Cupid Painted Blind

by Marcus Herzig

  I thought we weren’t going to talk about this anymore. Apparently I was mistaken.

  “So why not?”

  I’m not sure what he means. “Hm?”

  “If they’re both your best friends then why did you tell Zoey but not Alfonso?”

  “I don’t know.” I shrug. “Some stuff you share with some people, other stuff with others, I guess.”

  “I see.” After a pause he asks, “So which one of them knows you’re gay?”

  I’m aghast. I know, I know. I’m sitting with an openly gay friend in an openly gay milk bar, but that kind of question still freaks me out.

  “Why would you think I’m gay?” I ask and suck on my milkshake.

  “I don’t even know what it is, but it never even occurred to me that you’re not gay, to be honest.”

  “But why, though? Do I flail my arms around when I talk? Do I sound gay? Do I walk like a gay person? I don’t get it.”

  Chris grins. “You’re no Albert Goldman, if that makes you feel any better.”

  “Who?”

  He looks at me as if I’d just ask him who Harry Potter is. “Have you never watched The Birdcage?”

  I shake my head and shrug. Chris pulls out his phone, taps the screen a couple of times and then shows me a YouTube clip of the late Robin Williams and an extremely effeminate guy who, as it so happens, isn’t even a complete stranger to me.

  “Oh,” I say, “I know that guy! He’s got a recurring role on Modern Family. I just didn’t know his name was Albert Goldberg.”

  “Goldman. And his name is Nathan Lane. His character’s name in The Birdcage is Albert Goldman.”

  “Right.” I laugh awkwardly. “Sorry, I’m more of a book type. But I’m not anything like that Goldbergman guy, am I?”

  “Yeah, that was my point,” Chris says and puts the phone away. “But I don’t know, you have certain mannerisms. Most people probably won’t even notice it, so don’t worry about it, but for someone with a functioning gaydar it’s not too difficult to figure out. Remember how I winked at you in the entrance hall on the first day of school? You looked away and your head turned bright red. A straight guy would have reacted in a totally different way, so that was the first clue. And then the way you reacted when Jack called you a faggot, same thing. I didn’t really have any doubts anymore after that.”

  “I see.”

  “So who else knows?” he asks. “I mean officially.”

  I shake my head. “Nobody. Just Zoey.”

  “Alfonso left out of the loop again, huh? So is he, like, your best friend for all the unimportant stuff?”

  I feel tension rise in my body. We’re moving on very thin ice here, both of us.

  Under normal circumstances, anyone who dared to question my friendship with Alfonso or how important that friendship is to me would have a lot to answer for.

  But these are not normal circumstances.

  Chris is not a normal circumstance.

  Our date was off to a bumpy start. I don’t want to send it down the drain for good, so I will have to swallow my annoyance for the time being.

  “I talk with Alfonso about all sorts of important stuff,” I say, “but … look, I’ve known him my entire life, and I love him. But only as a friend, you know? I’m afraid that if I tell him I’m gay …”

  “… he’ll think you’re hitting on him.”

  I nod. “You know … there are some things, like … when we haven’t seen each other in a while we hug. I like hugging him. It makes me feel close to him, and there’s nothing sexual about it. I don’t want to lose that. But if I tell him I’m gay, I’m afraid things will change.”

  “Yeah, maybe you shouldn’t tell him that,” Chris says.

  I frown. “What do you mean? Not tell him I’m gay?”

  “No, you totally should tell him you’re gay, if he really is the friend you think he is. What I meant is, you shouldn’t tell him that you didn’t tell him you’re gay because you were afraid it would affect your friendship in a negative way. Because that’s like telling him you didn’t trust him, and that might be worse than telling him you’re gay.”

  “I never looked at it that way,” I say.

  “Just tell him you’re gay. If he’s the friend you think he is, he’ll be fine with it. And if he doesn’t want to hug you anymore, then maybe he’s not that good a friend after all.”

  I understand what he’s trying to say, but I almost find it offensive to have him question the loyalty of my best. It’s rude and presumptuous.

  But he is so cute though, so I’m not saying anything, even though I’m dying to prove him wrong. Incidentally, the opportunity to do so presents itself sooner than expected.

  My phone rings. After a quick look at the screen I answer it and say, “¡Hola!”

  “¿Que pasa, Guapo?” Alfonso asks.

  “Nothing.”

  “Wanna hang out?”

  “Sure,” I say, and I immediately bite my tongue. My reply was a reflex because it’s what I always say when Alfonso wants to hang out with me. “Except not right now. I’m still busy with something.”

  Chris raises his eyebrow at being called something, but he also points at his cheek to remind me of his dentist appointment.

  “How about in an hour?” I say.

  “All right. Wanna come over to my place?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “Okay then, see you later.”

  I end the call and place my phone on the table.

  “Someone’s pretty popular,” Chris says.

  “Not really,” I say. “That was Alfonso.”

  “Speak of the devil, huh?”

  “Yeah. He wants to hang out.”

  “Oh really? Good thing I have a dentist appointment, huh?”

  “Yeah.”

  He reaches across the table and playfully slaps me on the head. “That was a trick question! There’s nothing good about my dentist appointment! I hate dentists!”

  “Right,” I say sheepishly. “Sorry.”

  “So,” Chris says and looks me right in the eyes, “are you gonna tell him?”

  Shaking my head, I say, “I don’t know.”

  “I understand it’s a big step and I understand you’re scared of his reaction, but that reaction is his to make, not yours to assume. You have to at least give him the chance to accept you the way you are. Or not.”

  “I know,” I say, looking at my fingernails.

  They’re pristine, except for one torn cuticle.

  “And besides, if you and I … I mean, if we’re to spend more time together in the future, I want to be on good terms with your best friend. And that will be difficult if we have to keep hiding things from him. That’s not good for us, and it’s not good for your friendship with Alfonso. I mean, I’m not expecting you to climb on a table in the school cafeteria during lunch time and make a big announcement or anything. Whatever is happening between you and me is nobody’s business as far as the general public is concerned. But your friends? I mean, come on.”

  Too many thoughts are zigzagging through my mind, and there are too many things I want to say or ask. I have to pick one, and it’s, “What is happening between you and me?”

  Chris shrugs and smiles. “Whatever we want.”

  “Right,” I say.

  He looks at me for a few moments, then he says, “I like you, Matthew Dunstan.”

  I swallow. My heart is pounding like a jackhammer, and I actually do want to jump on the table and shout it out to the world, but I’m a wuss, so I say in what is barely a whisper, “I like you too, Christian Larsen.”

  For a long moment, a very long moment, we look each other in the eyes. His smile becomes more subtle, his blue eyes deeper than the ocean. I want to drown in his eyes, in my thoughts, my feelings, my awkward, awesome feelings. I want to sit here forever and just stare at him, his eyes, his lips, his hair and everything else that’s so perfect about him. I want to grab his hand, drag him out of this place and run, run out of the
Korova, out of Brookhurst and run, just run to the end of the world. Leave everything and everyone behind, wrap my arms around him and never let him go again. Ever.

  But this is not happening, at least not today.

  We’re not running anywhere today, except out of time.

  When it’s time to part, Chris plants an awkward kiss on my cheek. Then he runs off to see his dentist, and he takes all my euphoria with him, because the moment he turns the corner and disappears from my longing view, I fall out of my cloud-cuckoo-land and hurtle toward the stony ground.

  Alfonso is sitting at home, waiting for me. Having someone sitting at home and waiting for you is a nice and comforting thing.

  If you’re fifty-five.

  I’m fifteen, and my life is a mess. I said yes to a play date with Alfonso when I knew I already had a work date with Philip. It was a stupid thing to do, born out of my desire to show Chris how awesome my friendship with Alfonso is. And hey, it worked, didn’t it? Except solving one problem created another.

  I can’t bail on Alfonso. He’s my best friend.

