Changing Tyler-Chapter Three

Billy was awaiting for me in the cafeteria at our ordinary table – the one poked up against the wall betwixt the tray return window and the boy’s baths. No one else ever sat there – probably coz of the funky smell of tuna fish and urinal cakes that clung to it.  That was wonderful with Billy and me. We could talk without worrying about being overheard, and considering that a conversation with Billy usually included references to cute guys with cuter body parts, that was probably for the best – for me, in any case. I wasn’t out to anyone else, and had no intention of coming out of the closet anytime in a short time.

I felt like I did on the rare occasions that I was sick and running a fever. A little goofy, a little buzzy, and a entire lot unbalanced.  I sat down next to Billy, grinning like the freaking Cheshire Cat.

“What’s with you?” this guy asked, fighting with the spout of his milk container. It was one of the rejects, the cartons u suspect they’ve used super glue to seal. It wouldn’t open right, the cardboard separating in the wrong places, until Billy finally had to punch a aperture into it with a pencil and pry it open.

“Guess who’s a tutor in English and guess who was assigned as told tutor’s student?”

Billy’s eyes flicked up toward me. “No…really? Dylan Anderson? You’re going to coach Dylan? Girlfriend! you and him?”

I fell from my high with the velocity of a brick dropped from a fifth floor window. First, I detested it when Billy called me “girlfriend,” especially in public, even when I knew no one else was listening. It was just one of these things that irritated the Hell out of me. Secondly, hearing some other human being say “you and him,” meaning “me and Dylan,” made me realize the truth. This wasn’t some intimate dream whipped up in my post-pubescent head. It was real. It was going to happen.

Me and Dylan, together, alone.

Oh, crap.

“I can’t do it. I can’t. I’d have to talk to him, for God’s sake. What would I say to him, Billy?” I asked, feeling the blood drain out of my head and pool in my feet.

“You’ve talked to him in advance of. What’s the big deal?”

“Are you kidding? Yeah, I’ve talked to him. I’ve said, “Great run, Dylan,” and I’ve said, “you were robbed, Dylan,” depending on whether or not he won or lost a race. I’ve told “thanks” when he’s passed back a paper in class. That, Billy, is the whole history of our verbal communication.”

“You’re panicking over nothing, Tyler. Talk to him like you talk to me.”

“He’s straight, remember? I doubt if he’s going to crave to discuss whether Zac Efron or Shia LaBeouf has the better butt.”

“We talk about other stuff, too,” Billy said, rolling his eyes. “What about vids or episode games? What do str8 boyz like to talk about?”

“Girls.”

Billy made a face. “Well, that’s out. Yuck.”

“You’re not helping.”

Billy drained the final of his milk, putting the container down and turning toward me, placing his hands on my shoulders. this chab had a white milk mustache decorating his upper lip, which made it a little difficult to take him seriously. “You’re overreacting about this whole thing, Tyler. This isn’t a big deal. This is not a date. u are going to coach him, for God’s sake. You’ll be talking about school stuff. Dylan is straight. Even if he was gay, he’d be way out of your league.”

My face hole fell open and I blinked, but Billy continued before I could say everything.

“He’s not going to wish to make casual conversation with u. He’s not going to care what you’re wearing, or whether you brushed your freaking teeth. He’s only going to care about getting through it in time to go boink his girlfriend previous to curfew. It’ll be a piece of cake.”

“Wow. Way to let the air out of my tires. Thanks, pal,” I told sarcastically, shrugging off his hands. Sometimes, I actually loathed Billy – especially when he was right. One thing he’d told indeed bugged me, though. “Out of my league? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“No offense, Tyler, but let’s face it – Dylan is hawt. You’re…well, lukewarm at superlatively good. It’s nothing personal – I just calls ‘em as I sees ‘em. Now, let’s move on to more important things, shall we? What do you think I should wear on my date with Robbie? The Abercrombie jeans or the Diesel? I was thinking about layering my-”

“First of all, I don’t give 2 craps about what u wear. Wear the Abercrombie. Wear the Diesel. Go naked, if u desire – you’ll end up that way anyway,” I told snottily. “You’ll go out, blow him, and never see him again.”

Billy’s jaw dropped and for once, no thing came out.

I was being charming harsh on Billy, but I couldn’t help it. Here I was, presented with the opportunity of a lifetime; time alone with the guy I’d been crushing on for 3 years, and all Billy could think about was himself and his date with Robbie-the-Hunk. Plus, he’d insulted me first.

It was no secret that Billy had experience – lots of it. this guy dated with a regularity that was amazing, but he seldom dated the same chap more than two or 3 times. I doubted this chab could remember the names of everyone he’d gone out with during the past six months.

I knew anything there was to know about Dylan. I could tell u his eye color, weight, height, address, parent’s occupations, dog’s name, and what kind of  flowers were planted in his front yard. I knew that this chab was right-handed, and had a small mole behind his left ear. I could recite his track stats, knew that he was hoping for a sports scholarship to State, and preferred his sandwiches cut on the diagonal.

Billy didn’t even know Robbie-the-Hunk’s final name.

Besides, what was this crap about me not being in Dylan’s league? I knew I wasn’t good-looking, not like Dylan. I was shorter and skinnier, my hair at no time did what I wanted it to do, and I had an occasional breakout, but why did Billy feel the need to rub it in? he was supposed to be my friend! Didn’t friends stretch the truth a little when it came to stuff like that? At the very least, they didn’t throw it up in your face.

