“Oh, making the rounds. Thought I’d come in and say hi to everyone.”
“Really?” Nash says, his voice moving in rapid-fire fluctuations between hurt and anger. “I looked for you guys after school today.”
“I had a minor breakdown before PE and fled the building,” I say.
“You seem fine now.” Nash adjusts the watch and bracelets on his arm.
“Just a bout of teenage angst combined with a completely rational fear of Ms. Perry. Tom was concerned, but you would have slapped me right out of my amateur hysterics. Disaster averted by Diet Coke, new lip balm, and skipping my last class.” I smile at Nash, and he nods. But I can tell he’s still trying to decipher the array of information he saw when he first walked in to Square Peg.
“Interesting,” he says.
“Actually,” Tom says, “Maggie and I were hoping you’d come to dinner with us after she gets off work.”
I stare at him. Tom flicks my wrist with his fingernail, and I catch on enough to play along.
“We were,” I say. “Totally hoping.”
“I can’t go to dinner,” Nash says to Tom, ignoring me. “But we could hang out until then.”
“Maybe Maggie could meet us after work?” Tom says, as Nash drags him to the door. It’s futile to fight Nash when he’s got a plan. Tom shakes his head and gives in. The bell rings, the door slams, and the empty shop is quiet and still.
“Nash owes me for that record,” Quinn says, still looking at the door. “And what the hell just happened here?”
“Kayla Hill just happened here,” I say. “Ancient middle school feuds happened here. Nash’s jealousy happened here.”
“Ahhh, that’s why he was such an ice king,” Quinn says. “Well done, Mags.”
“What do you mean?” I say. “I have been flawlessly following the best friend guidelines, trying to give Nash and Tom every opportunity to establish a relationship while simultaneously running interference by keeping Kayla occupied.” I collapse on the stool and put my head in my hands. “Why isn’t it working? I’m doing everything right.”
“Well, let me ask you this,” Quinn says, stroking the divot in his chin like he does whenever he’s trying to solve a big problem. “You’ve been doing all this work to preserve Nash’s claim. And that’s to be commended. But who does Tom like?”
“That’s part of the problem. He’s not giving off the usual signs.”
“What are the usual signs?”
“Well, typically the object of Nash’s affection runs away, avoids him, and makes it clear that he is not interested in dating Nash, ever.”
“That kind of clarity would make things easier,” Quinn says.
“But Tom’s kind of a flirt.”
“Definitely a flirt.”
“With everyone.”
“I’ve noticed.”
“It makes it hard to tell if he’s being charming or if he’s really interested. When he’s with Kayla, he flirts with Kayla. He kind of even flirts with me, if that can be believed. But when he’s with Nash, I think he really could like Nash.”
Quinn shakes his head. “Honey, that dog won’t hunt.”
“Huh?”
“Tom does not like Nash.”
“What?” I say. “You’ve only known Tom for like ten seconds.”
“Trust me on this one. When you’ve been gay as long as I have, you get a sense for these things,” Quinn says. “And perfect, smiling Kayla seems a little obvious for a man of Tom’s apparent taste and wisdom.”
I nod. And then it hits me what Quinn’s hinting at. “Puh-lease!” I say, and grab the same stack of records for the third time.
“Okay, let’s try this another way. Boy meets boy. Boy meets girl.”
“Boy likes boy,” I say.
“Not gonna happen, sweetie!”
“You don’t know that. How can you know that?”
“Years of experience punctuated by painful trial and error.”
“And even if you’re right, that doesn’t mean—” I start to object but Quinn holds up his hand.
“I know what’s in front of me, Maggie,” Quinn says. “And right now it looks like Tom and Maggie sitting in a tree.”
“Quinn, seriously,” I say. “I’ll admit to some moments of wishful thinking in this case, but in the real world, guys like Tom do not go for girls like me.”
“You can believe what you want, Maggie, but that boy sees you, and he likes what he sees.”
I head back to Jazz with the records.
