In the Middle of Somewhere (Middle of Somewhere, #1)(90)

The movie begins and Rex’s hand tightens on my thigh. I glance at him and see that his jaw’s clenched.

“You okay?”

“Yeah, fine,” he says, and pats my leg.

The movie is definitely weird, but it’s interesting. I have no background in film. Like I told Rex, I never even watched many popular movies as a kid. Superheroes and some horror movies and that’s about it. But I’m glad Rex likes them because I’ll be happy to get an unofficial education.

After a half hour or so, I notice Rex glancing over at me more and more often. At first it was sweet; he seemed like he couldn’t keep his eyes off me. Now, though, it seems like he may just hate the movie.

“Are you bored?” I whisper.

“No, no,” he says quickly, and looks back at the screen. About twenty minutes later, though, his hand is back on my knee and he’s tracing complicated patterns closer and closer to my crotch, which is making it hard to pay attention. Not that I need to pay particular attention because the movie’s kind of disjointed. A boy and his aunt are making out and Rex is stroking my leg. Some people are sitting on toilets at a dinner table and Rex leans down to softly kiss my neck. I pull away a with a shiver and shoot him a dirty look because I don’t want to get all riled up in a theater at the school where I teach.

He kisses my cheek chastely and looks back at the screen, but he seems off. Fidgety and tense. Did I offend him?

I’m still wondering when the movie ends. The end is actually really beautiful, with the sounds of a riot at a zoo and the only thing on the screen a puzzled ostrich’s head bobbing back and forth seeking out the sound.

As we walk out, I cast a look at Rex. He doesn’t look mad, I don’t think, but he’s got his fists jammed in his pockets and he’s staring at his shoes.

“Weird movie, huh?” I say stupidly as I start the car.

“Yeah. So,” Rex says as if to change the subject, “ready to learn how to bake?”

“Sure. What are we making?”

“Do you like gingerbread?”

“Yeah, I love it.”

“Great.”

He sounds cheerful, but his knee is bouncing and he’s holding on to the seat with both hands. I’m not that bad a driver, I don’t think. Although, I’ve never driven with him before, only ridden in his car, so maybe this is how he always is as a passenger.

“I googled the director before the movie,” I say. “I didn’t realize he was the one who made this famous short movie with Salvador Dalí in 1929. The one where they cut open a woman’s eyeball?”

Rex doesn’t say anything and I find myself rambling on in the silence of the car.

“I loved the end. And the thing about the inversion of consumption and evacuation at the dinner scene was really interesting. I mean, that’s culture, right? Just a set of customs that tell us it’s polite to shove food into our faces in front of each other but not polite to take a shit. And it could just as easily go the other way, like in the movie. It makes total sense, you know? Like, what’s so special about the things we hide away anyway? Would they become unimportant if we just did them out in the open? And vice versa the things we think are fine. It doesn’t actually take that much for something to become taboo. Or, at least for us to stigmatize things and give people total complexes about them.”

I trail off as we pull into Rex’s driveway. Rex unlocks the door and as we walk inside, he sighs.

“You hated it, right?” I ask.

He shakes his head.

“Well, then what did you think.”

“It was interesting,” he says vaguely.

“Okay….”

He crouches down and pets Marilyn, who trotted over when we walked in.

“Okay,” I try again. “Well, I’m sorry if you didn’t like it.”

“I liked it fine,” Rex says, standing. He definitely sounds mad now. “I just don’t have a thesis about it to tell you, okay? I don’t have a clever theory to share or anything. All right?”

Where the f*ck did that come from? Jesus, I must have sounded like a total pretentious * in the car to have pissed him off that much. That’s the problem with nervous rambling. People think you’re attached to the things you say rather than talking out of your ass.

“Jesus,” I say, putting my hands up. “I just meant that you didn’t have to pretend to like it if you didn’t. I was just trying to do something you’d like. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to do?”

Rex doesn’t say anything.

“Oh, right,” I continue. “There are no rules. Well, that’s fine for you. It’s really easy to throw the rules out if you already know them. But I don’t. Anyway, if you hated it, it’s fine, but you don’t have to be such an * about it.”

“All I meant—”

“Oh, I know what you meant! You think I’m being the pretentious professor who thinks he’s so f*cking smart. Well, screw you. That’s not what I think.”

“You don’t actually know everything that I’m thinking, Daniel,” Rex says, his voice scary. “You can’t read minds! I know you think that you can just look at everyone in this town and know what they think about you or about politics. But you can’t.”