22. Marsh

TWENTY-TWO

Marsh

Here's the thing you need to know about Data: The man wears the hell out of a watch.

There's something about a man in a nice watch that's sexy, like a gay Clark Gable. I got him a fancy one for his thirty-fifth. I'm glad he didn't get rid of it post-break up. It's thick with a big head, and oozes charm. Like another part of him. The timepiece makes his wrist and forearm bulge with strength and assuredness. Sometimes, I'd glimpse it while he pushed my head into his crotch and get turned on even more.

Data taps the watch as he scans the cabin, sending a quick jolt of heat down my spine.

"Okay, we have approximately twenty-three hours to pack up this place and get the hell off this mountain."

The heat dissipates as soon as I stare out on what remains of Marshmallow Mountain. Maddi was right about the power coming back on sooner rather than later. Or maybe it was the chickens. The cabin is in a state of hellish disarray that comes with packing. If the gods really wanted to punish Sisyphus, they'd force him to pack up his apartment anew every day.

Data heaves out a breath through his inexplicably sexy nostrils. "We can do this."

Fortunately, after plowing our road, Duffy helped Data shovel out our cars. I offered to help, but he insisted I hang back and avoid another near-death moment.

According to the weather app—and Maddi's chickens—the next blizzard is scheduled to start late Monday afternoon. Twenty-three hours left to pack. Twenty-three hours left to put a final, permanent stamp on this relationship. Twenty-three hours left with Data.

Can we be one of those couples that transitions to actual friends? It's a very common thing in the gay community. Gay guys get each other in a way the rest of the world doesn't, and we also want to jump each other's bones. It's a feature, not a bug. But I don't know if I can be only friends with Data. Meet up for coffee or hang out at a game night knowing that we won't be going home together?

I know I chose this, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. People choose to eat salad to be healthy, even though it's salad. Keeping our relationship kaput is me being healthy. I can't let myself get tempted to eat Data's salad.

I should've picked a different metaphor.

Data claps his hands in front of my face. "Focus. We haven't made efficient use of our time this weekend. Time is ticking."

I don't need the reminder. "We got this. I once wrote, directed, and performed a play in twenty-four hours."

" A Fire Island Rumspringa . I remember." He laughs to himself. "That was the weirdest show I've ever seen of yours, and that's saying something."

I'm so grateful that he hasn't lost his sense of humor throughout this manic, hot, emotionally draining, life-threatening weekend. When I needed him on short notice, Data stepped up, something I won't forget. He's a real mensch.

"Thanks again for coming up here. I appreciate it." I take my phone from my pocket and put it on the kitchen counter. Less temptation to scroll .

Even though the power's back, there's no sense in wasting perfectly good candles, so I light the cabin with candles and the crackling fire of the woodburning stove.

Nothing romantic about that.

"Yeah, no problem." Data places fresh logs in the fireplace and gets it roaring. "If I'd known that you were in … if your financial situation … you didn't have to feel forced to sell the cabin if you didn't want to."

"There's no sense in keeping it, right?" I say with a shrug. "It's time to let this place go."

"How bad are things for you right now?" He squints at me as if I'm a ledger with a logical solution.

"I'm good."

"Marsh." He tips his head at me. It's very hard to lie to someone you love. I should've gotten an Oscar for making it through my crap break-up excuse six months ago. Or at least a Golden Globe. Hey, if Madonna could win one for Evita …

My shoulders slump. "I've been getting by with temp jobs until I figure out my next move."

"So that's it? You're just done with comedy entirely?"

"My big break came and I blew it. Time to move on." The hard truth with a career in the arts is that some people launch into stardom on a rocket ship, and others muddle along waiting for their rocket to arrive. Sometimes it has to do with talent, but not always. I've seen comedians that I think are doing next-level stuff on stage, like Preeti, but they can't break through. I try to stay positive in front of Data because nobody likes a Debbie Downer (unless it's Rachel Dratch, of course).

"What if Laughingstock wasn't your big break? What if it was just another bump in the road? Not every successful comedian is discovered at the festival. In fact, I'd wager that statistically, the majority of big breaks don't happen at Laughingstock."

"I love that you managed to bring numbers into this conversation." I chuckle at his analysis, but there's a kernel of truth that stimulates something in the back of my head. A pilot light clicking on. His math is mathing. There are a million different ways to breakthrough. Laughingstock was simply one option. What if it was just meant to be a bump? A test to see if I have the fortitude. And I'm bailing.

"I really admire you, Marsh."

"The backbreaking labor of trying to make people laugh?" I ask.

"You've worked really hard."

I shrug my shoulders. "Am I going to find my rocket, or am I one of those people destined to fade into obscurity? I wish I could know that in advance."

"Everybody wishes they knew that in advance. That's not how life works." Data begins opening a box and taping the bottom. I take one and join him. For the life of me, I am incapable of rolling out a piece of tape in a straight line.

"Be honest with me: Did you ever think about quitting accounting and trying to give woodworking a legitimate shot? Was there ever a tiny, kitten whisper of a thought in your head that it could work?"

Data scratches at his beard for a moment. I appreciate that he's giving the question honest consideration.

"Yeah. I thought about it here and there. I'll admit, watching you take the leap got the wheels turning for me."

