Out East

by John Glynn

  “Can I tell you something?” Mike asked as we walked along the beach the next weekend. “I never felt a connection with another guy until college. It took meeting a specific guy to make it real.”

  “Really?” I thought back to our senior year, the way Mike returned to campus with his drastic new look. It was as though he’d pressed a button and “become” gay.

  “Who was it?” I asked.

  “It was Evan.”

  Evan, our college roommate. My current roommate in Tribeca. He was up in Rochester that weekend with his girlfriend Lizzie.

  “Wait, you and Evan…But…?”

  “Ha, no, Evan is straight. But I told him how I felt about him one night. He was great about it. It brought us closer together as friends. Plus it opened me up to the possibility of meeting someone new. For you it’s different, of course. But Matt is a good guy. He has a good heart. And I’ve been watching you two interact, it’s definitely mutual.”

  “You…you think?”

  “One hundred percent.”

  I was less sure. On the beach Sunday afternoon Matt seemed distracted and withdrawn. He was glued to his phone. I’d lain on my stomach, sun blading my back, listening to the vibrational volley of his text exchanges. Twice he left to make phone calls.

  “Everything’s fine,” he assured me when he got back. “Stuff at work.”

  We went to Swallow East, a restaurant on the docks. On Sundays a reggae band played songs on a steel drum. Everyone went barefoot, kicking their sandals into a pile by the stage. We listened to “High Tide or Low Tide” as the sun dipped behind the fishing boats. Mike ordered us small plates—crispy fish tacos, orzo mac and cheese, asparagus fries, wedge salad, brisket. The calamari was sweet and spicy, glazed in a duck sauce and sprinkled with peanuts. Everything looked delicious, but I could barely eat. Matt’s withdrawal had left me disoriented. I retreated inward, into my insecurities, into the darkness that skulled me.

  Ashley, too, seemed to exist in a constant state of heartache. Her recent love interests had not panned out. With every new guy, she fell fast and hard. She did little to protect her heart, which was what drew so many to her. I admired her tendency to love deeply, but I hated to see her suffer. That summer we occupied the same vulnerable hutch.

  Every morning Ashley went to breakfast at an Italian restaurant in Midtown Manhattan. She ordered a wheat croissant with raspberry filling and a skim cappuccino. The bathroom attendant was a wrinkled woman who didn’t understand English very well, but Ashley liked to talk to her anyway. In college she had played varsity tennis. The admissions office approached her during her junior year and took her picture sitting on the court. She wore sunglasses, a high ponytail, and the red Dragon Adidas sneakers she reserved for match play. She was the only one on the team who had walked on. After the photograph, they asked her a few questions about how Providence College made her a better person. She was no longer the mean girl she’d been in high school. She assumed the brief profile would run in a collage at the back of the brochure. When the catalog arrived, she opened it to a two-page spread with the headline BECOMING ASHLEY.

  Ashley and I stayed out that Sunday and drove back to the city before dawn. Route 27 felt smooth and quiet, tinged with a lonesome pale light. In the back of her car lay some wedge shoes and running gear. CFA books were piled in the space behind the headrest. Despite the early hour we were both chatty and alert. She told me about a failed relationship with a coworker who had once been her best friend. He had left her gutted. It was over, but they still talked.

  “I wish I were more like Kirsten,” she said. “She can see the beauty in heartbreak. But I can’t. I just feel like I can’t breathe.”

  I paused as she described her anguish, aware that she was tracing the contours of my own tortured heart.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The city was in the midst of a heat wave. In Tribeca we ate ice cream as the AC hummed, the lights browning and dimming, then flickering back. The subway platforms baked to a boil.

  Wednesday was Tyler’s birthday. The Hive planned to celebrate at Beekman Beer Garden. I left work and walked to Forty-Second Street to catch the 2/3 train to Fulton. Times Square was a hot blur of movie billboards and soda ads, transfixed playgoers and incandescent lights. I listened to my iPod and tried to contain my nervous energy. I’d been on edge since the weekend, plagued by a pervasive sense of ineptitude. My crush on Matt held me captive.

