Dunkin and Donuts (6 page)

Chapter Sixteen

“That was hysterical,” Brice says referring to last night.

“Wasn’t it?” Dunkin grins broadly.

“It’s a good thing Shayla and I are adept at make-believe,” Brice smirks.

“You mean lying…”

I set down the box of Wawa muffins, in all their glorious crumbly deliciousness. They’re surprisingly tasty too, considering the source. Dunkin and I are at Brice’s place for breakfast.

“Remember…” I recall. “When Brice showed up at your office pretending to be your lover just to get that guy (what was his name?) off your back?”

“Off my back? Poor choice of words.”

We laugh.

“Claudette.”

“That’s it!”

A few months before Dunkin and I got together, I’d played a trick on him and had given his number and work address to an Ikea furniture delivery man who gave it to a cross-dressing homosexual gentleman named Claudette for the purposes of hot, animal, homosexual sex. When Claudette showed up at Dunkin’s office, I’d called Brice to go down there and pretend to be Dunkin’s main squeeze. Brice’s task was to convince the cross-dresser to leave “his man” alone. This strategy proved to be as effective as it was embarrassing.

“I guess we never learn.” Dunkin pops a bite full of muffin top into his mouth.

I still think the creators of
Seinfeld
were onto something with their muffin tops idea. Muffin tops are by far the best part of the baked goods.

“Speaking of not learning…Marlene is never on time. Next time, I’m telling her to come fifteen minutes before we actually need her to show up. Then maybe she’ll be on time.”

Marlene is Dunkin’s sister. She exudes a level of self-confidence that I’ll never hope to achieve. An offbeat, quirky, entirely at-home-in-her-own-skin lesbian, she and I have become fast friends. The four of us—Brice, Dunkin, Marlene, and myself—have hung out together a handful of times and it’s always been a riot.

In typical Marlene fashion, she bursts in thirty minutes late in a flurry of energy and declares without so much as a hello, “I met the one.”

“Good morning to you too.” Her brother gives her a playful noogie.

“I don’t have time for that. I met ‘the one.’ Her name’s Desiree and she’s incredible.”

Marlene grabs Brice’s hand and begins twirling him around, their musicless dance of celebration making the rest of us smile. I have two brothers and I’d give anything to be half as close with them as Dunkin is with his sister. Then, again, the twins have a built-in connection and I’ve always been the odd-man-out simply by virtue of never having shared an egg.

“Marlene, I saw you last week. How come you made no mention of this woman?” Dunkin asks.

“Because, I just met her yesterday,” his sister says, as if this explains everything.

“And she’s already ‘the one’?” My admittedly far-more-practical-than-I boyfriend asks incredulously. I, on the other hand, think it is endearingly romantic and want details.

“When you know, you know,” Marlene says simply. “Now, hand me a muffin. I’m starving.”

I oblige, handing over a delicious coffeecake one with some sort of icing-like cream inside. Yum. “So, tell us about this girl.”

“Well…We met on this paintball adventure. There’s a group that puts together activities for gays and lesbians. So a few friends and I decided what the hell? We signed up. So, yesterday, I played paintball and Desiree and I were the first ones to get killed so we got to talking. We just sat there chatting and laughing while the rest of our group played
GI Jane
. When it was time for the next round, Desiree and I were so intent on our conversation we could’ve cared less about some dumbass shoot ’em up game. Anyway, we bailed on the remainder of paintball, decided to grab lunch and… Well, I can’t actually stay for too long because I just dropped her off at her place to get dressed and we’re gonna go hang out downtown in a little while.” Marlene collapses theatrically on Brice’s couch. “The sexual chemistry is
amazing
. I’m exhausted.”

“Have you rented the U-Haul yet?” Brice jokes. There’s an old adage that lesbians meet, start dating, and move in together right away. But, as far as I know, Marlene has never been a U-Haul lesbian.

“Not yet…” she says cryptically. Maybe, she’s changed. Or maybe this Desiree really is someone special.

“This is ridiculous.” Clearly, Dunkin doesn’t like the idea of his sister being swept off of her feet. “You should take your time, and get to know a person, before deciding that they’re right for you.”

“Whatevs. We can’t all be as idiotic as you and Shayla.”

“Excuse me?”

“Everyone and their mother knew you two were meant to be together ages before you admitted it to yourselves.”

“We did,” Brice agrees. “You were clueless. It was sad, actually.”

