Absolutely Positively Not

by David LaRochelle

  Bradley Lenihan, from the student council, was sitting on a stool outside the gym. A paper banner above his head proclaimed the theme of the dance: THE FUTURE IS OURS! “Sorry, no pets,” he said.

  “She’s not my pet,” I snapped. “She’s my date.” I shoved our tickets into his hand and continued inside, Kelly following closely at my heels.

  Walking into the gym was like walking into the world’s largest roasting pan. Every conceivable surface from the scoreboards to the drinking fountains had been wrapped in aluminum foil. I guess the decorating committee had thought we’d be doing a lot of barbecuing in the future. The sight of all those male-female couples throughout the room, reflected hundreds of times on the shiny walls of the gym, caused me to rethink my outburst of self-confidence.

  On the far side of the gym I spotted Rachel talking intently with Victor. Before she could see us, I pulled Kelly behind a giant cardboard flying saucer. “We don’t have to let her know we’re here. Not yet.”

  Rachel was sure to create a scene, and I wanted a few minutes to regain my courage. I hurried Kelly to an empty table in the corner of the gym, where we sat hidden behind a bunch of Mylar balloons.

  A minute passed.

  Then five.

  Nothing terrible happened. The band played a mix of retro-rock classics, all at a volume so loud, it was difficult to tell one song from another. Girls squealed and hugged their friends and stood in groups admiring each other’s dresses. A handful of couples danced boldly in the center of the gym, oblivious to everything else, including the music. No one paid any attention to us.

  “I think I can do this,” I told Kelly. “I think I’m ready to find Rachel.”

  But before I could leave my seat, our table was darkened by a shadow roughly the size and shape of a water buffalo. It was Mr. Cheever, our vice principal. “Get that filthy animal out of here,” he growled.

  Kelly growled back.

  “And get it out now, before it attacks someone.”

  If Kelly could tolerate Downy and Bounce climbing all over her head, I doubted whether she was going to turn vicious on anyone in this gym.

  “She’s actually very gentle,” I said, scratching Kelly behind her ears. Her back leg started twitching and her growl was replaced with a wide, canine grin.

  “Out!” said Cheever.

  But it was cold outside, and windy. Besides, the cheesy futuristic decorations were beginning to grow on me.

  “Couldn’t we just sit behind these balloons and watch?”

  Cheever’s face was rapidly turning the color of tomato paste. “I am not about to let some smart-aleck kid disrupt this school event. I want that dog out, and I want it out NOW!”

  His ranting had drawn a small crowd.

  “Hey, look! It’s a dog!”

  “She’s so cute!”

  “What’s her name?”

  “Is it a boy or a girl?”

  Cheever jabbed his finger firmly toward the exit.

  “You’re not going to make them leave?” someone asked.

  “He’s got the best-looking date here,” said a pimply-faced guy in a shiny polyester suit, who was immediately whacked by the girl standing next to him.

  Then, from the back of the crowd, I heard a familiar voice.

  “Let the dog dance! Let the dog dance!”

  It was Rachel, sitting on Victor’s shoulders and punching the air with her clenched fist. The music had stopped and hers was the only voice in the gym.

  Then another voice joined in: Victor’s. Before I knew it, the walls were echoing with Rachel’s demand as all of the students joined the chant.

  Fifteen minutes ago I would have embraced any excuse to get out of this dance, but now … well, why should I allow Cheever to tell me who I could, or could not, choose for my date?

  I pushed back my chair and stood up. I didn’t quite reach Cheever’s double chin, but I straightened my shoulders and said, “Sorry, Mr. Cheever, but we’re not leaving. Our tickets said nothing about discrimination against dogs. The future is ours, and we’re staying for the dance!”

  The gymnasium exploded in a cheer.

  Cheever glanced nervously at the mob of well-dressed teenagers poised on the brink of a riot. With one last huff, he stomped off.

  After that, everyone wanted to walk Kelly around the dance floor, scratch her tummy, or bring her a glass of punch. When the band asked for requests, people shouted:

  “‘Who Let the Dogs Out’!”

