Cheat

“Hey, it’s okay, don’t be upset.” Cody said.

Cody placed his hand on my thigh, and I didn’t respond.

His fingers pressed low enough to be friendly, but high enough to remind me when we had been more. I crossed my legs, pushing him out of the space between my thighs. I looked away from him at the ledge in the corner where we and our drinks sat. It wasn’t a comfortable table. High wooden chairs cut the circulation from my legs as they dangled, making his touch prick my skin with pins-and-needles.

Cody’s glass sat empty, so I reached for mine to down the mixture and catch up. It was strong, generously strong – the bartender was sweet on me. He was older, and a suggestive wink here and there would elicit faux-interest from me, and then I’d get a free drink. Cody was easier to handle, with vodka.

Cody’s hand moved to my hip, and then my back, pressing his palms into my rigid frame. My knees had been cradling his hips. Now distanced, he leaned his torso down toward me to speak closely, in hushed tones. His breath smelled of cigarettes and the drink he’d polished off.

“I know why you’re upset, but it’s okay. We’re friends, it’s okay.” He brushed his lips on my ear, and I resisted the urge to turn my face toward his.

His breath was spicy, yet sweet and smoky. An ashtray dusted with cinnamon. And then it was gone.

“Wait here, I’ll get us another drink.”

The two palms massaging my spine disappeared, along with the warmth that accompanied them. As if I had fallen asleep, my body nodded forward – I’d been leaning into his touch, pressing myself against him. A familiar image of Cody walking away from me flickered by. He approached the bar with a stumble and immediately began flirting with the bartender. With the pop of his leg and his elbow on the counter supporting his wrist and chin, he pantomimed interest in whatever flattery the bartender was pouring into his ears. If I could get a free drink, Cody could get a bottle. Ashamed of my yearning, I forced my eyes to roam around the room for something else.

There was an older man that seemed to be in his thirties, sitting across the bar. His eyes were glued to the youth of a man no older than myself, although it felt as though I’d aged a lifetime in the past few months. I’d been to Jackson’s Bar every weekend since August, after I’d met Cody. Each night with him was as fun as the first, until it wasn’t. I’d return home late, drunk and tripping over shoes, then collapse into bed. Sometimes my roommate Julio would wake and become angry, sometimes he would sulk with his body curled toward the wall. I’d write daily poems and long streams of prose about the same dark-haired character. The man who could get whatever, whomever he wanted. My fantasies became his stories, and nothing else mattered. My schoolwork began to slip as I soaked my brain in corn booze, night after night — I was beginning to see the consequences, but I wasn’t ready to give up my addiction.

The older man watched the young one laugh and dance in place, shaking his hair to-and-fro, catching himself before falling once, twice. He’d had too much to drink. Not much else to do in an Iowan December. I was accustomed to alcohol now, though at the under-age of nineteen. I could get into Jackson’s with a fake ID; they wouldn’t blink twice to distinguish the brown face on any piece of plastic I handed them. I met Cody my first night there, through a friend of a friend. We’d hit it off in that whirlpool way, his cloying attractiveness and charm coaxing along my warm currents of naivety into an endless cycle. Before long, I was there again and again, tossing three, four, five drinks back to keep up with Cody and drown my doubts and insecurities. The older man had coaxed the younger one over to his table. They must have been hitting it off; their body language marked fresh interest. Eye contact, hand extended across the table, open legs swaying back, forth, and twitching up, down––

“OMG, Khairi? What’s up bitch?”

I turned to face an equally grating smile to match Sam’s voice. I hadn’t seen him since we graduated high school last May. He didn’t appear to have changed at all – still short, still shrill, still wearing that insanely unattractive floral shirt. It moistened the bare skin on my arms as he wrapped himself around me to squeeze a hello. As he pulled back, my body felt cold, slimy. I took a longer look at him. He’d figured out his hair from the looks of it – it was less wiry, and didn’t look particularly greasy assisted by the low lighting. His brace-straightened smile tore its way through the darkness – paid for by daddy. I wondered which, his father or his 32-year-old boyfriend Lance.

“Who’s that guy you’re here with?” Sam pried. Unsubtle as he was predictable.

“His name’s Cody,” I said.

“He’s so hot. Like really hot. How’d you meet him?” Sam’s eyes sparkled with condescending curiosity.

 “Don’t sound so surprised. We met here a while ago, why do you care?” I shifted in my seat, wanting to be anywhere else and nowhere else.

“Are you guys dating?” Sam asked.

“No, uhm, we’re just good friends.”

“Bullshit, you like him. Does he like you?” Sam asked.

“No, he has a boyfriend.”

“Sure he does. I’m gonna be your wingman. He’ll go home with you, just watch!”

