Or that’s what I told myself.
As the hours passed by without any studying happening, I should have felt panicked, but I mostly felt happy. And excited.
At half past four, there was a knock on the door. I also got a text from Leo.
I’m here. Open up. I have snacks and cologne.
Leo and his cologne. Every formal date I’d gone on—including the very platonic female date I took to prom who was just as queer as I was—had begun with Leo’s concerns about my scent. When we were in high school, he literally said to me, “A man’s nose is the pathway to his heart.”
Like he would know at seventeen.
I opened the door to see an exuberant Leo holding his black velvet bag of cologne and a can of pineapple. I couldn’t help it. I busted up laughing.
Leo ignored me and shouldered his way inside, carrying his cologne and can to the kitchen. “You laugh, but you have to admit you want Briggs to suck your dick.” He shook the can of pineapple back and forth like a maraca. “This right here makes Sam’s cock taste like a fucking popsicle.”
I scrunched up my nose in disgust.
“Oh, stop. Don’t act like you haven’t sucked his dick before,” Leo said.
This was the true problem with living in the same place your whole life. You ended up admitting to your best friend that you had, in fact, sucked his fiancé’s dick at some point.
Even if it was a long time ago, it was still in my memory.
“His dick definitely didn’t taste like a popsicle when I sucked it,” I told Leo.
Leo sighed. “Of course not. He didn’t know the secret yet. I’m telling you the truth here.” He opened the second drawer next to the sink and got out the can opener. “You’ll thank me later.”
I wasn’t even sure Briggs liked sucking dick. Maybe that wasn’t his thing. I mean, sure, I wanted to suck his dick. I wanted to run my tongue along every inch of his body, but I also only wanted to do so when he told me to.
Sex with Briggs wasn’t a single tortilla chip. It was complicated—quality supreme nachos always were—which meant I could spend the next month completely unaware of what my Daddy’s dick tasted like and be content. As long as that was what Briggs told me to do.
“We, uh, sort of had sex this morning,” I confessed, trying to sound as casual as possible.
Leo set the can of pineapple down. “What? And you didn’t tell me? What the fuck, Sanders?”
“I’m sorry. It’s just… I’m still processing it.”
My brain felt like a hunk of bread dough before it had a chance to rise. There was still so much I didn’t know and didn’t understand about what I’d shared with Briggs this morning.
“Was it good?” Leo asked.
I glared at him the way he always glared at me when I talked for too long. “What do you think?”
Leo’s lips quirked up on one side. “That good, huh?”
I sat down on the small wooden table where I’d eaten countless meals during my lifetime. “He made me feel…” How did I even finish that sentence? Elated? On fire? Whole? “He made me feel so good, Leo. I can’t even…”
Leo sat across from me like he had many times when we were teens. “So it was everything you hoped for?”
I shook my head. “No. It was more. It was…” I stopped myself before I said supreme nachos.
Leo shot back up and rushed over to the can of pineapple, attacking it with the can opener with renewed vigor. “You deserve this, Sanders. You deserve to be happy with someone.”
I didn’t think that what I “deserved” would have any impact on what happened with Briggs. But I also believed Briggs was serious about us. The way he’d taken care of me that morning by bringing me so much pleasure and then cooking for me even after all of that proved it.
How could I think otherwise?
“I’m sort of crazy about him. I mean, completely crazy about him. God, Leo. He’s…”
Leo popped the top of the can off and set the pineapple on the table, sliding it over to me. “He’s perfect? Yes, you’ve mentioned that a few times.” Then he grabbed two forks from the utensil drawer and sat across from me again. “Eat,” he said, handing one of the forks to me.
I spent the rest of the afternoon eating pineapple with Leo and not doing any studying at all. We weren’t even drunk this time or knocking holes in walls. It was just Leo and me like it had been before Mom had gotten sick and everything about my life had gotten out of control. I had forgotten how often we used to do this—just hang out with no work to do and no place to be.
Leo helped me pick out what to wear, which wasn’t a huge feat, seeing as how my options were limited after several years of nothing but school and work. We also looked at photos of the ring Sam bought because of course Sam had sent him photos. The two of them were way too excited to hold anything back from each other after last night.
At one point in the afternoon, I realized how much I wished my mom was there and could remember enough to enjoy this moment with us. It wouldn’t mean the same to her now. She didn’t remember Leo any better than she remembered me. But the thought made me remember how much I’d neglected her over the last few days.
“Will you promise me something?” I asked Leo as he got out his array of colognes and set them up on the kitchen table.
“Sure, what?”
“Will you go see my mom tonight?” I looked away from him, knowing how that must sound. “I haven’t been in a couple days, and I plan to go, I just… I need another night to figure everything out.”
The problem was that every other time I’d gone to see her recently, it had been easy to slip into the role of my uncle because nothing in my life was changing. I was still running the same business and failing the same classes, so it didn’t matter if she couldn’t remember what was going on.
But now my life was different, and I wished I could tell her, and she’d laugh and smile like she had before.
I wished she could meet Briggs and see how happy I was to be with him.
“Sure thing, Sanders. I should go anyway. I’ll leave these here with you for now, okay?”
What he failed to say was how difficult a visit from him would be for my mother. He wasn’t like me. He didn’t conveniently look like someone from Mom’s past, so when he walked into her room, he had to make up some kind of explanation. That explanation often involved explaining her situation. Sometimes he lied and said he was a friend of my uncle’s. That lie was sometimes easier, but it didn’t always go over well with my mom. After all, why would a friend of my uncle, who didn’t know her well, visit her in the “hospital”?
As Leo left, I couldn’t help but wonder how it would go tonight. Not just for me, but for him.
My mom was the closest thing he had to unconditional family. The closest thing except me.
Only I’d been too busy to be there for Leo much as of late.
A few minutes later, before I’d had a chance to sort through Leo’s many cologne bottles, there was another knock at the door.
That had to be Briggs.
I fiddled with the buttons on my shirt on the way to the door. He’d never seen my apartment before. It was a tiny condo with a beat-up screen door and carpets that probably should have been replaced years ago. My mom had bought it back when I was much younger, and back then she’d just been so happy to own her own place.