Tips on Having a Gay (ex) Boyfriend (18 page)

What a weird day! But it isn’t really. Because every day is crazy weird if you think of it. Every day some new person is born, some old person dies. Every day someone is loved for the first time and someone else is murdered for the only time.

I settle into my desk in German trying not to be pissed off about the fag hag comment. I mean, once is bad enough, but twice? I mean, what, I’m suddenly labeled? I’m not hurt-feelinged, I’m more sad. Plus, it was cool that Anna stood up for me like that.

Outside the window, the sky glows ski-parka blue and the trees sway in some frigid wind that I can’t hear or feel. I should be out there with my arms outstretched. I should be out there rolling in the leaves, only I don’t have anyone to roll with.

If sighing were acceptable I’d sigh right here but sighing, unfortunately, is a cliché.

Bob tiptoes in, without a pink triangle taped to his flannel shirt. He squints his eyes and looks at me through the corner of them. I wave. No hard feelings, I am trying to think. No hard feelings. Okay. A little hard feelings. He sits in his seat, looks around, starts scribbling a note to somebody. I bet it’s Dylan.

Tom has seen them kiss. I will not imagine that.

In some weird, selfish way, I wish Dylan had cheated on me with a girl. That would make things easier. I could hate her. Emily and I could rant about what a tart she is, how she’s bulimic or anorexic or should be (yes, that’s awful). I could be mad, mad, mad and hate could be a tiger pushing me through the days. Plus, nobody would be muttering fag hag at me in the halls.

But, no. Gaydom soars through Dylan’s Irish/Norwegian genes and his Gap jeans, probably. And I can’t be mad, mad, mad because . . . well, he’s oppressed. He’s oppressed. He is no longer a dominant Aryan boy with his blonde hair and white skin and good parents and cute house. Now, he’s a gay man. Now, he can be a victim.

I can’t be angry about someone being gay, can I?

Poor Dylan. Poor Bob. Poor me.

That’s the only time I’m going to say that. Okay. One more time. Poor me.

That’s actually fun to say. I am such a Mallory.

“How you doing, Commie?” Tom says when he sits down.

I don’t even look at him. “You don’t have to be nice to me.”

“What?”

I yank a notebook out of my backpack even though we never take notes in here. “I said, ‘You don’t have to be nice to me just because your dad told you to.’”

His breath blows out his mouth and hits hot against my neck. I pull at my ponytail and try to fix it but I do not turn around.

“Is that what you think?” His voice comes out as scorching as his breath.

I shrug.

“That’s stupid.”

I shrug again, which is not the best comeback. My palms tingle. I pull out my ponytail holder and start all over again.

“That’s not it at all.”

“What is it then?” I say.

He is silent. Then he says, “God, you really don’t know?”

Herr Reitz passes back our tests from yesterday. I’m afraid to turn mine over.

Tom taps me on the back. That’s what he does when he wants to share. I breathe in deep, afraid to look at him, afraid of what I’ll see in his eyes. I turn and see them, tree-bark brown and strong. There’s no pity there. No lies.

I hold my test up. Ninety-eight. Two points off for forgetting an umlaut.
Love, love me do . . .

Tom holds his up. One hundred.

Bob’s all alone. Not even Rasheesh is asking him what he got. Sorry, I should call him Crash. That’s what Rasheesh has renamed himself.

“Bob,” I say, while Herr Reitz starts opening windows to let October leaf air in. “How’d you do?”

Deer caught in the headlights, he stares and stares at me.

“What?” he croaks it out.

“You do okay?” I ask him. I turn sideways to face him, look over at Tom, he’s got a dog-eating-peanut-butter grin on his face, but Bob, Bob gives me a real smile and holds up his test.

“Ninety-seven.”

“Excellent,” I say. He keeps smiling. Tom shakes his head and once Herr Reitz starts talking a little folded-up note flips over my shoulder and lands on my notebook. I bite my lip and unfold it.

I should start calling you, Softie.

I snort.

I write back:
You better not.

I toss it over my shoulder when Herr Reitz starts the radio. We’re singing again. “All You Need is Love” this time.

“All together now!” Herr Reitz shouts. He’s dressed in green scrubs today. He lifts up his mask to sing.

The note flips back to me.

You like Commie better,
it says.

I scribble and sing, scribble and sing. Herr Reitz shouts, “Louder.”

I write:
I like Belle best.

Tom gets the note, scribbles again in his boy writing, straight, scrawling yet tight.

I unfold the note:
Softie fits you better.

When Herr Reitz turns around and starts dancing, I discreetly salute Tom with my finger. He laughs and laughs and laughs. Even Herr Reitz notices.

“Want to share, Tom?” he asks.

Tom lifts up his hands like he’s about to be hit by a speeding car. “No . . . No. That’s okay.”

The moment Herr Reitz isn’t looking, the note flips back.

Didn’t know you had it in you . . . Softie Commie Belle Pinko.

I write back:
Thanks. What’s your name again? Is it Tom, Dick, or Hairy?

Tom chortles again and I smile too. And then I realize it, for the first time in years, I’m not thinking about Dylan. I’m not thinking about Dylan at all, and the greatest part of this is that I don’t feel bad about that. I don’t feel bad at all.

He shoots me one more note, this time it’s on a piece of duct tape folded up and stuck together. The duct tape is shaped like a tiny soccer ball, but it’s still a note because there’s writing on it.

It’s a quote.

Of course.

I have to twirl the ball around to read it all. The letters are miniscule, just absolutely tiny.

It says: Embrace your desires. They make us love, make us create, make us long, make us live.

Hhmm. I don’t know how to kick that ball back to him, or even if I want to.

Reasons Why Calling Me a Fag Hag Is Not Cool

1. Because it’s bigoted. Duh.
   
2. Because it is not the most clever of rhymes.
   
3. It’s not appropriate. I’m really a beard.
   
4. Because all fag hag means is that I don’t care if a guy is gay and that I’m still friends with him.
   
5. Which I don’t know if it’s really true. If I am friends with him. I want to be, but he lied to me.
   
6. Because it makes me sound like I have long, stringy, tangled hair and a wart on my nose, which I most emphatically do not and if I did then I would have it removed. Nor do I cackle.
   
7. Because if you do it again, whoever you are, I will pound your face into the locker until it is unrecognizable and people looking at your yearbook photo will shirk away, afraid, very afraid. Well, I would if I weren’t a pacifist. I will, however, most certainly think about doing this.