Boy Crazy: Coming Out Erotica (8 page)
Read Boy Crazy: Coming Out Erotica Online
Authors: Unknown
“Jesus, you’re such a cow, Eliza. Did Josephine come a little early this month?” I adjusted the Ray-Bans on my nose and looked out across the highway at the ocean. Eliza didn’t respond to my goad about her period. It was too hard for either of us to stay angry on a day as beautiful as this one, especially in a convertible. Gran’s car was a creamy brown 1968 Mercedes-Benz 280SE with a red interior. It had been an anniversary gift from my grandfather, one she’d lost interest in it after he died. But Gran kept it in the garage at Flyte in excellent repair, and the ten-year-old car was spectacular. The top was down and the wind was in our hair. Eliza ran her fingers through hers, making sure it was blowing behind her as if she were starring in a Breck commercial—in her mind. She honked at her friends as we drove through Prothro, making sure that they saw her, obviously hoping they’d assume the car was hers.
Eliza turned left off Main Street onto Selkirk Street. We passed Treleaven’s Fish and Chips. As casually as possible, I craned my neck to see if Angus was working inside the shop, but I didn’t see him through the plate glass window, and Eliza drove too quickly anyway. I thought briefly of asking her to stop, but we’d just had breakfast and it was too early for lunch. There would have been no way to make the request without arousing her curiosity. Eliza turned right on Beach Road. Olivia Newton-John and John Travolta’s “You’re the One that I Want” from
Grease
, which we’d both seen earlier in the summer, played on the car radio. Eliza and I both liked the song, and we even ventured a joint duet during the
ooh-oooh-oooh
chorus, and thus a temporary truce would reign, by mutual consent, at least until we arrived at the beach and went our separate ways.
Grease
, which we’d both seen earlier in the summer, played on the car radio. Eliza and I both liked the song, and we even ventured a joint duet during the
ooh-oooh-oooh
chorus, and thus a temporary truce would reign, by mutual consent, at least until we arrived at the beach and went our separate ways.
After a lifetime of summers in Prothro, I could very nearly tell the precise time by the position of the sun on the ocean. Near five, I began my hike back along the beach to meet Eliza by the car for the drive home. I’d spent the day reading my well-worn copy of
The Lord of the Rings
and swimming when I was too hot. My skin was tight with salt and sun, and my muscles ached pleasantly. I knew that later tonight, in bed, I would feel the sway of ocean’s currents when I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.
The Lord of the Rings
and swimming when I was too hot. My skin was tight with salt and sun, and my muscles ached pleasantly. I knew that later tonight, in bed, I would feel the sway of ocean’s currents when I closed my eyes and drifted off to sleep.
Eliza was leaning against the car speaking to a man in a blue nylon jacket and a baseball cap, brim pulled low on his brow. His body was angled in such a way that I didn’t recognize him. I recognized Eliza’s pose, however—her back slightly arched, head tilted to the side, leaning with her fingers ever so delicately brushing the side of the car. I knew what the pose meant. It meant that she was flirting. I sighed, wondering if I’d be sitting in the backseat on the way home. Eliza reached out and touched the man’s arm lightly, and her silvery laugh carried across the distance between us. Then the man pulled his baseball cap off and I saw his red hair.
“Oh, look who’s here,” Eliza trilled. “Hello, brother dear. Did you have a nice day at the beach with the clams and the starfish?” She looked down at my copy of
The Lord of the Rings
. “How are the elves and trogs and Balrogs?”
The Lord of the Rings
. “How are the elves and trogs and Balrogs?”
“Umm, fine.” I suddenly felt very sunburned and tasted the sour salt of the ocean in the back of my throat. “Are you… umm…ready to go, Eliza?”
Eliza ignored the question. “Have you two met? This is my brother, Jem.”
“Hey, man,” said Angus Treleaven, extending his hand. “Name’s Angus.”
“Hi.” I shook his hand, feeling his calloused palm. Our eyes met and suddenly I was twelve again, crouching in the high beach grass above the dunes watching him make love to a girl whose face I didn’t see. Angus at nineteen was a stronger, harder vision of Angus at fifteen, and while I’d watched him grow up in glimpses every August, nothing could have prepared me for this. I caught the scent of him then: soap, cheap deodorant, sun, salt, freshly-laundered clothes, and a faint trace of boat engine oil. “I’m Jem.”
