“You saw my picture, Erwin. I’m a big dude!”
I wave my hands at him, and it feels so pathetic. “I would have felt fine talking to you...like...this. I would have definitely still replied to your first message if you had just put up a photo of yourself.”
“No one has before! Why you think I did this?”
I don’t know why I feel compelled to do this, but I hold my phone up and open up the camera. “I’m taking your photo.”
“What? Why?” He stands up then. “Please don’t, I’m sorry—”
The words are rushing out of him. He’s mortified. I dismiss him with a wave. “No, I’m not doing anything with it.”
“I’ll leave,” he says, and his hands are up, palms facing me.
“That’s not what I meant,” I say, and I sigh. “I just think you’re perfectly fine the way you are, and this...this thing you’re doing is pointless. I just wanted to show you what you look like. I mean...does it ever work?”
“Work? What do you mean?”
“Do guys ever stick around after you show up?”
“Well...” He sits back down. “Technically, no.”
I sigh. “Technically? What does that mean?”
“I haven’t ever met a guy off the app before today.”
My palm hits my forehead. Why is all of this happening at once? My phone buzzes; it’s one of what must be a million unread texts from Rosie. I’m shaking my head as I unlock my phone and shoot off a quick text.
Erwin here. Not who he said he was. Will update in a sec.
“So...” he says, and I ignore the succession of vibrating notifications. “Should I leave?”
I frown. “Erwin...”
“No, I get it, I shouldn’t have even tried. I’m sorry, Rodrigo.”
I don’t know what to tell him. This wasn’t what I was preparing myself for. Just minutes ago, I was terrified that no one would show up. But...who is this person? If he hates his body this much, is he gonna hate mine? Was anything that he told me true? What about all the things we spoke about? Was any of that true?
I stared at Erwin, at the worry lines forming at the corner of his eyes, at his thick lips as he licks them. He’s cute. Really cute. And if I am being honest, he’s cuter than the photo. Softer around the edges.
Real.
He’s not a profile. He’s a person. And maybe there’s a part of him that I understand. A part of this that makes a terrible sort of sense.
Would I use a different photo if I could?
Maybe.
No.
Probably not.
But I just spent half an hour actively trying to convince myself that no one would actually find me interesting or attractive enough to want to meet me.
And here Erwin is, proving me wrong.
(If this is Erwin.)
(It is, right?)
“You should leave,” I say.
He stands again, too sudden, and this time, his chair is squeaking on the tiles. “I’m sorry,” he says again. “Really. I promise.”
“But come back.”
He stops. Shakes his head. “What?”
I shrug. “Let’s do it again. A new start.”
He scratches at his head. “You mean that?”
Is this another mistake?
Or is this an opportunity?
“Yeah,” I say. “I do mean it.”
A grin spreads over his face, and it lights up the room. Maybe this isn’t such a bad idea.
And then Erwin walks out the door and he lets it shut completely. A few seconds pass, and my heart is racing again. What am I doing? I think. Why don’t I just kick this guy to the curb and leave?
But the door swings back open again, squeaks as it does. He walks in, his t-shirt clinging to his body, and I love how he has a shape like mine. He makes eye contact immediately, but this time, he doesn’t look away or rush past me. He grins, just a little thing that makes his face look warm.
When he walks up to me, there’s no shaking nerves, no uncertainty. Just those full lips and his round cheeks and a light in his dark eyes.
He sits down, a smirk growing, and he sticks his hand out.
There are texts from Rosie. So many of them. I’m sure I’ve ruined her day, but I have to live in this moment, this chance to refresh, to try again.
I take his hand in my own, and it’s surprisingly soft.
“Hi,” he says. “I’m Erwin.”
“Rodrigo,” I say.
“You come here often?”
I roll my eyes at him. “So you’re cheesy?”
“Maybe,” he says. “You wanna find out?”
“Maybe,” I say back to him.
And maybe I do.
* * *
VICTORY LAP
by
Julian Winters
I am capital, bold, underlined, and italicized THE WORST at finding a date to anything.
