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“Bobby, how do you mean he already does?”
“I just …” I drop on the couch behind me. My ass nearly misses the cushion, catching clumsily on the arm. I shut my eyes. “I’m …”
“You can tell me, sweetheart.”
My eyes are still closed. My heart drums frantically in my chest. She isn’t like the gossips of Spruce, I reassure myself. If you tell her what’s going on, she won’t spill it to anyone else.
She’s your Ma. You can trust her.
Just say it.
“Jimmy … has feelings for me,” I murmur, almost a whisper, to the back of my eyelids.
I don’t hear any noise, like every muscle in her body is as still as an iron piece of furniture across the room.
And then: “Well, of course he does, honey.”
“No.” I keep talking with my eyes closed. “Actual feelings. The ones you have for a … for a boyfriend. He has feelings for me. Real ones. Real and actual ones.”
Really, how many more ways can I say it?
I hear her hands drop to her lap. “Are you sure?”
“He’s kissed me. More than once.” I take a deep breath. “He and I are … figuring things out right now. It’s complicated.”
“Okay.” I hear shuffling, her rising from her chair, and then there’s a set of arms wrapping around me, hugging me close.
I lean into her hug.
Why was that so difficult, yet so easy to say out loud?
Strangely, I feel little relief. I don’t think I’ll feel relief until I know for sure that this isn’t just some exciting new sexual game Jimmy is playing with me.
I want to know it’s for real.
I want to know that Jimmy isn’t going to break my heart, in the same way he’s broken countless girls’ hearts at school. I had the pleasure of watching each and every one of them break. Some girls didn’t get the hint, and they’d puppy-dog me all the time, saying things like, “You’re close to him. Can you find out what I did wrong? Why he isn’t returning my calls? Please, Bobby, you’re my only hope. I’m crazy for him.” Over and over, girls would come to me, their new gay best friend, begging to know what they did wrong with the infamous Jimmy Strong.
What if it was none of their faults?
What if Jimmy is just a professional heartbreaker?
Then my ma goes: “So is he a good kisser?”
My eyes pop open. I pull away and give her a look.
She shrugs innocently, then sits on the couch next to me. “I’m just tryin’ to have a little conversation. This is … This is not what I was expectin’ to hear. About you and Jimmy. I need to process.”
There’s a buzz in my pocket. A text from Jimmy, I’m certain of it. “Ma, I know you’ve probably got a lot of questions, but—”
“Ya darn tootin’ I do,” she sings in her cute, feathery voice.
“—I really just want to clean up, shower, and go spend some time with Jimmy tonight at his place. We’ve got a lot to figure out. And I think the only way to really do it is to … well …” My heart still races. “… to spend time together. Just me … and Jimmy.”
“Mmm.” My ma fidgets with her fingers for a while. Then she nods, rises off the couch, and stops by the kitchen. “Well, go take your shower, and at least I can warm you up some casserole before you go. You’ve got to be hungry after your long day.”
I smile wanly. “Starved.”
“And I guess Jimmy will be comin’ by to scoop you up? Or do you need me to take you?”
“I’m sure he’ll come get me. He’s … probably sufferin’ from a bit of cabin fever. His ma’s workin’ him to the bone on dance stuff and farmhand management, far as I know.”
“Mmm, to own a farm.” My ma shrugs, then disappears.
And I pull out my phone to check the buzz from earlier. Just as I predicted, it’s Jimmy telling me he’s already halfway to my house. By the time I’m showered and dinner’s ready, Jimmy will be here before I even take my first bite.
I text him back, then call out, “You got space for one more at the table, Ma?”
Of course she does.
After taking a speedy shower to wash off the filth of being a movie theater usher with questionable stains all over my body and grease marks all over my uniform, I feverishly dry off. Then I go and throw on a pair of tight red boxer-briefs, denim shorts, and a fitted red-and-blue soccer jersey top with yellow trim at the neck and the ends of the sleeves, which cling to my arms.
Then I stare at myself in the bathroom mirror, unsure.
What’s missing?
I pull my shorts open and take a peek down at my dick.
Should I manscape a little? Squirt a spritz of cologne down in the jungle? Massage in a little oil or cream?