  “Something by Three Dog Night!”

  “‘You Ain’t Nothin’ but a Hound Dog’!”

  I thought this last suggestion was a little tacky, but Kelly didn’t seem to mind.

  Even Dwayne and Solveig stopped by our table.

  “You Americans are very strange,” said Solveig. “But I’m glad you found a date that you like.”

  Dwayne just looked at Kelly and said, “I don’t get it.”

  When it came time for the final dance, a slow one, I trotted Kelly around the dance floor myself. I smiled as I recognized the strains of “She’s Always a Woman to Me.”

  It was then that I spotted Mr. Bowman standing behind the punch bowl, dressed in a midnight black tux. He watched Kelly and me weave our way around the other couples, then gave us his nod of approval.

  Eventually the last dance ended. The band began to pack up, and the gym slowly emptied of couples.

  “One more thing,” Rachel said. She led all four of us into the hall where a professional photographer had his camera.

  “Smile!” he said. Then he snapped a picture of us against a backdrop of moons and planets.

  “You and Kelly were the stars of the night,” Rachel whispered as we walked to the car.

  On the way home we stopped at the Hungry Beaver Drive-Thru. Rachel and Victor ordered veggie burritos; Kelly and I shared a quarter-pound Burger Basket. While we ate, we reviewed our favorite songs of the night, critiqued the band’s performance, and took turns giving our best Cheever impersonation. Soon we were laughing so hard, we could hardly speak.

  “Awesome dance,” said Victor, wiping the tears of laughter from his face. He then looked in the rearview mirror and gave Kelly and me a big thumbs-up sign.

  “The four of us should do this again,” I said.

  We were making our way up the sidewalk to Rachel’s front porch. I bet there were a lot of places you could take a dog on a date: the park, the zoo, the drive-in movies. I wondered if the local roller rink would make an exception to their “No Dogs” policy for an animal as well-behaved as Kelly.

  I handed her the last dog treat, then opened the front door. She wagged her tail and trotted inside.

  When I turned around, Victor and Rachel were still halfway down the walk.

  In the glow of the porch light I watched Victor take his hands and place them gently on Rachel’s waist. He took a step forward. Rachel reached up and intertwined her fingers behind his neck.

  I didn’t breathe.

  Once, twice, they gave each other tentative pecks on the lips. Then Victor closed his eyes. Even from where I stood I could see the elegant curve of his long, dark lashes. He tilted his head low and gave Rachel a slow, graceful kiss. It was beautiful, natural, and perfect.

  It reminded me of the kiss I had seen on the movie screen between the two handsome actors.

  I don’t know how long Victor and Rachel continued. They were still at it as I stepped around them and began the cold walk home.

  Steven? Are you up?”

  I opened my eyes. Sunlight was streaming through the windows, and my alarm clock showed 11:05. Outside my door, my mother was tapping like a woodpecker. “You can’t stay in bed all day!”

  I knew what she wanted. Last night when I got home from the dance, I had told her I was too exhausted for a recap of the evening. She had been disappointed, but said she’d do her best to wait till the morning.

  I closed my eyes and tried to make the morning go away.

  “If you don’t get up soon, I’ll
have to call Rachel and get a report from her.”

  “I’ll be down in fifteen minutes,” I said, swinging my legs over the side of the mattress.

  A tell-all conversation between Rachel and my mom was not a pretty thought.

  My mother went away and I sat on the edge of my bed, staring at the Superman poster on the far side of the room. It was the classic pose, hands on hips, cape billowing in the wind.

  “What am I going to tell her?” I asked.

  Superman stared back, dissecting me with his X-ray vision.

  I turned away, but even with my eyes averted I knew what he wanted me to do. I just didn’t know if I was capable of it. How could I spring the truth on a woman who thought I was dating a clone of her best friend from school?

  I turned back toward the poster. Superman’s expression was unchanged. Stern and resolute. But at the same time, compassionate too.