  I walked through the Financial District to the East River. The Beekman occupied a wharf adorned with plush white chairs, beach umbrellas, and imported sand. I bought a Belgian ale crushed with an orange slice and found my housemates barefoot on the artificial beach.

  “This is, like, the earliest I’ve gotten out of work, ever,” Timmy said. He wore tight-fitting dress pants and a starched shirt, a work persona at odds with the weekend Timmy I knew. “I can’t believe Tyler isn’t even here yet. Who else is coming?”

  “Shane’ll be here in a minute,” said D.Lo, looking down at her phone. “Matt’s on his way.”

  “Wait,” Timmy said, flinging his arm at D.Lo. “Let’s talk about Matt.”

  “What about?”

  I was standing barefoot in the sand, looking out to the Brooklyn Bridge, listening but not listening. My body must’ve anticipated it, because I could feel the blood draining from my face, my chest knotting, my heartbeat quickening. In the glaring heat my skin went cold. Timmy tilted his head, eyes confiding.

  “I hear Matt has a new man.”

  I took a sip of my beer, tasting the sweet cut of the orange, my dread mounting. D.Lo confirmed Timmy’s statement, her words dismantling the beams of my elaborate inner world.

  They’d met in P-town. They’d hit it off instantly. They’d spent almost every night together since.

  I stayed for another drink, my awkwardness palpable. Matt came and I forced myself to act normal. No one made any mention of his new man, and neither did he. I wore a smile the entire time, sadness rotting me from the inside out.

  “Okay, here’s the thing,” Mike said the next night. We were sitting on the wobbly bar stools of Pete’s Tavern, drinking tequila, our voices muffled by the copper ceilings. “Matt’s guy is twice his age. He’s a novelty. It’s not serious and it won’t last.”

  Gossip hotwired through the Hive, traveling down reliable pathways. I had learned all the details about Matt’s new love interest, the cookie crumbs on social media revealing themselves in hindsight. It shocked me that Matt could spark with someone so much older. I had grown convinced that we shared a heart, but his new connection fell outside the scope of my impulses. Was he truly attracted to this person? Did he gravitate to him emotionally? I was mourning the loss of a relationship I’d never had. I nodded along to Mike’s encouragement, but the heartsickness was overpowering.

  “You two would be perfect together,” Mike said. “Just let this play out.”

  Mike himself was in no better shape. Since the Fourth of July his crush on Parker had grown like ivy. They were meeting at dive bars during the week, getting wine drunk, talking for hours, texting the whole next day. Mike got home from these meet-ups at one or two, then woke up at four for his opening shift at SoulCycle.

  You know he likes you, right? Shane had said one night, smelling the liquor on Mike’s breath. He likes you, and you’re gonna break his pathetic little heart.

  Mike had shrugged Shane off, but knew he had a point. Their desires were apparent. But Shane had one thing wrong. Mike wasn’t going to break Parker’s heart. Parker was already breaking his.

  I needed a breath, a moment to recalibrate. I had passed through the week in a dense fog of sadness. It took every ounce of energy I had to maintain a façade of workplace cheer. My feelings for Matt felt like a missed opportunity. The universe had given me one shot, and I’d been too afraid to take it. I went out to Montauk that weekend, relieved that Matt was not on the schedule.

  On the beach that Saturday, I watched a guy playing Spikeball in a cran
berry bathing suit. The Hive girls were slathering themselves in a mixture of Australian Gold tanning oil and coconut body lotion, and the scent bristled my nose. Perrie always applied self-tanner the night before, and so did Shane, but secretly. Sun In, too, was a clandestine indulgence. I returned my gaze to Cranberry Bathing Suit. He was shirtless, his face banded with sunglasses. He had the sharp jaw and etched abs of a Roman statue. I’d never seen anyone with such a perfectly proportioned body. Since connecting with Matt, I’d let more in. Privately I acknowledged that Cranberry Bathing Suit was hot. I stole glances over pages of The Secret History.

