Lawn Boy(73)

“There was that, too.”

“I guess that makes me feel pretty stupid,” I said.

“Why should you feel stupid? If we’re lucky, Michael, we grow into ourselves.” Without looking, she threw the wad of paper towel toward the wastebasket and banked it in.

“That makes you lucky,” she said.





Dickless Finally, there was Nick. I’d saved the toughest for last. I wasn’t sure there was room in my life for both Nick and Andrew. The combination seemed irresolvable. They’d met only once for about thirty seconds at Walmart—thirty of the most uncomfortable seconds of my life. The idea of the three of us hanging out was pretty hard to imagine. Andrew was only a casual football fan. He didn’t know a cornerback from a safety, let alone a three-technique from an edge rusher or a cover 3 zone from a man defense. He deplored the Seahawks’ colors. He thought the cheerleaders were tacky. Andrew liked Russell Wilson’s wife because he thought she was courageous. He thought Bobby Wagner was sexy. He thought Kiko Alonso was a beautiful name, though he couldn’t remember whom he played for or what position he played.


A future with both of them in it seemed unlikely. I’m ashamed to admit how easily I accepted this. It was with something of a heavy heart that I met Nick for a pitcher at Tequila’s.

“Dude,” he said. “You benched Julio Jones last week? You think a sprained knee is gonna stop that guy? He’s a fucking monster! His catch radius is like a square mile! Carolina’s corner is what, five ten? Seriously, what were you thinking? Michael, you’re in fifth place! Dickless is using auto-pick every week, and he’s thirty points ahead of you.”

“Who’s Dickless?”

“Whitehead! His fucking auto-picks beat you head to head in week four. And it wasn’t even close. Might have helped if you hadn’t picked the Packers defense with Peppers and Matthews out. I swear, you must be high, Michael. This isn’t March Madness! You can’t just fill in your bracket and get lucky. You gotta manage your roster. You gotta pay attention. It’s a commitment—it’s a fucking discipline, Michael. How do you think I won three years ago—and two years before that? Honestly, dude, it’s a fucking miracle you got second place last year.”

“I’m gay,” I announced.

“News flash,” he said.

“No, really.” I said. “Like actively.”

“Yeah, I believe it. No wonder you picked the Packers.”

I looked at him meaningfully. “Nick, I’m, like, actually gay.”

To his credit, he didn’t looked repulsed, just confused, like his nose was bleeding and he didn’t know why.

“It’s really no big deal,” I insisted.

“It’s a pretty big deal, considering,” he said.

“Considering what?”

“That I’m your best friend for like how many years? And suddenly you’re gay. And I’m just hearing about it now?”

“I’m just figuring things out now, Nick. It doesn’t change anything between us.”

Nick put a hand up in a yield gesture and grimaced as though he were experiencing gastric reflux.

“Ugh. Okay. Fuck,” he said. “Can we just play some darts and not talk about this?”

And so we retreated awkwardly back to the machines, already the distance between us widening. We hardly spoke the whole time we played cricket. I welcomed the focus. I was money right out of the gate: trip twenty, triple nineteen. Near miss on eighteen. I closed eighteen and seventeen next time around as Nick watched on dazedly. The poor guy was reeling. He couldn’t hit a twenty to save his life. Under practically any other circumstance, I would have relished destroying Nick. But that night, I took little pleasure in winning.

After the game, he drained his glass and consulted his phone.

“I gotta bolt,” he said. “Good darts.”

He didn’t clap me on the back or shake my hand or punch me affectionately on the shoulder on his way out.

Watching him go, I told myself I really didn’t care if I ever saw him again. Already, Nick was starting to feel like someone from my past. Maybe loyalty was conditional, after all. Maybe my burgeoning sense of self, my developing identity as a socially engaged, newly gay, working-class half-Mexican topiary artist demanded such wholesale sacrifices as leaving my old friends in the dust.





The Mixed Parts And what about Remy? Didn’t I owe her an apology? At least an explanation? Had I not willfully led her on all that time, buying all those crummy meals at Mitzel’s and having my water refilled every five minutes? Asking her out on dates, confessing my literary ambitions to her, texting her and not texting her, kissing her in two parking lots, and all the while sending her mixed messages, without ever understanding why myself? Suddenly it seemed cruel and fickle of me.


Remy was still working when I arrived at the Loft. Rather than sit in her section, I took a place at the bar and ordered a Sprite. When Remy registered me there, she did a quick double take, though it was impossible to read her expression. Already, this was starting to feel like a mistake.

Twice she passed me on her way to the kitchen and said nothing. On her third pass, she stopped at the bar for a drink order, flirting conspicuously with the bartender. When she caught me looking at her, she immediately cast her eyes down and started organizing tickets.