T.J. Klune - Bear, Otter, and the Kid 1 - Bear, Otter, and the Kid (27 page)

I sit on the couch at my house a couple of days later, after the fiasco that was Creeds homecoming. Ive been kicking myself for the last forty-eight hours, replaying the look on Otters face over and over again until I cant bear to see it again. So of course, right when I think Im over it, he pops back into my head, his eyes showing what no words can convey. The guilt has been eating me from the inside out. I cant sleep. I cant eat. I cant function on a normal day-to-day level like I should be able to. The last two days have gone by in a fog of Otter-ness, and unless I get some kind of reprieve, Im going to go insane. I havent seen him since I took Ty home that night. Weve talked on the phone, but Ive had to work late the last couple of days, and Ive gotten no chance to grovel at his feet for forgiveness. Trust me, its not been lost on me how I sound. Ive never acted this way before, not even with Anna. With her, if I ever did something stupid, and she was upset with me, I always knew that she would get over it. I just needed to give her her space, and eventually she would call me, whether it be the next day or a week later. Thats how we functioned. But now with Otter, only two days have gone by, and theres been one short conversation where nothing of consequence was said, and Im ready to crawl up the fucking walls. I sound so lame.

The face that belongs to the ear Im bending sits back in his chair, his little legs dangling off the edge, not quite reaching the ground. Ty puts his hand under his chin and rubs his jaw thoughtfully. I can see hes thinking, devising something, and I cant help but feel a small sliver of hope rise through me. Thats immediately killed by the thought of how Im waiting for my nine-year-old little brother to solve the crisis of my newfound sexuality and my…
boy
friend, who apparently Im pining for like Im twelve. Hey, at least I
know
Im pathetic.

“So weve determined that youre not ready to tell people yet,” the Kid says matter-of-factly. “And we dont know when youre going to be ready, right?”

“And we know that Otter promised you that he would do this on your terms (however unfair
that
is), and that he would respect your decision not to tell anyone about you two, right?”