Eliza giggled. She pointed at me. “My brother is such a book-worm. He’s the brain in the family,” she added lightly. She had clearly decided that playing the tortured intellectual poetess wasn’t going to work with Angus.
My
Angus. “Any other boy his age would be out chasing girls on a day like today, but not our Jem.”
My
Angus. “Any other boy his age would be out chasing girls on a day like today, but not our Jem.”
“Ah, a smart one is he?” Angus said, still looking at me. “It’s a good thing to be a smart one. I never was much good in school myself. Better at sports. Wish I’d studied harder.”
“Oh, I don’t think it’s just that,” Eliza said innocently. “I just don’t think he’s all that interested in girls.”
I felt the blood rush to my face, and I hated Eliza at that moment with the purest possible hate. Angus looked at her quizzically.
“It’s not that,” I said my face flaming. “I just like to read, that’s all.”
“See?” Angus said to Eliza. His voice was kind, and he smiled at me. “He’s a reader. Nothing wrong with that. There’ll always be time for girls later. Right?” Angus winked at Eliza. “So, pick you up at eight?”
I climbed into the front seat of the car without a word and looked out at the water.
“No, I’ll meet you in town,” Eliza said. “At nine, at the pub.”
“See you then,” Angus said. “Nice meeting you, Jem. See you around, man.”
I mumbled “Good-bye,” and Eliza started the car and pulled out of the parking lot. I fought the urge to look back at Angus standing beside his truck, but in the end I needed the sight of him one more time to see if I could make the pain go away. It didn’t go away.
On the ride home, Eliza and I didn’t speak, until suddenly she said, “Don’t tell Mum and Gran about this, Jem. I mean it. I don’t want them to know I’m seeing this guy. They won’t understand.”
“Why not?” At that point, I would have done anything to damage her, short of grabbing the steering wheel out of her hands and crashing the car, killing us both. “Are you afraid Mum and Gran will think you’re a slut? Because you are one, Eliza,” I added savagely. “And you’re a fucking cunt, too. I can’t believe you said that to him about me not liking girls.”
She glared at me. “What do you care? You don’t even know him. He’s just some townie fisherman. What do you care what he thinks?”
“What do
you
care what Mum and
Gran
think?” I shot back. “Why
shouldn’t
I tell Mum that you’re hanging around the beach picking up guys and agreeing to meet them behind everyone’s back? What if he’s a
rapist
?” I hated myself even as I said it.
you
care what Mum and
Gran
think?” I shot back. “Why
shouldn’t
I tell Mum that you’re hanging around the beach picking up guys and agreeing to meet them behind everyone’s back? What if he’s a
rapist
?” I hated myself even as I said it.
“He’s not a
rapist
, he’s a
fisherman
. His parents own Treleaven’s. He works there part-time. He liked Gran’s car, and we just started to talk. He’s cute. I think I’ve seen him around before, too.”
rapist
, he’s a
fisherman
. His parents own Treleaven’s. He works there part-time. He liked Gran’s car, and we just started to talk. He’s cute. I think I’ve seen him around before, too.”
Cute
. I really
would
kill her, right here, right now. “Then why be ashamed of telling Mum and Gran?”
. I really
would
kill her, right here, right now. “Then why be ashamed of telling Mum and Gran?”
“Because they won’t understand, that’s why.” Eliza sounded distraught, and if I didn’t hate her so much at that moment, I might have felt sorry for her. “You know what a snob Gran is about townies. Please, Jem. Look, I know I’ve been a bitch to you all day, and I’m sorry. But please, just this once. Keep it between us? Please?”
“Do you really like him, Eliza?” The pain in my voice, if she picked up on it at all, would be interpreted as anger directed at her. Eliza was too narcissistic to hear pain in another person’s voice unless she herself was causing it, on purpose. In any event, since I had the upper hand at that moment regarding keeping her secret or not it barely mattered anyway. I felt as though a nail-studded coffin full of bricks was lying across my chest, suffocating me and impaling me on its dull spikes at the same time. “Do you want him to be your…your
boyfriend
?”
boyfriend
?”
“I don’t know,” Eliza said lightly. “I haven’t thought that far ahead. But I’m bored. And he’s cute. He’ll do for the rest of August at least, I guess.”
I agreed to keep her secret, for my own reasons. Eliza’s proximity to Angus would bring him into my orbit as nothing else could. Adoring him from a distance had been my secret, the image I treasured after lights-out at school when I touched myself under the covers in my dorm room, when I was sure my roommate was asleep, and every night of every summer, especially in August at Flyte.
