Too Much Is Not Enough

by Andrew Rannells

  What I didn’t know that next morning, when I woke up in his bed, was that we would both start feeling, well, feelings. Feelings that felt real. It must have been the confluence of intense attraction and the power of fantasy that only two actors could manifest. There was an instant intimacy between us that was equal parts incredible and incredibly confusing. I needed time to investigate, but the weekend was over. It was Sunday, and Jill and I both needed to be back at work in the city on Monday. Like me, Jill had a job that was slightly soul-crushing but necessary for survival. I talked to Zuzanna about these new feelings for Kaolin. We weighed my options, and she agreed that I needed more time. “Just call in sick to work,” she said.

  This is a totally realistic suggestion and one that would normally work for just about any professional person. I could have just left a message for my boss that afternoon saying that I wasn’t feeling well and that I wouldn’t be in the next day. Simple as that. But, as you will recall, I had already used all my fake doctor’s appointments plus a fake colonoscopy, so I definitely could not fall back on anything medical. It was going to have to be something complex. Something that couldn’t be easily challenged. So bizarre that my boss would never even think of questioning it. I concocted a tale so strange that my boss was floored and, honestly, probably scared for me. I called him and told him that my friend Jill (I used her real name) had gone missing in Cambridge. I told him that she had gone home with someone she met in a bar and never returned. I explained that Jill (again, HER REAL NAME) had done this before, and while I was certain that she would ultimately be fine, I couldn’t possibly leave Cambridge without her. He, of course, was sympathetic about the possible abduction of my friend and said that missing work on Monday was not a problem. As I type this, I am still baffled as to how I got away with these things. I’ll bet my boss just thought I was deeply troubled and let these incidents slide.

  In any event, I bought myself an extra day with Kaolin and, more important, with Zuzanna. During that day I caught a small glimpse of what it might be like to date Kaolin while he was living in Cambridge. Weekends out of New York City, Amtrak rides, collegiate-looking blazers, driving his SUV around campus, picking him and Zuzanna up after class. It all sounded romantic and fun. I could date a sweet Abercrombie model and be with my best friend almost every weekend. I decided I was in. I locked down a relationship with Kaolin in forty-eight hours, and we agreed that we would take turns visiting each other every other weekend. In reality, I was the one who did most of the traveling, because of his school schedule and because it allowed me to see Zuzanna. It was perfect for a while. It was autumn in Cambridge and it was all sweaters and changing leaves and Pumpkin Spice Lattes. And on a subconscious level, I was “playing grad school student.” Much like I had “played Broadway” with Jim, the singlet-wearing chorus member in Footloose, I was once again hoping that some of their experience might rub off on me. If I couldn’t be in grad school, I could at least date someone who was. I know that is a cockamamie line of reasoning, but that’s where I was, folks. That’s where I was.

  After a couple months, reality set in. The commute to Cambridge was wearing on me, and Kaolin’s school schedule didn’t allow for much contact. Our romance was one meant for summer camps or the Titanic. It burned hot and bright, but only for a moment. I think those relationships are important. You learn, quickly, a lot about yourself and what it is you are looking for, what is actually important. And let’s be honest, Jack and Rose wouldn’t have lasted on land. He was a common criminal and she was a spoiled brat. If she really loved him, she would have scooched over more on that headboard.

  So Kaolin and I ended. We ended with minimally hurt feelings and a clear understanding that this was really more a matter of reality and logistics. But I was still disproportionately sad about the demise of this brief love affair. I came to realize that it was because I wasn’t going to be seeing Zuzanna as much now. Traipsing up there every other weekend for your best friend seemed needy. For a boyfriend it seemed normal. I had created a reason, a very handsome reason, to be in Zuzanna’s Cambridge world.

  While she was still the same girl I loved, and the physical distance hadn’t changed that, I was well aware that her life was making just a little more sense without me in it. I was jealous of her new friends, I was jealous of her new life, and I was jealous that she was following her dreams and going after what she wanted. She hadn’t been happy with the opportunities she was being presented with so she flipped the script. Why couldn’t I do that?

  Going back to school didn’t seem like a viable option for some reason. I never felt like I belonged in school, even acting school. My path would have to be different. But staying in Saturday Morning Cartoonland didn’t feel right, either. Could I still do what I came to New York to do? Was it too late for me to get the thing that I wanted? I needed to make some changes.

  The Tallest Man I Ever Loved

  If this point in my life had been a movie, I would have given myself a fast-cut makeover, like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman or Goldie Hawn in Death Becomes Her. Then, I would have bolstered my confidence like Christina Applegate in Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead by putting my hair in a low ponytail, smoking a cigarette, and plowing ahead. But much to my horror, this was not a movie. So I did what most adult New Yorkers do—I asked my therapist for help.