Sam turned away from me and sauntered toward the bar. He looked back, winking a promise I wanted to believe, before finding a place next to Cody. I hadn’t stopped him. I hadn’t wanted to. Something told me I should have, but I wanted Cody’s attention. No one else paid it, and I was tired of being ignored. Most guys preached ugliness, or exoticism, both in ways that made my skin itch and want to scratch it off. The night I met Cody, he had singled me out, asked me to dance, and hadn’t uttered a word that didn’t make me like him more. When I found out he had a boyfriend, I knew that night had been too good to be true, but I still desired him. I didn’t know his boyfriend, and I didn’t care to. His fringe existence was enough away to make that night with Cody, and the ones that followed, feel real.

As they spoke, my wingman’s talons dug deeper into Cody’s bicep. Cody seemed interested, at least with as much affection as he showed anyone that fawned over him. I was sure Sam had deliberately forgotten about me, until he met my eyes and smiled. He squeezed Cody’s bicep once more before releasing it and crossing the space between us, back to me. Cody grabbed the two drinks on the counter before returning to our corner.

“LA Water!” Cody took a sip from the glass, then brandished it for me with a wink.

I gripped it in my hands and took a long drink. On the brink of a brain freeze, I emerged from the glass.

“Khai, when were you going to introduce me to your friend?”

“Oh, um, this is Sam,” I replied.

Cody laughed and smiled at him. He wasn’t usually this soft-spoken, but then again, it was hard to get a word in edgewise with Sam sometimes.

After a bit of awkward conversation, Sam left us alone to go dance.

 “How do you know that guy? He’s cute.” Cody asked.

“Cute?”

“Yeah, a little aggressive, but…cute. Though he said there was someone else that wanted to go home with me. Anyone you know?” He gave me a knowing smile.

“He’s just messing around, don’t worry about it. He’s just trying to annoy me.”

“Well, would that be so annoying?”

“You’re drunk.” I stood up.

“I feel like it wouldn’t be, and it makes sense. Don’t worry, I don’t mind.” Cody chuckled and stood up out of his chair to face me.

“You have a boyfriend, remember?”

“Don’t be jealous,” Cody took a step toward me.

As he moved closer, he returned his warm palms to my sides. He was smirking, as if he’d made a bad joke and still expected me to laugh. The punch line hit me square in the stomach, making me want to vomit up the blue bribe he’d brought me just a few minutes before. His touch turned my stomach. It thrilled, tempted me. I’d often daydream slipping, feathery caresses, like when he’d spent the night with me.

“I don’t feel like dancing.” I wrenched myself away from his grasp. Cody shrugged and left to go dance with Sam.

The prior weekend, my roommate had agreed to make himself scarce. He owed me – Julio spat the word “fag” over his headset in a fit of gamer rage. The tiny room was never particularly welcoming – it had a fraught, odd shape, forcing us to contort around one another to live the way we wished. Julio and I hadn’t done anything to directly impact the room, but contributed to its brokenness. The carpet was matted, and the layout was awkward. Our beds were forced to be de-lofted, which made the room even more cramped, but the beds more accessible. Our dressers, desks and beds took up space, forcing everything in the room closer, and making everything seem to touch. Before I’d moved in with him, I was honest with him about my sexuality and he seemed accepting; friendly, even. After we moved into the dormitory, I felt our budding friendship strain. My apprehension toward straight men or his apprehension toward gay men pushed us further from each other, or perhaps it was the party lifestyle I’d adopted without sparing an invitation or sideways glance his way. We rarely spoke, until we didn’t speak at all unless it was absolutely necessary. With Cody, it had been.

“I’d give you the room with a girl,” I told him.

He avoided my eyes and said he would stay with a friend. That night, Cody came to my room around 10 p.m. to watch some gory movie. He liked horror movies, and I was trying to be agreeable. We sat on my bed in the corner, our backs against the wall and feet dangling off the side. I sat stiffly away from him and my desire in the dark, as we sipped the drinks he’d smuggled in. The movie ended, and in the silence following the credits, he asked me what time it was. Past midnight. Too late for him to walk home, he assured me. He asked if he could stay. I looked at my twin bed, swallowed, and said, “fine by me.”

He made himself comfortable under the covers while I went to turn off the light. I slid in next to him, and he closed his eyes as if to fall asleep immediately. Gripping the side of the bed, I balanced between his personal space and the edge, never turning too far in either direction. I listened to his breath, the hushed rising and falling rustle, the blanket on his chest. I laid on my back to look up at the ceiling. Its tiled panels were dilapidated, crumbling. It needed to be replaced, but they looked less damaged, more okay in the dark.

