Page 65 of Angels Fall

I stand as close to Tyler as I can, letting my fingers touch his. He makes no attempt to take my hand. Just continues to stare ahead, unmoving.

“Tyler…” I say.

He doesn’t look at me or shift his eyes in any direction, in fact. He just takes a step forward, says, “Sorry, guys. Please have a good Thanksgiving,” and with four long, purposeful strides, he’s out of the lobby, onto the street, and out of sight.

Halloween night, when I found out the guy I’d been having sex with was Tyler, I was… knocked into another dimension. Pulled completely out of my body and thrown to the wind. This isn’t like that. Now I’m hyper-aware. Because this has nothing to do with me. And yet, in my gut, it feels as though it does. I’m in suspended animation.

It’s a perverse scene with Dad trying to figure out what he should do to help, Mom hiding in the corner, trying to disappear, and me stuck in a space between going after Tyler, staying here, or closing my eyes and hoping to make time spin backwards a decade or so.

People buzz by, coming in and out of the lobby, smiling and patting each other on the back, puttering along, happily lost in their own worries and concerns. And we. Are. Statues.

And suddenly the devil appears on my shoulder and says, Gee whiz. Know what? I was wrong. Family’s fucking hilarious.

Chapter Fifteen - Tyler

“Tyler? What’re you—?”

I put my hand up to silence Evan as I march past the fancy holiday dinner he and Robert are having with all the well-to-do gays of Las Vegas. I glance to see if Siegfried and Roy might actually be there in person, just because I’m curious, but they’re not. I don’t think.

“Sorry to interrupt,” I say. “Don’t mind me.” I keep marching down the hallway to the guest room (there are like five guest rooms, but I just mean the one I’m staying in), and stomp inside, slamming the door behind me.

I start looking for things I can punch. But it’s not my house. I just know I can smash through the drywall. No question. But it ain’t mine to smash. So instead, I wind up stalking the space like a caged tiger. (Shit, if Siegfried and Roy are here, I hope they stay away. I don’t want whichever one it was who got attacked by the tiger back in the day to have a flashback and freak out. With everything else I’m dealing with, I don’t need that guilt too.)

My fingers dig into my palms as I clench them into fists, and since I’ve stopped cutting my nails too, they draw blood that trickles down my wrists.

There’s a knock on the door as it opens.

“Dude? What’s—Holy shit, did you cut your wrists!?” Evan shouts, darting into the room, and grabbing at my hands to look.

I pull away and try to swat him off me. “No! No! I didn’t! Will you stop fuckin’ grabbing at me?”

He puts his hands in the air and backs away. “What’s going on?” he asks. Then his eyes widen and he leans his head back. “What happened? Did Maddie—?”

“No. No. God, no. That was great. We fucked.”

“You… fucked?”

“Yeah.”

There’s a moment. Evan nods as if processing.

“Were… her parents there?”

“When we fucked? No! Jesus. They were in the lobby.”

“OK. So?”

“We saw my dad.”

“Your—? You saw your dad?”

I nod.

“While you were fucking?”

“No, dude! In the lobby!”

This is the most ridiculous conversation I’ve ever had.