  I can’t bail on Philip either. He’s not my friend, but we have to work on our term paper together for the next few weeks whether we want to or not, and if I don’t show up at the library for our very first work date he’ll probably think I didn’t come because his face freaks me out. It does, but that’s not the reason why I can’t come to the library, and I don’t want him to think it is. And I can’t call him to make up some flimsy excuse because he doesn’t carry a cellphone in his fancy fake Louis Vuitton bag.

  Alfonso doesn’t have a Louis Vuitton bag, but he does have a cell phone, so I pull out my phone and speed dial his number.

  “Hey,” I say when he answers, “listen …”

  “I’m listening.”

  “I … something came up. I can’t make it today.”

  “What happened?” he asks.

  “It’s … I got grounded. Long story, don’t ask.”

  “Oh, okay. You want me to come over to your place?”

  “No!” I say way too loud and too quickly, so I tone it down a notch. “I mean, that would be awesome, but … I’m in solitary confinement. No visitors allowed.”

  “Oh boy. That sounds pretty bad. What have you done this time?”

  Stop asking questions, goddamnit! I got no answers!

  “Uh … like I said, it’s a long story. I’ll explain later, because I’m actually not allowed to use the phone either, so … sorry, I really gotta go now.”

  “Oh well, all right then, 24601. I guess I’ll see you at school tomorrow.”

  24601 is the prisoner number of Jean Valjean in Les Misérables.

  I made Alfonso watch the movie with me under the not exactly false but nevertheless ostensible pretense that it’s a marvelous example of great storytelling.

  The real reason was that I love show tunes.

  And that I had a crush on Marius Pontmercy.

  “See you tomorrow,” I say. “Bye.”

  I end the call, and feeling even more miserable than the miserables in Les Misérables for having lied to my best friend, I make my way to the library to meet freaky-faced Philip.

  CHAPTER TEN

  When I arrive I find him standing in front of the library under his umbrella, his fake Louis Vuitton handbag hanging from the fold of his arm. Motionless like a sculpture by some obscure modern artist, he’s staring at the street. He doesn’t even see me coming, and for a moment I just want to walk past him and pretend that I have nothing to do with that weirdo.

  But I can’t do that, obviously.

  “Hey,” I say as I approach him.

  With a blank look on his face he twangs, “Hello.”

  “So …” I put my hands in my pockets, unsure how to proceed, but Philip just turns and walks toward the library entrance. I follow him like a clueless duckling. I don’t like to be in that kind of position, not with someone like Philip, so on the stairs to the second floor I take two steps at a time and put myself in front of him. When we reach the landing, I stop and look around. Philip walks straight past me to one of the workstations and takes a seat. He waits until I’ve caught up with him. The seat next to him is taken, so I remain standing, lean into him and put my hand on the computer mouse.

  “All right,” I say, “I guess we best start with Google. That’s a search engine. We can use it to—”

  “I know what Google is,” Philip interrupts me.

  He looks at the screen and nudges my hand away from the mouse so he can use it. The moment he touches me I withdraw my hand as if from a burning candle.

  He types ‘Romeo Juliet character development’ into Google. After a quick scan of the results page he quickly opens the second, third, and fifth search result in new tabs. Then he looks at me. “We should both do our research independently and then compare our results later.”

  “Right,” I say, feeling like a stupid little kid. There’s a free workstation opposite of Phil’s, so I walk around the table and sit down. I’m about to start typing when out of nowhere someone kisses me on the cheek. Startled, I turn to look at …

  “Sandy!”

  “Hi,” she whispers with a smile. Then she looks at Phil and waves at him. He acknowledges her with a barely noticeable nod.

  “Sandy,” I whisper, “what are you doing here?”

  “Urgh, don’t ask,” she says. “Last week our Internet died and Comcast is too stupid to fix it. And I’ve already blown my entire mobile data allowance for this month on YouTube, so I have to come here to check my email and stuff.”

  “Oh. Bummer.”

  “I know, right? So what are you guys doing here?”