  I was still seeing Thomas, and at this point in our sessions he introduced the concept of visualization. He believed that if you really wanted to manifest something in your life, you could do it by focusing all your energy and thoughts on that thing. I had been doing my own version of this all my life, so I took to it easily. I figured that this was a perfect time to restart my life, so we went through the three major areas that I could control: my career, my living space, and my love life. We made lists of all the things I wanted. In a job, I wanted something stable, something artistically fulfilling, something lucrative, and something I could be proud of. My apartment was meant to be a beautiful haven from the stresses of the outside world. And my relationship…well, that’s where I got really specific. I wanted him to be:

  Taller than me

  Dark-haired

  Fit, kind, and funny (but not too funny because that was my job)

  Social, but not have that many friends (I didn’t want to compete for attention)

  Creative

  A list only a twenty-two-year-old could make. Please note that I started with the physical attributes.

  The professional stuff was hard to control, so I quickly moved on to the living space list. I couldn’t move, so I decided to redecorate. I got most of my ideas from episodes of Trading Spaces on TLC. They made it seem possible to change your whole world with some cans of paint and a glue gun. While I wasn’t quite as ambitious as the designers on the show—I mean, I wasn’t about to hot-glue hay all over my walls or nail the furniture to the ceiling like Hildi—I was feeling creative. I thought I would start with my bedroom, so I bought some new sheets. They were purple. I don’t know why I thought that was a good idea. I was on my way to the Laundromat to wash those purple sheets and take control of my new and self-possessed life when I saw him. It was Todd, aka my Danny Zuko, from the Westchester Broadway production of Grease. He looked even more beautiful than I remembered. He was literally tall, dark, and handsome, and except for the whole being straight thing, he was exactly what I wanted.

  As we started to chat, I attempted to hold my purple sheets in the most inconspicuous way possible, while sweating profusely in the June sun. Todd said he had just moved in next door to my building. I tried not to swallow my tongue at this news. Not only would I be seeing him casually all the time, I was going to need to always be on guard, have fresh breath, and be ready for a street chat. I should probably go shopping for new walking-about outfits, I thought. Todd said he had heard about my dad and felt terrible about not reaching out sooner. In trying to comfort him
about not comforting me, I actually said the words “Oh, it’s okay!” about my own dead father. I was really nailing this interaction.

  Todd asked me what I was doing that night, and if I was free, would I want to have dinner with him? “It would be great to catch up,” he said. Are you kidding me? Catch up? I will catch anything you want to throw at me, Todd. We made a plan to get together that night, and then I practically floated to the Laundromat.

  I knew this wasn’t a date, but I was still very excited.

  We’d picked a spot in our neighborhood, which was mostly made up of Greek restaurants, and decided to order gyros and some beers. I didn’t drink beer, but it seemed appropriate for my non-date date with this straight guy. We mostly talked about my dad and my family and the funeral and how quickly it all happened. I really opened up to him in a way that surprised me. Maybe because it wasn’t a date. Then I asked Todd what he had been up to since I last saw him. He got a serious look on his face. “It’s been a crazy couple of months. After my divorce I really had to think about what had gone wrong with my marriage and why.” I’m going to be honest here, I zoned out for most of Todd’s speech and was mainly just watching his sexy lips move and how his pecs jumped when he gestured with his hands. But I instantly became laser-focused when he said these words: “I realized that I’m gay and I wasn’t being honest with myself. So…I wanted to tell you that, Andrew. I’m gay.”

  You know those moments when all time stands still? I imagine like when you drive your car off a cliff or when you see your baby for the first time? That’s what this felt like. It was equal parts terrifying and also incredibly exciting. He’s gay. He’s gay. I kept repeating it in my head. I finally managed to say something supportive and vague about being honored that he chose to tell me this, and also how brave I thought he was for being honest with himself. And then we moved on. I knew from my own coming out that saying the words could be difficult, and it didn’t necessarily mean you wanted to talk it all out in that moment. I followed Todd’s lead and the subject was changed. The rest of the dinner was mostly professional chitchat about auditions and jobs and things we wanted to do with the rest of our summer. We walked home to our apartments, hugged awkwardly for a few seconds too long, and then I went inside in a daze of anxiety and lust.

  I paced around my apartment like a tiger in a cage, replaying the conversation over and over again, wondering if I should have said something different, if I should have acted different. Somewhere in my spiral I came to the conclusion that maybe we had been on a date. Maybe that was his attempt at asking me out and I blew it. Thinking about this now, I have no idea how I came to this conclusion. I think it had a lot to do with my new manifesting mentality. I had a high level of self-centeredness, which convinced me that his coming out was somehow about me, but also a low self-esteem, which prevented me from believing that someone that attractive would ever be interested in me. (I blame my mother for this phenomenon that has plagued me my whole life: High Self-Worth/Low Self-Esteem. If anyone was ever making fun of me at school, she would say, “They are just jealous of you.” But if I said something negative about someone else, she would say, “You aren’t any better than that person. Don’t say that.” So which was it, Charlotte? Was everyone jealous of me or was I no better than anyone else? I digress…)

  It struck me like a lightning bolt that the only possible action at that moment was to go back to Todd’s apartment and simply ask him, “Was this a date?” And that’s exactly what I did. I rang his buzzer, announced that it was me, and he let me into the building. I went to his door, where he was standing there without his shirt on, and in a more panicked tone than I had wanted, I asked, “Were we just on a date?”

