Brett Read online

I am my own joke and punch line.

  “It’s floral arrangements!” I spell out, desperate. “It’s bridal themed! Kinda.” I take a sip of my own concoction I ordered. I wince and attempt not to spit it back out. “Delicious!” I force myself to say.

  “I wonder what’s next on the itinerary,” Lena jokes quietly to her friend. “An adorably girly cat café where they dress up the cats like groomsmen?” Maria snorts into her drink and teases back: “Or maybe a ‘super exciting’ tour of the great garter belt museum? Ooh, I can’t wait!” And they laugh.

  If I was a groomsman cat right now, my ears would’ve just folded back in frustration.

  When the ladies take a trip to the restroom, I turn to Skylar. “I wanted to take them out for a fun night and spend some time with you. I didn’t think it’d be a totally lame bore fest for them.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself, buddy.” Skylar throws an arm around my back and pulls me to his side. “They’re having a great time, trust me.”

  Being this close to Skylar, I can see a thousand shades of crystalline brown in his eyes, infinite and full of life. His lips are perfectly pouty and inviting. I can’t even count how many nights we went out drinking back in the day, and how many times we would end up in this exact configuration: his arm around my back, hugging me to his side, and those inviting lips of his right in front of my eyes.

  It’s like a dare he keeps giving me.

  A dare I can’t possibly oblige.

  “I guess I should cancel our tickets to the garter belt museum,” I say, borrowing his sister’s joke. Or was it her Maid of Honor’s? “They were pretty damned expensive.”

  Skylar chuckles at that. “Good idea.”

  “What should we do, then?” I ask.

  Skylar shrugs. “I guess my sis is more … loud. She likes clubs and crazy bars and … well, I guess some other things are her scene, too, but—”

  “What other things?” I ask. “Please. Tell me. I gotta save this night somehow.”

  An uncomfortable look crosses Skylar’s face. “Well, she … she has a bunch of …” He finally lets it out. “Gay friends. She had tons of gay friends at college. She’s … really into the gay scene.”

  I stare at him. Am I being baited to come out, or is he serious?

  Skylar laughs it off suddenly and turns our half-hug into a firm pat on my back. “But it’s okay, bro. I’m not asking you to take us to a gay bar or something like that. I’m just telling you what kind of scene she’s used to.”

  Is this my chance?

  Is this when I finally let out my secret?

  Just then, Lena and Maria return to the table. “Okay, okay,” Lena says at once, coming right up to me. “I’m sorry, I really don’t mean to be critical, I know you’re trying really hard, showing us all of these places, but … I can’t drink another sip of this.”

  While staring at Skylar, the corner of my lips curls upward. Yes, this is my chance, and I’m taking it. “You won’t have to,” I tell her with a self-important puffing up of my chest, “since it just so happens, I know exactly where to take us next.”

  “Please God no,” moans Maria to herself.

  I face the ladies. “We’re heading to Mayville. Otherwise known as Gayville.”

  Lena’s eyebrows pull together in a mixture of confusion and surprise.

  “You heard me right,” I go on. “I’m gonna take you to the best damned drag bar in town … and we won’t let the night end until we’re super drunk on our asses, covered in other peoples’ glitter, or dressed in feather boas. How’s that sound?”

  Lena and Maria look at each other, stunned.

  Skylar comes up to me. “Dude, you don’t have to do this just for them,” he tells me quietly. “If you had other plans or whatever, I’m sure they’d—”

  “Don’t be silly.” I put my arm around him and, just like he does to me, pull him up against my side. “I think it’s finally time for you to see my side of town.” I smirk at him. “Where I live.”

  It takes him half a second before he connects the dots. “Your side of town …?”

  “Wait a sec,” mutters Lena, staring at me. “Are you telling me … you bat for the boys?”

  Despite the nervous (nearly cardiac-arrest level) thumping of my heart, I’m proud as I face the ladies and give them a firm nod. “You bet I do.”

  Those words sounded confident in my head.

  They come out more like a squeak toy.