  “Nothing,” I say. “Just working on our term paper.”

  “Oh, okay. You got Romeo and Juliet, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Lucky you,” Sandy says. “At least you got something romantic. Jason and I got freaking Macbeth!”

  “Oh. A tale told by an idiot, huh?”

  Sandy frowns. “I don’t think Shakespeare was an idiot, Matthew.”

  “Uh, that was actually a quote from Macbeth,” I say. “He calls life a tale told by an idiot. I was joking. Never mind.”

  “You are so funny and clever, Matthew!” she says, slapping my arm. “But anyway, I think the librarian lady is about to kick us out because we keep talking, so I better go.”

  “All right then, see you later.”

  “See you later guys,” Sandy whispers, waves at an unresponsive Phil again and finds herself a workstation across the room.

  I turn back to my computer monitor and start sorting through my search results.

  On the other side of the table, Philip keeps typing and clicking and scrolling and scribbling things down on a notepad. Behind both of our computer screens I can only see his eyes, his forehead, and his mop of thick black hair, and I catch myself thinking that if you ignore the cleft lip and the cauliflower nose, he’s not even all that ugly.

  When he catches me staring at him I quickly avert my gaze and look around the library. Apart from us there are maybe a dozen people around, most of them middle-aged or older. On a workstation by the window on the opposite side of the library, Sandy is typing away on her keyboard.

  My phone buzzes in my pocket. I take it out and look at the screen. 2-b-pretty has left a comment on the latest chapter.

  2-b-pretty:

  Congratulations to Matty on securing that valuable spot as third runner in the relay team. Best place on the whole track because once he’s handed the baton over to Chris he can just keep running after him and watch him shake his booty.

  It’s not even all that funny, but for some reason picturing that scene cracks me up. Sometimes—especially when you’re in a shitty mood to begin with—the silliest things can make you literally laugh out loud before you even remember you’re sitting in that temple of silence that is a public library.

  Instantly, a dozen pairs of eyes from all around the library are on me with piercing,
accusing looks. I wince and place my hand over my mouth. Opposite me Philip scowls, and on the other side of the room Sandy is silently laughing at me and shaking her head.

  “Sorry,” I whisper to no one in particular, trying to withdraw my head between my shoulders like a turtle. As the reproachful eyeballs divert from me, I type a quick reply to 2-b-pretty.

  Mattoid2002:

  Your comment about watching Chris’s booty made me laugh out loud, and now the whole library is staring at me. This is all your fault! :P

  I hit send and slide the phone back in my pocket. When I look up, I catch Philip staring at me, his head raised above his computer monitor, and something is off. It’s not the infamous blank stare anymore. All of a sudden there is something in his eyes that I can’t quite put my finger on, and I have no idea what it’s supposed to mean.

  “What?” I say.

  “Are you done with your research?” he whispers.

  I shake my head.

  “Well, get on with it then!”

  “Jesus Christ,” I utter under my breath as his head disappears behind the monitor again.

  A minute later my phone buzzes again.

  2-b-pretty:

  “I have done no harm. But I remember now I am in this earthly world, where to do harm is often laudable, to do good sometime accounted dangerous folly.” Now stop messaging me and get back to work or whatever else it is you have to do at the library!

  Mattoid2002:

  Why is everyone so bossy today? I’m actually here because I have to work on this stupid school assignment with that freaky weirdo from my class.

  I hit send again, and this time I place the phone on the table, hoping that 2-b-pretty is still online and will reply quickly. I turn my attention back to Romeo and Juliet, but I can’t seem to concentrate. There’s something about 2-b-pretty’s last comment that tickles the back of my mind, so I pick up my phone and read it again.I don’t know why, I don’t know what, but something is off. I’ve come to know—and indeed love—2-b-pretty for her occasionally quirky language, but this sounds too weird even by her standards. And why is she using quotation marks? Suddenly a strange suspicion besets my curious mind, so I put my phone back on the table and type the quotation into Google. The result knocks the wind out of me.