t get out of your mind?”

  He was quiet long enough to make me look at him. “Maybe not for the reason you think.”

  I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do about this tension. If he’d admitted to being gay, I would have liked it a lot. I turned fully towards him. “Back at the school, you said you sensed something between us. Would you like to know what I think that is?”

  “Sure.”

  “You’re attracted to me. And I’m attracted to you. There are probably a lot of reasons for this, and one of them is that we’re both gay.” If that didn’t send him packing, nothing would.

  “Just because I find you interesting doesn’t mean I’m attracted to you sexually.”

  “How, then? In what way are you attracted to me?” And why didn’t that send him packing? Did he want to be caught?

  “There’s something edgy, something cool about you. And you’re smart. Really smart. I was always one of those kids who wouldn’t admit they’re smarter than they act. You know the type? Boys, mostly. If we have a brain, we hide it. And talent in art is like the plague. Not cool. Me, I barely got into BU. But I know I have the brain power and the talent to stay, and maybe enough to go on after that.” He pointed the straw from his drink in my direction. “You? You’re the whole deal. I can’t speak to talent, but on top of everything else, you like art.”

  “And you think I’ll—what? Open doors into your true inner self?”

  He grinned. “ ‘Live True.’ No, I’m the only one who can open my doors. But, see, if there’s anything we can make a friendship out of, I’d like to do that. Because I gotta get away from my home crowd. I’m from Boston, y’see. And some kids who see me like I used to be are still around me, at BU. Skipping classes, getting drunk, that kind of scene. I’m over that. They’re not. And college is a great place to reinvent yourself. So I’m looking for new friends.” He waved the straw around as he spoke. “And you’re not the only one. I’ve been watching people, talking to people I don’t know. Girls can take it the wrong way, so I’m limiting myself to guys for now. And you’re new to Boston, so I figure maybe we can help each other.”

  My mind had caught on how he’s limiting himself to boys, and the helping each other bit nearly threw me. “What makes you think you can help me?”

  “This course you’re doing. The City one. I was thinking that part of what makes a city a city is the people, and in Boston most people have come from someplace else. Like Italy. My nonna lives in the North End. That’s mostly Italian, in case you don’t know. Won’t move out. You can speak Italian to her—just a few words would give her a thrill—and she’ll tell you anything you want to know. In English.”

  This gave me pause. It would be an interesting angle.

  “And then there’s Straight Edge. X. Like this tattoo, which I know you’ve noticed. You said part of what you need to show is how culture connects cities, right? Well, X is all over the world. Like I told you, it’s in England. So right there you’ve got Italian immigration and how it affected Boston’s development, and I can give you the goods on X as it is here, and both those influences apply to cities everywhere.” He shrugged. “So, yeah, I have something to offer. Something I’ll bet the other brainiacs in your class won’t be able to match.”

  I was speechless. He was right; there were doors he could open for me. I might even want to make Italian immigration or Straight Edge—X—the focus of my final presentation, kind of like a thesis. It seemed unlikely there was a connection between the two, but I could choose one or the other. X would be more unusual, and the fact that it’s contemporary would help get me noticed at Oxford.

  And in return, I must offer him friendship. Didn’t seem like a fair trade, really. That aside, though, I searched his face for a few seconds. What kind of toll would this take on me, to spend time with this artistic Roman god and not be able to touch him?

  Finally I said, “There must be more to this arrangement for you.”

  “All right, look, there’s something else I want to get out of this, too. I have a course where I’ve been given an assignment, comparing art in Italy and England. And I just don’t get English art. Maybe you can help me with that.”

  “I must say, you’ve given this a lot of thought.”

  “We were told to ‘think outside the box’ for an approach.” He chuckled. “You’re outside the box, all right.”

  Trite expression. “So, why the coy camouflage? Why start this conversation by trying to pretend you had a less pragmatic motive ?”

  “Dunno. I guess . . . I guess I’m not used to being up front about anything academic. And, like I told you already, I don’t talk to strangers easily.”

  This still seemed rather thin. And I wasn’t so sure he found it difficult to talk to strangers. Which made it all the more likely that his real reasons for talking to me were ones he wasn’t admitting to himself. This should have sent me packing. It didn’t. Holding my straw between first and second fingers, I bounced it on the table. “How would this work, then?”