I nod again, ignoring the commentary.
“So you think Otter is mad at you because you had the opportunity to say something, and you didnt. And youre mad at Otter because you feel like hes pushing you toward that something even though he promised you not to. But at the same time, youre respectful of the position youve put him in because he hasnt had to hide who he is and who hes with in years, and you can see its straining him.”
I nod, loving the Kid more than I could ever tell him.
“So now you need to find a way to make Otter happy again, and at the same time, make you happy and also make sure its a happiness that will last until you are ready to admit the truth to people who probably will only be mad because youve kept it from them for so long. And with this, you also want to find out what it would
take
for you to be ready to tell people about you, but you need to grasp why you are so freaked out about it in the first place, because eventually, you do want people to know about you and Otter, but only for the simple reason that you want Otter and yourself to be able to go about your lives without having to worry about what secrets you keep and who knows them.” He stops and takes a deep breath. “Does that about cover it?”
I nod weakly.
The Kid sighs. “Bear, its pretty obvious.”
I startle. “It is?”
He shakes his head. “I cant believe that youve been stewing over this for the past two days and havent come to the conclusion yet. Ive listened to you for the last twenty minutes and even
I
know what you need to do.”
“What!” I almost shout. “Tell me what I need to do!”
“You want Otter to be with you, right?”
I grimace, but agree.
“And you want him to be happy?
“Right.”
“And you want to be able to do something for him that will let him know how you feel about him?”
“Yes!” I say, practically panting.
“And if I tell you what it is you need to do, youre not going to question it but do what I say because deep down youll know I am right!”
“I swear to God, Ty!”
The Kid looks me squarely in the eye. “You need to tell him that you love him. Youve never told him that before. You need to have him stand in front of you, and you need to tell him how much you love him and that you dont know what youd do without him.”
“Well, I dont know about that,” I say, hedging.
“Bear!” the wannabe ecoterrorist shouts at me. “You just swore. To
God
. You cant tell a little kid that you swear to God over something and then not do it. You may effectively ruin my childhood.” He looks off into nothing, a wistful expression on his face. “Gosh, think of the therapy bills. Not to mention how Ill probably never be able to have a normal relationship when Im an adult. Ill live with you forever and become a cat lady.”
I cock an eyebrow at him. “You hate cats.”
He rolls his eyes. “Well, yeah,
now
I do. But I wont have a choice. Itll be inevitable. And Ill probably have to throw birthday parties for my feline companions where I bake them cakes out of Fancy Feast. All because you went back on your God swear.”
My hands feel sweaty as I rub them together. “Ty,” I say, “I cant just have him come over and say „Hey, Thanks for coming. Can I take your coat? Oh, by the way, I love you, so please dont be mad at me anymore.” I shake my head. “That sounds retarded.”
“Well, duh,” the Kid says, sounding like a kid. “Youve got to do something special for him. My Lord, Bear, dont you know anything about romance? Youve had a girlfriend
and
a boyfriend; you think you would have learned
something.
”
“I know romance,” I retort. “I can be… like
that
if I wanted to.”
The Kid sits back in his chair, his
MEAT ISN’T NEAT
shirt riding up on his side. “Okay, then,” he says as he makes a face, “if youre such a passionate person, then why dont you tell me what you think you should do?” He folds his hands on his stomach and smirks at me.
“Fine,” I say vehemently. “Ill tell you what Ill do. Im going to…. Okay, wait a minute. Okay, no, thats lame. I could—wait, no, I think thats illegal in this state. I could… make… him something?” I finish, looking up at the Kid, who waves his hand, motioning for me to go on. “I could… make him dinner? And… there could be… candles?” He nods, waving his hand again. “And, we could… do… something else? Jesus, Ty, Im not some kind of machine! I cant think of something right on the spot.”
He shakes his head. “Bear, youre so lucky you have me,” he says seriously.
“I know,” I reassure him.
He leans back in his chair, and I am amused at his lordly mien as he presides over the future of my so-called love life. He doesnt speak right away, and it gives me a moment to mull over the position Im finding myself in now. If someone had told me a few years ago that I would sitting on the floor of this apartment waiting for the Kid to figure out the greatest way for me to tell my best friends brother that I love him, I would have thought that person had a hardcore crack addiction. Theres a nervous jitter running through me, an anticipatory buzz at what the Kid and I are planning.
Am I really going to tell Otter that I love him?
I think.
Is that even going to fix anything?
I notice with trace amusement that I never question the fact of whether if I do love him or not.
Well, at least that’s settled
, I think wryly.
Tys eyes light up, and he sits up straight in the chair and claps his hands together. “I know what to do!” he exclaims. “Bear, you are going to owe me so bad after this!”
“What!” I say, excited and terrified all at the same time.
“Okay, so you said that you wanted to make Otter dinner, right?”
“Right.”
“And we both know youre surprisingly not bad in the kitchen, right?”
“Uh, thanks. But right.”
He ignores this and moves on. “So heres what youre going to do….”

Hollywood movies. I swear to God the Kid is going to conquer the world when he grows up. Okay, scratch that; hell probably take over in the next five years. Like I said, though, the idea was amazing, but the execution… well, the execution isnt going so well.

Ty suggested that we go for broke on this one. It was his philosophy that if youre going to do something like tell your boyfriend that you love him for the first time that you should go big or go home. I told him about how Otter had said it to me for the first time, and it wasnt anything elaborate. He had me tell the story of a few days ago when I had practically begged Otter to say it. When I finished, the Kid said it sounded big to him, and then he snickered to himself. I told the Kid he doesnt make any sense. Ty told me to shut up and listen to him because I didnt know what I was talking about. I told him to act his age. He told me to act mine. I decided to shut up and listen to him. Now I think he was just being dirty.

Tys idea was still to have me make dinner for Otter, but he said that while making dinner in and of itself is nice, its not good enough. Ty said that we needed to do this on the beach, in front of the ocean, and under the stars. He wanted to get a table and set it up in the sand and cover it with a white tablecloth and have us dress up in our nicest clothes (he kind of looked at me in disdain when he said this part and then proceeded to ask if I even owned any nice clothes) and have candles and music, and while he was talking, I tried to picture all of this in my head and couldnt imagine myself doing anything like that, and what the hell were we thinking, and I was just going to pick up the phone and tell Otter right now. I told the Kid as much and had gotten as far as to pick up my phone and was about to press in Otters number when Ty grabbed the phone out of my hand and threatened to tell Otter that I liked to be spanked during sex.