“Just think about it,” Quinn says, turning to the computer. “You and Nash don’t get to make all the rules.”
Chapter 17
Tom comes back to Square Peg at closing time. “Where are we going?”
“How am I supposed to know? This is your party.”
Tom laughs. “Do you guys have any good Vietnamese around here?”
“There’s PhePhiPho.”
“Mmmmmm. Hot noodles on a cold night? Lead the way.”
We walk toward the restaurant, tucking our chins against the chill.
“How was your time with Nash?” I ask.
“Good,” he says. “Confusing. He seemed mad, but not at me. I kind of thought it was at you, and that made me a little mad.” He rubs the back of his head, like he’s trying to stimulate his brain. “But I don’t really know why anyone would be mad.”
“Nash is . . .” I search for the right word. “Passionate . . . about his art, his friendships, loyalty.”
“Has someone been disloyal?” Tom asks.
I shake my head. “No, not really,” I say. “But he feels . . . threatened? Uncertain, I guess?”
“About me?”
I stop, not sure how to answer, then start walking again without looking at him. “Nash thinks you’re great.” I tiptoe across the words so I don’t make a misstep. “What do you think of Nash?”
“I think Nash is great,” he says. “I think you’re great. Kayla’s great. I really can’t complain about anyone I’ve met in Cedar Ridge.” He takes a deep breath, and I see the cloud his breath forms as he blows it out. “Look, usually I have a strong belief that conversations about friendships should happen between those two people.”
“Fair enough,” I say.
“But in this case, well, I’m kind of getting that Nash likes me . . . more than I can like him, if that makes sense?”
I stop and look him in the eye. “So Nash is not your type?”
“Nope.”
“And that’s because he’s too tall?”
“Nope.”
“Too sarcastic?”
“No.”
My heart sinks. “Too male?”
Tom nods. We walk again, letting that information rattle around us for a bit.
“So my brother’s gay,” he says.
“Okay. Good to know.” I’m wondering if Tom told Nash.
“He got messed with, a lot. You know, every time we moved, he had to go through this whole process with the local brand of bullies.”
“That must have been tough.”
“It was. And I wasn’t always there for him like I wish I’d been. We’re okay now, but we weren’t for a long time. I was kind of an asshole. A lot.”
“So hanging out with Nash—”
“Listen, Nash is fun and smart and interesting. I want to be friends with him.” Tom shoves his hands in his pockets. “But yeah, hanging out with Nash might be a little bit about making up for the shit with my brother.”
“And that’s a problem because . . . ?”
“It’s not a problem. But he’s very . . . for whatever reason Nash obviously thinks he and I . . . and I’m not . . . That’s not happening. That’s not my deal.”
“‘For whatever reason’? Could it be because you are excessively friendly to everything with a pulse?” I ask.
“What? I’m not—”
“Bullshit.”
Tom opens his mouth like he wants to argue, then looks away. “Okay. Sorry. I know. It
’s a bit of a survival mechanism. It tends to accelerate the friend-making thing at a new school.”
“And I’m sure this isn’t the first time your ‘friendliness’ has been misunderstood?”
“Yeah, well, no, not exactly. Anyway. You’re Nash’s best friend. What do I do?”
“If you’d asked me a couple weeks ago, I would have told you not to play with his emotions in the first place.”
“I wasn’t playing. Not on purpose. But whatever. Now what?”
“You’ve got to tell him. Soon.”
“Then what happens?”
“Shit, Tom, give it some time, I guess. And it’s going to be awkward.”
“It already is.”
“Yeah, well, maybe you should be a little more careful. Clearly flirtation is your superpower. Someone could get hurt.”
We walk a couple more blocks along Main Street, turning onto a side street. “Can I ask something slightly more philosophical?”
“Ask away,” Tom says.
“Why hang out with Nash and me in the first place?” I ask. “I mean beyond working out unresolved issues with your brother.”
“I didn’t exactly have a choice. You guys hijacked me that first day.”
