by Adam Silvera
“Boy or girl?”
He takes a second to answer. “Boy.”
Now would be a good time to have a fully functioning crystal ball so I could divine whether or not Collin is going to be a good father to his little boy. I don’t just mean whether or not he’ll take his son out to play and feed him spoonfuls of medicine when he’s sick, but if Collin will let his son listen to songs sung by women and let him date a dude if it made him happy.
“Congratulations,” I say.
“I know you don’t mean it.”
“No, I think it’s cool,” I lie.
“That sucks about you and Genevieve.”
“I know you don’t mean it,” I parrot with a grin.
Then we just look at each other, the same way we did during school when we passed each other in the halls. “Want to get out of here?”
“Let’s get the check,” I say.
“And the waiter’s pen,” he adds.
We’re going to Comic Book Asylum, laughing as we throw the waiter’s pen at each other, overdramatic, like gladiators hurling spears. After we started hanging out last year, we would go to the comic shop when it was too cold out to do anything else. It didn’t matter to me as long as we were chilling. We’d spend hours sitting in the aisles, as close to each other as possible, checking out what we wanted to read but were positive we didn’t want to buy. Man, I spent so much time at Comic Book Asylum that Genevieve brought me there for Trade Dates. Then again, she also created Trade Dates because there was a strain in our relationship, also because of Collin.
He always surprised me whenever he brought up things that weren’t related to comics and fantasy books. One afternoon I thought we were about to leave the shop, but he pulled me back down to the floor beside him. I was both nervous and hopeful he was going to kiss me, but instead he said he was done caring about what others thought of how he lived. That sentiment didn’t survive any longer than a shadow-basilisk did against a black sun phoenix, but in the moment it made me happy to believe it. And then I lost him and his conversations and touches, and I couldn’t fill that hole. So forgetting the hole was even there turned out to be the next best, saddest thing.
But I have him back now, I think.
Stan is by the door, doing a poor job installing a Captain America gumball machine. He smiles at us. “You two done fighting?”
Collin is looking at me funny, sort of like that time I echoed the ending to his bad haircut story because he’d forgotten he told me already. I paid attention, made him feel worth it, and I promised I always would.
“We’re good,” he answers for us. He leads me to the graphic novel section.
“What was that about?”
“I came in here a few times without you, and Stan kept asking me where the Robin to my Batman was.”
“That’s bullshit,” I say. “I’m totally Batman.”
Collin snickers. “For a while I made excuses, said you were sick or working, but eventually I accepted we probably wouldn’t ever talk again. It sucked, but it made sense with how I ditched you.” He trails a finger across the spines of graphic novels and says, “I gotta ask you something.”
“Shoot.”
“When you saw me here and were being extra nice and fake, were you doing it to impress that guy you were with? Was he your boyfriend?”
I completely forget that happened on account of having forgotten my relationship with Collin. Two worlds, ten feet from each other—and Collin was the only one who knew, the only one who was affected by it. “He was never my boyfriend and you were barely anyone to me. I went through the Leteo procedure and forgot my time with you.”
“Sure you did,” Collin says.
He doesn’t believe me. Why would he? But I told him.
We sit against a bookcase, our elbows touching. We’re both reading the same graphic novel about zombies invading a heavily guarded garbage dump, where they find their master’s decapitated head. Not really sure what the zombies plan on doing with the head if they manage to retrieve it, but we lose interest anyway.
“Remember our spot behind the fence?” he says out of nowhere.
It’s not a game of Remember That Time.
“It’s been a while,” I say.
“Want to go?”
I close the graphic novel. We tell Stan we’ll see him later and I wonder if he knows about Collin and me. As long as he’s not outing us, it doesn’t matter.
We head to our spot between the meat market and flower shop. I steer Collin toward the fence from behind, but he shrugs me off and I don’t give him any shit for it, even though there’s not a single gay-hating soul in sight. The smell of dead cow is way more pungent than the flowers this evening. There’s a sign that reads: community service gathering on friday, august 16th. Who the hell knows what that entails? But it’s pretty awesome to find our graffiti still on the wall.
We crawl through the open spot in the fence into the side where history is pulsating with memories of our first time, second time, third time . . . you get it. Collin scans the area for any wanderers or birds with cameras on their heads before coming back to undo my belt buckle. It’s so dark someone could murder us and get away with it, which we prefer—the darkness, not the murder part. I pull him into a rough kiss and I don’t doubt that whenever he’s kissing Nicole he’s pretending she’s some other guy—maybe even me—and as I kiss him now I pretend he’s someone else, and it’s just so fucking sad.
He hands me a condom and I rip open the wrapper with my teeth.
7
HEART-TO-HEARTS AND
HEARTBREAKS
It’s only been a day and I desperately need to see Collin to stay sane. I know he’s working two jobs—one as a busboy at an Italian restaurant, the other as a stock boy at a bodega—and doesn’t get a lot of sleep. But I need him as badly as I should be pushing him away. It’s too weird a mix of ugly and hopeful.
