“Listen,” he says after it’s clear that my fumbling for a response is going nowhere. “I…I’ve got something for you. I hope it’s not weird. I was planning to give it to you anyway, but I didn’t get around to it, and…and regardless of how you feel about me—about us—I still hope you’ll keep it.”
He pulls his backpack off his shoulder and digs around inside for a sec, then emerges with a small cardboard box tied with a somewhat-wilted ribbon.
I don’t know what to do besides take the box. I tug at one end of the ribbon until the bow unravels. And when I open it—
“Oh my god. Is this—”
“It’s a Leica range finder. Thirty-five millimeter. Hannah Wilke shot in thirty-five millimeter a lot. But you can’t find thirty-five millimeter anymore, and this, I thought you might—”
“Wyatt, this thing costs almostsix thousand dollars!”
He looks a little bit like he wants to die on the spot. “I didn’t pay for it,” he says quickly. “I mean, I did. But it was a while ago. This was the first expensive camera I ever got myself. I thought maybe you could use it better than I can now. Or at least, I’d love to see what you do with it.”
I’m staring at him with my mouth hanging open. A friggin’ Leica. Afriggin’, frick-frick Leica. HisLeica. The one he shotCloudburston. And he wants to see what I make with it. He wants me to make art with his Leica.
“Wyatt—”
“There’s more,” he says. At this point he’s clearly just rushing to get it all out before I can tell him to fuck off again. “Look.”
I lift the camera up and there it is—a roll of thirty-five-millimeter film. Still good.
“I only had the one roll left,” he says apologetically, “but…”
“You didn’t need to do this,” I breathe at last.
He messes up his hair even worse this time. I really, really want to reach up and fix it for him. To slide my fingers into those chestnut waves and—
“I’m sorry; I know. I’m not trying to, like— This isn’t a bribe. I really did plan to give it to you anyway.”
This man. Thisman. Thisincredible,fantastic, gorgeous man.
I can’t help smiling now, the expression creeping across my face despite my best efforts. Wyatt’s clutching his backpack in both hands now, holding on for dear life.
“Okay,” I say. “That’s fine. I’ll accept your apology, pending future discussions.”
Wyatt still looks so pitifully remorseful, all cow eyes again—what is it with this man and the bovine woe? I stop him before he can utter another heartbreaking apology.
“And,” I say, “I meant to say it. Iwantto say it, and I want—I want you to know how much this means to me. I love you too, Wyatt. More than anything.”
Wyatt’s shock is so artistically satisfying, it could be a gallery show on its own. Maybe my next collection will be calledMeditations on a Fish Mouth.
“Really?” he says at last. His cheeks are flushed. I wonder if his heart is pounding as fast as mine is. I’m clutching the Leica like someone might swoop down and steal it, but I wish I were clutching him instead. I wish I could bury my face against his strong chest and breathe in the scent of him as his arms curl around me and hold me tight.
“Really. So much.” I take a breath and then another one, a steadying one. “But it’s kind of weird having this conversationright now, with the whole…” I gesture, indicating the entire gallery, the students and critics milling about.
He laughs, his shoulders finally settling down to their usual position. “Yeah. Sorry. I probably could have chosen a better location for my grand declaration of love.”
“Just a tiny, tiny bit. But since we already fucked that part up,” I say, “we should go back to your apartment. And then we should have sex. Lots of sex. As soon as possible. In fact, can we get out of here right now?”
And there—that’s the suave fucker I met at Revel. He quirks up a corner of his lips. “I think we have a solid fifteen minutes before the crowd starts to dwindle. But at that point…absolutely, we can make our daring escape.”
He hesitates a second, that vulnerability creeping back in. “Ely, I really do…I care about you. More than you can imagine. You mean the world to me, and I almost lost you. I never want to make that mistake again. I promise you I won’t.”
He takes a half step closer to me, then another. And then he slides his hand along my cheek and he kisses me—right there, in front of everyone.
I almost drop the Leica, but Wyatt—thank god—is quick enough to slide his hand between us and cup it beneath mine, holding the precious camera bracketed between our bodies as his other hand slips around the small of my back and pulls my hips in toward him.
When the kiss breaks, I’m off-balance, giddy and effervescent, like my whole body is filled with Wyatt’s damn LaCroix.