  It doesn’t seem to matter, because at once, Lena’s eyes go wide, stars of delight fill them, and she excitedly cries, “Take me there! I need to be with my gays! Oh my God, take me there now!”

  With a stiffened-up Skylar still in my grasp, I give her a self-assured grin. “The bride’s wish is my command.”

  7

  Trade the smoggy, traffic-lined curbsides for a flashing, body-stuffed room.

  Trade the streetlights for club lights and glitter.

  Trade the noise of car horns for happy shouts of laughter and thumping dance music.

  Trade the snobs of Uptown for drag queens.

  Welcome to Dames & Dudes.

  On the stage is a drag queen doing a lip sync show to a sea of cheerful men and women. There is a big dance floor where people are getting down, and a semicircular bar near the door, where Lena and Maria quickly rushed to fetch themselves some drinks before we all flooded the dance floor.

  “C’mon, dude!” I tell Skylar. “There’s no need to be afraid!”

  “I’m not afraid!” he shouts back through all of the noise, but his eyes are darting around in every direction. Someone bumps into him and he appears alarmed, looking over his shoulder.

  I grip his shoulders and face him to me. “You look like you’re about to shit a diamond brick.”

  Skylar frowns at me. “Dude, I’m not afraid!”

  “Open your mind and heart to some fun! Sure, it may not be your usual place of entertainment, but look, there’s a giant drag queen in ten-inch high heels on the stage. How can you not like that??”

  Skylar gives the stage a diminutive peek. “They aren’t ten-inch high heels,” he mutters back.

  Somehow, I hear him. “Hey, you said your sis is way into the gay scene. This is the gay scene. If she’s happy, aren’t you? So let’s let loose and have a little fun with her tonight!”

  Before we can continue our conversation, Lena and Maria find us in the crowd, and after shouting something unintelligible at the pair of us (between fits of their own manic laughter), they yank on our unsuspecting hands and pull us into the throng of dancing men and women.

  Maria makes me hers right away and dances with me. Lena takes her brother, pulling him out of his daze, and gets him to move. I watch her say something into his ear, and he cracks a smile.

  The next while is lost to the thumping beat and colorful lights. Maria is a fucking great dancer, by the way. I’d not have guessed that from the rigid, terrified-of-everything look that was pasted on her face at the start of our night. I guess the ladies just feel safer in the gay part of town, or perhaps more easily able to let down their hair, so to speak.

  When a certain song plays that both Lena and Maria clearly recognize, the girls scream, take hold of each other, and get lost in the crowd. Skylar and I are left on our own, moving to the rhythm and glancing at each other uncertainly. He dances his way up to me, then narrows his eyes.

  That look he’s giving me makes me laugh. “Is there something on your mind?”

  “You know damned well what’s on my mind,” he throws back.

  “And what’s that?”

  “Why didn’t you tell me you’re into guys?”

  I shrug. “Maybe a part of me was afraid taking my straight bro to a drag bar like Dames & Dudes was going to be too much for you.”

  “I meant back then,” he amends. “At the frat. Years ago.”

  We’re still dancing. And while we have to yell at each other to be heard over the music and the thick, moving crowd of sweaty men and wo
men, it feels like we’re all alone somehow.

  “We could’ve been so much closer,” he adds.

  I laugh. “Seriously? Knowing I was gay—?”

  “Dude, you don’t know the half of it.”

  “What don’t I know?”

  “Everything, Brett. Fucking everything.”

  Something explodes over us. Confetti in every color of the rainbow drops from the ceiling, and a wave of shouts and hollering rush over the crowd.

  “Birthday,” I explain to a startled Skylar, who looks at me. “It’s something they do for birthdays. You gotta pay for it, and talk to the DJ, and—Hey!” It suddenly hits me. “Did your sister already have her bachelorette party planned? I’ve got a great place she and the ladies could totally crash. A gay strip bar. My roommate works there.”

  Skylar is beside himself as his frustration is at once traded for disbelief. He starts laughing. “Who are you, Macintyre??”

  “Same ol’ Macintyre I was back then, just … more forthcoming about what I’m doing. Y’know.” I nudge him. “Not hiding my ‘ladies’ from the frat house anymore.”

