Ben sat on the king-sized bed and looked around. Music and baseball posters covered most of the walls. He found all sports boring, but at least some of these featured pretty hot athletes. The only exception to the generic posters was an abstract painting, a collection of cool colors that might be depicting an ocean or waves. He stared at it for a while, wondering why it had been included. Did Tim choose it, or was it his mother’s idea?
Across from Ben sat a dresser that supported a medium-sized television and VCR. A closet door and bookshelves were to his right, this time actually filled with the intended content. Ben browsed the titles, hoping to get a hint of what Tim liked to read but unable to do so. They were a completely eclectic mix, some even written in Spanish. His music choice was easier to discern, the CD rack containing nothing but popular alternative music. Well, that and the Little Mermaid soundtrack. Ben mentally filed that one away as potential ammunition.
He paused to gaze out the bedroom window at the long, well-groomed backyard before returning to the dressers to collect a change of clothes. Socks were easy to find, as was underwear. He didn’t examine the contents of this drawer too carefully. Doing so felt like cheating, like peeking ahead at the end of a book, since he hoped to discover Tim’s underwear one by one over a series of hot encounters. Ben laughed at his own presumptions and went to the closet for a shirt and jeans.
He brought these items and the pillows back downstairs to his patient. The pizza was soon done afterwards and served. They ate together while flipping back and forth between MTV and VH1 to avoid commercials, laughing at most of the videos but genuinely enjoying a handful. There were quite a few songs that Ben wanted to sing along to, but for the first time in his life he was feeling too shy to perform. Finally the Fugees’ new version of “Killing Me Softly” came on, which was too perfect of an opportunity to show off.
Ben gave it all he had, belting it out along with the lead vocals and almost putting Lauryn Hill’s voice to shame. Tim sat straight up, his eyes wide in amazement. He clapped and raved when the song was over and spent the next hour trying to get Ben to sing along to some of the other videos. A few, like Beck, were a hopeless cause, but for some of them Ben was able to comply.
After a while Tim switched off the TV.
“So what’s it like being gay?” he asked, catching Ben off guard.
“Like anything else I guess,” Ben answered. “What’s it like to be whatever you are?”
“Straight,” Tim assured him. “Don’t you catch a lot of slack for it? I mean, everyone at school knows, right?”
Ben nodded.
“I’m surprised you don’t get beaten up every day.”
“I get a lot of crap,” Ben said with a shrug, “but I got crap before I came out for totally different reasons. It’s no different now. Not really.”
“I guess that’s true. If it’s not one thing, it’s another.”
Ben rolled his eyes. “Like you would know. It must be hard being a jock with rich parents and a brand-new sports car. People must tease you unmercifully.”
Tim’s grin was cocky. “When you put it like that, I do have it good, but I still get crap from other people. Miss a catch or don’t make it to base and your team turns on you, especially if you lose the game.”
Ben made sure he didn’t look convinced.
“Well, all right, how about this then?” The smile dropped from Tim’s face. “At my last school my ex-girlfriend went around telling everyone that I raped her, just because I dumped her. I had every girl in the school coming up to me and saying the craziest shit. A few even tried to knee me. It was insane.”
“What happened?”
“What do you mean? Nothing happened. It was her word against mine, but she didn’t take it to the police or anything because she knew the truth. It blew over after a while, but people never treated me the same afterwards. You don’t know how glad I am to have a fresh start.”
“The idea sounds appealing,” Ben admitted.
“Would you still come out? If you moved to the other side of the country where no one knew, would you come out again?”
“Yeah,” Ben answered immediately. “Are you kidding me? What would I do otherwise? Pretend I’m into girls and start sleeping with them?”
Tim only shrugged in response.
“I’d definitely come out again. It’s the only chance I have at meeting someone else who is gay. It pays to advertise. That’s the theory at least.”
“No luck in the romance department?” Tim asked with an amused expression.
“Not really. Not love at least.”
A garish cuckoo clock came to life, the little bird popping out and returning to its little home seven times.
“Jesus, I should get home.” Ben hurried to leave, pulling a shoe onto the wrong foot before realizing it and reaching for the other. “Are you going to be all right? There’s drinks and stuff in the fridge and leftover pizza on the counter. Should I bring it in?”
“Naw, I can manage.”
“I thought I’d come by in the morning to make breakfast and check on you, and then again in the afternoon?” Ben didn’t mean to phrase it as a question. He wanted to say it like it was the obvious thing to do.
“Yeah?” Tim answered with his own inquiry. “You’d do that for me?”
“That and a hell of a lot more.” The words were out of his mouth before his brain could stop them. The only damage control he could do was a nervously little laugh, which probably made him sound twice as crazy. “Uh, so see you tomorrow then,” he said before he made a mad dash for the door.
* * * * *
The pancakes were the right shape--round and flat. They were also spongy like they should be. Only the color was off. The first few out of the pan were an albino version of the normal brown variety. The next three were almost black. Ben had no idea what he had done wrong.
He had read and reread the simple instructions in his mom’s Betty Crocker cookbook three or four times and had even written down the basics, but these didn’t look right at all. He shoveled the last pancake onto the plate with the others and poured a generous amount of syrup over them to conceal their inadequacies.
If Tim noticed that they weren’t quite right, he didn’t let on. It may have helped that he had taken a painkiller when Ben had shown up half an hour ago. His eyes had a certain glazed look about them when Ben presented his creation. Within five minutes the entire plate had been cleared and licked clean.
“A guy could get used to this,” Tim said appreciatively as Ben carried the plate back to the kitchen.
Next up was Tim’s request for a bath. This idea had already been the subject of more than one of Ben’s fantasies the last few days. In them he had to assist his poor, helpless invalid out of his clothing, place him in the bathtub, and sponge clean every delicious nook and cranny of his body. This, of course, would lead to an involuntary physical reaction on Tim’s part, one so intense that he’d beg Ben for relief.
The reality wasn’t anywhere near as exciting. Ben was asked to run the bath before he left for school, Tim insisting that he could manage the rest on his own. If this was true then it was also clear that Tim could have turned the faucet on by himself, but Ben let it slide. The more indispensable he became the better.
As the tub filled and the bubble bath frothed, Ben thought of how he was supposed to be in P.E. this very moment. He felt deliriously happy about missing it, but he still had to make it back to school in time for roll call in English class. Even though he had awakened early to have extra time, he already needed to leave if he wanted to make it.