THE BRO-MAGNET (4 page)

Unaccountably, I’m still horny so I go into the bathroom and jerk off into the toilet, remembering to wipe the seat and put down the seat and flush – Aunt Alfresca’s training – before exiting Room 213.

No sooner do I close the door behind me and begin adjusting my tie than a door far down the hallway opens and who should it be but the newly minted Mrs. Billy Keller.

Alice startles when she sees me.

“What are you doing here?” she asks, puzzled. Then her expression darkens into a scowl as she sees the number on the door behind me. “Oh you did not just bang my cousin, did you?”

I say no, just for form and to protect her cousin’s reputation, but I know she doesn’t believe me.

* * *

I go back to the reception, figuring to snag a recovery beer before heading on home. The place is mostly empty now, just a few stragglers left.

Big John wheels himself over to me.

“You did good by Billy today,” he says. “Your mother would be proud.
You
should be proud.”

“Thanks, Dad.”

“And that ‘circles of a man’s life’ speech” – he pounds his fist against his heart – “no matter how many times I hear it, it never gets old.”

I love my dad. Almost everyone else, they always refer to it as the ‘circle of friends’ speech. Big John is the only one here who gets it, who knows to call it what it is: the circles of a man’s life speech.

“Thanks, Dad,” I say again.

“I only hope I’m still alive someday to hear someone give as good a speech at your own wedding.”

You and me both, Dad, I think but don’t say.

Just then our male-bonding moment is interrupted by some guy who looks as though he spent the day going drink for drink with Three Sheets.

His thick tie’s so loose it’s just a gentle tug away from becoming a scarf and his hair looks like someone messed it up so he’d resemble a young Einstein.

“Hey, man.” He places his hand on my shoulder. Usually I’m not crazy about strangers touching me but he’s weaving back and forth so much, I’m happy to provide ballast. Better that than have him crash to the floor and need me to take him to the hospital to check for a concussion. “That speech… You know, I’m getting married in six months. I already asked my brother to be my Best Man, but now I’m thinking maybe I could swap for you? George’ll only wind up saying something lame for the toast. You, on the other hand, if you could just give that speech…”

God, what is wrong with these guys?
I shake off his hand, disgusted.

“Do I even know you?”

By the time I arrive home from the reception, it’s full dark out.

When I slip my key in the lock and turn it there’s no resistance and I realize that the door’s unlocked. No, I didn’t leave it that way. Aunt Alfresca trained me well: safety first.

Fucking Sam.

I push the door open and, yup, there’s Sam sprawled out on my living room couch, a bottle of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale open on the table along with four bottle caps and a half-dozen takeout cartons of Chinese food, a pair of chopsticks poking out of one of them – Sam can eat, and drink – and the TV on. The digital display reads 63, which is MSNBC, and I immediately recognize the show as being one of those things the station runs every weekend about hardened criminals and incredible crimes. Sam loves those things. Me, not so much, although I do occasionally watch with Sam for a while because I like to see if I can come up with loopholes that, if I were the lawyer, I’d use to get the criminals off. Not that I want more criminals on the streets or anything, but I like solving puzzles and working on finding a loophole is like getting one big brain massage.

Sam doesn’t even visually acknowledge my presence as I enter my own home, toss my keys on the table by the door.

“Can you believe the tats on that guy?” Sam says, eyes glued to the criminal on the screen. Then, Sam burps.

“The tits?” I say. “Well, he does look like he’s spent too much time in the prison gym.”

“Not the
tits
.” Sam is disgusted, not an uncommon occurrence. “The
tats
. The tats all over his body.”

“No, I can’t,” I say, taking a seat on the ottoman. “He’s like one big tat, which, when you think about it, is probably preferable to being one big tit. Not that there’s anything wrong with tits.” I squint at the TV. “Does he even have any eyes?”

“I don’t think so.”

“Did you and Renee have another fight?”

“What do you think?”

“It’s Sunday night, you’re here instead of next door. I’m thinking chances are good.”

Every time Sam and Renee fight, Sam comes over here, using the spare key if I’m not home. Sam and Renee have been together for about a year, and I doubt they’ll last another, but finding Sam on my couch has been going on a lot longer than that. Sam just likes my place better than the one next door, says the paint job here is better for promoting good feelings. No duh. Paint – it never lets you down. Paint – it’s what I do.

