I feel like I can tell Ethan every little bit of myself. Every inch of my brain, even the stupid stuff, and he always wants to hear it and he always understands. But with Robert, I don’t talk much. My words feel heavy when I do. Gestures have more meaning. His fingertips grazing the back of my hand. A look. It’s calming. It leaves me with room for my own quiet.
When Robert sits at the table with me, he smiles, and I smile back, and it’s comfortable and exciting at the same time. The lasagna is gooey, with layers of mushrooms and smoked sausage.
“So,” I say softly, “I heard this rumor that you like me.”
“Do you think it’s true?” he asks. I like the way his eyes crinkle when he smiles.
“Yeah,” I say. I kick at his boot under the table. He grabs my ankle with both his legs. We eat dinner with our feet entwined.
We eat until our plates are clean, soaking up sauce with big chunks of rosemary bread Robert made from scratch. I don’t drink my wine. It stays on the table, mocking me. Ethan doesn’t drink anymore either. We can’t.
“Is the wine too dry?” Robert asks when he pours himself a second glass.
“No,” I say, “it’s perfect. I just—I was nursing a headache today.”
“You know what the best cure for a headache is?”
I expect him to say sex, because I’ve heard that line before. Too many times. I feel disappointed about it, that he’s actually the kind of guy to use a line like that. But then he says, “This,” and stands behind me. He rubs my shoulders with his strong, strong hands, which, of course, leads to sex, on the kitchen floor, on the stairs, in his bed, but nothing about it is disappointing in the least.
* * *
I sleep at Robert’s house. All night. I don’t leave before he wakes up. Sex is one thing—just putting parts together. It’s another thing entirely to exist together. Robert is someone I want to exist with.
— Chapter 52 —
Ethan is so excited about the dance that he’s been in his top hat and tails since before I even got home from waiting tables.
He helps me get ready. We twist small sections of my hair and pin them as flat as we can against my scalp.
“You know,” Ethan says when we finally get the wig on my head, “I like you as a blond.”
“Personally,” I tell him, “I think you should wear a top hat all the time.”
I get the makeup perfect, copying a picture Ethan found for me: big red lips, eyeliner only on the top lash line.
When I go to my room to put my dress on, the zipper won’t pull up. It was fine before, but now, once I get it past my hips it starts to stick.
“Almost ready?” Ethan calls from the hallway.
“Almost,” I yell. I empty out every last little bit of air I have in my lungs and suck my stomach in as far as I can. I pull on the zipper hard and it finally slides all the way up. I have this fleeting thought that makes my heart stop and my insides flip-flop around, but I push it to the far corners of my mind. I’ve been eating three meals a day like a normal person since I got here. It’s catching up to me. The seams are straining, but I’m in the dress and I’m hoping that with all the beads and shine no one will notice it’s too tight. I bought a lacy shawl at a thrift store last week. I wrap it around myself before I go out in the hallway so Ethan won’t notice. He desperately wants everything about tonight to be perfect. I’ll just try to keep my shawl on as much as possible.
“Smashing, my darling. Positively smashing,” Ethan says when I meet him in the living room. He’s holding a plastic clamshell box with a huge wrist corsage of pale pink roses and sprigs of rosemary. It’s the first time anyone has given me roses. Matty never brought me flowers when he took me to homecoming.
Ethan opens the box and slips the corsage on my wrist. “As promised.”
* * *
We stop in to see Robert at the bar to show him our costumes and bring him a microwave lasagna.
Robert laughs. “You guys do realize we serve food here.”
“It’s what we do, right?” I say. “Bring lasagna to the person who doesn’t have a date?”
“We didn’t want you to feel left out,” Ethan says.
Robert kisses me and ends up with a mouth full of red lipstick.
* * *
Ethan takes me to a club on Grove Street that’s decked out like an old-time dance hall. Punch in big bowls. Streamers hanging from the ceiling. We dance like Fred and Ginger all night long, even though the music is wrong and everyone else is swing dancing. We almost win the best costume contest, until someone realizes I’m not a drag queen.