  On the other side of us, our friends the Stavolas were playing volleyball. They were the ones we’d inventively nicknamed Volleyball Girl and Volleyball Girl’s Sister before learning their real names. They’d grown up in Montauk and bemoaned its recent evolution. Once “a drinking town with a fishing problem,” Montauk was becoming—somehow—hipster chic. Many worried it had lost its humble spirit. Signs were appearing throughout town: a fedora slashed with a red line above the words SAVE MONTAUK. I knew, as weekenders, that we were part of this unwelcome influx.

  “Mm-hmm.” Colby nodded to Kirsten from his beach chair. “Girl, check out that eye candy. He is fine.”

  Cranberry Bathing Suit was leaning over with his hands on his thighs. His abs were flexed.

  “Oh my God,” said Kirsten. “I’ve been eye-fucking him all afternoon.”

  “The cranberry bathing suit?” said Perrie. “Me too!”

  “Holy shit, me also!” said Tyler.

  “Ugh, he’s mine!” said Kara.

  Cranberry dove for the ball, his sweat mixing with the sand. The Hive ogled. Even the finance bros offered their admiration. I wanted to chime in and knew I could have without controversy; people would’ve taken it in jest. I considered it, but remained silent. I was too uncomfortable to join the chorus, and the moment passed.

  That night at the Mem, I wingmanned for Arthur. He was trying to hook up with a girl from the Meeting House, a share near the pond. I flirted with her friend, bought her a drink, trying to will myself to be into it. With Matt not around, it seemed like a good opportunity to revisit the world of heterosexuality. But the whole thing felt hollow. It carved me empty. When Arthur failed to connect we went back early, the air still heavy with humidity.

  “Let’s go in the pool!” Colby suggested as we got back to the house. We were still sweating from the Mem and not in the mood for sleep, so we changed into our bathing suits and ventured down the cascading wooden staircase, our footsteps swallowed by the dark. The pool sat at the bottom of the backyard, fifty yards down. It was outfitted with a starched-white diving board, a basketball hoop, and a sun-faded slide. We felt the water with our toes. It glowed a shocking neon blue.

  We played a few rounds of Marco Polo, drunkenly flailing and swallowing water. Arthur was it and counted to ten. I swam to the deep end and held on to the side. Colby swam up next to me.

  I felt a hand slip under my bathing suit. Fingers searching for, and grabbing, my dick. I lurched away.

  “Oh, come on,” Colby said, swimming closer. His voice was crackly, his eyes distant. I could tell he was on the cusp of blacking out.

  Marco.

  “Colby, no.”

  He reached into my suit again and I was less resistant.

  “Just let me play with it,” he said. “It doesn’t mean you’re gay.”

  I treaded away, slowly, laughing a little, embarrassed by my arousal. “Colby.”

  He held my gaze. His eyes were piercing, blue and bloodshot with chlorine. He looked tired, hollow.

  “Just, come on. I know you want it. No one has to know.”

  I wanted to run and hide. Colby’s behavior that summer had grown increasingly distressing. He was picking fights with everyone and constantly stirring up drama, especially with the girls. I knew I needed to swim away and ultimately fended him off. But part of me wanted to carry him to a bedroom and lock the door.

  Perrie woke up the next morning and got in her car. She rolled down the windows and turned up the music. In her glove compartment lay a notebook and a pen. She had a dock she liked to drive to.

  She parked her car and strolled to the dock. In her notebook were the seeds of a long-germinating novel. She sat on the bench and began to write, a morning fog rolling across the sea. The best times at the Hive, she thought, were the times when you could slip away.

  Chapter Eighteen

  That Tuesday I received an email from my dad. It was a follow-up to a phone call we’d had on Sunday. Overwhelmed by the weekend, I had hinted at waves of heartache but offered no details beyond the backdrop, Montauk. My father assumed the object of my anguish was a girl.

