The thing my dad wanted to tell me in person was that he was getting me a therapist.

“How was your week?”

“Boring.”

Meet Amy. I’ve had two sessions with her already, but this was the first time she asked me about my week. The first two sessions were entirely about my sexuality and what happened in fucking San Marino. We met weekly every Monday afternoon at her house. There’s a lot of places we can talk, but I’ve only chosen her office for now. My best description is “an average therapist’s office, with maybe a lot more books than usual.” It’s comfortable; she clearly puts a lot of work into making it that way.

“Your week was ‘boring’? Why do you say that?”

“I didn’t do anything.”

“Surely you did something in an entire week.”

“Well, yeah, I did things, but nothing interesting.”

“Well, what’d you do?”

“School, homework, video games, watched some YouTube and some movies, did Basketball stuff.”

“Any good movies?”

I shrugged to indicate a “no”.

“None of what you did is interesting? Nothing?”

“No. It’s just the same old shit over and over.”

“Um. You mentioned you play on a team at your high school, right?”

“Right.”

“How’s that?”

“Fun, kind of.”

“‘Kind of’?” she said that almost sarcastically, but definitely not mockingly.

I nodded.

She paused, “What are your goals in therapy?”

“I told you: I don’t know.” My dad made me come here. Why would my answer to that question be any different from what it was last week?

“Right, you told me that. But, if you’ll let me, I want to tickle your brain… If I could magically fix one problem in your life, what would it be?”

“Umm… I would want friends.” I actually blurted that out. I have thought about that statement at least three dozen times since then. I couldn’t understand why I said it. I’d never really thought that statement before, much less said it. And it came out so casually. Was it because I found Amy so easy to talk to? Did she subconsciously pressure me into saying it? Both, probably?

The conversation continued just as casually:

“You would want friends?”

“Yeah.”

“Would you say you have any?”

I shook my head.

“Would you say that’s why your week was boring?”

I tilted my head ever so subtly.

“Sorry, I got ahead of myself. Let me explain: I asked what you wanted out of therapy because I often see a patient’s own goals skewing what they think about themselves. And by extension, how they act in therapy. And that’s fine. This is your time, and I can work with it. But I was just thinking, if you say you don’t have friends, is that why you say your week is boring?”

I had to think about that one, but ended up nodding.

“Then let’s fix that.” she smiled, “Is there anyone you would want to be friends with?”

I shrugged, “I’m sort-of friends with Kyle on my basketball team.”

“‘Sort-of’?” Same semi-sarcastic, non-mocking tone.

“We talk quite a bit. During practice, and games.”

“More than he talks to other people?”

I shrugged, “I guess so, yes.” She was going straight for the point today. Amy was always direct about everything, but today was special.

“Is there any way you could connect with him?”

“Um, a senior on the basketball team is throwing a Halloween party tomorrow.”

“Oh.” She perked up. I couldn’t and can’t tell if she would consider that reaction a mistake or not. “I take it Kyle is going?”

“As far as I know, yes.”

“Are you?”

“Wasn’t planning on it.”

“Why not?”

“I kind of have a reputation of being a nerd, and an introvert? It’d be weird for me to show up.”

“Do you need an invite?”

“Yes, but actually no.”

“Did you get one?”

“Everyone on the team got one.”

“It sounds to me like he or she wants you to attend.”

“Ehhhhuuuuhhhhh okay, I guess I can go. I don’t have a costume, though. And the invite was very clear that I would need one.”

“What would it take for you to get one?”

I shrugged, “I could go buy something, or make my own.”

“Who or what would you like to go as?”

“I dunno, Halloween isn’t my thing.”

“What have you dressed up as in the past?”

“I don’t really remember. One time I dressed up as Luigi.”

“Like, from Super Mario Bros?”

“Yeah.”

She nodded, “I want to make sure you’ll leave with a costume idea.”

“Why? I’ll come up with something.”

“Because its short notice, and I want you to feel confident. Look, Anthony, I want to move on from this topic, but I really do want you to go to this party. It seems like a very good way to make friends, especially because it seems like your team will be there. I can’t legally tell you to get drunk because you’re underage, but I don’t think you give a shit. So go there, and anecdotally get drunk. Then report back to me next week?”

She smiled at me, further highlighting her excitement for me.

I smiled back.

We settled on “hippie” because I had a lot of things that I could use already and it was sufficiently low effort for me. The costume was easy enough, getting together with my friends from the basketball team was harder.

“Wait you’re actually coming?” Kyle sent a reply nearly instantly after I announced the change of plans.