This proceeded to lead us on a long tangent where I had to have him explain to me how he knows about stuff like people getting spanked during sex. He said he might have heard it mentioned while watching MSNBC. I told him he was grounded from watching the news channels for a week. Thats where this whole sidebar should have ended, but then I was forced to explain S & M and bondage to my little brother, who was persistent on the topic, and who then kept staring at me with mounting horror when I finally
did
explain, and I realized I had maybe gone too far, and we had to spend the next five minutes with me swearing to God that I had never nor would I ever attempt to do anything like that. He might now be the only nine-yearold who has heard the terms “cock ring” and “fisting.” My parenting skills are unparalleled.

When finally he would look me in the eyes again, I knew the only way I could earn his trust back (no matter what he says, I
know
the Kid thinks I like getting whipped now) was to go through with his plan. I wondered out loud how we should get Otter to dress up in nice clothes and come to the beach without giving him some kind of idea as to what was going on. The Kid said he would call Otter and tell him when and where to be. I tried to weasel out of it halfheartedly again by saying what if someone saw us and wouldnt that kind of defeat the purpose of keeping this on the down-low? The Kid countered with the fact that we both knew of a small stretch of beach that nobody ever went to. What about the Kid? Where would he go while I was doing all of this? It seems that was the perfect time for him to ask me if he could go on that damn camping trip with Alex and his family on Wednesday, after school got out. I saw how neatly the Kid had played this game, and I would have been pissed off if it hadnt been so
smooth
.

Wednesday. Has a day ever sounded so ominous? Wed-nes-day. I told the Kid I thought Wednesday was Latin for Satan, and that we probably shouldnt do it then because it might be bad luck. The Kid then proceeded to tell me what the word Wednesday actually means and where it came from (apparently its Middle English for
Wednes dei
, the day of the English God
Woden
—how the hell he knows these things, Ill never know). He then said to stop being such a girl. This struck him as funny, and he laughed as he asked me if I was the girl in my relationship with Otter. I scowled and threw a pillow at his head.

So the Kid called Otter and told him where to be and what to wear. I tried to listen in on the conversation, but Ty shot me annoyed glares and eventually locked himself in the bathroom and turned on the sink and the shower and kept repeatedly flushing the toilet to drown out his whispering. I banged on the door and yelled that Al Gore would kick his ass for wasting all that water. He came out five minutes later and told me that first, Al Gore stopped being relevant four years ago, and that second, he hadnt given anything away to Otter. But he did tell me that there was a new stipulation and that we both couldnt wear shoes. I arched an eyebrow at this, and he said that it wasnt meant to be more romantic this way but more practical. He said that Otter had tried to find out what he was up to, but the Kid made him promise not to ask any further questions to either him or me. Otter promised.

We reviewed everything that I had in my closet, and Ty was getting more and more discouraged as we went further and further into the racks of clothes. He had finally pulled out the last thing in the closet, and our room was completely trashed, and he sat on the ground, shaking his head, asking why did I not even own some kind of suit? I told him I wasnt pretentious enough. He said I didnt know what that word even meant. I told him what it meant. He grumbled for a few minutes, and then his eyes grew wide, and he jumped up from the crater of clothing he had created and ran down the hall, and I heard him go into Moms old room. This surprised me, because he never goes in there for anything. I got up and followed him, and he had opened the closet door in her old bedroom. I wondered what he reached for because our mom had taken the majority of her clothing with her, and even if she hadnt, I wasnt going to wear anything of
hers.
I opened my mouth to tell the Kid that yes, I might be about to tell a guy that I love him, but that didnt mean I needed to do it in a bad thrift-store dress and heels. Before I could speak, he let out a crow of triumph and stopped back out of the closet, holding a tuxedo that was fashionable twenty years ago. Id forgotten it was in there. It belonged to Tys dad and had been left here along with some other things when he and our mom had stopped doing whatever it was theyd been doing. My mom had said she didnt have the heart to throw it away and thought that maybe Ty could wear it on his wedding day. I remember looking at my mom with a strange sort of respect. Of course, that was immediately killed when she continued by saying she wanted Ty to wear it on his wedding day as a reminder to never be a fucking bastard bitch whore like his father was.