That's news to me. Whenever I broached the topic with him in our relationship, he was a firm no. I guess we couldn't know every thought in our partner's head.

"I actually talked to a furniture designer to fully understand what it requires."

"You did?"

My heart races as he nods. Ever the multi-tasker, he begins packing his box with cookbooks from the small shelf above the sink. No matter what we say, no matter if we use them or not, neither of us have the heart to throw cookbooks with beautiful photos into the trash.

"I ran through scenarios of what it would look like," he says. "But it wasn't for me."

"Why?" I open the nearby kitchen cabinet and wrap glasses in newspaper.

"I don't know."

"That's not an answer. Did you get scared?" I place the glassware gently in the box.

He considers the question. Another beard scratch with his watch-wearing hand. A second jolt of heat fizzles down my spine. Data doesn't even realize all these little moments of his are hot—which makes them even hotter.

"A little," he admits. "Marsh, you don't understand. You grew up differently than me."

"My dad's business wasn't some cash cow. It ebbed and flowed."

"The fact that you can say ‘my dad's business' means you don't understand. I know there were tight times for Harmony when you were younger, but did you ever feel it as a kid?"

"I mean, my parents didn't really discuss business financials with me and Albie."

"You never had to worry about food on the table or gas in the car. You never had the landlord personally come to your apartment to hand you an eviction notice. You never went to bed with a sick feeling in your stomach after watching your mom cry." Data looks away and grabs a vegetarian cookbook we really should trash. He doesn't yell, but there is a quiet intensity in his voice that hits me in the gut.

I stop mid-newspaper roll of a wine glass. After eight years together, it's still possible to learn something new about your partner. He always told me things were tight growing up, but he never wanted to elaborate.

"I didn't know things were that bad." My heart breaks for little Data curled up in his bed. I hate that there's nothing I can do to change his past, that he has to live with those memories for the rest of his life.

"My entire childhood was a rough patch," he says flatly. "I didn't want to talk about it. And you … I mean, you said that when Harmony had a tough year, your parents could only send you to summer camp for one month, not two."

I hang my head, laughing at my insensitive Karen Walker moment. "God, how you never smacked me all those times."

"It's hard to be mad at you. That's one of your best qualities."

"I'm sorry you didn't feel comfortable talking to me about stuff like that."

"It's not your fault. I didn't want to share. I don't want people's pity."

I can't stop thinking about little Data and his mom. She's a sweet woman, but she also doesn't take shit from anyone. I can see how that kind of struggle can wear a person down.

"Now I get why she was so adamant about you choosing a safe profession. I'm sorry for telling you to quit all those times." I swallow past the lump in my throat. He didn't have the luxury to follow his passion. "You've done well, Da–Marshall. She's proud of you."

"You're probably right. I don't like my job, but I don't hate it." He exhales a breath of relief as if it were some big secret he was keeping. "When I looked into woodworking as a career, it wasn't just the uncertainty. There are parts of my work that I enjoy. I like business and working with a team, and I like finding a story in the numbers."

"Plot twist. Data likes data."

"You gave me the nickname because of my butt, and you wound up capturing my whole personality. Go figure." He cracks a smile, then tests lifting his box of books to make sure it's liftable. "We can get a few more in here. "

He walks over to a shelf of fiction in the living room and clotheslines a row of smaller paperbacks onto his lap.

He reads the cover of a paperback and snorts. "Do you remember when you bought this?"

Data turns it to me. The familiar pinched face of a man either crying or orgasming catches my eye.

" A Little Life !" I swipe it from him. "I'm still planning to read this. I promise."

"That's what you said when you bought it what? Five years ago?"

"I'll get excommunicated from homosexuality if I don't read it." I weigh the tomb in my hand. "We only went into that store because you saw a black cat napping in the front window, so this purchase is partially your fault."

I hand it back, but Data refuses, making the man on the cover cry and/or orgasm more.

"I'm not schlepping it into a storage unit. That thing is a door-stopper of depression."

"Fine. I'll keep it." I might read it … or I might use it for the wobbly leg of Preeti's coffee table. "But if I'm forced to keep this, then you are taking these back home with you."

From the back of the kitchen cabinet, I pull a six piece set of little blue-and-white tea cups and coasters. They are covered in dust because they have never been used.

He bursts into a wild gale of laughter. "They're nice!"

"You made us drive all the way back to that antique store so you could buy these. So we could have high tea with a quilting bee, I'm assuming. Even though I reminded you multiple times that we don't drink tea and we already have coffee mugs." For some gay men, like Data, old lady antiques were as addictive as poppers.

Data puts his hand on A Little Life as if about to go on the witness stand. "I swear to take this lovely tea set home with me. "

I put my hand over his and take a similar stance. "And I swear to take this book home, read it, and cry my eyes out."

I rub my thumb over his pinky. His pinky wraps around my thumb, gives it a squeeze, melting my heart. It's one of those perfect fleeting moments that I'll randomly flash back repeatedly and smile to myself while riding the subway.

"Hey. I have an idea." I quirk an eyebrow. "We've already had le breakup sex. But we haven't had le breakup meal. The stove's working. What do you say, for old time's sake? I'll make your favorite."

Data doesn't even try to protest. I may be a so-so comic, and a so-so ex-boyfriend, but I make a damn good matzoh ball soup.