Frankly in Love (Frankly in Love, #1)(39)

Love demands you do stupid things like post goofy selfies, but if that’s what love takes, then I can be stupid all day. At #WeAllScreamForIceCreamExhibit with @frankofhouseli

Wait. Is Brit saying she loves me?

I look at the photo, then at Brit. I want to know how it would feel to say the word love. But I’m scared of where that would lead. I’m scared of the stakes it would raise. I find myself standing paralyzed before a whole entire next level to our relationship.

“There’s a whole entire next level to this exhibit,” says Brit, and leads me up a flight of vanilla wafer stairs. At the top they’re handing out samples of ice cream with bizarre flavors, like jasmine and bacon caramel.

“I’ll try the jalape?o pistachio,” says Brit.

“Getting crazy,” I say, kissing her cheek. “I’ll try the cinnamon churro.”

“Frankenbrit!” says a voice in strong California Surfer Local.

It’s Wu.

“I saw your post, so I figured—” says Wu with a little pop-n-lock move “—we’d come check it out to kill some time.”

Joy appears from behind a gummy bear the size of a real bear. “The wait for Cheese Barrel Grille is like ninety minutes.”

I have to stifle a laugh. Joy absolutely despises Cheese Barrel Grille, whose presence fatally undermines any hipster cred the warehouse district might’ve had. She hates it down to its spelling of Grille with that extra French-for-no-reason e.

French-for-no-reason is originally Brit’s joke. Brit is here, Joy is here, Wu is here. We’re all here standing close together, and it makes me feel like my deception is hidden only by the thinnest of curtains, ready to be revealed by the slightest accidental breeze. My head starts to spin and my heels leave the floor just a millimeter.

Wu starts performing for a selfie video, and he hook-arms Joy into the frame, where they make goofy faces and stick out their tongues and laugh. But as soon as he stops recording, he’s all business, tagging and captioning and whatever. Brit leans in to help Wu spell tags correctly. While they screen-chimp, I whisper to Joy.

“Seeing all of us together is kinda freaking me out.”

But Joy seems lost in her own thoughts. “We’re fighting.”

Fighting? A moment ago they were having fun for the camera. Then I remind myself that social media is all a lie. “Why?” I say.

“Same shit,” says Joy. “He feels like I’m holding him at a distance. Because I am.”

“Wait, so it’s hashtag?” says Wu to Brit. “Not circle-A?”

“Hashtag,” says Brit. “And then hit Share.”

“Nice, thanks,” says Wu with a moonwalk step. Then he notices Brit’s tee shirt.

WHAT HAS FOUR LETTERS

Wu thinks. “I don’t know. What has four letters?”

“That’s the joke,” says Brit. “What has four letters.”

Wu stares and stares.

“W-H-A-T,” says Brit, counting on her fingers. “Four letters.”

“It’s the word what!” cries Wu. He claps his big hands once. “Which has four letters! Fuck, Brit Means, that’s funny—but like mind-blowing also?”

He looks around at the room as if to say, Have you seen this fucking tee shirt? Many, many girls stare back at him. He elevates his elbow, runs a hand through his hair, and stuns every single one of them with his eyes: zap-zap-zap. Their boyfriends lead them away like orderlies.

“I just wish we could be ourselves, out in the open like everyone else,” says Joy. I can see a weariness in her eyes. She looks tired.

“I wish the same wish,” I say.

Joy’s left buttock starts vibrating. She reaches into the pocket and holds up a restaurant pager flashing angry red.

“Baby, our table’s ready,” says Joy.

“Fuck yeah,” says Wu. “See you, Brit. See you, my Asian stud brotha!”

He gives me a devastating body slam of a hug. Like many things Wu Tang, Asian stud brotha somehow makes sense coming only from him and no one else. When he says it, I start to think, I am Asian; I am a stud; I am a brotha. Even though by the next minute I’ll have no idea what any of that meant.

I watch them leave. I watch and watch. I realize what I’m watching for: a lookback from Joy.

Joy looks back with a smile and a shrug. Wish me luck, Frank.

“Wu is so . . .” says Brit, searching for the word.

“Dumb?”

Brit looks shocked. “No!”

“It’s okay, you can call him dumb. He’s dumb. I still like him.”

“It’s just that Joy’s so . . .”

“Smart?” I say, with a little pride. For Joy is my very good friend, maybe better than I fully realize. I’m proud to know her.

Brit nuzzles my neck. “You’re smart.”

“I’m not so smart,” I say. “I’m kind of a dum-dum.”

Brit giggles. But it’s true. Only a dummy would keep a girl like Brit a secret. Only a dummy would think that made any kind of sense. Or that it was in any way fair.



* * *



? ? ?

“Should be peak sparkles right about now,” says Brit. “Wanna see?”

I have no idea what she’s talking about, and I don’t care. I hold her hand. We zip into jackets and stumble out onto an empty beach. The moon watches over a sandscape gone blue and ice cold. There is no one there. The world is ours.