Collin has a few hours free before work, so at 2:00 he meets me at the track field where I watched trains speed by with Thomas. I look around for him lying on the grass or sitting on the bleachers, thinking about how he can be the architect of his life, but Thomas is not here. It’s okay, it’s okay: I have Collin, my first gateway to honest happiness. I tell Collin I chose this spot so we could run around and get him in shape for basketball tryouts, but when we race he’s so far behind, and it reminds me of Thomas losing too. But unlike Thomas, Collin doesn’t just quit, be it a job or a dream or a race. He charges on to the end and then throws himself onto the grass beside me.
“Can we talk about it?”
His question throws me off. “About . . . ?”
He looks around before tapping my scar. “Was it really that bad?”
“Yes.” I lie back and stare at the sun until it hurts. “Life felt like it was going to be too long. I wanted out.”
“It wasn’t because of me, right?” he asks quickly.
I shake my head in the grass. “Not completely. I’m not some kid who was pissed someone didn’t want him back.” Except I was. Even having forgotten all the things that led to Aaron 2.0. I was still aching for a Leteo procedure because of fear and disappointment in someone who couldn’t love me back. And I was despicable enough to try and play my suicide card to forget heartbreak. “There were a lot of reasons. But trying to live when my father refused to stay alive—because of who I am—broke me in a way I don’t think will ever be fixed.”
“I was so pissed at you, Aaron,” Collin says. “Nicole told me what you tried to do. I was stuck on this level of Vigilante Village and I was this close to throwing my controller at the TV. But I kept it together because I didn’t want to ruin her the same way I wrecked us. I always thought we would be the endgame, even when I knew I couldn’t afford to be that person.”
“You walked away from me.”
“It’s taken me a few months to re
alize how badly I miss you. I know I’m living a lie, but I’m thinking about this kid, Aaron. My son. What is having a gay dad going to do to him? I sometimes think I’d be better off not being in the picture at all, but I can’t get myself to be a deadbeat dick either.”
I sit up. “What do you want from me? Are you going to bounce again?”
“I can’t promise anything,” Collin says, which is basically promise-speak for Don’t count on me. He sits up with me and—for a second—holds my hand. “I just want you to be alive when I figure it out.”
So, I have another maybe to wait around for. Maybe Collin will stick around or find me again later in life. Maybe Thomas will come out for me. Maybe I’ll get another do over from Leteo. Of all the maybes, Collin’s making me happy is the safest bet.
We return to the track field the next day, but this time we sit on the bleachers to reread The Dark Alternates before the last issue drops this week.
Collin flips through Issue #5, the happiest I’ve seen him since I told him my mom was cool with me being gay. All his money goes to Nicole and the kid so he’s only been able to read each issue at the store and always in a rush because of customer demand. His smile fades when he reaches page twenty-four, where Thor is beaten bloody by his Dark Alternate and left for dead in a pub.
“The day we got jumped,” Collin says. “I was so fucking scared for our lives. I really thought that was it.”
“That’s how I felt when my friends ganged up on me,” I say.
“Why did they do it?”
I ask myself this every fucking hour. Hate, ignorance, feeling betrayed—I don’t know, but they turned against me and there’s no taking it back or forgetting. But I answer honestly: “They didn’t like my friendship with Thomas, that guy you saw me with at Comic Book Asylum. They had the wrong idea about us.”
“Did anything ever happen between you two?”
I won’t tell him we kissed. “He’s straight,” I say. That’s what Thomas claims, and I roll with it to protect him. If my instincts are right and he does come out to me, I don’t want to have betrayed his trust. He never betrayed mine.
“That sucks,” Collin says. “Everything happens for a reason, right?”
Collin is the reason. Full circle.
After missing him yesterday—Collin had a doctor’s appointment with Nicole before work—we didn’t get to hang. Now we’re back at the track field for the third time. We get ready to run a lap when I see Thomas on the bleachers eating Chinese food. With Genevieve. It’s like a sucker punch. I can’t breathe. I have never been so hurt seeing someone else so happy.
She cracks open a fortune cookie. I hope it reads: you’re just asking for heartbreak again.
Thomas brought Genevieve here, one of the more public places where he thinks, and I hate the idea that he is sharing his thoughts with her. Maybe he’s even taken her up to his roof to watch movies, shirtless. If it has gone that far, I don’t have it in my soul to be happy for them, especially when he’s bullshitting her and she’s bullshitting herself again.
I take off, hoping to get the fuck out of here before I can be seen, but then Collin calls my name and both Thomas and Genevieve look around and find me. Thomas doesn’t take his eyes off me, but Genevieve’s eyes dart back and forth. Her face falls when she sees Collin.
I jet out of there even faster and don’t stop until the corner of the next block.
Collin catches up to me. I’m heaving and spitting over a trash can, pressing a hand against my aching rib cage.
“You okay? Your face is mad red.”
I cover my mouth so he doesn’t have to watch me try and throw up.
“I saw Genevieve back there with your boy Thomas. She’s not going to tell Nicole she saw me, right?”
“I don’t think they even talk anymore,” I manage. He’ll be lucky if Genevieve doesn’t take on a Dark Alternate herself and rat him out. “I think I should go home and rest. See you later this week?”
“You still like Thomas, don’t you?”
I don’t want to lie to him, but the truth might cost me him.