  He leaned forwards, his face intense. “I’ll give you a quick intro to X. Play you some of the music, show you some of the stuff online, maybe introduce you to a couple of guys I know who are in it
. And you and I go to the Museum of Fine Arts; we focus on Italian and English art. By that time, I’ll have told my nonna I have a friend who speaks Italian—”

  “Only a little Italian. Please understand that.”

  “Fine. And she’ll probably invite us to dinner, and she’s a great cook, and you can pick her brain. Make friends, you know. And then you can use her as a resource. She loves to talk about Italy and what it was like to leave, and what she thinks about Boston.”

  I tried to force my brain to focus on what he was offering towards my academic success, but his face was so gorgeous, intense eyes trained on me, mouth partially open and tempting me to wonder what he’d do if I leaned forwards and kissed it. I turned deliberately back towards the street just as a tall, obviously gay man walked by, a Siamese cat in a red harness perched on his shoulder. I watched his retreating figure and then turned to Michael.

  “It won’t bother you that I’m gay?”

  “Will it bother you that I’m not?”

  “Maybe.” Yes. Or, it will bother me that he thinks he’s not.

  He laughed. “I like your honesty. And as long as we’re honest with each other, I think this will work. What are you doing tomorrow afternoon?”

  “I’m not at uni yet, y’know. Thursday is a school day.” I decided not to go into my spelling coach job with him.

  “Okay, well, the museum is open until nine forty-five. How about we go there after school lets out for you?”

  My voice teasing, I said, “So you get your art before I get my Italian?”

  “How’s this, then. We go to the museum, spend a couple of hours, then you can come back to my dorm and meet the guy in the room next to mine. He’s not Italian, but he’s X. We could start there. Go out to dinner together. We’ll tell you everything. Plan?”

  “I’ll be free by four. Should we meet at the museum after that?”

  “Plan.”

  As we were about to head different ways, Michael asked for my phone number. “I’ll call you tomorrow to confirm, and you’ll get my number that way.” He laughed when I had to fish out my iPhone to look up the number.

  “I just got it,” I told him by way of explanation as I began to go through the icons.

  “And you don’t have it memorised yet? You, the brainiac?” I looked up at him, and he winked.

  “I’ll ring you,” I said. “What’s your number?”

  And just like that, I had the Roman god’s contact information stored in my phone—the Roman god who might as well be a stone statue, cold to my touch.

  Boston, Saturday, 15 September

  Thank the gods I have Graeme—my fantasy version of Graeme—to keep me warm. As it were. Otherwise I think I’d go berserk thinking about Michael all the time.

  I was not especially attentive to Toby Thursday afternoon. First, I was late, because I’d stopped at the house to drop off my books so I wouldn’t be lugging those around all evening, and I also wanted to change my St. Bony shirt to something more intentional.

  On a single sheet of paper I had a list of words I’d looked up for Toby, but it wasn’t long enough, and I had a hard time using his dictionary to find words at random of sufficient obscurity to stump him. I was going to have to put in more effort; that was sure. I was so distracted that at one point, when he finally missed a word, I said, “No, there’s more yellow. You missed the second i.” Which of course made him quiz me about what that meant until I had to tell him about my synaesthesia.

  “Wow! If I had that, I’d win for sure! Would they even have let you compete? I mean, when you were younger? Or would that be considered cheating?”

  “I’m sure I don’t know.” I hoped my dismissive tone would discourage more questions, but no; it seemed he wanted to know the colour of every single letter. Finally I pointed out that he was wasting time better spent on practice, and he buckled down again.

  During our break, with Colleen puttering about in the kitchen and Toby rambling on about how much he loves the film Close Encounters of the Third Kind and speculating about the coloured lights that flash when the alien ship is sending out tones and whether the aliens had synaesthesia, my mind wandered away again towards Michael and what it would be like spending the evening with him. I tried to refocus by reminding myself that he was not to be touched, but that just ended up making me feel sad and vulnerable.

  Toby was explaining how Close Encounters is all about being open to other creatures we can learn to understand when La La surprised me by jumping onto my lap. Automatically, my fingers began to rub behind her ears, and suddenly my eyes stung with tears. I squinted hard to keep them away.

  Toby, unfortunately, noticed. “Simon! Are you all right? What’s wrong?”

  My voice would break, I knew, if I spoke right away, so I shook my head and coughed, which sent La La back to the floor. I managed, “I’ll tell you another time.”

  There was no putting him off forever, though. During the rest of our practice, he deliberately misspelled some words, I think to try and make me feel better. Finally I had to tell him that I’d had to leave my cat behind in England. He jumped up and threw his arms around my shoulders as best he could. I didn’t get out of my chair to make it any easier. As he sat down again, he wiped tears from his own eyes.