But that night I cried myself to sleep, suffocating beneath the weight of jealousy and loss over what Eliza had stolen. Because now, every time I tried to summon my cherished image of Angus in the dunes, it was my sister’s grinning face I saw underneath him, and he was
fucking
this time, not
making love
.
fucking
this time, not
making love
.
If Eliza hadn’t been reading her poetry aloud as she paced the upstairs hallway instead of watching where she was going, she would never have tripped on the third-floor stairs and broken her leg two weeks later. If she hadn’t broken her leg, I might never have wound up on Angus’s boat, and what happened would not have happened.
“You need to go meet him for me,” Eliza pleaded. “Tell him what happened. Tell him I can’t meet him, but that I’ll call him in a few days. We were supposed to go out on his boat tonight. He wanted to take me fishing. This is so tragic.”
“All right, Eliza. But you’ll owe me.” After two weeks of enduring conspiratorial smiles, sighs, and winks from Eliza before and after she slipped out to meet Angus, and listening to my oblivious grandmother compliment Eliza on how nice she was looking lately with a little makeup and her hair brushed, Eliza’s accident was an immensely satisfying experience. I could barely contain my euphoria, especially when I found out that the poem she’d been reading was a new, particularly awful one called “The Fisherman’s Friend,” about her and Angus, whom she now referred to in private as her “muse” and “incubus.” I hated her even more when I looked up the meaning of the word “incubus.”
I parked my bike near the public wharf in Prothro and went to look for Angus’s boat. I soon found it and him waiting beside it. Angus was dressed for the ocean at night. He wore faded jeans, a navy blue Peter Storm sweater, and a worn yellow rubber slicker jacket. He walked purposefully down the steep incline toward me, steady on his feet in spite of the swaying docks.
“Hey, buddy,” Angus said, reaching for my shoulder and steadying me. “Where’s your sister? We were supposed to go out on the water.” He smiled uncertainly. “She’s not standing me up, is she?”
“She asked me to tell you that she’s sorry, but she can’t come. She broke her leg.” It sounded like a lie, so I added, “Really. She was really looking forward to coming out with you tonight. She really likes you,” I said, my voice breaking. “A lot. She thinks about you
all the time
. She’s thought about you for
years
, even before she met you this summer. I think she’s in love with you.”
all the time
. She’s thought about you for
years
, even before she met you this summer. I think she’s in love with you.”
Angus was quiet for a moment. The he sighed. “Loves me, huh? Ah, summer girls,” he said. He shrugged. “Oh, well. I might have seen this coming.”
“Don’t you believe me? I’m telling the truth.”
He shrugged again. “Sure, buddy. I believe you. But the boat’s all ready and it’s a nice night.” He shrugged again. Then he said, “Do you want to go out? I’m going out anyway. Least I can do after you came out all this way to deliver the message, personal like. We’ll be back in an hour or so. Before you’re missed, I promise.”
“Sure,” I breathed. “Yes, I mean, I’d like that. Thanks.”
We walked to the stern. He stepped lightly up onto the swim grid and extended a strong arm. I took it, awkwardly. We were suddenly inches apart on a piece of slatted wood over the water. He led me into the cockpit and started the engine. Suddenly the floor was shaking. I jumped, and Angus laughed.
“Can I help?” I asked, hoping he’d say no.
“Nah, just sit here on this locker beside me and watch.” He walked to the window, and with one arm flipped himself out and onto the dock where he untied some lines. Another swing, he was back inside. He stuck his head out the window on either side to check for room, and the boat began to move out into the water toward the end of the docks. Small waves hit the hull, and it rocked, churning a furious wake. We passed a green buoy in the harbor. The sky was streaked with broad bands of yellow, orange, peach, and blue. Behind us, Prothro harbor grew smaller and indistinct.
“We’re at sea, buddy,” Angus said. “Come here and take the wheel. You won’t wreck anything, I promise.”
“It was you, wasn’t it?” Angus said. He was watching me as he spoke. He’d cut the motor, and the boat swayed beneath us. The sun had begun the most dramatic part of its descent, and the sky was now silver-blue and fiery orange against the horizon. Sitting on the deck, Angus had offered me a beer, which I’d declined. He had opened one for himself. “That day, the summer I was fifteen? You were watching me and that girl? I saw you. Do you remember?”
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