I’m a wiz at pre-calculus. I can do a perfect handstand. I can run the 5km in under fifteen minutes. Last year, I was the first-ever sophomore on South Perry High School’s cross-country team to win the state championship.
But when it comes to something simple like asking a guy to the winter formal, I’m hopeless. Negative-twelve in the game department.
Luke Stone, eternally single.
“What about Dean Watkins?”
Thankfully, I have best friends like Aiko and Skyler to save me.
“Dean Watkins?” Aiko repeats.
“No,” Skyler says from my other side. “He’s a superior douchebag. And he’s always staring at me.”
Aiko smirks. “Because you’re so fierce.”
“Duh.” Skyler rolls their seafoam-blue eyes. “All non-binary people are. That doesn’t make him an acceptable date.”
Aiko stares at me expectantly.
I half shrug, frowning a little.
Okay, maybe the reason it’s so hard to find a date to the winter formal is because I’m not actively trying? I spend more time watching YouTube on my phone or trolling Instagram for cool anime art than stalking the guys who are out at our school.
Aiko and Skyler, on the other hand, are on a mission.
We’re exiting La Mesa del Abuelo, this awesome Mexican restaurant in Main Street Plaza, which is a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shopping center on, you guessed it, Main Street. The main attractions of this plaza are a farmers’ market on the other end and the barbershop my dad owns.
Aiko and Skyler are trading names back and forth while I carry a takeout bag for Dad. Chicken burritos with extra jalapeños, his favorite. If I don’t grab him food, he’ll forget to eat. He’s always so focused on work. Entertaining his customers.
“Okay. DJ Yang.” Aiko’s holding up her phone with DJ’s Instagram opened. “Very date-worthy.”
“Very straight,” I tell her. “He’s always throwing heart-eyes at Jaliyah.”
She rolls her eyes. “He could be bi. Pan. Questioning.”
“What about Dylan Johnson?” Skyler interjects, shaking their phone in my face.
I frown.
Dylan could be my twin. We’re the same height and build. Identical curly hair. Except he’s got this wide grin, pale brown skin and hazel eyes. Also, Dylan’s a year younger and has the perfect nose and eyebrows for his face.
Me? I have dark curls, but my hair is shaved super-close on the sides. And my eyebrows are outrageous. I have a small scar over the left side of my mouth people mistake for a dimple. At least my smooth brown skin is over the acne stage, and the rest of my body is catching up with my long legs.
“He’s not my type,” I lie.
My type is simple: guy. That’s it.
We stroll lazily down the sidewalk outside the shops. December exhales a cold breath against our cheeks. The sun’s dipping, flicking
a thick gold rope across our faces. Another phone is thrust into my face, but I ignore it to watch the colors melt across the sky.
Aiko offers, “Rico? He’s hot.”
He is, but I still say, “Nope.”
“Jay?”
Definitely not queer.
“Scott from the basketball team?” Skyler says.
Definitely not from planet Earth.
“Terrence Newton?”
I stop and gape at Aiko. The Terrence she’s referring to is my cross-country teammate. Was my teammate. It’s weird to think like that. I quit the team in early September.
For a good reason. I did the right thing.
My brain likes to repeat this mantra, like it’s an achievement.
Anyways, Terrence is like family. I can’t ask him to the formal.
Even though Aiko’s giving me her infamous You Will Not Deny Me stare, I say, “I’m not going with Terrence,” with only a hint of squeakiness in my voice. I’m blaming that on allergies.
I’m allergic to my own bullshit.
The truth is, I want to stroll hand-in-hand with a guy into the formal. Dress up and smile stiffly for photos and dance awkwardly together. To kiss him good-night. To not worry what anyone will think about that.
And I want it to be someone I know.
I’m kind of out at school, depends on whether you check my Instagram likes or who I follow on Twitter. But none of the students in my class see me as date-potential. I’m just Luke Stone, the guy with the curls and eyebrows who ran cross-country.