Dunkin groans, wraps an arm around me, and says, “Okay. I am officially butting out.”

“Impossible.” Marlene rolls her eyes. “You couldn’t mind your own business if your life depended on it. But, I appreciate the sentiment.”

True, Dunkin has always been protective of his sister. That’s one of the reasons I love him. Like Marlene, I highly doubt that he’ll be able to detach and refrain from micromanaging his sister’s love life. Still, it’s sweet of him to try.

“Tell me more about these gay and lesbian activity groups,” Brice demands.

“I didn’t know you were interested in activity groups,” I say, chewing thoughtfully on a pilfered bite of my boyfriend’s muffin.

Brice looks at me, but declines to comment. Oops. As usual, I’ve put my foot in my mouth. I gather he’s interpreting my comment to mean that, since he’s such a big-boned fellow, he obviously wouldn’t be interested. I didn’t mean that at all. Brice gets winded walking up a flight of stairs and is bored by sports. I just didn’t think he’d be into some gay adventure group. But what do I know? Apparently, Dunkin isn’t the only one who needs to learn to butt out.

“Sooo…
Marlene
,” he emphasizes her name, clarifying that his words are intended for her, and only her. “Details…?”

“Sure,” Marlene absentmindedly fidgets with her eyebrow ring, winces, then runs her fingers through her short, spiky, recently died blue and purple streaked hair. “The group is great! I’ve done a few of their other events.”

They make a beeline for Brice’s computer as he stuffs the last remnants of his second muffin into his mouth and grabs a third. Marlene is still nibbling on hers and, in fact, leaves a trail of crumbs in her wake on her way from the couch to the computer. The kindergarten teacher in me, as an automatic reflex, immediately trails after her, and picks up the crumbs she leaves behind. It’s a habit that’s difficult to break.

Dunkin feigns disinterest from his recliner, but I have no shame about my own nosiness and so peer over Brice’s shoulder as Marlene navigates toward the Gay Play page where a series of gay male actors are engaged in a variety of activities—skiing, canoeing, jogging, climbing, and a number of other active things that presumably require a person to move. Brice doesn’t move. Still, the taste of foot in mouth residue from earlier discourages me from piping up as Brice registers for rollerblading in the park. I picture him in size thirteen rollerblades, knee pads, elbow pads, a helmet and spandex and bite back the urge to laugh.

Chapter Seventeen

As predicted, Brice is laying prostrate on his bed, ice stuffed between his legs, cursing (between moans) less than a week later.

When he calls me, his voice sounds sheepish and pained. “I shouldn’t have tried to

rollerblade,” he admits. “I pulled my groin.”

“I thought the whole purpose of gay rollerblading was to try and get someone else to pull on your groin.”

“Haha. Very funny. Seriously…It hurts.”

Brice then proceeds to tell me the story of his gay rollerblading adventure—or, more accurately, misadventure. Apparently, he had decided that elbow and knee pads were uncool and that a helmet was beneath him and so arrived at the park with his rollerblades slung over his shoulder clad in—I kid you not—a pair of bicycle shorts and a Queen T-shirt. He did not consult with me before outfitting himself for his day with the boys. Also, he likely missed the episode of
Modern Family
where Mitchell tries to covertly get Cam out of his bicycle shorts—double entendre intended. Few men can pull off spandex and burly Brice is not one of those chosen few.

But, I digress. Brice arrived at hunk central where a bunch of svelte, athletic men were stretching and laughing in their rollerblade gear. Feeling slightly out-of-place, but not wanting to let on, Brice flirted. He smiled. He preened. To hear him tell it, he was the life of the party for roughly ten minutes until it came time to actually rollerblade.

Then, he put on his skates and realized his mistake. Brice is not especially athletic or coordinated. At 300 pounds, balancing his oversized body on a single strand of four, small, centered wheels was an accident waiting to happen. And happen it did.

Surprisingly, he managed to stay upright and navigate the flat stretch of paved park terrain by wobbling and wriggling forward, inching his way around after his more practiced gay comrades, until a dog—albeit a tiny Chihuahua-looking thing—got loose from its leash and ran toward Brice, yapping and jumping.

“Go away!” Brice snapped, teetering, but somehow managing to keep his balance.

I’d have given anything to see my friend furiously waving his hands about while simultaneously maneuvering his substantial bulk and trying to keep his cool. Remember, he was a man on the prowl after all, only signing up for gay rollerblading in the hopes that he might meet someone. Unfortunately, I have to content myself with Brice’s recounting of the details since I can’t be there to see it firsthand.