Collin shrugs. “It sucks, but it’s for the best. I’ll see you later this week, Aaron.”
He walks away. I watch him. I really wish people would just start punching me in the face again. At least a punch in the face would make me feel worthy of being hit. All this—Thomas and Genevieve laughing without me, Collin not giving enough of a fuck about me—makes it clear that no one would have any problem forgetting that I existed.
Maybe that’s the only way Leteo can work. For the forgettable. No one wants to be forgettable. But I’ll take that risk.
8
IMPOSSIBLY FORGETTABLE
I try not to be home when Eric is around. Out of all my relationships since being unwound, ours is the only one that hasn’t changed. Even remembering all the times he teased me doesn’t shift anything; we’ve always given each other shit, after all. But I’m kind of, sort of, definitely awkward around him because even though he knows, I never actually came out to him. Still, the apartment is small, and the arguments with Mom to approve me for another procedure are loud and daily.
I get to Good Food’s early to dodge Eric before he wakes up.
Mohad has been really cool about me missing work. But on Tuesday I asked him to give me some extra shifts because I needed to get out of the house. My mom only agreed to it because Mohad banned Brendan, Skinny-Dave, and Nolan from the store. He even told me I could call the cops if they showed up while he stepped out.
More than anything else, I thank Mohad for not firing me yesterday when I completely zoned out during a customer transaction. I gave this guy change for a fifty twice. That asshole naturally took the cash and bounced, but Mohad could see on the cameras that I didn’t pocket it—just got really distracted, I guess.
I spend the afternoon doing the same bullshit: cashiering, taking inventory, cutting conversations short about why my friends jumped me, sweeping, more cashiering, cutting more conversations short. It’s nearing the end of my shift when Mohad asks me to mop the beverage aisle. I prop up the caution: wet floor sign, dip the mop in the bucket, and almost freak out when Thomas and Genevieve appear. They slowly approach me.
His head is low, like when he couldn’t face me at Leteo.
Her head is high, like she’s won a prize I could never have.
My head is spinning, like I’m drunk on worthlessness.
“Hi, Aaron,” Genevieve says. “Do you have a chance to talk to us after work?”
“You can talk to me here.” I start mopping, but then Thomas’s cologne hits me and I retreat back to my corner.
Genevieve peeks into the next aisle and says, “Your mother told us about Leteo. Why would you do this again to yourself and everyone who loves you?”
“You’ll never get it.”
It’s impossible to explain the emotions cycling through me to someone who never forgot her life, later remembered it, and now has all these memories bleeding into each other. Every day feels more like chaos, like I’m never going to get my life straight—no pun intended—like starting over again is better than game over. Surely there’s some Leteo support group for those whose buried memories have been unwound. On the other hand, I don’t need any more sadness in my life listening to other people’s tragedies.
“Aaron, it’s you who’s not getting it,” she says. “Leteo fixes some things, yes, but it ruins everything else. I’ve been with you every step of the way, as much as I could, and pieced together everything else myself. This is not the happiness you want.”
I throw the mop onto the floor. The clattering makes Gen flinch.
“I can’t have the happiness that I want. On top of everything else, why should I have to carry around that weight too?” What I feel for Thomas is the loudest thing I’ve ever had ringing through me. I can be me again—or some form o
f me—when that ringing shuts up.
Thomas steps toward me. “I’m trying to make sense of this, Stretch. This guy, Collin . . . The one we saw at Comic Book Asylum and at the track field. You forgot him, but still knew him?”
“I forgot my time with him,” I say.
Thomas looks me in the eyes and I turn away. “What does that mean for me? Do we have enough history that you would still recognize me? Would you forget me?”
“Maybe,” I say, wishing I were somewhere else, even back home with Eric. “I don’t know exactly how Leteo puts together their blueprints.”
Thomas sniffs. I look up. His eyes are red and watery. I haven’t seen him cry since Brendan laid into him. “Remember back in June when we left that Leteo rally? You agreed with me that everyone serves a purpose. Is our friendship really so worthless now?” he asks.
When I don’t answer, he turns to Genevieve. “I’m going.”
It doesn’t sound like an invitation, but she looks at me one more time before following him anyway.
Genevieve is right: I don’t want this happiness, but blind happiness is better than inhabitable unhappiness.
After my shift, I go straight to my building, ignoring Baby Freddy’s shouts to hang out. I enter the lobby just as my mom exits the downstairs Laundromat, pushing the heavy load of clothes in a shopping cart. I come up beside her and take over, heading to the elevator.
“Genevieve and Thomas stopped by,” I say, keeping my cool.
She doesn’t even try and play it off or explain herself. “Thomas too?”
I press the elevator button. “Yeah. Did you only recruit Gen for the mission?”
“Outside your family, she loves you the most,” Mom says. “I thought that was my best shot.” Maybe so, but I guess Gen thought bringing along the guy I want to be my happiness might be a better bet. That girl is really something else. “I’m tired of this fight, Aaron. I know it’s my responsibility as a parent to give you the life you want, especially since I failed at getting you your own room and finding you a father who didn’t get so lost in his own head, but I don’t want to lose my son.”