Kiss Her Once for Me (33)

“What? No! I love art because—” The anxiety control-alt-deletes everything I love about art from my brain, so I’m just sitting across the table, floundering. I fell in love with art because… because it was something my teachers praised me for. Because nothing I did at home ever got me noticed by my parents, but drawing—being good at something—got me noticed at school. So I kept doing it, kept getting better, kept getting attention.

“Okay.” Jack straightens in her chair, unable to wait for my response. Her smile is suddenly mischievous. “Honesty game: What is your favorite Taylor Swift album, and why is it evermore?”

I’m ill-equipped to handle her dialogic whiplash, and I sputter, “What makes you think I love evermore?”

She waves a hand in my direction. “I’m getting definite evermore vibes.”

“Okay, for one, it’s the single greatest Christmas album ever written—”

“It’s not even remotely a Christmas album.”

“Agree to disagree.” I take another sip of my coffee.

“Not that you asked, but my favorite album is Lover.”

I slam down my mug. “Lover cannot be your favorite album. That’s offensive to her overall body of work.”

“It’s just nonstop bops, and I’m here for it.”

I eye her across the table. “You don’t really look like a Swiftie….”

“What does a Swiftie look like?”

“I don’t know…. You’re just sort of… cool looking?” Her eyebrows shoot up in her face. “And, you know, more… butch.”

She leans forward across the table until our faces are close together and attempts to lower her voice. “Butch isn’t a dirty word.” She’s still at almost-shouting volume. “You don’t have to whisper it.”

“You just don’t strike me as someone who enjoys pop music.”

She doesn’t move away from me, so I can smell the praline syrup on her breath when she opens her mouth. And beneath that, coming from somewhere on her skin, freshly baked bread. “Tell me: What kind of music is someone like me allowed to enjoy?”

I cringe at myself, closing my eyes tight. “I’m so sorry. Of course, you can listen to whatever music… I didn’t mean—”

“Honesty game: Have you ever met a queer person before?”

“Of course I have,” I snap defensively. “I mean, I’m queer, actually.” I resist the urge to cringe at myself again. “I’m bi. It’s just… you know, Portland is a little different, and I’m still getting used to it.”

She studies me from across the table. “Let me guess: Iowa.”

“Ohio.”

“Ah, yes.” She nods sagely. “Everyone in Portland is originally from Ohio.”

“It’s why I moved here,” I attempt to explain. “I flew out here to visit the city before accepting the job at Laika, and it just felt like… like home. I’ve always felt like I don’t quite fit in, but within five minutes here, I just knew it was right. Like if I could be myself anywhere, it would be here.”

“Are you?” she asks.

“Am I what?”

“Yourself.”

I look up from my napkin sketch and find Jack staring at me again. “For the record, I only listen to pop music,” Jack says. “And Taylor Swift is the greatest lyricist who has ever lived. I’m pretty sure Bob Dylan listened to Folklore and immediately threw his Nobel Prize for literature into the fire. Are you drawing my hand?”

I look down at the napkin in front of me where I’ve sketched out long fingers, shadowed knuckles, square fingernails, a thick callus on the index finger. I attempt to cover the drawing with my elbow. “No, I was just—”

“Honesty game!”

I move my elbow out of the way. “Yes, I guess I am drawing your hand. In my defense, you have very interesting hands. Like, from an artist’s perspective.”

“You drew my hand,” she repeats, sounded awed instead of creeped out. Which is something.

“I’m sorry. It’s bad,” I say, crumpling the napkin.

“Wait! Don’t.” Jack reaches out and puts her hand over mine to stop me. Then she takes the napkin and carefully smooths it out with her callused fingers. “Shit. You are really good.”

“I basically have this ten-year plan,” I explain, because I need some distraction from the serious way she’s studying my napkin drawing. “I was at the top of my class in undergrad, and I earned this prestigious fellowship for grad school, which is how I scored the job at Laika. My job now is working as a character animator, and I’ll probably do that for a few years before I work my way up to lead animator, so that hopefully one day, I can write my own animated movies.”

“Huh.” Jack glances up from the napkin to frown at me. “I thought there was an intense, overachiever smell coming from that side of the table.”

“What does that even smell like?”

She leans forward again, even closer to me, and takes a deep breath through her nose. “Stale coffee and unresolved perfectionism.”

“I’m not a perfectionist,” I argue. “I just like plans.” I’m flailing my hands again, and Jack reaches across the table and plucks one out of the air like she’s capturing a nervous bird.