Sam’s been using that key for a good six years now, ever since I moved into this complex; Aunt Alfresca scoffed when I bought the condo, said a house would be a better investment, but it turned out that for once I was right, what with condos holding their value a lot better than houses in the current economic climate. When I moved in Sam’d already been here a while, we met the first day, instantly bonded, Sam helped me and Billy and Drew unload all my stuff from the U-Haul, we exchanged keys in case of emergency, and have been BFFs ever since. I realize the BFF designation is somewhat girly, but Sam says that’s what we are and I’ve learned not to argue with Sam.

I kick off my white patent-leather shoes. Geez, my dogs are tired.

The shoes make thunking sounds as they hit the floor and Sam tears her gaze away from the TV long enough to see where the thunks came from.

“What the hell are those things?” she says. Then, for the first time, she looks at me. “Oh my god, what are you wearing?”

I look back at her. Sam is five feet ten inches of perfectly formed woman. She has longish honey-colored hair, perfect skin and green eyes behind black-framed rectangular glasses that make her look intelligent in a very sexy way. Right now she’s wearing short-shorts, even though it’s a pretty cold February evening, and a bikini top like they might reopen the pool down by the clubhouse any second. Sam also loves the Mets, the Jets, the Lakers, beer, poker, buddy movies and
Morning Joe
on MSNBC – all the things I love. Honestly, if she weren’t a lesbian and my BFF, I’d date her.

As if a non-lesbian Sam would ever have me. As if.

“Did you forget I was going to a wedding today?”

I’m feeling miffed. I have no problem keeping track of everything going on in Sam’s life, on
her
schedule. You’d think she’d be able to remember something as significant as me being Best Man in the wedding of one of my oldest friends and the girl I had a major crush on for a ridiculous amount of years.

“Sorry,” she says, with a half-apologetic shrug. “You’re in so many weddings. And what with all the Renee drama today and all…”

She trails off, no doubt expecting that by the time she finishes trailing, I’ll stop being miffed.

“
God
, you look like a dork dressed like that.”

Thanks, Sam. Like that’s going to help me get over it.

“Oh, yeah?” I counter. “Well, you look like you’re going to the pool.”

“Aw, don’t be mad.” Here Sam pays me her highest compliment: she picks up the remote and shuts off the TV. “I want to hear all about it,” she says eagerly, “every detail of what it was like being Best Man at the wedding of Bobby and Alex.”

“Billy and Alice,” I correct, not for the first time. The Alice/Alex part is fairly new but Sam’s been calling Billy by the wrong name off and on pretty much since they met that first day in the back of the U-Haul. Billy and Sam don’t exactly love each other. Billy, figuring he’s my best friend because he’s known me longer than anyone else, gets kind of jealous of any competition for first place, hence his not inviting Sam to his wedding even though they’re both in my weekly poker game. And Sam, well, Sam may know she’s my BFF but she’s got her own jealousy issues where I’m concerned.

“Hey, I was close with the names! But wait. I’m going to get another beer. Don’t start until I get back.”

Like I was going to? Like I was going to just tell myself the story out loud? Fucking crazy Sam.

A moment later, her voice comes to me from the kitchen. “Hey, you want one?”

I love it when she offers me my own beer like it’s her fridge.

My buzz from the reception is entirely gone. Might as well start work on curing the hangover. Or start on the next buzz. Besides, it’s still early. “Sure,” I holler back.   

By the time Sam returns with two beers and a bottle opener, I’ve shed my tux jacket and scooted over from the ottoman to the prime spot on the couch in the right-hand corner.

“Hey!” Sam’s outraged. “You stole my seat!”

I raise an eyebrow that I hope conveys the message:
My
couch.
My
seat.

“Asshole,” Sam mutters, pushing past me, but there’s no malice in any of it.

I cross my legs, so my right ankle is resting on my left knee.

“Nice socks,” Sam says.

I study my white socks, shrug. “It was either that or purple. You think I should have gone for the purple?”

She pops the caps on the beers, hands one over and sits down a foot away, tucking one leg under her bottom as she faces me.