I check the time on my phone: 5:06 p.m.
“Damn. I’m late,” I say hurriedly.
Aiko blinks at me. “How’re things with your dad?”
I shrug. I always get this question, even though it’s been four years since Mom died. I get it—Aiko cares. Skyler, too. I know they’re concerned that I haven’t been honest with my dad about why I quit the team. Why I’m doing what I’m doing.
I just don’t like talking about it.
“FaceTime me later?” I offer, avoiding further interrogation.
“We’ll think about it,” Aiko says, yawning.
Skyler elbows her. “Don’t work too hard, Luke.”
I nod, jogging backwards. And I’m so invested in waving while balancing my phone and the takeout bag that I spin around almost a second too late. I nearly collide with someone blindly shuffling in the opposite direction.
“Whoa. My bad.”
“I’m so sorry.”
It’s Milo Leone. We sit together in the back of world history every day, not that we speak. We’re not friends. Not enemies, either. Since freshman year, I’ve been in the cross-country crowd. Or the Aiko-Skyler crowd.
I’m carefully holding him upright by his shoulders as he tries to untangle from his red apron. It has a giant GROUND FRESH logo in the middle of it. Ground Fresh is the farmers’ market hugging the corner of the plaza. There’s something about his voice, deep but squeaky, if that’s a thing, as he repeatedly tries to apologize.
I grin.
Milo’s chestnut hair is wind-wrecked. He’s wearing a black turtleneck, which makes his watercolor-paint green eyes stand out. He gently bites a chapped bottom lip.
“Are you okay?” I ask him, head tilted.
His hands shake while tying his apron. A dust of pink frames his cheeks. His nose is red, too. He sniffs and presses out this too-shy-to-exist smile. “Uh, yeah. Thanks.”
I release his shoulders. He stumbles back. I almost reach for him again, but he straightens. And I laugh under my breath as he wiggles around me.
Over his shoulder, Milo gives me a quick look.
I nod, and he trips on his feet but, thankfully, he doesn’t faceplant into the sidewalk.
Still... Milo Leone is kind of cute.
My phone buzzes in my pocket and I’m reminded, no matter what Milo is, I’m late.
* * *
I shouldn’t know who Tevin Campbell is. Or New Edition. Frankly, I shouldn’t know every lyric to “Waterfalls” by TLC, but I do.
Thanks, Dad.
Dad’s shop, Razors & Blues, is sandwiched between a nail salon and a shoe store. It’s a cornerstone of Main Street Plaza. Generations of families have built shops around it for almost two decades. Some have come and gone, but Dad’s business is notorious.
Everyone knows Darwin Stone. “Uncle Dee” to the kids who hop in his chair every Saturday, crying at the slightest swipe of alcohol against their freshly-cut skin fades until Dad gives them a lollipop.
Dad’s chair is booked from 8:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. Monday through Saturday. Never Sundays.
“It’s the Lord’s day,” Dad insists, even if he spends his Sundays in sweats watching sports and listening to old-school R&B. “Jesus died so I could have one day of relaxation.”
No, Dad, the Lord didn’t create Sundays as your free-pass to laziness.
But Dad doesn’t need a pass. He’s earned more than just Sundays off. All his life, he’s been a hard worker. His dad was too. His dad’s mom. It’s the legacy of every Stone.
It’s why I’m at the shop now, sweeping hair as Dad finishes Mr. Whitaker’s perfectly-shaped high-top fade. The Stones work; everyone else plays.
Overhead, Shanice sings about loving some guy’s smile. I kind of dance—the Stones are also credited for creating the two-step shoulder-shimmy—while sweeping. It’s the only way I survive in the shop. The music and the “war stories” Dad recites to all his clients, about trudging five miles in the snow to cut hair during the brutal Georgia winters.
For the record—it doesn’t snow enough in central Georgia to build a proper snowman. And every year, when winter drops a fistful of flurries on the South, it turns into a national emergency.
