Like a Love Story(69)

I feel my face burning from embarrassment.

“The jury is out on whether oral sex is safe or not,” Stephen says. “But my advice is to use a condom for that too. Experiment with flavors if you want, though I think the flavored ones are gross. I don’t want sex to taste like pineapple.”

Does sex have a taste? Does it taste the same with different people? Am I supposed to be asking these questions out loud?

“And here’s something important,” Stephen says. “The straight world has defined losing your virginity as intercourse. That’s their thing. But we get to define it for ourselves. And you never, ever have to do anything you don’t want to do. As far as I’m concerned, sex is just intimacy between two people. You can define what that looks like for you, and what losing your virginity looks like for you. We’re queer. We make our own rules.”

“Oh, and don’t feel like you have to buy into that tops and bottoms bullshit,” Jimmy adds. He’s just joined us, a prescription in his hand. “If you’re a top, fine. If you’re a bottom, fine. But you can be both, or you can be a top on Monday and a bottom on Tuesday.”

“Who has sex on Monday and Tuesday?” Art asks.

Jimmy laughs. “Honey, before this disease, some of us had sex seven days a week.”

That’s what I want. To have sex seven days a week. With Art. Only with Art. Seven days of Art.

“I know there’s a lot to be afraid of,” Stephen says. “But I want . . . I just want to communicate to you that . . . that . . .” Stephen’s voice shakes a little. Cracks.

“That sex is beautiful,” Jimmy says. “That intimacy is beautiful. That feeling like one with another human being is why we were put on this planet. It connects us to everything good that exists inside us and outside us. And you can’t be robbed of that. Stay safe, but don’t lock yourself in a prison. Live.”

Stephen nods and repeats the last word, “Live.”

Live. A marching order given to me by two men with little life left in them, their future a ticking clock with the alarm set to go off at any moment. Live.

Stephen grabs two packs of condoms and goes to the counter to pay for them. He hands one to me and one to Art. “You don’t need to tell me anything,” he says. “Promise you’ll keep these just in case.” After a pause, he says, “But don’t keep them in your pockets! Store them somewhere cool.”

Art walks me home, but he doesn’t come up. I don’t let him. “Art,” I whisper, taking the condoms out. “Please take this with you. I don’t think my mother could handle finding it.”

He laughs. “You think your mother snoops through your stuff?”

“I think all mothers probably snoop through their children’s stuff,” I say. I don’t know if I mean it. But I know that I took the first chance I had to look into Art’s backpack. I know that I invade Abbas’s pockets. I have to assume others are as duplicitous as I am.

He takes a condom from me and puts it playfully in his mouth, biting the edge of the wrapper. “I’ll keep it somewhere safe,” he says.

I shake my head, smiling. I’m not used to smiling this much. But I stop smiling when I go upstairs. My mom, Abbas, and Saadi are finishing dinner and ask me to join them. My mom asks me how my study group was. They think that’s where I was. I don’t have the energy to tell them the truth. My mom hasn’t mentioned my coming out since it happened. She hasn’t used the word gay or asked about Art. She just pretends it never happened, and the rest of the family seems to back up this fiction.

She’s equally in denial about Tara, who moved out in early January, after finally telling her that she’s now a bartender in love with a DJ. They argued for hours and my mom cried. But now it’s like nothing happened. Tara and I have a new saying. Denial isn’t just a river in Egypt, it runs through the whole Middle East.

At home, Saadi has become an expert at taking the cues and saying nothing about me. But at school, he and his friends are constantly taunting me. I’ve heard every possible word a homosexual could be called in the last few months, all spewed out of the hateful mouths of Darryl, Saadi, and their cronies. Faggot. Pansy. Mary. Butt pirate. Fruit. Turd burglar. Flamer. Nancy. Queen. Lately, they taunt us with lyrics from Madonna’s new song, which they know we love, and which celebrates the underground ball scene.

This morning, as I walk into school, I hear them cracking each other up as they call, “Reza, are you ready to strike a pose?” I ignore them. Then, when Art approaches me, Darryl says to us, “Hey, ladies with an attitude, don’t just stand there, let’s get to it!”

Art looks up at them, with a defiance I wish I had in me. “Yeah, you fellas in the mood?” he asks lasciviously. “Because I’ve got some whips and chains in my backpack I’d love to try on you.”

“I bet you’d like that,” Darryl says in disgust.

Art approaches them slowly, methodically. “Don’t motherfuckin’ test me,” he says. “And leave Reza alone, you hear me? Save the abuse for me. He’s off-limits.”

“He’s got it easy here,” Saadi says, smiling. “If he went back to Iran, they’d kill him.”

That sends a jolt down my spine, because it’s true. I escape the situation, searching for an empty classroom. As I do, I walk straight past Judy, who looks away from me as I cross her. She’s standing with Annabel de la Roche and a group of popular girls I’ve never spoken to. They’re laughing, pretending I don’t exist.