Chapter 8: John

Midterms arein full swing and I've taken the week off from any form of work. Apparently, that doesn't mean work has taken the week off from me.

"Where's Inu?" I ask Isamu, where he's made himself comfortable by draping himself over my bed, tossing a tennis ball over his head. He's so at ease despite never having been here before. He looks like he belongs there, pretty and obnoxious like he's been every day since I've met him. Too bad these days are limited.

"Gave her the day off. She's a hard worker; too serious. I worry she doesn't get enough time to be a kid." He flicks the ball against the wall near my head and smirks at my annoyance. "Am I disturbing your studying?"

I turn back toward my desk. The truth is, there isn't any more studying to do. I've spent weeks exhausting myself to keep up and accidentally put myself ahead of the curve. There's only so many more practice exams I can do.

"Yeah, deeply. Where's your boyfriend?"

"Gonzales," Isamu says pointedly, "is with Aaliyah studying for something or another."

"Is studying a strong choice of words?"

Isamu snorts and continues to toss the ball. "Oh yeah. They're definitely taking more study breaks than studying. What about you, Johnny boy? Where's your girlfriend?"

This would be the perfect opportunity to tell Isamu. I'm gay—slip it out there nice and easy. It wouldn't even sound forced or like I'm interested in my client. Which I'm not.

"I'm not aromantic, but I don't date," I tell him truthfully. I don't fuck around with people that are just going to leave me. Which is to say, I don't fuck around with people at all.

"Ha! Of course you don't. Ever so mysterious. Do you get a gold star every time you say something angsty?"

"Do you get a gold star every time you're a dick?" I shoot back, annoyed.

He sits up quickly, smile quickly dropping off his face. "Sorry, got ahead of myself. I envy this," he waves his hand over my general vicinity. "Whole introspective thing you have going on. I actually get it, you know. It's easier to not get hurt if you don't open up," he finishes, laying back on my bed.

"You okay?" I ask, willing to let go of his barb now that I know where it comes from.

He hums in thought and flicks the ball back up.

"I've been thinking?—"

"Dangerous," I cut in.

"I've been thinking," he trucks on, ignoring me. "About that thing you said. ‘Fear of the unknown.' It was one of the many times we were cutting wood."

"Yeah, I remember." I slide my papers into my desk drawer, knowing they're not getting touched for the rest of today.

"I feel like I should be having this conversation with Gonzales—fucking psych majors—but... I don't know. You get me. Or, no, you just don't care?"

"I don't judge?" I supply.

Isamu nods readily. "And you're not going to give me advice. You're just going to... listen. Or not. You're like Inu 2.0."

"How so?" I straddle my desk chair, ready for whatever Isamu is going to give me.

He laughs and rubs the back of his neck, looking away with a blush. "Uh, I talk to her all day. Like all day. She doesn't respond but it's nice."

"Maybe that's why she's so serious. She realizes you're a mess and she has to be the adult." I grin at him.

He launches the ball at the wall near me again. "You're so obnoxious," he says through a laugh. "Shh, seriously. I'm going to be introspective." He waves his hands grandly above his head, still laying on the bed. "Let me channel my inner John."

"Go for it," I challenge.

He sighs. "What if I'm traveling because I'm scared?"

I don't respond.

"Like, uh—man, I gotta be stoned for this. What if my dad still looks at me like I came back broken, and my roommate-slash-best friend is secretly psychoanalyzing me, and what if I just want to travel because everything here is falling apart, but in reality, it's me that's fallen apart?"

He throws the ball.

"That still doesn't feel right."

"It feels closer," I tell him, and he shrugs.

"It does. How do I say it in an angsty John way?" He looks up at me and grins, his chin bunching up unattractively against his neck. It almost makes me smile.

"You don't say anything," I tell him, honestly.

"Does that get lonely?"

I think about it: if I feel alone; lonesome.

"Sometimes." When my dad was too drunk and I was too small to carry him. When Isamu sits in my bed and talks about feelings, but I feel like there's Carolina tar in my throat keeping me from doing the same. "But most of the time, it doesn't."

"Do you get tired of holding everything in your head without anyone to help?"

I'm not sure I'd trust anyone to. If it's too much for me to deal with, how could anyone else? I think of Isamu holding Gonzales up while he was running from his mom. I wonder if Isamu could bear the weight of all of my troubles, but I know that he can't. No one can. That's why they all leave.

"I don't know what you mean, Isa," I tell him, leaning my cheek against the chair.

He smiles. "Now you're calling me that, too?"

"Should I not?"