  No Mr. Lloyd appeared to darken the rest of Toby’s afternoon. When I was downstairs in the entrance lobby, alone at last, I pulled out my phone, brought up the entry for Michael’s number, and sat there staring at it until the screen dimmed. I touched the phone to brighten it again. This went on for some number of times I lost track of until I finally just hit the Call icon. He answered on the second ring.

  “Michael, Simon here. Ready for your art lesson?”

  “Primo. I can be at the entrance on Museum Road in twenty. You?”

  “Same. See you.” And I rang off before anything in my voice could give away that I was shaking a little.

  I sat where I was for another couple of minutes, trying to talk myself out of this funk. Get it together, Simon. What is wrong with you? You’re acting like a child. Grow a pair. Find your backbone.

  I spotted him immediately, leaning against the side of the building, casual, at ease, and oh, so handsome. He wore a white cotton shirt tucked loosely into blue jeans, sleeves rolled up to reveal well-formed forearms in that olive tone of his heritage that contrasts beautifully with white. A couple of girls passed by him ahead of me, and they both turned to look at him. But he was watching me.

  Inside, he led us right to the museum’s permanent European collection. He had some specific works in mind that he wanted to examine, some paintings and some sculpture. I think I impressed him by drawing his attention to other types of art: silver work, furniture, textiles—other works in which he might detect the patterns that were distinctly English or Italian.

  It was intoxicating, standing close to him for minutes at a time, examining a work of art, inhaling the scent of him: wool, warmed by the sun. No cologne, no added fragrance. I stumbled on the technique of asking him a leading question and then basking in his nearness as he formulated an analysis. I listened to his responses only enough to tell that he knows a heck of a lot more about art than I do, and to come up with another question so we wouldn’t have to move on and, inevitably, apart any sooner than necessary.

  It came to an end at last, though later than Michael had planned. “We’ll have to hoof it or we won’t have much time to talk with Chas.”

  A taxi was just dropping a passenger off, and I hailed it. Michael said, “Whoa, there, that’s pricey.”

  I smiled at him and held the door. “My treat.” And I sat as close to him in the backseat as could possibly be deemed reasonable, not quite but almost touching. He didn’t move away.

  “Aberdeen Street,” he said to the driver. I tried to pay attention to how we got there from the museum, but the distraction of Michael’s leg or shoulder occasionally touching mine was too much for me.

  Aberdeen turned out to be a short block of underwhelmi
ng buildings. We got out of the taxi with a row of cars between us and the building. I paid for the ride and was putting my wallet away when my eye fell on a sticker on the bumper of a parked car. Michael was greeting someone, undoubtedly another college student, who had just come out of the nearest doorway and had unlocked this same car, his remote causing a short beep of the horn. But my attention was on that bumper sticker. It read, LOST YOUR CAT? CHECK MY TIRE TREADS.

  “Simon,” Michael was saying to me, “this is Dick. He lives on the first floor.”

  Dick, a large fellow, lots of bulk to him and rather unattractive, was holding his hand out. I didn’t take it. Instead, looking right at him, I said, “Dick, is it? How appropriate.”

  Dick lowered his hand and scowled at me. “What’s your problem?”

  “Not my problem. Yours.” I pointed to the bumper sticker. “Did you put this on here?”

  “What if I did?”

  Michael, unsure what was going on, moved to where he could see the sticker. He looked at it, looked at me, looked at Dick.

  Dick repeated, “What’s your problem, dude? You some kind of cat lover?”

  “Well, your attitude towards cats is hanging on your proverbial sleeve. You realise,” I said to him in a voice that suggested sarcastic confusion, “that cats can’t read, right?”

  “So?”

  “So your problem must be with people who like cats. So your problem is with me.” I lifted a foot and dragged the sole of my shoe across the nasty thing. “This is a prehistoric attitude to project towards people you haven’t even met. You don’t know me, but you want me to be angry with you.” I shook my head. “Primitive. Michael, are we going inside?” I turned my back on “Dick” and headed towards the doorway.

  No doubt more to avoid additional conflict than to do my bidding, Michael practically jumped towards the door. “See you later,” he called to Dick.

  “And that faggy limey had better not be here when I get back!”

  Michael pulled the door open and held it, aiming a hoarse whisper at me as I passed. “What did you do that for?”