Losers (10 page)

He peered at me through slanted eyes. “Really?”

“I mean—not that about Ms. Fortinbras, no. Bates, why are you asking me? Is this some mind game where you're going to lull me into a false sense of security and then dislocate my nose or stick jalapeño peppers up my butt or sacrifice me to goats?”

Bates winced at the bit about the jalapeño peppers, but other-wise, he squinted at me like I was speaking in tongues. “Hey, look, man, if you don't want to talk, you can just go,” he said. He gestured toward the boulevard that lay before us.

“And you'll just let me?”

“Well, no. I mean, I'll probably give you a black eye or something, but just for aesthetic purposes. I can't just let you walk away empty-handed.”

I considered. “Okay…so what do you want to talk about?”

Bates waited, as if he hadn't at all expected me to choose that option. When he finally did speak, he did it in a completely different voice—methodical, plotted out, as if he was taking baby steps on the moon.

“I want to go downtown with you,” he announced at last.

“What?” I said, and then, “Why?”

“To meet guys,” said Bates.

T
he day was clear, not a cloud in the sky. The outside temperature was exactly the same as the temperature of a warm bowl of soup, and the wind was a tepid massage rubbing at my skin. Bates's face was honest, plaintive. As if his meaning was clear as day and
I
was the one who was being completely obfuscating, instead of the other way round.

I looked at him askew. “You mean, like, other kids to beat up? Or metal guys—like, other guys like you? I've only been down there a few times before, I swear, I don't know where any concerts or anything even
are
.”

“No,” said Bates matter-of-factly. “Like, guys to date.”

I didn't know how I got roped into these things. Most of the problem-child moments in my life, from the time I swallowed all the glue in first-grade arts and crafts class and onward, began the same way—I started taking people seriously and didn't know how to stop.

We climbed on the bus together that day. The driver was my
regular driver, who gave me an even weirder look than usual. I popped in an extra token for Bates. He nodded curtly at the driver, brushed past me, and went straight to the seats in the back where he plopped himself down, taking up the entire row. He sat with his legs spread wide, elbows resting on his knees, hands dangling absently between them. His eyes went straight forward. His nose twitched as if he was sniffing the air for danger. I noticed that he had left his staff back at school. Every few minutes, he would glance over at me, making sure I was still there, that I hadn't wandered off and was still sitting up straight in my seat. When the window views started changing from run-down ghetto neighborhoods to gas stations and warehouses and then to skyscrapers and coffeehouses, his gaze never left me.

“Th-this is downtown,” I managed to stutter. “So, whe—uh, just where exactly were you thinking that you wanted to go?”

Bates's lips barely cracked open. In the small division of his mouth, his teeth still gripped each other.

“Just go wherever you usually go,” he snarled.

I yanked the stop cord at Twelfth and Vine, one of the places I usually liked to get off. The main downtown action was still a few blocks away, but I liked to walk for a few blocks to get myself out of school mode and into the swing of things. Twelfth and Vine, I figured, was far enough away from the coffeehouses and record stores so I could avoid being publicly embarrassed, but still populated enough so that Bates wouldn't be tempted to dump my body somewhere.

I scampered down the rear steps. Bates was right behind me. The bus deposited us on the corner, a graffiti mural facing us to one side, the early autumn wind blowing at us from the other. I
folded my arms, looked one way first and then the other, and scrunched my face up in confusion.

“Do what you'd normally do. Pretend like I'm not even here,” Bates instructed.

I gave him one last look of uncertainty. He gave a firm nod. I turned around, looked in the direction of the city, and plotted. The coffeehouse, where we would be seen, inspected, and on display for the entire community of people, was out of the question. So I turned down South Street, into the swarming throng of bizarre-looking locals and European tourists who mobbed the sidewalk, and headed for Repo Records.

From down the street, I could see their sign hanging. Only the interlocking
R
s and part of a vinyl record were visible, the rest obscured by band stickers and concert posters. I don't want to sound too melodramatic, but I got a little chill. In this dangerous jungle of leading Bates around, it was like I'd sighted my backup.

We stopped in front of the door.

Or, rather, Bates stopped me. “No one around here's gay,” he hissed in my ear. “Take me somewhere else.”

“I don't
know
anywhere else,” I insisted.