  Not sure what to say here ..

  Few thoughts ..

  * Weekend partyhouse may not be much of a place to look for a substantive romance to begin .. host of reasons…

  * Looking for something to happen may sometimes create unrealistic expectations or translate an undercurrent of urgency

  * Weekend of drinking absolutely sets up tension, sense of vulnerability and depression

  Now I’m sure what to say ..

  * Know who you are…a great kid with strong core values

  * Have strong faith that sticking to those core values will ultimately make the difference and define the success of your life

  * You are deeply loved with good reason

  SHBAL D

  My dad’s emails were akin to haikus. Sharp staccato sentences dredged with ellipses and the frequent asterisk. He signed them SHBAL, Study Hard Be a Leader, the sendoff we’d used since I was in first grade. A corollary to the “clear eyes, full hearts, can’t lose” chant from Friday Night Lights.

  My dad and I were both driven, soft-hearted, and prone to guilt. He was an involved and present father, and I loved him fiercely. He began sharing his wisdom with me from an early age. On car rides he’d quiz me on musical artists. Who sings this one? he’d ask, cranking up the oldies station. The Four Tops. The Lovin’ Spoonful. The Rolling Stones.

  He coached me in basketball and taught me to ski. We played HORSE in the driveway and went for runs through the park. Then we’d order lunch at the Burger King drive-through and get an extra order of fries—road fries—which we’d share on the ride home.

  I was an intermittently competitive but very anxious athlete. It sometimes seemed like nothing made my dad prouder than when I excelled in sports. In third grade, I made it to the state finals in the four-hundred-meter dash. The event was held in Braintree, Massachusetts, on the hottest day in July. I was issued a black T-shirt to run in. Around sundown I toed the start line as the official raised the gun. My dad held the camcorder. My mom cheered. A crowd ringed the track and filled the bleachers.

  I had carried around the psychic pressure of the event for weeks, and then, as the gun went off, I merged my body with it. I hugged the first curve and sprinted down the straightaway, hugged the second curve, then eyed the finish. The setting sun was big and orange and caromed off the bleachers. I knew I wasn’t going to win the heat, but the boy next to me was within my stride. I had to beat him. I had to. It meant everything, beating him. And when I did, my parents rushed the field and hugged me and handed me a red Gatorade. That was what I remembered most, the sweet Gatorade staining my mouth, and my dad—proud, happy, and approving.

  In mid-August D.Lo’s grandfather died. After the funeral she went to the Hive with her sister. She needed a few days to decompress. Matt arrived that Friday with a box of treats from Insomnia Cookies, her favorite bakery. She had been inundated with thoughtful affirmations, but the most poignant condolences came from the Hive.

  “I got more texts from the Hive than I did from my high school friends and college friends combined,” she told Matt as she bit into a chocolate chip.

  Life in the share house could be melodramatic. It could be hidebound and all-consuming. But our friendships were jeweled with a fierce loyalty. In times of need
the Hive took care of its own.

  I reached Montauk that weekend in a state of apprehension. I hadn’t seen Matt since the Beekman and didn’t know how I’d behave around him. My loneliness felt like a dark halo, visible to everyone. I searched out D.Lo and gave her a hug. She offered me a cookie. I found Matt’s thoughtfulness deeply touching. He was first and foremost a good friend. I bit into a chocolate cookie, vowing to keep my emotions in check.

  “The three of us are going to Surf Lodge,” Ashley instructed. “If we go early, I can get us in.” Matt and I were lying on Ashley’s bed, staring at the ceiling. It seemed we had no choice in the matter. D.Lo and her sister had gone to dinner at Harvest, and the others had yet to arrive. I showered and dressed in my nicest outfit, J Brand jeans and a white linen button-down. Ashley’s pearlized bag contained Life Savers mints, mascara, flash tattoos, one latex condom, a cell phone charger, and her hair straightener. Henry arrived in his Montauk’s Best Taxi van.