tiny: you’re not.
me: i am.
tiny: says who?
me: says me?
tiny: don’t i get any say?
me: no. i just ruin it. you don’t get any say.
tiny touches my ear lightly.
tiny: you know, you get all sexy when you turn destructive.
his fingers run down my neck, under my collar.
tiny: i know i can’t change your dad or your mom or your past. but you know what i can do?
his other hand works its way up my leg.
me: what?
tiny: something else. that’s what i can give you. something else.
I am so used to bringing out the pain in people. but tiny refuses to play that game. while we’re texting all day, and even here in person, he’s always trying to get to the heart of it. and that means he always assumes there’s a heart to get to. i think that’s ridiculous and admire it at the same time. i want the something else he has to give me, even though i know it’s never going to be something i can actually take and have as my own.
I know it’s not as easy as tiny says it is. but he’s trying so hard. so i surrender to it. i surrender to something else.
even if my heart isn’t totally believing it.
Chapter fifteen
The next day, Tiny isn’t in precalc. I assume he’s hunched over somewhere writing songs into a comically undersized notebook. It doesn’t bother me much. I see him between second and third period when I walk past his locker; his hair looks unwashed and his eyes are wide.
“Too much Red Bull?” I ask, walking up to him.
He answers all in a furious rush. “Play opens in nine days, Will Grayson’s adorable, everything’s cool. Listen, Grayson, I gotta go to the auditorium, I’ll see you at lunch.”
“The other Will Grayson,” I say.
“What, huh?” Tiny asks, slamming his locker shut.
“The other Will Grayson’s adorable.”
“Right, quite right,” he answers.
He’s not at our table at lunch, and neither is Gary or Nick or Jane or anyone, and I don’t want the entire table to myself, so I take my tray to the auditorium, figuring I’ll find everyone there. Tiny’s standing in the middle of the stage, a notebook in one hand and his cell in the other, gesticulating wildly. Nick ’s sitting in the first row of seats. Tiny’s talking to Gary onstage, and because the acoustics are fantastic in our auditorium, I can hear exactly what he’s saying even from the back.
“The thing you’ve gotta remember about Phil Wrayson is that he is totally freaking terrified. Of everything. He acts like he doesn’t care, but he’s closer to falling apart than anyone else in the whole freaking play. I want to hear the quiver in his voice when he’s singing, the need he hopes no one can hear. Because that’s gotta be what makes him so annoying, you know? The things he says aren’t annoying; it’s the way he says them. So when Tiny is taping up those Pride posters, and Phil won’t shut up about the stupid girl problems he brought on himself, we’ve gotta hear what’s annoying. But you can’t overdo it, either. It’s the slightest little thing, man. It’s the pebble in your shoe.”
I just stand there for a minute, waiting for him to see me, and then finally he does. “He’s a CHARACTER, Grayson,” Tiny shouts. “He’s a FICTIONAL CHARACTER.”
Still holding my tray, I spin around and leave. I sit down outside the auditorium on the tile floor of the hallway, leaning up against a trophy case, and I eat a little.
I’m waiting for him. To come out and apologize. Or else to come out and yell at me for being a pu**y. I’m waiting for those dark wood double doors to open and for Tiny to blow through them and start talking.
I know it’s immature, but I don’t care. Sometimes you need your best friend to walk through the doors. And then, he doesn’t. Finally, feeling small and stupid, it’s me who gets up and cracks open the door. Tiny is happily singing about Oscar Wilde. I stand there for a moment, still hoping he’ll see me, and I don’t even know that I’m crying until this crooked sound comes up out of me as I inhale. I close the door. If Tiny ever sees me, he doesn’t pause to acknowledge it.
I walk down the hallway, my head down so far that the salt water drips from the tip of my nose. I walk out the main door—the air cold, the sun warm—and down the steps. I follow the sidewalk until I get to the security gate, then I dart into the bushes. Something in my throat feels like it might choke me. I walk through the shrubs just like Tiny and I did freshman year when we skipped to go down to Boys Town for the Pride Parade where he came out to me.
I walk all the way to this Little League field that’s halfway between my house and school. It’s right by the middle school, and when I was a kid, I used to go there a lot by myself, like after school or whatever, just to think. Sometimes I would bring a sketchbook or something and try to draw, but mostly I just liked to go there. I walk around the backstop fence and sit down on the bench in the dugout, my back against the aluminum wall, warmed by the sunlight, and I cry.
Here’s what I like about the dugout: I’m on the third base side, and I can see the diamond of dirt in front of me and the four rows of wooden bleachers on one side; and then on the other side, the outfield and the next diamond over; and then a large park, and then the street. I can see people walking their dogs, and a couple walking into the wind. But with my back to the wall, with this aluminum roof over my head, no one can see me unless I can see them.
The rarity of the situation is the kind of thing that makes you cry.
Tiny and I actually played Little League together—not in this park, but in one closer to our houses, starting in third grade. That’s how we became friends, I guess. Tiny was strong as hell, of course, but not much good with the bat. He did lead the League in getting hit by pitches, though. There was so much to hit.
I played a respectable first base and didn’t lead the League in anything.
I put my elbows on my knees like I did back when I was watching games from a dugout like this one. Tiny always sat next to me, and even though he only played because the coach had to play everyone, he was super-enthusiastic. He’d be all, “Hey, batter batter. Hey, batter batter, SWING, batter,” and then eventually he’d switch to, “We want a pitcher, not a bellyitcher!”
Then, sixth grade: Tiny was playing third base, and I was at first. It was early in the game, and we were either just barely winning or just barely losing—I don’t remember. Honestly, I never even looked at the score when I was playing. Baseball for me was just one of those weird and terrible things parents do for reasons you cannot fathom, like flu shots and church. So the batter hit the ball, and it rolled to Tiny. Tiny gloved it and threw the ball to first with his cannon arm, and I stretched out to make the catch, careful to keep a foot on the bag, and the ball hit me in the glove and then immediately fell out, because I forgot to squeeze the glove shut. The runner was safe, and the mistake cost us a run or something. After the inning ended, I went back to the dugout. The coach—I think his name was Mr. Frye—leaned down toward me. I became aware of the bigness of his head, his cap riding high over his fat face, and he said, “FOCUS on CATCHING the BALL. CATCH the BALL, okay? Jesus!” My face felt flush, and with that quiver in my voice that Tiny pointed out to Gary, I said, “Suhrry, Coach,” and Mr. Frye said, “Me too, Will. Me too.”