  Skylar’s eyes go somewhere else, contemplative and faraway.

  Lena and Maria crash into us suddenly, all of the colorful confetti in their hair. “I want to live in this place,” Lena cries out. “Me, too! Do you have to get married?” asks Maria. “I love Emilio, but you’re never gonna have this much fun again, girl!”

  “Remind me to tell you about Aubergines and hot male strippers,” I shout. “Have you planned a bachelorette party yet? If you did, you’ll want to cancel! I’ve got the perfect place for you ladies!”

  “Canceled!” Lena shouts out, laughing.

  The music lifts up again, the beat builds, and as it comes crashing down, the whole room blows up into a new rush of dancing. Lena grinds against me while Maria spins a still-bewildered Skylar around. Then we trade partners, and I’m throwing both my hands in the air with Maria. Soon, all four of us are lost once again to the noise.

  Normally, I’m drunk off my ass when I get like this. The house parties I throw can be epic, huge, and threaten to topple Piazza Place when the music is turned to full blast. By the morning after a party, I can’t remember half the night, if any of it at all. I always feel cranky and wasted, and there is usually a guy (sometimes two) who I have to politely kick out of my apartment.

  But tonight, I’ve got barely two drinks in me, I’m fully focused—and I’m having the time of my life.

  Is this what living it up really means?

  And if it is, then what the hell am I doing with my riotous house parties? Numbing all of the pain? Giving everyone else a night to remember because I can’t find that kind of happiness for myself?

  I leave the three of them on the dance floor and hit up the bar. When the bartender comes by, he’s already got the whole wrong idea of what my night has been like. “Dude, that guy you came in with, you gotta lock it down,” he tells me. “There are too many hot shits here tonight, and if you leave him alone too long, you’re gonna lose him. Why aren’t you doing your usual thing?”

  I swear, he still thinks I’m that overly horny new guy in the gayborhood who bunny-rabbits his way from one guy to the next every weekend. “I’m not trying to ‘lock it down’ with him,” I tell him. “He’s my buddy from college.”

  “You went to college??” The bartender laughs at that—too hard, I might add—then pours me a quick shot. “On the house. Liquid courage. You’re way too sober, my friend. Lock it down.”

  “He’s straight,” I point out after I take the shot. “Thanks for this, by the way. We’re only here because his sister is getting married and has a hundred gay friends, apparently, so this is her happy place. I think he’s having a miserable time.”

  “I read people for a living. And that guy?” He shakes his head. “He is not having a miserable time. He’s horny, frustrated, and wants you.”

  I roll my eyes and laugh it off. “Sorry, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. I appreciate you trying to feed my unhealthy fantasies, but—”

  “Feed them yourself. He’s heading this way.”

  “What?” I spin around.

  Skylar hops onto the barstool next to mine.

  I blink, staring at him. “Skylar! Dude, did you just ditch your sister on the dance floor?”

  The bartender, after giving us both a look—and failing to hide his superior smirk—slinks away to help someone else, leaving us to ourselves.

  “More like they ditched me,” retorts Sky with a chuckle. “Lena is having so much fun. Too much.”

  I smile, studying his eyes. “Are you alright, my man? You’ve been kinda … off … ever since we left the other side of town. Like you’ve got something on your mind.”

  “No, no, I’m good.” He gives a glance over his shoulder, as if to check on his sister. Of course, we can’t see anything but gyrating bodies and flashing lights from here. “I haven’t seen Lena this happy in a long time. Especially after the stressful past few weeks we’ve had, putting this wedding together so last minute. I’m glad to see her having a great time with her best friend. Maria is Emilio’s sister, by the way,” he quickly adds. “Yeah, she’s marrying her best friend’s brother. She’s about to turn her best friend into her sister-in-law. I told her it was a bad idea, but …” He laughs. “Sisters never take their brothers’ advice. Be glad you don’t have siblings.”

  He remembered. “I always wanted a brother.”

  “I know. You basically turned me into one.”