Bates's grip on my shoulder tightened. “Stop being kvetchy,” he said. “Or I'll—”

Heat rushed to my face. Suddenly, I felt all the fear in my body changing to something else. At first I thought it was anger, but then I realized—it was annoyance. Bates might still be bigger than me, and he might still be one step away from beating me into chewing gum, but he wanted something from me. And that meant, one way or another, that I was in control.

“You'll
what
? Look, Bates—I am about ninety-nine percent as clueless as you. This is the only place I've ever seen any kind of gay, lesbian, or otherwise non-heterosexually themed people or propaganda on display in any store,
ever
. I seriously don't know what you're expecting from me, or where else to take you, or what I'm supposed to do to prevent getting a bloody nose by the time this is over. So unless you know where the local underground disco bar is or unless you've got a better idea, this is our first stop. Got it?”

I jammed my hands into my pockets—quickly, because I didn't want him to see how thoroughly my body was shaking. In reality, the only totem of gay culture I'd ever seen here was two guys with crew cuts and leather vests holding hands while they checked out the David Bowie section, but that was the firmest lead I had.

Bates nodded his assent, and we walked into the store.

Today it was mostly empty, the aisles devoid of people, the floor-to-ceiling black, chipping, wooden CD racks looking relatively neat and unscoured. On a busy day, there'd be jewel cases sticking out of the racks, lying overturned on their sides. The clerk, at least, was my favorite one—this absolutely beautiful pale-skinned, long-black-haired goth who wore mercifully little makeup and actually looked less like a goth than a ghost—the ghost of a quiet, thoughtful, and gorgeous porcelain girl who rarely said more than three words in a row to customers, even when ringing up their purchases.

“Where are they?” Bates hissed into my ear.

“
They
who?” I shot back.

“The kids you wanted to show me. The queer kids.” Bates said
queer
like he'd been practicing it—like he'd tried out all
the words to see which would fit, and this was the one that sounded the least gay.

He brought his face away from my ear for a moment, glanced reflectively at the vinyl section in the back. “Do they have a special aisle where they hang out? Is there something you say to the chick at the desk that lets her know who you're looking for?”

“I really don't think so,” I said. I spun around, bent down, and immersed myself in the flyers on a milk crate by the door.

Bates crouched down next to me. His breath blew into my ear. “Go up and ask.”

“I can't go up and ask!”

“Just
ask her
!” he hissed.

“I'm not going to just walk up and ask her!” I protested loudly.

“Why not?” Bates held a metal-lined fist to my face.

“Because she's devastatingly beautiful and I have a crush on her!”

That last part, I shouted out, exasperated—which turned out to be way too loud for the fairly tiny record store. The clerk, as well as two twelve-year-olds in the Punk/Post-Punk section and the middle-aged lady with the mullet who was leafing through Foreigner records, all looked up.

My face turned the red of blood and new cars.

Bates flashed the world's widest, most horrifying smile in my face.

Then he pulled back his arm and hit me on the shoulder.

I stumbled. Propelled by his momentum, I lunged forward, practically slamming into the cash register—and into the girl who was working there.

“Need help?” she asked.

She had huge eyes, eyes that looked like a Halloween special effect. They seemed to have two distinct irises, an ordinary blue one with a deeper, purple-black iris inside it.

I could feel my face growing even redder.

This had to be the worst part. Worse than all the other parts of today put together. Blushing was the un-gothiest thing I could think of.

“Actually, yes,” I said, leaning into the cash register—close and confidential. “Do you know where the gay clubs near here are?”

She blinked in surprise.

“The gay clubs?” she repeated, as if checking to confirm just how devoted I was to this notion of discovering a club that was convened especially for people of the gay persuasion.

I shot her a little smile back. It felt like my entire face was rolling itself up into a ball, swallowing my eyes and nose and ears down my throat. She leaned back, rubbed her chin with a lace-gloved hand, and watched me fidget. God, of all the possible first real interactions I could have had with her, I think this would rank at just about the number-one worst.

On the other hand, there was always Bates's fist as motivation.

“Yes, those ones,” I said. “I mean, it's really okay if you don't, we were just wondering if—”

“ALRIGHT, STORE'S CLOSING EARLY TODAY! PLEASE MAKE YOUR WAY TO THE CHECKOUT COUNTER TO PAY FOR ANY AND ALL PURCHASES, AND IF YOU MONSTERS IN THE BACK THINK I'M NOT GONNA NOTICE YOU TRYIN' TO SNEAK THOSE GREEN DAY CDS DOWN YOUR PANTS, YOU
GOT ANOTHER THING COMIN'!” Her head tilted back, and her mouth opened farther than I'd ever seen a human mouth open. Her hand came down on a call bell on the counter, and instead of a dinky
ding
came a huge reverberation that rang throughout the store.