  Todd smiled at me. “Get in here,” he said.

  I did as I was told and we proceeded to have the greatest sex I had ever had in my entire life. Everything about him was perfect: his mouth, his eyes, his body. I was twenty-two years old and I was instantly in love with him. That night, I fell asleep and woke up in his arms. It was the first time I had slept the whole night through since my dad died. Everything about Todd made me feel safe. And I think I made him feel safe. He was just out of the closet and here he had a man, albeit a young man, who was mad for him and would do anything for him. It must have felt like dating a puppy.

  That night began what I considered to be my first adult relationship. There was not a day in the next few years that I wasn’t either with him or thinking about him. We had sex every day we were together, often twice a day. I had never been so attracted to anyone in my life. The intensity of this attraction also brought about an insecurity and mania in me that destroyed us several times. I was both Sid and Nancy in our relationship in the way I needed him and hated him for it.

  Todd, for the most part, was a real trouper. He was patient, he was understanding, he was sensitive. However, his one major flaw was his habit of occasionally having sex with someone else. Each time this happened, I would have sex with someone else to get back at him, we would both cry and promise to be better, and then we would fuck ourselves back in love. It wasn’t mentally healthy, but it was exciting. And what did I know about relationships at twenty-two? All I had ever been told about long-term relationships was that they were “a lot of work.” And we were definitely working. Mostly too hard.

  It’s important to note that shortly after Todd and I started dating, we were both given auditions for the new Broadway production of Hairspray. The whole show was cast, but at the last minute, they needed a new men’s chorus member. He would be one of “The Nicest Kids in Town” and understudy Link Larkin and Corny Collins. Todd and I were not the same type physically or vocally, and there was a twelve-year age difference between us, so it came as quite a shock that we would both be considered for the same role. Even though I loved Todd, I was out for blood the day of that audition. I got in that room and the dreaded “this is going to happen for me” feeling came rearing its ugly head once again. Everything they asked me to do just clicked in my body. I’m sure Todd was having a similar experience, because we both got down to the final four. We left the audition that day in silence and rode back to Queens together, both imagining our new Broadway careers.

  About two hours later we both got phone calls telling us that neither of us had booked Hairspray. Todd was disappointed but took it in stride. I, on the other hand, was devastated. I was truly convinced that I belonged in that show. I was cheesy, I was white, and I could Pony my ass off. The inevitable crash after the high of possibility landed hard on my heart once again. If I couldn’t land this job, then what business did I have being in this business? I decided to focus on my work at 4Kids. I really thought I was done with showbiz this time.

  I had a steady boyfriend and a steady job. Todd and I created a comfortable routine together, and I didn’t miss being rejected by the career I wanted most. When you let yourself settle into a life that is comfortable, it’s crazy how time passes. The first year went by quickly. Mondays turned into Fridays and I found myself living for my weekends. Todd and I were going to farmers’ markets and flea markets, basically any kind of market, just to pass the time. There were weekend trips upstate and home repair projects. I learned how to decoupage. (Trading Spaces still had a big influence on me.)

  Todd and I were good together—mostly. The first time we broke up, for approximately a month, was in a terribly dramatic fashion. We went on a cruise with another gay couple, friends of ours. I hated the experience. The cruise ship made me depressed. The people, the overeating, the sunburns—it all seemed so forced. No one was really having a good time, but they were all working their asses off to show that they were. We were docked in Cancún, and Todd and I got into a terrible argument in our room. I don’t remember many of the details of this particular fight, but I do remember it started because he “made me feel stupid” for ordering Riesling at dinner the night before. (At twenty-three, everything is very high stakes, folks.) This argu
ment spiraled, as they often do, into a larger conversation about me feeling controlled by Todd and Todd feeling like I ignored him when we were out with friends. The doors to the balcony were open, and the whole time we were fighting, we could hear mariachis playing various covers of pop songs. Our relationship ended during “La Bamba.” Todd shouted at me, “I don’t want to do this anymore!” just as the final note was played. (I’m sure he was thrilled at his accidental musical timing.) This was only midway through the cruise, so we still had three more ports to get through before we could go home. We barely spoke to each other.

  This breakup was relatively short-lived. Before long we were back into our routine of weekend crafts and constant blow jobs. This was the first truly serious relationship either of us had been in. I mean no disrespect to Todd’s marriage, but this was the first time his sexual preferences lined up with the person he was committed to. I understand now that being insanely attractive and having just come out of the closet, he wanted to make up for lost time. He had just discovered some new tricks and he wanted to show them off—with other people. I totally get it. I didn’t at the time, but now I do. And there was a part of me that didn’t fight him too hard on these periodic requests. I was madly in love with Todd, but I was also curious. We were mostly monogamous, with a handful of Friends-style breaks during which we would each take some exploratory sexual walkabouts.