“Smooth, Dee.” Mr. Whitaker checks himself out in the mirror behind Dad’s chair, leaning on his cane. He’s easily sixty years old. “There’s no one like you, brother.”
Dad grins. “No one cares like me.”
It’s true. Dad’s devoted to his craft, unlike the other barbers who duck out the shop promptly at 4:00 p.m. Dad won’t leave until the very last walk-in is complete.
Once Mr. Whitaker has limped out the shop, Dad turns to me and says, “That man looks ridiculous. Who does he think he is? Bobby Brown?”
“Bobby Who?”
“Luke Zion Stone,” Dad says in that annoyed-but-amused voice I love. He’s hard-core serious, but after you’ve caught your dad dancing to Whitney Houston in the middle of the night, it’s hard to fear him.
“Was he a rapper?”
“He was everything. An icon. Don’t you forget it,” Dad says, half laughing.
I fake a chuckle, too. But one word echoes in my head: Zion. Mom gave me that middle name. Suddenly, I’m somewhere else. Floating between the shop and an emptiness.
“Hey.” Dad’s voice is soft. “What’s up?”
I force myself out of a daydream of Mom’s voice. Her fingers in my curls. The warmth of her laughter. “You’re right,” I say, ignoring the roughness in my voice, “he looks flippin’ ridiculous.”
It’s not the word I want to use, but Dad’s old-school about swearing. If you’re not paying bills or don’t own a car, you can’t swear around adults.
“Can’t tell Mr. Whitaker nothing,” Dad mumbles.
I exhale a laugh but nothing inside of me is amused.
“You’re distracted.”
“I’m not.”
Dad raises an eyebrow at me. “You’ve been sweeping that same pile of hair since you got here,” he shakes his head, “late, with cold chicken burritos.”
Oh, wait. What’s that weight piled on my shoulders? Hello, guilt!
“I don’t pay you to be late and distracted.”
I wrinkle my nose at him. “You barely pay me.”
�
��It’s entry-level wages.”
“Dad, I’ve been sweeping hair in this place since I was old enough to crawl—”
“When I was your age,” Dad interrupts, thick arms crossed over his chest, “I had to...”
Right on cue!
But I tune out Dad’s childhood horror stories to stare out the shop’s giant window front. The plaza is dead, like always. Endless gray from empty parking spots. Moms carrying takeout to their minivans. Old men ambling into a gas station to play the lotto. A girl dances down the sidewalk to her own beat while snapping selfies on her phone.
None of them worried about finding a date to a stupid winter formal.
“Luke?”
“I’m cool, Dad.” And I am. Mostly. “I’m cool,” I whisper again to Dad. To myself.
But Dad obviously isn’t listening. “Come on.” He smacks the worn leather of his chair repeatedly.
“Dad,” I whine, suddenly possessed by four-year-old Luke.
“Let’s go.”
“I just got a line-up last week.”
“And you look a hot mess. Fire your barber.”
“You’re my barber!” I say, half laughing, half mortified.
“Then tip better.” Deep wrinkles crowd Dad’s pale brown eyes. His grin overtakes most of his face, the way mine does on a good day. Gray hairs are scattered through his neatly-trimmed beard. A constellation of freckles on both cheeks stands out against his light brown skin.
Firmly, he says, “Luke Zion” and I sprint over before he can finish. Dad’s “means business” tone still scares me a little bit.
Every moment of this is like home. The neck strip tied loosely below my Adam’s apple. Dad’s flimsy black cape draped over me. The jerky lift of the chair as Dad’s foot pumps the pedal, lifting me higher. The click of the clippers as they come alive. The first ghostly brush of them against the back of my head loosens a shiver up my spine.
We never talk at first. Dad needs to find his groove. I need to find courage. This has been Dad’s method of breaking down my walls since I was a kid. When I admitted to him I was terrified of the dark. My preteen confession about acne ruining my school life. Fifteen-year-old Luke shyly asking about condoms, even though I had no intention of using them. I just needed Dad to know that, when the time was right, I’d be safe.
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