The woman with the mullet dropped all the records back into the bin but two, and handed those to the clerk, along with thirteen dollars and ninety cents exactly, which she clutched in her hand. The two tweeny boys scampered out right after her, leaving a trail of CDs on the floor in their wake.

Bates craned his head to watch them run away, fascinated. “You want me to run them down for ya?” he offered keenly.

“No, that's fine,” said the clerk girl, whose voice returned to its normal autumny whisper, but still felt different, like she'd let go of all the pretense. She stepped over the CDs on the ground, reached into her plaid tartan skirt for a key, and stuck it into the front door. “They didn't swipe anything; I was keeping count. I'll pick up those tomorrow. Besides, are you coming with us—or is your diminutive friend here the only one who's looking for queer kids?”

“No!” Bates roared—and then, embarrassed, coughed into his hand and started speaking at a normal volume. “I mean—I suppose I could be persuaded to accompany you guys. But where the hell are you gonna take us?”

“Just come,” she said, walking past us and out the door. Mystified, Bates and I looked at each other. We both felt clueless, all our hunches without base. We'd never before had so much in common.

The club was called Bubbles, and ordinarily—she told us—it was one of those ambiguously gendered clubs for twentysomethings. “You know, eighty percent straight, but they play enough Pet Shop Boys to keep us coming back,” she said, laying one soft hand on each of our backs and guiding us through a narrow, black-lit corridor that was lined shoulder-to-shoulder with people leaning against walls that were painted with black and white globs like a cow. “One afternoon a month, all the city's queer youth organizations pool their money together and rent out the club so that the underage kids have a chance to meet each other and get their groove on, too.”

We ducked underneath a couple of skinny guys in white tank tops and rainbow necklaces who were making out in a doorway, and stepped into the next room, which was lit in bright orange, glowing neon tables and kids dressed up in the quirky, Day-Glo colors of cartoon characters. Heavy, pulsing thuds of techno music rocked our stomachs. I had to blink. It felt like night in here, like it had instantly gone from four o'clock to ten-thirty. It felt even weirder when I looked at our surroundings: This was an actual club, something I had heard about before but had never seen with my own eyes. People came here and drank alcohol, fancy alcoholic drinks in bright colors with little umbrellas. People came here to flirt with each other. I looked over at the luminescent red vinyl couches, the shiny metal poles. People might have made out right where we were standing. People might have actually had sex in this room.

“Wow, Bates,” I said. My head couldn't stop looking around, mouth open, eyes wide. “I guess we found what you were looking for.”

“Yeah,” Bates echoed back, gazing around the room, his brain in a similar orbit to mine. His voice sounded smaller than ever, as if something had finally managed to make an impression on him. “I guess we did.”

“So,” I said, picking up a carrot stick off one of the appetizer trays they had lying around, “this is what gay people look like, huh? And this is what they do with their time.”

“This is what they
want
to do,” Bates corrected me. “They spend the other twenty-nine days of every month waiting for this shit to go down, and as soon as it breaks, they leap on it.”

I chewed on my carrot, listening to him speak. It was fresh and crunchy. My teeth sank straight through it. “Yeah, that's pretty much what I was thinking,” I said, baffled by his vocabulary, but trying not to let on. “So, I don't know how it works. Are you supposed to notice guys that are cute and start talking to them? Or are they supposed to notice you?”

“I don't
do
‘cute,' ” Bates snapped. He caught hold of himself. “I don't like
cute
guys. I mean, I don't frickin' know. I've never done this before. Shit, do you think I'm
supposed
to be somebody's type? Are there secret signals or something?”

“Actually, I'm pretty sure that anyone would notice whether you were their type or not,” I said, subtly trying to communicate to Bates how, in a room full of boys wearing designer jeans and sequined sleeveless shirts and girls in vintage polka dot skirts, he was pretty much the only one who fit the two-hundred-pound, leather-wearing construction-worker type. If that even existed for teenage gay kids. Why hadn't Bates kidnapped Sajit instead of me? He was a bona fide gay boy, while I was just an innocent bystander. If there was a secret handshake, Sajit would know it
for sure. Maybe that's why Bates would have been nervous about talking to Sajit? It was kind of funny to think of Bates being totally intimidated by Sajit, of all people.