"No, please do. It's like my baby nickname though, so it's funny to hear it from you." He flicks up the ball but misses the catch.

It hits him in the face but we both ignore it. "Do you ever . . . want people in your life?" he asks. "To help shoulder the burden? To take on dates? Share a bed with or a meal?"

I glance at the bento box Isamu brought me earlier, sitting on my bedside table, and push away the desire.

"Seems kind of cruel to expect that," I tell him.

"I'm sure someone would want to. I hope someone would help shoulder my . . . Isamuness."

Words are hard. Saying things that are going to be thrown away the second Isamu leaves is harder.

Grunting, I stand from my desk chair. "Well, you aren't going to find romance sitting in my room moping. Food?"

Isamu turns down Twinnie's,and Cosmic, and every other suggestion I make until we wind up at his apartment, loudly making ourselves known in fear of walking in on Aaliyah and Gonzales. It's all for naught, however. Aaliyah and Gonzales stare up at us from the kitchen table with matching looks of annoyance.

"Couldn't be sure," Isamu says with a shrug before going into the kitchen.

I look over Aaliyah's shoulder and peer at her studies. "Ah yes, vector calculus. One of the many calculi that every common man should know."

She grabs my chin, her long nails scratching nicely at my itchy beard. "John, I have literally been doing this for five hours straight. Please tell me you come with food."

"I'm making it as we speak," Isamu calls from the kitchen.

Gonzales groans, stands with a luxurious stretch, and follows Isamu's voice to the kitchen. "I should give him a hand."

"Where did we find two hot men that could cook?" Aaliyah asks quietly, pushing her cheek against mine, still holding my chin.

I hum and push away from her. "Don't get it twisted," I tell her, sitting at the table.

Inu trots in from the hallway and pauses to sniff at Aaliyah. Aaliyah gives Inu a practiced scratched between her ears.

"What do you mean? You guys are together all the time and you're gonna tell me you're not even a little interested."

I shrug at Aaliyah, knowing if I tell her that my eyes can't seem to stop seeking out Isamu and my hands itch to reach out, then she won't let it go. Isamu is just a stranger making a pit stop; I have to convince myself to let him go as quickly as he'll let me go.

Inu comes over and stares at me. I stare back. She lays by my feet, and I cede the little space I have so she can rest her head gently over her paws.

"It's not like that," I tell Aaliyah.

She gives a pointed look at Inu, then toward the kitchen. "He's making you food."

Rolling my eyes, I push Aaliyah's papers toward her, hoping she'll let it distract her. It's best not to tell her he makes me food almost every day.

She pushes it away. "I'm not saying every gay guy is an option, John. I'm just saying, he is making you dinner." Her eyes widen and her grin grows mischievous, but I'm already shaking my head.

"It's just friendly. He doesn't know I'm gay."

I'm already putting my hands over Aaliyah's mouth when she gasps, used to her dramatics. I blame her roommate Keelie; she's been slowly making Aaliyah more and more boy-crazy over the years.

"Bitch, how?" she asks.

I laugh and shake my head. "Bitch, because I don't do relationships."

She leans back and frowns. "Do you want to? Like with him."

"No," I say, my voice sounding certain despite my gut twisting.

I frown down at the table, ignoring my discomfort. "Does Gonzales ever make you dinner or do you just leave the whip cream for post-study activities?" I ask with a smirk.

She takes the bait but for some reason, I find that for the first time, I wish she hadn't.

Isamu

Gonzales stands over me,looming and annoying, as I cut onions. The onions are making his eyes water—mine are long used to it. He sniffles, I cut.

"What?" I finally ask. "Are you helping me or just being creepy?"

He laughs, sniffles, and grabs a pair of pork cutlets.

"Mexican or Japanese?" he asks, salting each piece of meat.

"Uh, I don't know. We could do spicy cutlets?"

He leans against the counter and we stare at each other.

"Slice the pork? Make tofu, add some peppers with the seeds and ginger?" I ask, staring at the fridge as I try to think of everything we might have in there.

"Ginger to calm the stomach from all the spicy?" Gonzales grins.

"Does... Aaliyah? Actually," I can't remember if John likes spice, so I stick my head out of the kitchen to ask. "Is spicy—" both of their heads snap up, looking oddly guilty.

"Spice? Yes, no?" I hold my hand up, flipping between thumb up and thumb down.

"Like Cholula?" Aaliyah asks.

Gonzales snorts from the kitchen.

"Sure. Is Cholula too much spice or too little?"

Aaliyah looks at John. He shrugs. They whisper something to each other and I continue to stand there—thumb up, thumb down, decision unmade.