“Did you fall?” I ask. “Did the dog knock you down?”

“No. I’m pretty proud of myself for managing to stay on my feet. I wasn’t exactly graceful, but I didn’t fall—at least, not then.”

The dog’s owner had rushed over, scooped up the dog, and apologized as Brice skated slowly away. Crisis averted! And he was still vertical. Rounding the bend down the path after his group, Brice realized that the next leg of the skate was downhill and he hadn’t learned how to stop. Ever resourceful, my friend figured out a way to coast downhill a few inches then hop onto some adjacent grass to slow himself down before returning to the pavement to coast downhill some more then hop-stop onto some more grass. He continued on in this way for a while, managing to slow down his trajectory, and started to feel like he was getting the hang of things. Only, Brice failed to realize that, a little farther down the hill, the grassy area became bordered by a paved curb, a little lip of cement sticking up around the greenery.

The next time he hopped up and jumped over, he misjudged the distance and the wheel of his rollerblade caught on the paved lip sending his legs into a wild split as he collapsed onto the pavement, skinning his knees and buttocks and pulling his aforementioned groin.

“Oh shit!” I say. “What did you
do
?”

“I took off my skates, threw them over my shoulder, and limped back to my car in just my socks.”

“Then what?”

“I left.”

“Without saying goodbye?”

Evidently, even at thirty-one, even big kids, when they don’t like how the game is being played, will pack their toys and go home.

“Will you come over and… ice my groin?”

I laugh. “Sure thing. What are friends for?”

And, while I refrain from saying so to him, when I hang up the phone, I can’t help but don a self-satisfied smirk and I say out loud to my empty apartment, “I told you so.”

Chapter Eighteen

“I’m thinking of having my boobs done.”

“Who is this?”

“Don’t be an idiot,” my mother says.

I have no idea if she’s being serious about the boob thing. The woman is fifty-five and is still in amazing shape. My father looks at her as if she were Olivia Wilde. He’s so in love, and in lust, that it’s practically sickening. Once, when she and I went out for a drink, a couple of guys my age came over to the bar and hit on her (not me!). Vanity Ross is a knockout. She looks closer to thirty than fifty. The last thing the woman needs is a boob job. A lobotomy, maybe, but a boob job…?

“Mom, your boobs are fine. Don’t be silly. Why are you even telling me this? Usually, I’m the last person you’d talk to about this stuff.”

“Well, I want your opinion.”

“I gave you my opinion,” I say somewhat petulantly. “Leave your boobs alone. You have a better figure than I do.”

“Oh I know
that
dear. But, that’s beside the point. See, the doctor found a lump and it may be cancer and I was just kind of thinking that, maybe, I’d do what that Jolie woman did and have them take my boobs. You know…As a preventative measure.”

“Wait. Rewind. You think you may have
cancer
?” I am starting to feel guilty for my earlier flippancy.

“Everybody gets cancer eventually,” my mother says, dismissing my concerns. “Never mind. I’ll figure it out about the boob job myself. Besides, truth be told, I didn’t really call to talk to you about my breasts, sweetie. I called to tell you about your brothers.”

“What about them? And, Mom, the possibility that you might have
cancer
is a big deal. We should talk about it.”

“They’re getting married. Both of them. In a double wedding. I think the double wedding is a bit tacky, but you know how John and William are, always doing everything together.”

My twin brothers are the center of my mother’s universe and, in her eyes, can do nothing wrong. I’m surprised she’s even admitting that the double-wedding idea is déclassé. Her adoration is insufferable. I bite my tongue to keep from asking her if John and William are marrying each other. In case you can’t tell, growing up in my brothers’ shadows left me with just the tiniest chip on my shoulder.

“Good for them,” I say.

“Yes, maybe, one day Dunkin will propose to you dear—assuming you don’t do anything to drive this one away.”

“Mom, I love Dunkin. I’m not going to drive him away.” How did we circle back to the subject of me and my failed relationship history? The woman is diabolical.

“We’ll see, dear,” she says. “That reminds me…Bring him over to the house on Sunday for brunch. I won’t take no for an answer.”

And, before I can respond, she hangs up leaving the looming spectre of cancer in the air without even a thought about the fact that that might be an upsetting revelation for me, her daughter. That’s classic Vanity Ross.