Slowly, over the course of ten of the most awkward seconds of my life, realization clicked in.
Willow stood up.
Started clapping.
“Bravo,” she said. “Dang, bro. You look smokin’.”
Don’t blush, Ezra, don’t blush, don’t you dare fucking—
I blushed.
“Ezra?” said Dad. “Wow. You look, uh…I guess ‘beautiful’ is the word? Beautiful. Yeah. You look beautiful. Sorry. We just watched the ‘Jail Break’ episode of Steven Universe where Garnet sings and beats up Jasper, so my brain is all over the place.”
And then Willow and Dad looked at Imogen, and panicked.
“You look amazing, Imogen!” said Willow.
“Absolutely stunning,” said Dad.
“Gorgeous.”
“Amazing.”
“I already said that, Dad.”
“I’m reemphasizing.”
“Oh, you guys,” said Imogen, shrugging her shoulders bashfully.
“So, uh…” said Dad. “Is this a prom thing?”
“Actually, we’re making a YouTube video,” I said. And then a sudden, very important thought occurred. “Willow, who did your Malvolio makeup?”
“Uh, me,” she said. “Duh?”
“How would you like to play another old man?”
I explained the scenario: that this was essentially a highlights reel of the movie Ed Wood. (Willow watched it with me once, although she seemed less impressed by modern films that felt the need to be filmed in black-and-white.) I explained that she would be Bela Lugosi, the original Dracula actor.
Ed Wood was about friendship, after all. And besides, Bela Lugosi had all the best lines.
“Is this the one where Dracula’s a heroin addict?” said Willow.
“Uh, morphine, actually,” I said.
Willow grinned, and then attempted her best Transylvanian: “Count me een. Get eet? Because I’m ze count. Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah.”
• •
We finished filming at about two thirty in the morning. For the first time ever, I uploaded the video directly onto my social media. On the part of the internet that knew Ezra the Person, not Ezward the Enigma.
I tagged Willow and pressed post.
“Is anyone else as not tired as me?” said Willow. She was still in full costume, of course. Thick emo hair slicked back. Fake, out-of-control, bushy eyebrows (leftovers of Malvolio’s, dyed black). Crinkly, vaguely hostile “old man” face. She was dressed in her loosest black clothes, swaddled in a black cape.
The cape was hers. Don’t ask me why or how she owned a black cape.
“I’m not ti…hired,” said Imogen—yawning, and stretching like the world’s longest cat, and smiling sleepily.
“Great, it’s settled,” said Willow. “We’re watching a movie.”
We watched Splatter. The original. I wish I could tell you that it was less terrible than the sequels, but it really wasn’t. It was so bad. I loved it.
Jane Jenkins was still in high school. It was prom night. And she was in for a rude, gory, breathtakingly violent awakening.
About ten minutes into the movie, Willow fell asleep. Just completely conked out—head hanging, snoring violently, there was a little bit of a drool situation threatening to transpire on the bottom of her lip. It was highlighted perfectly against the glow of the TV.
“Wow,” I said. “That didn’t take long.”
Imogen didn’t say anything. I turned—expecting to find her asleep on my other side.
She was looking directly at me. One side of her face pale in the TV’s glow, the other dark, all of it very intense.
“Oh, hey,” I said. “Is…everything okay?”
“Can I kiss you?” she said.
She literally asked me permission for this. Like I might say no or something.
“As an experiment,” she added, after I failed to respond. “In the name of science.”
“Well, if it’s for science—” I started to say.
And she kissed me.
I’d tell you how it was, but this was the sort of kiss that seals space and time and reality in its sphere. I was on a different planet. In an alternate dimension where anything was possible, and nothing was hopeless. When her lips finally broke away from mine, I didn’t even know who I was anymore. Ezra? What’s that?
Imogen smiled.
Then rested her head on my shoulder.
“So…” I said, “experimentally speaking…how was…”
“Further study is necessary,” she said.
“Further study?”
“More experiments are required.”
“More experiments?”
“Oh yeah,” she said, nodding seriously. “So many experiments. A wide variety, for sure. It’ll probably be an ongoing study. It could take a substantial amount of time. You know, before we come to any conclusive evidence. For science.”
I could feel her smiling into my angora sweater.
• •
We stayed that way for a long moment. Long enough for Imogen to fall asleep.
For the snoring apocalypse to commence.
I lost interest in the movie. Buddy Borden’s body count was already in the double digits. I instead found myself transfixed by the large living room clock on the wall. As the minute hand clicked on fourteen, and the second hand tick-tick-ticked closer to the infinite, irrational number between fifteen and sixteen.
Thirteen…fourteen…fifteen…
Sixteen.
I let out the breath I didn’t know I was holding. Glanced from Willow to Imogen to myself. I wanted to laugh and cry simultaneously. But mostly, I just felt breathless from the anticipation.
My phone vibrated on the coffee table. From where I sat, I could see the caller.
Wynonna fucking Jones.
I quietly reached, struggling not to disturb Imogen. My fingers splayed, tracing the edges of the phone.
Grabbed it.
I gently leaned back into the sofa. Imogen stirred slightly, adjusted, then fell back into a deep snoring trance.
I pressed the answer button.
“Hey,” said Wynonna quietly. Like she knew Imogen and Willow were sleeping on the other end. Or maybe Holden was asleep where she was. Who knew? “Just wanted to make sure you were still alive. Also, to hear your voice. If that’s not weird. It probably is. Whatever. Fuck you.”
I laughed. “Hey, Wynonna.”
“Okay, well…that’s good enough for me. Sleep tight, Slevin. If you can manage that much.”
“Good night, Wynonna.”
She hung up.
I set the phone in my lap.
And I fell asleep.
Does it take an army to write a book? Maybe! This novel would not be the beautiful thing that it is were it not for the many beautiful people involved. For starters, my agent, Jenny Bent, who listened compassionately while I had an actual midlife crisis over the phone. (I’m only thirty-three, but I feel like I’m one hundred and three, and not in a wise, sagely way.) My editor, the actually wise and sagely Laura Schreiber, who corresponded considerately while I threw toddler-like temper tantrums about her brilliant edits and intuitive suggestions. Laura’s wonderful editorial assistant, Mary Mudd, who is basically Wonder Woman and fills in all the gaps. Managing editor Sara Liebling, who keeps track of all the production schedules I’m so fond of fucking up. (Just kidding, I promise I’m not trying to!) A huge shout out to the visionary Mary Claire Cruz who designed a cover so lush, it makes me want to cry. Copy editors Guy Cunningham and Meredith Jones, who fine-tuned the inner-workings of this story like that ’63 Corvette Stingray that Ezra couldn’t drive. School and library marketing guru Dina Sherman, who is a beacon of sunshine to meet in person. A special shout out to my three cats, Stormy, Bagheera, and Tyson, who contributed nothing, and even walked across my keyboard a couple times and deleted shit, but they help keep the bad feelings at bay. And lastly, my partner, Erin Rene, who is just the fucking best.
is th
e author of Neanderthal Opens the Door to the Universe. He is bisexual, slightly genderqueer, and married to his favorite human, Erin Rene. She fixes the computers, and he does the cooking. They are the parents of three cats: Stormy (the chubby one), Bagheera (the evil one), and Tyson (the one with three legs; he’s a sweetheart). Preston has taught seventh grade and ninth grade English, mentored drug addicts, and mowed lawns (in no particular order). He is obsessed with slasher films and Sufjan Stevens.
Where I End and You Begin Page 34