  How can you win an argument with Superman?

  “Okay,” I said. “I’ll do it. I’ll tell my mother I’m gay.”

  As I stood in the shower with steamy water pummeling my scalp, I imagined my mother’s reaction. Tears? Anger? Uncontrollable hysteria?

  Or maybe Rachel had been wrong. Maybe my mother already knew. Maybe this revelation would come as no big deal to her.

  The shower turned icy as the hot water ran out.

  “Steven! I’m waiting!” called my mom from downstairs.

  The time for stalling had come to an end.

  My mom was at the kitchen table, scissors in hand and a stack of coupons in front of her. The Sunday paper was spread in every direction.

  “Finally!” she said and swept the papers to one side, making a spot for me to sit. “I’ll get you something to eat while you tell me all about last night.”

  My stomach was flip-flopping so much I couldn’t have eaten a cornflake, but I didn’t bother to argue.

  “There’s so much I want to know. For example, who was there, who were the chaperones, did they play any waltzes….”

  She took a plate of last week’s French toast from the fridge, briefly ran it under water, then popped it into the microwave. “But why don’t you start with Kelly.”

  Nothing like getting to the tough subjects first.

  “What did she look like? And don’t spare me any of the details.”

  Okay, Superman, it’s time to make you proud.

  “Mom, Kelly is a dog.”

  My mother’s face went blank. Then she scowled.

  “Steven Killebrew DeNarski! I thought I raised you with better manners than that! How dare you refer to a young lady in that manner!”

  I tried again.

  “Mom, Kelly is a real dog.”

  “I don’t care, Steven. That’s still no way to talk about a girl.”

  I picked my words a little more carefully. “Mom, Kelly is not a girl. She’s Rachel’s golden retriever. A canine. A dog.”

  My mother squeezed her eyes shut and placed her fingers alongside her temples as if she were getting a headache.

  “Call me old-fashioned, Steven, but why would anyone take a golden retriever to a high school dance?”

  Here we go. This was it.

  “Because I’m gay.”

  I braced myself for the hysteria.

  My mother smiled. “Steven, just because you took a dog to a school dance doesn’t make you gay.”

  “I’m not gay because I took a dog to the dance. I took a dog to the dance because I’m gay.”

  This explanation sounded confusing even to me.

  My mother sat down at the table and folded her hands. “I love you very much, Steven. You know that, don’t you?”

  I nodded.

  “And the only thing I want in this world is for you to be happy and safe.”

  This conversation was going better than I had feared.

  “Therefore, you are absolutely, positively not gay.”

  The buzzer on the microwave went off and she went to get the French toast.

  “But I am!” I said.

  “No, you are not. You are much too young to be gay.”

  Boy, did she have that wrong. Even as I talked about last night, I was picturing Victor giving me the thumbs-up sign and seeing his dark eyes smiling at me in the rearview mirror.

  She set the plate of withered French toast in front of me. “Would you like some syrup? Or maybe a little powdered sugar?”

  “I’m not hungry,” I said.

  “Well, I’m starved.” She picked up a fork and dug into the toast.

  Complete dismissal was not a reaction I had expected. And as much as the topic still made me nervous, I wanted my mom to acknowledge it was real. “It’s true,” I said. “I’m gay.”

  “Mmmm!” she said. “Delicious! Can I at least get you some orange juice?”

  “You’re not even listening, are you?”

  “Of course I’m listening, Steven.” She went to the cupboard to get a glass. “You’re telling me about some crazy phase that you’re going through. I know all about crazy teenage phases. Believe it or not, I was a pretty wild and crazy teenager too. And if you want to pretend that you’re gay for a little while, you go right ahead.”

  She began drinking the juice herself.

  “I’m not pretending, Mom.”

  “You know, taking a dog to a dance is kind of cute. You’ve always liked animals, ever since you were a little boy. Maybe we should have gotten you a dog when you were younger. Would you like to get a dog now? I’ll talk to your father. We can all go to the humane society this afternoon.”

