Two Boys Kissing(20)
Just Listen
Stay
You’re the One That I Want
So Much Closer
Where I Want to Be
The Difference Between You and Me
Positively
Matched
Perfect
Wonder
You Are Here
Where I Belong
I’ll Be There
Along for the Ride
The Future of Us
Real Live Boyfriends
Keep Holding On
When Neil is through, Peter smiles and holds up his hand, gesturing Neil to wait there, to not say a word. He picks out two books from the YA section, then runs to the fiction section for a third. He is still smiling when he returns to Neil and shows his selections one by one.
Take a Bow
A Blind Man Can See How Much I Love You
Keep Holding On
Peter makes a stack of his books and takes a picture of the spines, to send to Neil. Neil then does the same for Peter. They put a few of the books back on the shelves and buy a few of them. (They’d buy them all, if only they had the money to do so.)
As they map their way in ribbons through the store, as they traverse the alphabetical and the topical and the arcane, we are reminded of bookstores where we went, of coffee shops and sex shops and Barneys and the Piggly Wiggly—all the aisles where we navigated relationships, all the conversations that were part of the aggregate conversation of our love.
It isn’t until they’re in the back of Peter’s mom’s car that Neil remembers the two boys kissing in Millburn. With his permission, Neil takes Peter’s phone and clicks on the link again.
Neither one of them can believe it. Right there, in the town next to theirs, two boys kissing for hours in front of the high school.
“Not your typical Saturday,” Peter says.
“No,” Neil agrees. “Not at all.”
Cooper had to leave Walmart after he bumped into Sloan, so now he’s at a Starbucks a few towns away. It’s full of people who are the same type of people who go to his high school and live in his town, but they’re not the same people. Cooper feels anonymous, and that suits him fine.
He’s flipping through three different hook-up apps, finding a lot of the same guys on each one. Forty-seven-year-olds who want him to come over. Eighteen-year-olds who want to flirt aimlessly. Twenty-nine-year-olds who want to know what he’s into. He never starts the conversations. He never picks them out. It means more if they come to him, because that means he’s desirable. And if he’s desirable, he has the upper hand.
We think he is too young to know this. But he knows this. You learn it now at a much younger age.
By now, he’s seen that there are at least a dozen messages on his phone, all from his parents. The house line. Each of their cell phones. He’s not going to listen to them, and he’s not going to call them back. He is blacking all that out. It is on the other side of the barrier. He doesn’t know where he’s going to sleep tonight, but it’s not tonight yet, is it? He’s sure some people would think it’s denial, but it’s not. He doesn’t care. In order to be in denial, you have to in some way care.
All he feels is the bored emptiness of the flat, flat world. And there’s no one who bores him more than himself. He looks again at the men on the apps, and this time a new one has popped up. Twenty-three. Hot. His screen name is Antimatter. His stats are the right stats. His one line of description is Trying to find the sensible strain in the midst of all the chaos.
Cooper waits for five minutes. He wants Antimatter to contact him first. But he’s impatient. After five minutes, he thinks, Fine.
He goes ahead and makes the first move.
The question, in Avery’s mind, is whether or not they’ll kiss.
They’ve been on the boat for a couple of hours now. They’ve talked, they’ve paddled, they’ve talked some more. As the sun angles closer to the horizon, it’s getting warmer. The canoe is metal, and it’s becoming hot to the touch. They haven’t brought anything to drink or eat, and the sun is starting to make them drowsy. Avery wishes the boat was wide enough for them to sit next to each other. It’s so much easier to kiss when you’re right there.
“I think I’m starting to bake,” Ryan says. “Maybe we should go in.”
Avery agrees. They start to paddle in earnest, and Avery is startled by the satisfaction he feels as he levers through the water, how gratifying it is to push through the resistance, to feel the effort in his arms. He is still a long way from being proud of his body, but sometimes a movement will catch him the right way.
The air cools as they move, but their bodies remain warm. They find their tandem and row in rhythm. Not a word needs to be said.
When they get back to the dock, they both have to wipe the sweat from their foreheads. Ryan jumps out first and ties down the bow. Then he holds out his hand to Avery. Even though he’s an overheated mess, Avery takes it. Ryan pulls him onto the dock and keeps hold. They stand there, the canoe clanking against the dock in the slight tide.
“That was fun,” the blue-haired boy says.
“It was,” the pink-haired boy replies.
These words are inadequate.
Ryan keeps hold of Avery’s hand as he ties down the stern. Then he rises back up and turns their bodies so they’re face to face, toe to toe.