“True, but you had to know pretty quickly how the Nash thing was going to play out. And anyway, in general, why not aim higher?”
“Maggie, what the hell are you talking about?”
“Seriously. You come to this school, smart, funny, not bad-looking . . .”
Tom grins. “You think I’m good-looking?”
“I said ‘not bad-looking.’ There’s a difference.”
He elbows me in the side, almost knocking me off the sidewalk.
“A big difference,” I say. “So anyway, you could use your skills to finesse your way into any group of friends in the school. What’s with the slumming?”
“Would you rather I defect to the A-list?” he asks.
“No.” I shake my head. “But I wonder why you don’t. You said yourself you had fun with Kayla and her friends the other night.”
“Well, she asked me out, and I didn’t want to be rude,” Tom says. “And if I’m honest, she seems like she might be sort of smart under all that giggling and flirting, but I don’t have that kind of time. It was okay, not a bad experience. But it’s not like when you and I hang out. With you it’s different. Normal.”
“Normal?” I laugh. “I don’t get called that very often. If Nash and I seem normal, you must have run into some real freaks in your travels.” Tom laughs too, and for a minute it feels like Seattle again. “So, what you’re saying is that all your moving around has taught you the wisdom of shunning the popular in favor of the drastically less popular?”
“Let’s say my experiences have taught me that assholes come in all shapes, sizes, and social classes.”
“Ah, yes, your vast and worldly experiences.”
“Well, I think I can claim a little more of that than someone who’s lived in Cedar Ridge her whole life.”
“Ouch.”
Tom looks at me sideways. “The truth is that I have been to nine new schools in ten years. Every time I moved, I had to make new friends. When you’re little, nobody cares about popularity. There are always one or two kids on the outside, the nose-picker or the one who smells funny, but in general everybody’s friends with everybody else.”
I nod.
“A few years ago, making friends got harder. I had to start . . . positioning myself, I guess, if I wanted to make friends. And I had to start working at it. Had to make myself more likable. Sometimes I set my sights on the ‘popular kids’ or whatever, sometimes not.”
“Did you just use air quotes?” I ask, stopping.
He scowls at me.
“Sorry. Please continue.”
“Anyway, I never thought that much about it, until a couple years back. First day, new school, a nice guy named Jim is the first one to approach me. Sort of like you and Nash did. He’s kind of dorky, but so am I, so we talk comic books and sci-fi movies, and things are great. We hang out for a couple days, and then I meet some other people, people who also seem nice. I’m having fun and kind of lose track of Jim, but I don’t think much of it since I’ve hit it off with these other kids.”
“The ‘popular kids’?” I ask, using air quotes myself.
“Do you want to hear this or not?” Tom stops outside a dark storefront a couple of blocks from the restaurant.
I clamp my lips together and nod.
“So these other kids seem great and we’re all having fun, and then one day we’re in the hall and there’s Jim alone by his locker. I feel the mood shift. The guys I’m with start elbowing each other and whispering.”
“Oh. Not good.”
“Yeah. So pretty soon they start saying stuff to Jim. This wasn’t just teasing—this was bad. Crap about his mom, and things they want to do to his sister, and how he’s a fag and a sicko. They keep going, and I’m talking nasty, awful shit. I don’t say anything, but I don’t stop them, either. Jim ignores them at first, just keeps getting books out of his locker, but eventually they get to him, and he faces us.”
I am still now, hands shoved in my pockets.
“I will never forget the look on his face when he turned around. He was resigned, weary. Like he knew the script and was just waiting for the scene to be over. I’d seen that same look on my brother’s face before. But this time I was one of the people making someone feel that way.” Tom looks away from me. “Anyway, he said stuff, and they said stuff, and I stood there like an absolute idiot. And then somebody grabbed Jim, pushed him into his open locker, and shut the door. He starts banging right away, but these new ‘friends’ of mine”—he uses the air quotes again, but I don’t tease him this time—“these guys walk away laughing and patting themselves on the back.”