  “Mom, I’m gay.” I didn’t know how else I could put it.

  She finished the juice and started filling the sink with soapy water. Everything she could reach, she tossed into the suds. She must have forgotten that we owned a dishwasher. “Steven, I’m just too busy to talk about this right now.”

  She plunged her hands into the sink and pulled out a wet ketchup bottle. Even though she was hoping this conversation would go away, I needed her to hear me. “Mom, please.”

  “Steven. I’m sorry.” She removed a clean frying pan from the shelf above the stove, dunked it in the water, and scrubbed it with the concentration of a fanatic. The sound of steel wool scraping against the aluminum pan made my teeth hurt.

  Then she stopped.

  She set the dishrag on the counter and looked out the window over the sink. “I need some time to think about this,” she said.

  I could understand that. I was still thinking about it myself.

  “Would it be okay if we talk about it later?” It was both a suggestion and a plea.

  “Sure,” I said. Later was a compromise I could live with.

  My mother’s head and shoulders collapsed in relief, like a sock puppet minus its hand. Then she pulled the plug from the sink and wiped her soapy palms on her slacks. “But in the meantime, please don’t mention any of this to your father. I don’t think he could handle it as well as I did.”

  It was my evening to help my dad in the kitchen. Once a week I was required to be his assistant as he made dinner. “A man’s got to know how to cook,” he had told me. “You never know who you might end up marrying.”

  His menu for the night was Exploding Chili: eight quarts of black beans, pinto beans, and kidney beans, seasoned liberally with green chilies and Tabasco sauce.

  “Pepper,” he said.

  I slid off my stool and looked through the cupboards till I found the canister of pepper hidden behind a box of trash bags. I tried to keep the seasonings all together in alphabetical order, but my mother or father was always messing them up.

  My dad took the pepper and shook it over the pot. “So, how was the dance?”

  “Fine,” I said.

  “Good.”

  End of conversation.

  Unlike my mom, my dad seldom asked a lot of personal questions about my social life, and tonight I was glad.

  “Chili powder,” he said.

  I finally found the chili powder in the dra
wer with the dish towels.

  “You should invite her over for dinner,” said my dad.

  “Who?”

  “That girl you took to the dance.”

  Since when had my dad become interested in hosting dinner parties?

  “Kelly’s parents are strict,” I told him. “They don’t allow her to eat with strangers.”

  My dad dropped several pounds of ground beef into the pot. “They sound like real screwballs,” he said.

  My mom was probably right about not telling my father. Even Superman couldn’t expect me to drop a bombshell like this on my dad.

  He lined up eight plump tomatoes on the cutting board and hacked them into tiny pieces.

  After all, the only time I had ever heard him mention anything about homosexuals was when I was ten. He and a bunch of buddies from work were grilling brats in the backyard, drinking beer, and telling jokes. I was underneath the picnic table eavesdropping.

  “Here’s a good one,” my dad had said. “How many fags does it take to screw in a lightbulb?”

  No one had known the answer.

  “Two. Unless it’s a three-way.”

  I hadn’t understood the joke, but I never forgot the laughter. How could I possibly tell a person like this I was gay?

  He turned up the heat on the stove, and the chili began to bubble.

  “So her folks won’t let her eat over at our house, huh? I suppose we’re not good enough for her. Take my advice, Steven. Don’t get too serious about a girl like that.”

  He stirred the chili with a slotted spoon that looked suspiciously like the one he had used to scoop ice chunks out of our fishing holes.

  “Remember, when you marry someone, you’re marrying their entire family.”

  How did we get onto the topic of marriage?

  “There are plenty of girls whose families will accept you just the way that you are.”

  But I wasn’t looking for any girls.

  “I want you to marry a woman who is proud to wear the DeNarski name, do you understand?” He brought down a cleaver with a resounding whack! and split a whole onion neatly in half.

  “Dad, I’m gay.”

  I don’t know who was more surprised, me or him.

  “What did you say?”

  “I’m gay.”