  I laugh at that. “Did I?”

  Skylar looks me in the eyes. Quite suddenly, he turns serious. “I want to make something clear, and I don’t want you to take this the wrong way, or to get that way you get when I try to tell you something. I’ve got to say this, and it’s important.”

  I feel my stomach wring itself dry.

  Even the butterflies all take a perch somewhere as they wait with bated breath for whatever it is Skylar has to say.

  He leans toward me and puts a hand on my arm. Every single cell in my body feels that hand. My eyes are locked on his. “Brett …”

  “Yeah?”

  “I …” He closes his eyes, gives himself half a second, then opens them. “I want you to know that nothing has to change between us.”

  I’m still staring into his eyes. I feel like there’s more, and yet … “Yes?”

  “I know it’s been years since we last hung out, and even though we’ve only just reconnected, there is clearly a very …” He chuckles awkwardly. “… a very strong connection between us, like we picked up right where we left off, as best buddies.”

  “It feels like that for me, too,” I quickly put in.

  “So all I’m saying is that being attracted to men doesn’t change anything between us. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, or where our lives are going to take us, but … I definitely know that you make me feel like a more complete person, Brett. I want you in my life.”

  “I want you, too,” I tell him.

  His eyes snap to mine.

  I swallow. I want you, too? Did I just say that?

  “What were you trying to, uh, say to me?” I ask him suddenly, yanking the spotlight away from my embarrassingly suggestive words. “Back on the dance floor? Something about how much closer we could’ve been? Me not knowing everything?”

  Skylar’s face turns to stone yet again.

  At once, his sister and Maria crash our little moment here at the bar. “Okay, we talked it over,” Lena tells us, “and we’re going to change our plans for the bachelorette party. Brett, you’re in charge now. Something about Aubergines and hot men stripping for us …?”

  I peel my eyes away from Skylar’s. “I, uh … yeah! Aubergines! My roommate’s a shot boy there and I know the manager Larry.”

  “It’s always been my dream to have a gay man plan my bachelorette party. Wait, sorry.” Lena clears her throat. “That is, if you are gay and not bi or fluid or so
mething else. I didn’t mean to assume.”

  “It’s all good,” I assure her. “I’m gay.”

  Lena giggles, then eyes Maria. “And sorry to you, too. I know as the Maid of Honor, the ball was kinda in your court, but seeing as Brett here—”

  “No, no, please,” Maria quickly says, lifting her hands. “I was having a nightmare trying to book a place for us, and after the last one canceled—”

  “It’s settled, then!” cries out Lena. “Aubergines is our place! Can you make that happen?” she then asks me, lifting her eyebrows expectantly. “Also, I heard you know the names of a few good DJs …?”

  After glancing at Skylar, who still looks uneasy, I give them an assured smile. “I’ll get it all covered. You don’t have to worry about a thing.”

  Lena glances at each of us, seeming to pick up on something. “Also, I think Maria and I are gonna head back now. We’ve got a few of our own things to sort out before tomorrow.”

  “We do?” blurts Maria. After a less-than-gentle nudge from Lena, she perks up. “Yes, we do! Sort out things, right, right.” Maria pastes on a smile.

  Skylar nods and slides off his stool. “Alright, I can get you two home. Let me just make sure I—”

  “No, no.” Lena pushes Skylar right back onto his seat. “We are heading off. You two are going to stay right here and continue your fun little night.” At the look of surprise on Sky’s face, she adds, “I think you two have a lot more … catching up to do.” She gives her brother a quick hug before flashing me a charming smile. “Don’t worry, I know the way back. Take care of him, okay?”

  Before Skylar can protest, the girls are gone. The music thumps on. The two of us remain at the bar, a look of bewilderment in our eyes.

  “I’m kinda clubbed out,” Sky admits suddenly.

  “Me, too. Y’know …” I give a nod toward the door. “It just so happens, this place is located right across the street from where I live.”

  He lifts an eyebrow. “Really?”

  “Yep. Wanna … hang at my place for a bit?”

  His answer nearly overlaps the question. “Yes.”

  8