“What did you do?” I ask. My voice comes out a little squeaky.
“I just stood there. I was so surprised by it all. It happened so fast. Jim was banging on the inside of the locker and screaming, and the guys were disappearing around the corner, and I just . . . stood there.”
“You didn’t let him out? You didn’t help him?”
“Some girl came down the hall and tried to get Jim out. She had to talk him down enough to get him to give her the combination, and when he got out he was so angry, I thought he might beat the shit out of me. So I left.”
“That’s it? You left him there?”
“That’s it.”
“Wow. That’s . . . so you didn’t even apologize?”
Tom looks away. “Yeah, I know. Not my finest moment. None of those assholes ever talked to me again, and neither did Jim. And I don’t blame them.”
“So the moral of the story is everyone sucks?” I’m a little confused about how this relates to my original question.
“Not exactly,” Tom says. “I guess the moral of the story is social status doesn’t make people worthy. It doesn’t make them unworthy, either. Since then, I go with my gut and spend time with people who seem interesting, whether they are at the top of the food chain or the bottom.”
I nod. Maybe I’m a little suspicious of Kayla because she’s popular. I know Nash is. She’s been nothing but nice the last few weeks, but it’s weird how I keep waiting for the punch line with her. At the same time, I get a little psyched at the idea we could be friends again. If I go with my gut, as Tom suggests, I’m still confused. Part of my gut is telling me it could happen, but another part keeps kicking my brain with steel-toed boots, telling me she’s after something more selfish. Tom and I walk along in silence for a bit, and after a while I bump him with my shoulder and say, “Thanks, Tom.”
“For what? All I did was reveal, twice in one evening, what a spineless idiot I can be.”
“For telling me the truth, and for . . . I guess for thinking I’m interesting enough to spend time with.” We stop, and I give an involuntary shiver as the wind pushes some dry leaves up and around us.
&nbs
p; Tom takes off his wool coat and wraps it around me, then pulls me into a sort of hug and starts rubbing his hands up and down my back to warm me up. I hope the bulk of our coats will camouflage my body’s bumps and lumps enough that Tom doesn’t notice them.
I smell his clove gum and the clean woolly scent of his collar. I have never been this close to a guy before, not anyone besides Nash. And Nash never makes my insides go haywire the way Tom does. That ember is back in the base of my stomach. I feel myself sort of relax into Tom, and he rests his chin on the top of my head.
“Hmmmm,” I say. “Thanks.”
“Anytime, Maggie.” Tom pulls me a little tighter, slowing the pace of his hands. The stroking feels less practical now, more about pleasure than warmth.
I go from relaxed to alert, unsure of what I should do. It seems like Tom is kind of, well, making a move. And I like it, like standing in his arms. Like that my senses are wide awake whenever he touches me. But there are too many things complicating the purity of this moment. Besides, I’m beginning to see Tom has a gift for making whoever he’s with feel this way. Still, I let myself enjoy it for a few more seconds.
“Maybe we should go get some food,” I say, pulling back from him and handing him his coat. I clench my arms around my torso and turn in the direction of PhePhiPho.
It takes a few seconds, but Tom falls into step alongside me. I don’t look, but I can feel that he’s watching me as we walk. After half a block of silence, I resort to page one of the dating handbook: I ask him a question about himself.
“So, I am getting to know you well enough to know about your Dungeons and Dragons phase, your torture and locker imprisonment of innocent students—”
“Too soon,” Tom says.
“Sorry. Your occasional use of air quotes. But I have one more question that will seal my growing conviction that you are more than just a pretty face: that you could be an authentic dork like me.”
“Uh-oh,” Tom says, but he’s smiling. “What’s the question?”
“How many action figures do you own?”
“Oh, no. I’ve had enough humiliation for one day. Besides, you owe me several embarrassing tidbits about yourself,” he says. “Until we even the score a bit, we will not be discussing my action figures.”
You and Me and Him Page 11