Cody shifted, startling me. My eyes wide, he wrapped his arm around my side, pulling me to face him, and then closer. I wasn’t sure if he was awake or not. I didn’t know whether to close my eyes or not. I laid there motionless, waiting for him to let me go or push forward. He rubbed my back, then kissed me once, twice, three times. His way of telling me to get comfortable, to get out of my head. My muscles separated from my mind, each opposing the other. They say you already know what you’ve decided to do, long before you do it. I thought about this as I kissed Cody back, and continued onward to complicate our friendship.

Cody moved both arms to surround me, and I continued to give to him, tit-for-tat. We moved against each other, with each other, making something that wasn’t love, but felt warm enough. I let him move around me, welcomed him inside me. It was painful, lacked love, but it hushed the hurtful voices that told me I wasn’t enough. I’d gotten Cody.

When we finished, I told myself we hadn’t done anything wrongful. We still weren’t, not really. Cody was with his boyfriend. It was a fit of passionate need, and we had been drunk. We were just friends. Friends have sleepovers, and friends can cuddle. Friends can enjoy the touch of their friends. Friends get a pass if something goes too far.

The next morning, I woke up to find Cody jumping into his pants, zipping away the now-flaccid prize he’d given.

“Oh, hey.” Cody looked at me and ran his hands through his hair.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“I gotta go, I’m supposed to drive to see Carter today,” Cody said.

“So he has a name now?” My voice was soft, but sharp.

“Yeah, he always has, I suppose. What’s wrong?”

“You just cheated on him.”

“Well it wasn’t just me. What did you think was gonna happen when you invited me over?” Cody put his shoes on.

“I didn’t think anything. You’re just going to leave?”

“It’s not like that.We’re still friends . . . won’t Julio be coming back soon?”

“So that’s it?” My body tensed up, wanting to jump at him and thrash him with lips and fists.

“I gotta go. We’ll go out next weekend; Jacksons?” He didn’t give me time to respond, slipping out of the door, leaving me with the silence of a used condom.

An hour later, Julio returned. “How was your night?” he asked. He didn’t want to know, and I wasn’t sure but told him it was great.

“So is he like, your boyfriend or something? Is he going to be coming around a lot now?” Julio asked.

“No,” I replied. Julio nodded, and that was the end of it. He didn’t have anything to worry about.

In Jackson’s, I wasn’t sure what we were. I’d fought myself in coming here, and ended up losing. As soon as Cody texted, I responded with smiley faces and eagerness.

We weren’t just friends. I finished my drink, and my thoughts began to spin in time with my stomach and vision. The drink made its way to my brain, mixing with Cody, Sam, guilt and desire. As I navigated to the bathroom through the dance floor, I saw something that looked like Sam, and it winked at me as I moved past. I ignored him and went to the toilets to puke. I washed my hands and stared at my reflection in the mirror. “You’re cuter than Sam,” I told myself. “You’re better than him.”

When I came out of the bathroom, Cody had made his way to Sam on the dance floor. I sat back at our table and watched them move together. I had been in my own dance with Cody for months, and accepted the break in watching theirs. Sam’s body was ungraceful, awkward in front of Cody’s slithering debonair. He didn’t know how to move alongside Cody, with him. Sam wasn’t going to notice when his movements grew too hungry or too sloppy, too drunken. They moved alien to one another. They were all too close, their stunted, horny, drunken dance in front of my face. It was haunting, disgusting, and familiar. They were almost done — it was 1:40 a.m. and the bar would be closing soon. There would be nowhere for Sam’s sweat stains to find refuge once they turned the lights on.

I stood as Cody stumbled back over and grabbed his phone.

“Hey, this was fun! I’ll see you next weekend,” Cody said.

“Where are you going?” I asked.

“I’m gonna go home with Sam, he seems like a fun time!” Cody gave me a wink and turned toward Sam, who was across the bar and waiting by the door. I met eyes with Sam and he looked at the ground. It was fine, we weren’t really friends. And Cody didn’t belong to me.

“Don’t forget your keys. You’ll need them to drive to Carter tomorrow.” My voice dripped with drunkenness and venom.

“We broke up, actually. Last week,” Cody said.

“What? Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.

“You didn’t want to dance,” he replied, shrugging.

“I guess I’m used to having only one partner,” I said.

Cody chuckled, shook his head, and turned to meet Sam at the door. He saluted me as he made his way out the door; a “see you next week.” My muscle memory tore at me, aching to follow. Clasping my hands, I moved to the center of the floor to sway and be jostled by the sweaty bodies moving closer, then farther, about me.

As my body moves in time with itself, I move my hands up and down my arms. My skin feels slippery, tingly, smooth. I look up at the lights flashing across the ceiling and exhale. Through the noise, the bartender yells out to everyone, to me, “last call.” I’d seen the older man from before approach me, slowly, like a buzzard approaches the dead and dying. The other guy must have sobered his youth and ran along. Alongside the chance to be reborn, he offers me a shot. I accept, mistaking the advantages life has to offer.