I was in a group chat with him, Samantha, and Jessica. I was kind-of friends with Kyle but I don’t know how I ended up in a group SMS with them. More on the two ladies in a bit.

Anthony: Yep.

Kyle: You have to wear a costume

Anthony: Yes I saw that on the invite.

Kyle: Do you have a costume?

Anthony: Yes.

Anthony: Well, sort of. I have the idea of a costume.

Jessica: What the fuck is an idea of a costume

Anthony: I haven’t looked at what I have yet, but I should be able to string together a hippie thing.

Jessica: A hippie thing?

Anthony: Best I could come up with on short notice.

Kyle: So you’re actually coming?

Anthony: Yes?

Anthony: Is it really that hard to believe?

Kyle: Yes

Jessica: Yep

Beyond the condescension, they were actually quite helpful. We met at my house at the time the party was supposed to start (I actually felt weird about this, but they assured me that we are supposed to show up late) and improved my costume to the point to where it looked like I hadn’t just thrown it together with whatever I could find. Twenty minutes after the three of them had all shown up, my costume was something that my mom would call (and did call) a polished gem.

“Thank you, guys,” I was standing in front of my bathroom mirror, with them behind me.

“Happy to help,” Samantha said. She put some makeup on me. It definitely wasn’t my first time putting makeup on—My sister did it to me at least once, to my memory. It still felt weird, despite being “just a small amount.” It made me look good though.

Samantha is a cheerleader, and dated Kyle most of our freshmen year. I’m just as surprised as you might be that they’re still friends. I haven’t heard a single rumor of any drama surrounding their breakup.

Kyle and Jessica are both players on my team. Kyle is the other point guard (along with me), and Jessica is the most terrifying wing I’ve had the displeasure of encountering, on my team or off. She fouls out of I’d say… 40% of games.

And yes, “Jessica” is also the name of my sister. It’s totally not at all confusing for anyone I talk to.

Samantha was dressed as Cat Woman. I’m gay, but it was an attractive Cat Woman.

We rode to the party in style, in my Porsche Panamera.

I’m pretty sure they conspired to start a conversation in the garage just so they could gawk at it for a few minutes in the bright florescent lighting of the garage.

I bought my Porsche for my 16th birthday that spring, and I loved showing it off. Painted a saturated deep blue with two thin white stripes along the bottom. Leather seats, exterior waxed every two weeks, and of course a matching blue underglow that I disabled a couple of years ago because I’ve grown out of it.

It had four electric engines and one gas. The Insurance Company modifies any cars that member families use. And any cars that we do use must be modified by them. But the modification is free (to us). The main thing is self-driving capability, and the remote control that comes along with it. But they also do many other things that could make up an entire chapter in of itself.

I elected to pay extra to make it more powerful. Much more powerful. All five engines (one gas, four electric) have a combined horsepower somewhere over 1200. Although, I would have to change many settings to get anywhere near that kind of power. The torque is also insane, but I don’t remember the number at all because I have no idea what that number would actually mean. I’m a computer guy, not a physics guy. It cost me around $350k in total, and it’s still the main car I drive to this day.

After a heated three-way first-to-three rock-paper-scisors battle, Kyle got shotgun.

Jessica, as the runner up, got to play music. But no matter what, they were clear that I was not going to be the one doing that. Ouch, but fair. My music taste is still admittedly fucked.

My house was in Beverly Hills, and the party was in Inglewood. We took a Joyride on the 405. Surprisingly little traffic for a holiday, even considering it was a Tuesday. I got into a race with a ford GT, and won.

We arrived an hour late which everyone else in the car assured me several times was “perfect”. We parked on the street as close to the house as I could. As far as I remember nobody commented on the car. I have no doubt Kyle bragged about it, somehow.

This was actually an excellent night in terms of making friends. On top of being socialized with my teammates, after this night, I was comfortable labeling Kyle, Jessica, and Samantha as friends.

Five and three-quarter days later, I was telling the tale to Amy. She was happy for me, and I was thankful for what was probably a complete shot in the dark on her part.

But what I didn’t tell her was the story of my interaction with Tyler.

To this day, I have no idea why he was there. None. He wasn’t on the basketball team, or a cheerleader. Was he dating one of the latter? He’s kind of the opposite of someone a cheerleader would date. Either way, he was there, and I noticed him about fifteen minutes after I arrived. He was dressed as a clown. A rather cute clown.

I’ve kind of written myself into a corner at this point in the story. I’ve realized that I’ve left out a lot of details from the previous chapters, and I have avoided writing the rest of this chapter for several months as a result.

So let me try to explain.

So, even in a school with ~4½ thousand students, it’s hard for a gay person to find someone to date. Especially if they were absolutely terrified of coming out, like me.

So,.. at this point in time when I first saw Tyler at the party, besides questioning a thousand times over as to why he was there, two main thoughts kept swirling around in my head.

First, I had this overwhelming suspicion that he liked me. For the last, like, month or so. Give or take. I felt like we’ve been slowly crushing on each other more and more. Whether this is true, I will not currently comment on. That is for later chapters. But it’s what I was feeling at the time.

Second, I felt like I should tell him.

I didn’t drink all night. Not one sip. That’s really off-brand for me. Even when I would have to drive three out of four of us back to my house later, dropping Jessica off halfway through.

And I didn’t because nearly all of my attention not spent on whoever I was talking to at any specific moment was on Tyler. It was like he was trying to make sure I had understood whatever he wanted me to understand by looking at me so much, waiting for some equally vague yet direct signal to let him know I did.

I guess I was looking at him a lot too, as socially-anxious teenagers with a crush do. I didn’t really think about how much I did, at the time.

Then came ten thirty.

There’s nothing grandiose that happened at that time. And I don’t know why I remember it was [very near] that time. A bunch of drunk cheerleaders decided that it was time to try and do headstands and tricks and shit, as drunk cheerleaders in skimpy Halloween costumes do. Samantha included.

Honestly I don’t know how it started, or why, or anything. But I had snagged a spot on the couch to get away with the noise. Everyone was in the backyard. I guess the group came in here for the empty space.

So I got to watch it. Surprisingly, not a lot of fumbles. I guess they are good at what they do.

But the thing with this is, Tyler came in to watch as well. He sat on the armrest right next to me, and other people squeezed me into him.

It was intentional. 100%. I could feel his body heat. Smell him. The clown pants he was wearing were tight in the seat area. His butt was cute, and right up against my shoulder. It’s like he was doing some weird foreplay as we watched what was supposed to be a pyramid fall apart because the roof was too low.

Okay, sorry, that doesn’t make too much sense. Honestly, my memory of this time is super blurry, especially nearly seven years later. But either way. This was a tangible (sexual?) advance.

And then he left. Still without saying a single thing to me the whole night. Nor did I say anything to him.

Dustin, the player who hosted the party, was standing at the door to make sure nobody came in that he didn’t know, and to hand out candy to trick-or-treaters. But he had since left his post, so people had been wandering outside (and back in).

About half an hour after I noticed this, I decided to take a walk, after making sure to notify the group chat in case something came up and we had to leave. But even if something did, I had no desire to be around my car—I had just spent the past three odd hours rotating between talking to people I kind of but actually didn’t really know completely sober, repeating the same five things about my car.

And mulling over this weird new silent crush I had developed.

It was late enough where a kid under thirteen still out would be suspicious, but early enough where a teenager wouldn’t be. But even with all those people moving through the front door, there was nearly nobody out.

I wandered around for about fifteen minutes, making loops so that I could get back quickly at any time. The music got turned down in favor of not getting the cops called on the very much underage-drunk party, but it still took nearly a block and a half for the music to be quiet enough where I couldn’t make it out at all.

I ended up at a park. It was a reasonably sized park, with a playground and a couple of benches. I detoured through it with the intent to head back and maybe leave, when I noticed that Tyler was there too. Sitting on one of the benches.

That set something off in my mind. It jumped to the conclusion that for some reason, he came to this party, somehow baited me out to the park, and was now staring at me so he could do… something. Talk?

But then the rational part of my brain kicked in. There’s no way he would know I was here. And he looks genuinely surprised to see me. As did I to see him.

I walked up to the bench.

“Can I” I pointed and/or motioned at the empty half.

He nodded quietly.

I sat as far away from him as I reasonably could because I didn’t want him to feel trapped, or just like I was coming onto him. I immediately thought “wait no fuck” because I had no idea what to say.

Nor do I remember what I said. It’s been so long ago and I hate this part of my life so much that I’ve forgotten what I said to him. I even hate thinking about this moment so much that it’s taken me a third of a year to write these few paragraphs.

After a few seconds of silence. I said something along the lines of:

  • I might be wrong
  • If I am, I’m sorry
  • I’m here for you if you need me or want to talk

And then there was this moment of silence where we just sat and stared at each other.

At this point in my life, I would probably describe myself as a “respectful incel.” I was still a virgin, watched a lot of porn, objectified people, but was still respectful and didn’t push boundaries (usually). I felt like I should kiss him, or something. I got the vibe he wanted it.

I eventually got up and left without saying another word. We didn’t see each other for several weeks after this, nor did I really think about it.