I pushed my uneaten meatloaf sandwiches into my backpack and stood up, slinging the strap over my shoulder. “Thirdly, I’m sick and tired of everything always having to be about you. You’re actually a butthead sometimes, Billy!”

“What did I do?” Billy asked, widening his hands. that guy indeed looked wounded, as if this chab hadn’t done anything wrong. “Tyler? Tyler!”

I stomped off in a classic snit, the blood pounding in my ears drowning out anything else Billy might have called out after me.

The meatloaf tasted like cardboard as I mechanically chewed and swallowed it. I sat alone on the bottom bleacher at the edge of the track, wondering if eating had been such a valuable idea after all. My stomach was in knots, bile burning my throat. I stuffed the uneaten half of my sandwich into the paper sack and set it aside.

I just couldn’t understand Billy. I couldn’t figure him out. We were supposed to be friends, but that hadn’t been the first time he’d brushed me off, made me feel unimportant or unattractive. It certainly wasn’t the first time this chab wanted the conversation centered on himself, either. That happened every time we got jointly.

Billy was high maintenance. That was a fact I’d found shortly after encounter him, but that guy also made me laugh, and understood what it was like to be homo in a school full of straight kids. There were times when I felt like a square peg in an ocean of round holes, like I didn’t fit in anywhere. I couldn’t be myself at home, and I couldn’t be myself at school, either. I always felt like I had to see anything I said, the way I walked, the way I dressed…it was frustrating.

With Billy, I didn’t have to pretend to be somebody I wasn’t – I could always just be me. That freedom had been worth the one-sided conversations and preoccupation with anything Billy.

I’d come out to him about two months after we’d met. It wasn’t smth I’d planned or rehearsed – it had just happened, a spur-of-the-moment decision.  It was a rainy afternoon, and we were in my room playing – what else – Guitar Hero. Well, I played. Billy stood on my couch and danced.

I’d looked over my shoulder at him after the song finished. that guy was still dancing, even though the music had stopped. That was typical Billy – this guy danced to the music in his head whenever that guy felt like it, and didn’t give a crap who was watching.

I suddenly wanted with all my heart to be like Billy. To not care what someone thought of me, free to do what I wanted, behave the way I wanted, dress the way I wanted. To like whoever I wanted.

To be me, Tyler, and not somebody everybody else on the planet thought I should be. To have somebody who understood me, and who wouldn’t judge me.

“Hey, Billy?”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t think I like girls.”

“Yeah, I figured.”

“You did? How?”

“Well, let’s watch. Mindy Flagler just about got down on her knees and begged to have your babies final week and u didn’t even bat an eye.”

“She did?” I didn’t remember her doing any such thing. Mindy had always been nice, waving and smiling at me. She’d brought me a couple of brownies that she’d baked, and usually showed up at my track meets. I realized that she must have been crushing a little, although I hadn’t understood it at the time. I was a little ignorant when it came to the behavior patterns of the female of the species. I was twelve when I found that I found boys much more interesting, and hadn’t really paid attention to angels after that.

“Yeah, I know. you were likewise busy scoping out Dylan Anderson’s ass.”

“Oh. Yeah, well, he’s got a great butt.”

I turned back to the game console, clicked for the next song, and that was it.

Billy just accepted it. that guy answered a lot of my questions, likewise. Questions I’d not ever have had the nerve to ask anyone else, mostly about sex. Billy was a virtual how-to manual, a homo man’s step-by-step guide to getting laid. Unfortunately, I’d not at any time had the opportunity to put any of his advice into practical use. this guy and I had at no time connected, not in that way. To me, for all that his stories and language sometimes seemed scraped directly from the gutter to his mouth, this chab was absolutely asexual, my own personal little redheaded Ken doll. We were friends, in the purest platonic sense of the word.

Somehow, though, looking back at our relationship, I realized that I’d always felt like Robin to his Batman. Billy had the dates, this guy had the stories, the information, the experience, and the condoms in his Bat-utility belt. All I had was Billy.

Maybe it time to turn in my sidekick cape.

“Hey, Tyler.”

I looked up at the sound of the voice – the familiar voice – that called to me. Dylan stood about a half dozen steps away, looking as gorgeous as usual, but incredibly uncomfortable. this chab shifted his weight from foot to foot, and his eyes were fixed at a point about ten feet above my left shoulder.

“Uh. Hi.” That’s the way, Tyler, I thought. Dazzle him with your brilliant conversational skills.

“Um, I guess we’re teamed up for that naive tutoring thing in English, huh?”

“Yeah. I guess so.” Holy crap! Dylan was indeed talking to me. Full sentences, too, not just grunts. Oh God, please don’t let me do smth naive like burp or fart or throw up on his Nikes.

this guy nodded, eyes flicking everywhere but at me. That was a first – he looked as nervous as I felt. “So, do you have time this afternoon? To study? Or coach? Or whatsoever it is we’re supposed to be doing?”

“Study. yep. Um, after practice?”

“Cool.”

Dylan turned and walked away to where a small in number of his buddies waited. No goodbye, no wave, but that was ok. He’d talked to me, as in actual back-and-forth dialogue, and I hadn’t frozen up or keeled over, or had an embarrassing loss of bodily functions. I’d even held up my end of the conversation.

Okay, I hadn’t indeed told greater quantity than 3 words at a time, but it was a start, right? Suddenly, my appetite came roaring back with a vengeance, and I dug out the rest of my meatloaf sandwich from the paper sack, devouring it in 2 bites. I was going to need my strength. It was going to be a long afternoon.