How They Met, and Other Stories(36)
Author: David Levithan

I walked around the city a little, but even that was too much. I took the train home, defeated. The only saving grace was that my parents were already out when I got home.

Jeremy was there, though, babysitting himself, which wasn’t something I’d been allowed to do. He was watching a movie on cable, studying his Torah portion during the commercials.

“Hey,” he called out when he heard me come in. “How was it?”

At first I didn’t know what he meant—how was what? The movie? The date? The ride home?

Then I realized he meant the sleepover at Thomas’s. Which he thought I’d spent with Graham.

“It was okay,” I said, throwing my bag down on the floor and sitting next to him on the couch. He muted the TV.

“Did you have fun? Did you tell Graham about the Bar Mitzvah?”

“Look,” I said, “I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

“No, it is!” Jeremy said, looking totally energized. “Mom and Dad gave in. I knew they would.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

“How?” I asked.

“I just told them I wouldn’t do it,” he said. “And they knew I wouldn’t.”

“Are you kidding?”

He looked at me, confused. “No. Not at all. It seemed stupid to have a Bar Mitzvah if I wasn’t going to stand up for something that’s right, you know.”

I knew he was trying to help. I knew he was trying to take my side. But still I couldn’t help but see him as my younger, inexperienced brother who didn’t know anything about anything.

“Do you understand what you’re doing?” I said, my voice rising. I wanted to shake him. “Don’t think I don’t appreciate it. But are you crazy? Think about it for a second. Not about Mom or Dad. Or me. Think about you. This is a very big deal, Jeremy. All our family. All your friends. Do you really want all your friends to see your brother and his boyfriend? There has to be a line somewhere, doesn’t there? Do we get to sit together? What do I introduce him as? Do we get to dance together? What do you think everyone will say, Jeremy? Your Bar Mitzvah will go down in history as The One With The Gay Brother And His Boyfriend. You can’t want that. You can’t.”

But even as I was saying it, I was looking at his expression and I was thinking, Yes, he does. He is ready for all of that.

I didn’t know where he got it from. Not my father or mother. Or me.

“Jon,” he said, “it’s okay. Really, it’s okay.”

This twelve-year-old. This stranger. This brother. This person sitting on the couch with me.

It was too much. I had to leave again. Only this time I wished I had the ability to stay. I wished I could stay there and believe him.

But it was too much. It was all too much.

I tried to sleep through Sunday. My mother came into my room and asked me to try on my suit one more time.

“I have to hand it to your brother,” she said. “He makes one hell of an argument. Especially when he’s right. Sometimes I guess you need to be bullied by the truth. I was caught up in everything else.” Then she smiled at me and apologized for how stressful the past few weeks had been. “I just want to live through it,” she said, straightening my tie. “I want it to be a perfect day. Although at this point, I’d settle for really good.”

She asked me if I’d asked Graham. I said yes.

She asked me if he was coming.

I said yes.

It’s not that I wasn’t thinking—I was thinking way too much. I was thinking of what Jeremy was willing to do, and how I’d be letting him down if I didn’t deliver on the situation I’d thrown him into.

“Does he know to wear a suit?” my mother asked.

Again, yes.

She put her hand to my cheek and said, “I look forward to meeting him.”

I knew that took a lot.

I thanked her.

My father let his lack of complaint speak for him.

The whole day I wanted to pull Jeremy aside and tell him: You’re believing in love more than I do; you’re standing up for someone who is less than deserving.

I was trying to keep my mind from Graham, from Monday afternoon when we’d see each other again, but that was an impossible thing to do. Every hour that passed was loaded with thousands of thoughts—and no conclusions.

Somehow I made it through school. Somehow I made it into the city. Somehow I walked through the door to class without trembling.

He was waiting for me, waiting with Eve and Miles to rehearse the third movement of the Blur piece.

“Hi,” he said, a little hesitant. Then, after he sent Eve and Miles to rehearse in a corner together, “How are you?”

“Been better,” I said. “I’m really sorry—”

“No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to give you the wrong idea. And at the same time, I don’t want you to think I don’t care about you. I do.”

“I know,” I said. Maybe I did, maybe I didn’t. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t.

We hovered around our apologies, our acceptances.

“It’s okay,” I said, finally. “Really, it’s okay.”

Maybe I even believed that. But my body didn’t. It had lost the thread of the dance, grasping instead at ulterior intangibles. My arms opened too wide, then held too fast. My turns ended in the wrong place.

Graham did not say a word. Not until Eve and Miles were involved. Then he tried to minimize the damage I was doing, the errors of my way.

I could sense Miles watching me, wondering what had gone wrong. But Graham was always within hearing distance. It wasn’t until after the dismal rehearsal that Miles could come over, put his hand on my shoulder, and ask me, “What happened?”

He took me to a used bookstore café around the corner. He bought me tea. He sat me down. He didn’t ask what happened again, because it was so obvious. The language of my posture translated to defeat.

“Jon,” he said. Quietly, gently, the word pillowing out to me.

And I told him. What had happened, what hadn’t happened. Even more than I’d realized before. Eventually I found I was talking more about Jeremy than I was about Graham. About how I had set up this picture in my brother’s head of what my life was like, and how he had fought for that picture. That had made it more real. And I still couldn’t deal with it. I was still running away instead of fighting, too.

“Your brother’s pretty brave,” he said. “I can’t imagine…”