Will Grayson, Will Grayson(58)
Author: John Green

“Will,” he whispers.

“Dude, save the voice.”

“Will,” he says again.

“Yeah?”

“No. Will.”

“You mean the other Will,” I say, and he just raises his eyebrows at me and smirks.

“I’ll go look,” I say. Twenty minutes to curtain, and the auditorium is now damn near full. I stand on the edge of the stage looking out for a second, feeling a little bit famous. Then I jog down the stairs and slowly walk up the stage-right aisle. I want him here, too. I want it possible for people like Will and Tiny to be friends, not just tried errors.

Even though I feel like I know Will, I barely remember what he looks like. I try to exclude each face in each row. A thousand people texting and laughing and squirming in their seats. A thousand people reading the program in which, I later learn, Jane and I are specially thanked for “being awesome.” A thousand people waiting to see Gary pretend to be me for a couple hours, with no idea what they’re about to see. And I don’t know, either, of course—I know the play has changed in the months since I read it, but I don’t know how.

All these people, and I try to look at every last one of them. I see Mr. Fortson, the GSA advisor, sitting with his partner. I see two of our assistant principals. And then as I get into the middle, my eyes scanning faces looking for Will Graysony ones, I see two older faces staring back at me on the aisle. My parents.

“What are you doing here?”

My father shrugs. “You will be surprised to learn it was not my idea.”

Mom nudges him. “Tiny wrote me a very nice Facebook message inviting us personally, and I just thought that was so sweet.”

“You’re Facebook friends with Tiny?”

“Yes. He request-friended me,” Mom says, epically failing to speak Facebook.

“Well, thanks for coming. I’m gonna be backstage but I’ll, um, see you after.”

“Say hi to Jane for us,” Mom says, all smiley and conspiratorial.

“Will do.”

I finish making my way up the aisle and then walk back the stage-left aisle. No Will Grayson. When I get backstage, I see Jane holding a supersize bottle of Pepto-Bismol.

She turns it upside down and says, “He drank it all.”

Tiny jumps out from behind the set and sings, “And now I feel GrrrrrEAT!” His voice sounds fine for the moment.

“Rock ’n’ roll,” I tell him. He walks up to me and looks at me askingly. “There’s like twelve hundred people in the audience, Tiny,” I say.

“You didn’t see him,” he says, nodding softly. “Okay. Yeah. Okay. That’s okay. Thanks for making me shut up.”

“And flushing your ten thousand gallons of vomit.”

“Sure, also that.” He takes a big breath and puffs out his cheeks, rendering his face almost perfectly circular. “I guess it’s time.”

Tiny gathers the cast and crew around him. He kneels in the center of a thick mass of people, everyone touching everyone because one of the laws of nature is that theater people love to be touchy. The cast is in the first circle around Tiny, everyone—guy and girl—dressed like White Sox. Then the chorus, dressed all in black for the moment. Jane and I lean in, too. Tiny says, “I just want to say thank you and you’re all amazing and it’s all about falling. Also I’m sorry I hurled earlier. I was hurling because I actually got awesome-poisoning from being around so many awesome people.” That gets a bit of nervous laughter. “I know you’re freaked out but just trust me: you’re fabulous. And anyway, it’s not about you. Let’s go make some dreams come true.”

Everyone kind of shouts and does this thing where we raise up one hand to the ceiling, and then there are a lot of jazz fingers. The light beneath the curtain is extinguished. Three football players push the set forward into its place. I step off to the side, standing in cave-darkness next to Jane, whose fingers interlace with mine. My heart pounds, and I can only imagine what it’s like to be Tiny now, praying that a quart of Pepto-Bismol will coat his vocal cords, that he won’t forget a line or fall or pass out or hurl. It’s bad enough in the wings, and I realize the courage it actually takes to get onstage and tell the truth. Worse, to sing the truth.

A disembodied voice says, “To prevent interruptions of the fabulousness, please turn off your cell phones.” I reach into a pocket with my free hand and click mine over to vibrate. I whisper to Jane, “I might puke,” and she says, “Shh,” and I whisper, “Hey, are my clothes always superwrinkly?” and she whispers, “Yes. Shh,” and squeezes my hand. The curtain parts. The applause is polite.

Everyone in the cast sits on the dugout bench except for Tiny, who walks nervously back and forth in front of the players. “Come on, Billy. Be patient, Billy. Wait for your pitch.” I realize that Tiny isn’t playing Tiny; he’s playing the coach.

Some pudgy freshman plays Tiny instead. He can’t stop moving his legs around; I can’t tell if he’s acting or nervous. He says, all exaggeratedly effeminate, “Hey, Batta Batta THWING batta.” It sounds like he’s flirting with the batter.

“Idiot,” someone on the bench says. “Our guy is batting.”

Gary says, “Tiny’s rubber. You’re glue. Whatever you say bounces off him and sticks to you.” I can tell from his sloping shoulders and meek look that Gary’s me.

“Tiny’s g*y,” adds someone else.

The coach wheels around to the bench and shouts. “Hey! HEY! No insulting teammates.”

“It’s not an insult,” Gary says. But he isn’t Gary anymore. It isn’t Gary talking. It’s me. “It’s just a thing. Like, some people are g*y. Some people have blue eyes.”

“Shut up, Wrayson,” the coach says.

The kid playing Tiny glances gratefully at the kid playing me, and then one of the bullies stage-whispers, “You’re so g*y for each other.”

And I say, “We’re not g*y. We’re eight.” This happened. I’d forgotten it, but seeing the moment resurrected, I remember.

And the kid says, “You want to go to second base . . . WITH TINY.”

The me onstage just rolls his eyes. And then the pudgy kid playing Tiny stands up and takes a step forward, in front of the coach and sings, “What’s second base for a g*y man?” And then Tiny takes a step forward and joins him, harmonizing, and they launch into the greatest musical song I’ve ever heard. The chorus goes: