Will arrived at my apartment midmorning wearing jeans and a new jacket I’d not seen him wear before. He’d barely done the rounds of conversation with Carter and Isaac before I was ushering us out for coffee. The beauty of living in an apartment in the city center is having everything within walking distance.
We walked past a much-closer Starbucks but made our way to my favorite café for coffee. It was a rule of mine never to frequent commercialized, franchised coffee shops when smaller, independent cafés still existed. Carter and Will were very well-versed in this conversation with me, and when Isaac questioned why we walked past two perfectly good coffee houses, they both groaned.
“Because Mark hates franchised cafés,” Will said with a sigh.
“And we’re not allowed to go in them,” Carter added.
I think Isaac was waiting for a punch line. Instead, I told him, “It’s my one pet peeve. I’m rather passionate about it.”
“And by passionate,” Will said, “he means stubborn and ranty.” They all laughed at me.
“Laugh at me all you want, but I’m a man of principle.”
Will held the door open of the much smaller, more personalized coffee shop. “You’re a man of many things. I’m not sure principle is one of them.”
I gave him my best death-stare as I walked in, but I promptly asked for a table for four. We sat down and ordered coffee and food.
Will was all smiles with dimples, and when I asked him the reason for his good mood, his smile grew even bigger. “Well, I might have called that guy on the list you gave me yesterday.”
I almost dropped my coffee. “Which one?”
“The first guy on the list.”
I rolled my eyes. “Tim? Jim? Jack? What was his name?”
“Jayden,” Will answered.
“And?”
“And what?” he said with a smile.
“Don’t act coy with me, Will Parkinson,” I tried using my stern voice. “Spill the details. Is he coming for dinner tonight?”
“No way.”
“What do you mean ‘no way’?” I asked.
Will looked at Isaac and Carter, who were kind of caught in the crossfire. He apologized to them, then lowered his voice to speak to me. “There’s no way I’d bring someone to meet you on the first date. You’d scare anyone.”
“But I introduced you!” I cried. “Well, kind of.”
“I’ll meet him first,” Will said, “and if he’s worthy of a second or third date, then you can meet him.”
“A third date? I need to meet him before a third date!” I looked at my oldest friend. “Carter, back me up!”
“I’m with Will on this one,” he said calmly.
I put down my coffee. “I’m beginning to regret letting you two meet. You’re both supposed to be in my corner, not ganging up against me. You know, like, if I’m Batman, you two will be Robin and Alfred. And believe me, Robin and Alfred would never gang up on Batman.”
“Alfred?” Carter asked. “Seriously?”
“Don’t underestimate the old guy,” I told him seriously. “He kept the best secrets.”
“Well, I don’t know about being Alfred,” Carter said, smiling into his coffee. “But I will always be in your corner, Mark. The last thing Will needs, though, is for you to intimidate any potential boyfriend.”
“I don’t intimidate anyone,” I said seriously.
Will and Carter both scoffed, and then Carter said, “You don’t mean to, but your confidence is daunting sometimes.”
“What does that even mean?” I asked.
Will patted my hand. “Your awesomeness is too much for some people.”
I squeezed Will’s hand. “Thanks.” Then I looked at Carter. “Why couldn’t you say it like that? Alfred would know how to say it.”
“Maybe I’m Robin,” Carter said.
“Pfft. You are no such thing,” I said flatly. “Will is my Robin.”
Will grinned, the full double-dimple kind. “I’d be your Robin,” he said. “But I draw a line at the tights and green Speedos.”
“But that’s the best part of his outfit,” I said seriously.
“No, the best part of his outfit is his cape,” Will said adamantly. “But his is yellow.”
“That doesn’t matter,” I replied matter-of-factly. “It’s a cape. The color of the cape is irrelevant.”
“Irrelevant?” he repeated. “It is no such thing. It’s the most important part!”
“I thought you said the tights and underpants were the most important part?”
“Oh my God,” Isaac mumbled. “Is this conversation even happening?”
“This is nothing,” Will said, taking a bite of his bagel. “Once we debated the pros and cons of eighties music. It lasted for two days.”
“I was arguing against,” I told them. “He was arguing for.”
“You were arguing for the sake of arguing,” Will replied. “No one is that passionate about teased hair, acid-washed denim and Lycra.”
I gasped, and Carter laughed.
“It’s true,” Will said. “He argues about everything.”
“I don’t argue,” I told them. “I just have opinions.”
“On everything,” Carter said.
“Isaac, sweetie,” I said, ignoring the two traitors at the table. “Looks like it’s you, me, and the wonder dog today. These two don’t play fair.”
“Oh, you love us,” Carter said.
“I’m reconsidering my options,” I told them.
Will pushed his plate with his half-eaten bagel on it toward me and changed the subject. “Care to tell us what we’re doing today?”
“Well, it’s Open Studio Day,” I told them, picking up Will’s leftover bagel and taking a bite. “I thought we could go…”
“What’s that?” Will asked.
“It’s Oak Hill’s art center’s exhibition day,” I explained, talking with my mouth full.
Isaac’s face turned to mine. He was almost smiling. “Oak Hill? Really?”
“Yeah, it might not be that exciting, but I only had a week to find something for us all to do,” I said, trying to play it down. “You might be sick of that kind of thing, Isaac, I wasn’t sure if you’d be interested but it’s their art exhibition day. They even have art classes, or so the website said.”
“I would love it,” he said, giving me a full smile.
“Um,” Carter started, but Isaac cut him off.
“Oak Hill is the name of the Connecticut Institute for the Blind,” Isaac said. “I’ve heard a lot about it, but never been.”
“Well, good,” I said. “Today you shall go. Then tonight, if you’re interested, there’s a jazz thing on at The Stage. Normally they do theater but this is some concert. I got us tickets anyway.”
Carter grinned at me. “And you want people to think you’re cold hearted.”
“Shh,” I hushed him. “Don’t ruin my reputation. I can’t have people thinking I’m all kind and considerate. It’d be years of being an asshole down the tubes.”
Isaac smiled then. “Your secret’s safe with us.”
I looked at Will, and he was smiling at me too. “You’re not an asshole, Mark.”
“Shh,” I repeated. “I said keep it a secret! Jeez, Boy Wonder, your secret-keeping skills are sorely lacking. I might have to revoke your cape privilege and give it to Alfred over here.”
Will just grinned at me, no sarcastic comeback or anything. Then he said, “What are our plans for tonight? And please don’t tell me it involves taking body shots from those Brazilian twins before or after the jazz show.”
I burst out laughing. “No… but now you mention it…”
“Who are we taking body shots from?” Isaac asked, a little too keenly.
Carter cleared his throat. “Uh, no one.”
“Oh come on, Alfred,” I said to Carter. “Where’s your sense of adventure?”
“I’d rather my fiancé not drink alcohol from the navels of strangers, thanks anyway,” he replied.
I looked at Will. “See what happens when you get married? Do you solemnly swear to never have fun again? I do. Do you hereby swear to never have sex with anyone else, ever again? I do. Do you declare to lose all sense of humor? I do.”
Will laughed, Carter rolled his eyes, and Isaac tilted his head. “Mark, where do you get this aversion to marriage from?”
Carter’s eyes shot to Will’s and they both grinned, slowly. They spoke in unison. “His mother.”
“Don’t speak of the devil,” I warned them. “Jesus, now she’ll freakin’ call. If my phone rings in the next ten minutes”—I looked at Will, then at Carter—“one of you two are answering it.”
They both laughed, of course, as though it was remotely funny. Which it wasn’t. At all.
Isaac looked like he didn’t know what to say, so I explained, “My mother is… well, she’s… not exactly what you’d call maternal.”
“She’s great,” Will said, with a nudge to my elbow.
“Oh yeah, she’s a real hoot,” I added sarcastically.
Then, because the universe hates me, my phone rang. I fished it out of my pocket and slid it across the table to Carter. I didn’t even have to look at the screen. “You answer it. Tell her I’m busy.”
Carter laughed and snatched up the phone. “Carter Reece speaking.”
I could hear the excitement in the shrill tone of my mother’s voice through the phone when she heard Carter. I took Isaac’s hand. “It’s okay, she may be Satan, but her powers for evil are rendered useless through a telephone. She can’t hurt him.”
“Satan?” Isaac asked.
I nodded. “Yes, she has evil powers. If you speak her name, the phone rings and it’s her.”
Will laughed. “Oh come on, she’s not that bad.”
“Not that bad?” I asked. “When I was sixteen, I’d told her I was going to the movies with some friends, and she told me to go to the cinemas on New Park Avenue because the seats were roomier,” I told him. “‘Better for giving head,’ she said. Those were her exact words.”
Will burst out laughing. “Your mom cracks me up.”
Isaac’s mouth fell open. “Really? She said that?”
“Yep,” I said. “I told mom I was taking a girl and she sipped her wine—” I mimicked the action of holding a glass of wine. “—and then she said, ‘giving head, getting head, you’ll need the same space’.”
Carter put his hand over the phone. “Your mom said to stop talking about her.”
Ignoring him, I rolled my eyes and looked at Will instead. “I did get five tickets for tonight, so if you want to call your date and ask him to come along…”
Will looked at me for a long moment, but before he could say anything, Carter held the phone out. “Will. It’s for you.”
Will took the phone and Carter slid his arm around Isaac and grinned. He looked at me. “Mark, your mom hasn’t changed one bit.”
“I know,” I agreed. “Plastic surgery and Botox will do that.”
Carter laughed. “I meant personality-wise.”
I nodded. “Yeah, that’s because she’s pickled from the inside out. Wine and gin will do that.”
Carter chuckled, but then he leaned in to Isaac and whispered, “She’s not that bad.”
Will said goodbye to my mother and handed me the phone. I looked at the dark screen. “She didn’t want to speak to me?”
He was trying not to smile. “No, she said no need…”
I glared at him. “Will…”
He grinned then. “She said it was nice of you to ask her around for dinner next weekend.”
My mouth fell open. “You didn’t!”
Will put his hand to his chest. “I didn’t, no.”
Carter laughed. “I did.”
I glared at him instead. “Some friend you turned out to be.”
My phone rang in my hand and the caller ID told me it was my mother. “I told you,” I growled at Carter and answered the call. “Mom!”
“Yes, hello darling,” she replied. “Just thought I’d let you know I’ll be there at seven. Did you want me to bring anything?”
“No, Mom, it’s fine,” I said, kicking Carter under the table.
“Okay, darling,” she said musically. “You’re such a sweet boy. Don’t know why some nice boy hasn’t snatched you up yet.”
And there it was. I let my head fall forward so my forehead rest on the table. “Bye, Mom.”
I clicked off the call, and when I looked up, Carter and Will were grinning. “Come on, Isaac,” I said. “These two are being assholes. Looks like it’s just you and me.”
I stood up, slid my hand over Isaac’s, and said, “How about we make our way to Oak Hill, huh?”
Isaac stood up, as did Brady, and we walked toward the door. As we passed the waitress, I looked back and pointed at Carter and Will—who were still grinning—and said, “Those two are paying the bill.”
Carter laughed, but I still led Isaac and Brady outside. “We’re not really going without them, are we?” Isaac said quietly.
“Nah, they’ll catch up,” I told him. I linked arms with Isaac, putting my hand on his forearm. I looked behind us, and sure enough, Will and Carter were following. “We have to wait for them at the bus stop anyway.”
By the time we walked to the bus shelter, they were right behind us. Carter spoke first, I realized, probably so he didn’t startle Isaac. “Your mom said she hopes you cook that Hungarian lamb dish when she visits on Saturday. She said it was good.”
“It’s not good,” I corrected him. “It’s awesome.”
Will looked up from his phone. “It is. It’s pretty damn good.”
“You’re coming too, Parkinson,” I told my so-called best friend. “If you threw me to the lions, the least you can do is be there.”
Will’s eyes went wide. “No, I told your mom I wouldn’t be there,” he said, still holding his phone. “I have a date, remember? With a guy you picked out.”
“Well, not technically you don’t,” I said. “Not yet.”
“But you’ve made a list and it’s only right that I keep my dating options open,” he said with smile. “It was your idea, remember?”
“Dammit.”
“Yeah, your mom was disappointed too,” he answered.
“Because she likes you more than me,” I told him. “I can’t believe you’re making me have dinner with my mother, and you’re not coming.”
Will looked up the street. “Oh look, saved by the bus.”
We got on the bus. Carter sat with Isaac and Brady, and I sat next to Will and stuck my tongue out at him, which he duly ignored. I hated it when he ignored me.
Will’s phone beeped, and he gave me an uncertain smile and half a shrug. “Well, Jayden can come tonight.”
“Your date?”
“Well, yes. You said to ask him,” he answered. Then he held up his phone. “So I asked him.”
“Jeez, you didn’t waste any time.”
“I can text him back and say we’ll go somewhere else instead.”
“No, no,” I said, giving his thigh a pat. It wasn’t lost on me that he said if his date wasn’t coming, then neither was he. “It’s fine. Guess I have to meet this guy sooner or later.”
“You’ll be nice to him, won’t you?” Will asked, giving me a stern look.
“Of course, I will,” I declared. “Scouts’ honor.”
Carter laughed in the seat behind us. “Mark was never a scout.” Then he leaned forward between me and Will and quoted me in a whisper, “But he’s fucked plenty of guys who were.”
I looked at Will. “Not when they were Boy Scouts.”
Will shook his head and stared out the window instead. “Nothing surprises me when it comes to you.”
I sighed. “Isaac, I’m going to need to advertise in the personals. I need a new Alfred and Boy Wonder. These two suck.”
“Well,” Isaac said. “I can’t vouch for Will here, but Carter certainly does. And very well, I might add.”
I laughed, and even Will chuckled. “I can’t believe I’m bringing a date to meet you lot.”
I put my arm around Will’s shoulder and gave him a squeeze. “He’s going to love you, Will,” I said. “You’re all kinds of awesome.”
“You think so?”
“Of course!” I said. “You are the company you keep,” I told him. “And you keep company with me, and I know I’m awesome, so that makes you awesome.”
Will shook his head again, but leaned into me and put his head on my shoulder for the rest of the trip to Oak Hill.