"Too little. I can go hotter," Aaliyah says.

John immediately puts his head in his hands and I grow concerned. "John, that okay?"

"If it's not hotter than Gumbo, I think I'm set," he mumbles, pulling his head up only to motion at Aaliyah and shake his head.

I'm proud to realize I understand John's mannerisms well enough to know he's saying she can't handle the spice.

"We've got Cayenne peppers," I murmur to myself returning to the fridge. I hand Gonzales a few and he snorts.

"This is more than Cholula," he says but starts cutting anyway.

"Just don't put any in hers. We have bell peppers too."

The smells of spice fill the kitchen and Gonzales and I continuously adjust the Japanese tacos as we take samples from each other's sides. If my dad were here, he'd be drinking ginger tea—more milk than tea—just to make it through.

"Was that... too much Cayenne you think?" I ask as I wipe the sweat from my brow after a bite.

Gonzales coughs into a napkin. "Nah," he starts, voice raspy. "It's good shit but I'm definitely calling dibs on the toilet afterwards."

"Solid," I tell him, plating the dishes, making sure I know which hand has Aaliyah's tacos in it.

Inu is, surprisingly, under John when we get to the table. But even more surprisingly, John seems cool and collected, despite her just being inches away. It's not hard to notice that he's grown more used to her while we work on the van conversion. But while I've been letting my hands linger against John's while passing him fifty different types of screwdrivers, maybe they've grown closer than I thought.

Seeing them so close to each other twists my gut in a way that feels like falling and being held all at once. I almost think about switching my plate with Aaliyah's less spicy one until I remind myself John is straight. Now my guts are just falling, quite pathetically falling.

"This isn't even spicy," Aaliyah says triumphantly as she finishes her first taco.

John has been steadily eating his, eyes glued to mine, squinted and goading. I smirk at him as I take another bite, ignoring the bead of sweat that drips down the side of my face. He shakes his head and takes another bite.

Gonzales is long past tapped out, swirling milk in his mouth between bites but carrying on delightedly anyway.

"Are you guys sweating? This is nothing," Aaliyah says proudly. "Man, and I always thought I was such a wuss for spice."

John bites his lip, raising an eyebrow at me. I shrug and take another bite that sears my tongue, but not so much that I can't taste the flavor underneath the burn. It's sweetened and offset by the tofu infused with ginger sugar broth.

"Aaliyah, tesoro, can you get me more milk?" Gonzales begs.

She pops another bite into her mouth and nods. John finally looks away from me when Aaliyah comes back with a Cayenne pepper in hand.

"Can you eat these whole?"

Immediately, we're all making noises of disagreement.

"But they're kind of sweet," she argues, handing Gonzales his milk. He chugs it down straight from the bottle. I stare in disgust.

"Liyah—" John starts, before stopping and just shaking his head.

Aaliyah looks on suspiciously, crossing her arms slowly.

"Why are you guys sweating?"

John stuffs his mouth and looks down at his plate, tapping out of the conversation. She isn't my girlfriend, so I turn away from the conversation, expecting Gonzales to nut up. He just continues on with his milk.

"Are you guys serious?" She lunges for one of Gonzales's tacos needlessly—he doesn't even fight her on it—and takes a bite.

John and I continue our stare off as soon as Aaliyah spits the bite into a napkin.

"Why did you make mine softer?" she asks, annoyed.

Gonzales finally takes a breath. "You thought Cholula was spicy, but if it makes you feel better, I'd rather have yours."

John and I get through our second taco. There's only one left. He takes the first bite, my stomach rolls; sweat drips into my eyes; John's barely even bothered.

"Is this like a pissing match?" Aaliyah asks, steering clear of Gonzales and his groaning.

"That's exactly what it is," he tells her.

John takes another bite. I hesitate, trying not to eyeball the milk. My eyes are watering but if I wipe them, I'll risk getting seeds in my eyes. I take a bite.

John grins and slowly, ever so cruel, puts the entire soft taco into his mouth. I blanch and breathe deeply in through my nose before doing the same.

He chews slowly and calmly. I spit it out into the napkin and reach for the jug of milk.

"Well, this has been fantastic," John says standing up. "Thank you both for the meal, but I should probably get back to studying."

He pats my sweaty back on the way out as I drink from the milk jug.

"Pinche, John. Where'd you find him, Aaliyah?" Gonzales asks.

I groan and lay my head on the table just as Inu comes and snuffles against my leg, even off duty, she can smell and hear my heart beating out of control. I just wish I could blame it on the tacos.