“So. The big wedding. Spill.”

I take a swig of my beer and do as instructed.

I take her through the whole wedding ceremony, the cocktail hour, my speech – “I love the ‘circles of a man’s life’ speech!” she says – and finally the dance with Alice.

“What was that like, finally getting to dance with Alma after all these years?”

This time, I don’t correct her on the name.

“It was great,” I say. “Well, maybe not great. More like incredibly awkward, especially when she gave me a hard time about my speech.”

“What’s wrong with that woman? How could anyone give you a hard time about the ‘circles of a man’s life’ speech? Leave it to Barney to marry someone with an attitude problem and no taste. Everyone loves that speech. It’s a crowd-pleaser.”

“I know, right? But I guess for some reason brides don’t like to be toasted with the same toast they’ve already heard at another wedding.”

“Huh.” Sam’s puzzled. “Go figure.”

“I know.” I swig more beer. “You’re telling me? But that’s brides for you. They can be particular about little stuff. And they can
really
be particular if they catch you exiting their cousin’s hotel room after the reception.”

“Hold on a second. Back up.”

So I do. I back up to the reception and Three Sheets, her loving my speech because she’s the only woman there who hadn’t heard it all before, the garter belt, her squeezing my face ala Aunt Alfresca and everything else. 

“You’re kidding me, right?” Sam says when I’m finished.

“I don’t know,” I say, trying to think what in all of that a guy would want to make up. “Which part?”

“You were right there with Three Sheets, practically doing it, and you just stopped because she was shit-faced?”

See? This is one of the reasons Sam’s my BFF. No one puts things the way she does.

“Well, yeah.” 

“But why? Was it that she was so drunk that she was sloppy and you got turned off?”

“Well, no. I mean, she was sloppy but not excessively so. Well, not until she nearly passed out.”

“Why then? Why would you get so close and then stop? If there’s a guy who needs to get laid, it’s you.”

Gee, thanks,
BFF
.

I feel myself blush, a rare thing.

“I wanted to, but it just didn’t seem right. It felt too much like – ”

Sam practically spits her last swig of beer out, she’s so worked up right now as she points her bottle at me. “Oh, you are
not
going to finish that sentence by saying ‘The Night’.”

I feel the blush deepen. Thank God I don’t have to look at me right now. If there were a mirror in front of me, I’d be so embarrassed by my own embarrassment.

“It’s true,” I say. “Suddenly it felt exactly like – ”

“
The Night
,” she cuts me off, flops backward, her head hitting the couch like she’s a lousy actor who’s just been shot in a Western. “Jesus, Johnny.”

I have no idea what she’s talking about. “What?”

Sam pops back up again. “You are not going to compare this to the night you were going to lose your virginity and then didn’t.”

She’s talking about when I was twenty-one, junior year of college. Sam didn’t know me back then, but she does know my stories, knows more of my stories than anyone else. And the story she’s referring to now, the one known as The Night, is about the time Marcy Bonano and me hooked up at a kegger, got really drunk together, confessed our mutual virginity and then decided to do something about it, got more drunk before the actual doing, and then right before, I stopped myself because it didn’t feel right. I didn’t want Marcy Bonano’s first time to be something she wouldn’t even remember. It seemed too much like something other people could call rape, something
I
would call rape.

Of course I did eventually lose my virginity, but still.

“I’m not?” I say. “I’m not going to compare it? How come?”

“Because there’s no comparison!”

“Why not?”

“Because the legendary Marcy Banana – ”

“Bonano.”

“Whatever. She was, what, seventeen?”

“Sixteen,” I correct. “She was smart and a super-early admission. Plus, you know, she looked a lot older.”

I’ve always felt uncomfortable about the five-year age different between me and Marcy Banana – shit, now Sam’s got me doing it – but really, we were only two grades apart, so it didn’t feel like that big a deal at the time.

“And Three Sheets was how old?”

“I don’t know.” I shrug. “We’re adults. It’s not like being a kid where the first things you ask when you meet someone new are ‘How old are you?’ and ‘What grade are you in?’ and ‘Do your parents let you stay up til eleven on weeknights?’” I shrug again. “Probably my age or thereabouts.”