Once you’ve been to Naples

It’s hard to shop at Staples,

And once you’ve been to Milan

It’s hard to eat at Au Bon Pain.

Once you’ve been to Venice

you turn from iceberg lettuce.

And you learn that baloney’s baloney

When Bologna feeds you rigatoni.

Being a transatlantic gay

Is a dangerous game to play.

Because once you’ve been to Rome

It’s hard to call a suburb home

for the first time i can recall, mom looks completely tickled. she even hums along a little. when tiny is done, her applause is genuine. i figure it’s time to end the lovefest, before tiny and mom run off together and start a band.

I offer to do the dishes, and mom acts like she’s completely shocked by this.

me: i do the dishes all the time.

mom looks seriously at tiny.

mom: really, he does.

then she bursts out laughing.

I am not really appreciating this, even though i’m aware there are many worse ways this could’ve played out.

tiny: i want to see your room!

this is not a hey!-my-zipper’s-getting-itchy! request. when tiny says he wants to see your room, it means he wants to see . . . your room.

mom: go ahead. i’ve got the dishes.

tiny: thanks, mrs. grayson.

mom: anne. call me anne.

tiny: thanks, anne!

me: yeah, thanks, anne.

tiny hits me on the shoulder. i think he means to do it lightly, but i feel like someone’s just driven a volkswagen into my arm.

I lead him to my room, and even manage a ta-da! when i open the door. he walks to the center of the room and takes it all in, smiling the whole time.

tiny: goldfish!

he goes right over to the bowl. i explain to him that if goldfish ever take over the world and decide to have a war crimes trial, i am going to be noosebait, because the mortality rate of my little goldfish bowl is much much higher than if they’d lived in the moat at some chinese restaurant.

tiny: what are their names?

oh, lord.

me: samson and delilah.

tiny: really?

me: she’s a total slut.

he leans over for a closer look at the fish food.

tiny: you feed them prescription drugs?

me: oh, no. those are mine.

It’s the only way i’ll remember to feed the fish and take my meds, if i keep them together. still, i’m thinking maybe i should’ve cleaned a little more. because of course tiny’s now blushing and not going to ask anything else, and while i don’t want to go into it, i also don’t want him to think i’m being treated for scabies or something.

me: it’s a depression thing.

tiny: oh, i feel depressed, too. sometimes.

we’re coming dangerously close to the conversations i’d have with maura, when she’d say she knew exactly what i was going through, and i’d have to explain that, no, she didn’t, because her sadness never went as deep as mine. i had no doubt that tiny thought he got depressed, but that was probably because he had nothing to compare it to. still, what could i say? that i didn’t just feel depressed - instead, it was like the depression was the core of me, of every part of me, from my mind to my bones? that if he got blue, i got black? that i hated those pills so much, because i knew how much i relied on them to live?

no, i couldn’t say any of this. because, when it all comes down to it, nobody wants to hear it. no matter how much they like you or love you, they don’t want to hear it.

tiny: which one’s samson and which one’s delilah? me: honestly? i forget.

tiny scans my bookshelf, runs his hand over my keyboard, spins the globe i got when i graduated fifth grade.

tiny: look! a bed!

for a second, i think he’s going to leap onto it, which would kill my bed frame for sure. but with an almost-shy grin, he sits gingerly on its edge.

tiny: comfy!

how have i ended up dating this sprinkled donut of a person? with a not-unfriendly sigh, i sit down next to him. the mattress is definitely canyoning his way.

but before the inevitable next step, my phone vibrates on my desk. i’m going to ignore it, but then it buzzes again and tiny tells me to get it.

I flip open the phone and read what’s there.

tiny: who’s it from?

me: just gideon. he wants to see how things are going.

tiny: gideon, huh?

there’s an unmistakable suspicion in tiny’s voice. i close the phone and head back to the bed.

me: you’re not jealous of gideon, are you?

tiny: what, that he’s cute and young and gay and gets to see you every day? what’s there to be jealous of?

I kiss him.

me: you have nothing to be jealous of. we’re just friends.

something hits me then, and i start to laugh.

tiny: what?

me: there’s a boy in my bed!

It’s such a stupid, gay thought. i feel like i have to carve ‘I HATE THE WORLD’ into my arm about a hundred times to make up for it.

the bed really isn’t big enough for the two of us. twice i end up on the floor. all our clothes stay on - but it’s almost like that doesn’t matter. because we’re all over each other. he’s big and strong, but i match him in the push and pull. soon we’re a complete hot mess.

when we’ve tired ourselves out, we just lie there. his heartbeat is huge.

we hear my mother turn on the tv. the detectives start talking. tiny runs his hand under my shirt.

tiny: where’s your dad?

I’m totally not ready for the question. i feel myself tense.

me: i don’t know.

tiny’s touch tries to soothe me. his voice tries to calm me.

tiny: it’s okay.

but i can’t take that. i sit up, knocking us right out of our dreamy breathing, making him shift away a little so he can see me clearly. the impulse in me is loud and clear: immediately, i can’t do this. not because of my father - i don’t really care that much about my father - but because of this whole process of knowing everything.

I argue with myself.

stop.

stay here.

talk.

tiny is waiting. tiny is looking at me. tiny is being kind, because he hasn’t realized yet who i am, what i am. i will never be kind back. the best i can do is give him reasons to give up.

tiny: tell me. what do you want to say? don’t ask me, i want to warn him. but then i’m talking.

me: look, tiny - i’m trying to be on my best behavior, but you have to understand - i’m always standing on the edge of something bad. and sometimes someone like you can make me look the other way, so that i don’t know how close i am to falling over. but i always end up turning my head. always. i always walk off that edge. and it’s shit i deal with every day, and it’s shit that’s not going away any time soon. it’s really nice to have you here, but do want to know something? do you really want me to be honest?

he should take this as the warning it is. but no. he nods.

me: it feels like a vacation. i don’t think you know what that’s like. which is good - you don’t want to. you have no idea how much i hate this. i hate the fact that i’m ruining the night right now, ruining everything -

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 pussy. 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.”