Heteroflexible

“How many guys were you gonna shoo off? Five more? Ten? Would we have to go through the whole population of that nightclub before you were satisfied with whatever guy showed interest in me? And besides, what gives you the right to choose for me?” Bobby’s eyes are on fire as he rises from the bed suddenly and stands over me. “I deserve the right to make my own stupid decisions. To make my own mistakes. To go home with whoever the hell I want. You aren’t the boss of me, Jimmy Strong.”

Standing over me like this in just his underwear and a tight-fitting tank, his crotch is just a foot or two from my face. I only notice it because suddenly I have this overwhelming desire to apologize to him, and it’s making my arms want to reach out and hug him aggressively, or tackle him to the bed to make him laugh, or do anything to change that unhappy look in his eyes.

I hate it when Bobby Parker’s unhappy.

And I hate it even worse when I’m the cause of it.

This sure as shit isn’t our first fight. It isn’t the first time I’ve pissed him off, or vice versa. But for some reason or another, it’s the first time it hurts me so deeply that all I want to do is squeeze my pal until it’s all better and he’s smiling again.

“I do know what it’s like,” I tell him, looking up his long, lean torso to his eyes. “Being the minor character or whatever.”

His eyes soften. He doesn’t say anything, but he’s listening.

I look down at my hands. “Growing up as Tanner Strong’s lil’ bro …” I let out half a sigh and half a laugh. “Wasn’t always easy. Being compared to the Spruce Juice my whole life. The big college football star. Tan the Man. So many stupid nicknames. I mean, I love my big brother,” I add quickly, peering back up at Bobby, “but it gets to you after a while. How was I ever gonna climb out from under his huge shadow? Dude, you remember that one year when Mama forgot it was my birthday because she was all caught up in planning Billy and Tanner’s wedding? It was my sixteenth.”

“I remember.”

Good, I’ve got him talking again. “Everyone’s always fussin’ about my brother, my whole life. I wasn’t Jimmy back then. I was just the Spruce Juice’s lil’ bro. I was Tanner’s little brother. So yeah, I think I have an idea of what that’s like.” I eye him importantly. “And I don’t want you feelin’ like second to anything, Bobby Parker.”

His mouth crinkles up with frustration. “Yeah, well, maybe it was like that for you while growin’ up, but it sure as hell isn’t like that anymore.”

“No, it isn’t. And do you know when it changed?” I stand up, bringing my eyes level with his. “The day I asked you to prom.”

Bobby’s eyes cast downward, a look of self-consciousness reddening his face suddenly.

I put a finger under his chin and lift it, bringing his eyes back to mine. “What I’m sayin’ is,” I tell him, looking him right in those warm, muddy brown eyes of his, “you’re the reason I’m someone now, Bobby Parker.”

Bobby’s lips twitch.

Maybe I could even call it an attempt at a smile.

It’s all I need to feel reassured—that dumb little nothing smile on Bobby Parker’s face. “I became someone that day, a person totally apart from my big bro. It was somethin’ that gave me an identity, somethin’ even my being the first dude to enroll in dance at Spruce High couldn’t do. And you?” I shake my head. “Bobby. You aren’t a minor character in anyone’s story.”

Bobby tilts his head and crosses his arms again. “So you’re saying that your huge, overinflated ego now is basically my fault?”

The pair of us stare at each other.

Then we both burst out laughing together.

Suddenly, I chase a thought I had a second ago and tackle him to the bed, causing him to shriek out in surprise. Then I straddle him on top of that bed and attack his bare, exposed sides and ribs with my evil fingers, tickling poor Bobby into a state of screaming, choked cackling, and tears.

When my fingers mercifully stop, we’re both out of breath, and he’s staring up at me with a frozen smile on his face.

I shrug. “Yeah. I guess it is all your fault, huh?”

Bobby is still catching his breath when he shakes his head and laughingly hisses out, “You’re a fuckin’ monster.”

There’s a twinkle in his eye. It’s probably a stray tear from his having laughed so much. A little parting gift of my relentless tickle attack. A tiny, liquid gem of hysteria.

But there’s also all the words we just shared.

And his pain that he won’t show, that lonesomeness inside of him, that part that I was supposed to help alleviate by taking him all the way to this club, far away from home.