Conflict Resolution

From some guys, you can expect the world. They know your fondness for foreign cinema, how you take comfort in spending your Sunday afternoons at home and most importantly, they share your appreciation for the little surprises in life. So on any given Sunday afternoon they might show up at your apartment unannounced with a copy of Amores Perros and a Hershey’s Cookies and Cream chocolate bar.

From some guys, you don’t even expect a future phone call. That’s why I was so surprised to hear from Toy Soldier three weeks after our New York Pride post-party rendezvous. He’s in town just for one night and wants to meet up, perhaps for drinks, perhaps for something more. He’s vague on the phone about his game plan, leaving it ambiguous for us to figure out as the night goes on. With an appetite for spontaneity, I invite him over to my place.

“Who was that?” Sunny D asks suspiciously. The tone of my voice while talking on the phone had revealed my intrigue with the stranger on the other side.

“Just a friend,” I answer, rather vague myself. “He’s coming over and going out with us tonight.” Sunny D tries to pretend not to be bothered by the abrupt addition of a third party. “He’s chill,” I reassure him after sensing the uneasiness he’s unable to hide. “We’ll have fun.”

Moments later, Toy Soldier arrives at my place looking exactly how I’d remembered him—his defined jaw, his strong neck, his broad shoulders and brawny chest tugging on his light blue t-shirt in all the right places.

“Hey there,” he says extending his arms. I smile and go up to give him a hug. Nothing can replicate what years of military combat training can do to naturally accentuate the contour of the male body. I introduce him to Sunny D who doesn’t hesitate to ask, “So… how do you guys know each other?” He’s sure there’s some decadent back-story to account for the strapping soldier sitting in our living room and drinking our gin. And as usual, Sunny D is right.

Toy Soldier looks at me, unsure of how to respond. Here’s the real story. But I opt to tell the shorter and more discreet version. “At a club.” Again, keeping it vague for the sake of keeping the peace.

Sunny D continues his interrogation and eventually learns that the only illicit behavior in Toy Soldier’s file is that he got discharged from the Army after being caught canoodling with another man. Of course, this little insight prompts a “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” discussion and gives Sunny D the chance to address the personal story in terms of political standpoints. But much to his surprise, Toy Soldier doesn’t share his activist agenda. This bothers him, I can tell.

After the heavy conversation, I go into my room to put on a belt and Sunny D follows me. I stand in front of my mirror and Sunny D stands right behind me looking over me at my reflection in the mirror as I finger my black leather belt along the loops of my pants. Sunny D slides his hands around my waist and grabs on to the ends of my belt. Using it like reins, he turns me around and pulls me closer until my hips bump into his. He then rams his upper body on me, pushing me up against the mirror. We start to make out. I’m totally caught off guard by his aggressive approach, very uncharacteristic of happy-go-lucky Sunny D. It’s a total turn on.

We exit my room after a few minutes and Toy Soldier has poured himself another drink. We must’ve looked flustered because he asks, “What the hell were you two doing in there?” in the same tone of voice Sunny D had used earlier to indicate suspicion.

“I was putting on my belt,” I answer. Vague is the name of the game. “Are you ready? We should go.”

At the subway stop, Sunny D dashes through the turnstile, but Toy Soldier needs to get a MetroCard. I wait with him as Sunny D watches impatiently on the other side. After he’s done, Toy Soldier walks over to me slowly and puts his arm around my lower back.

“You’re not fucking your roommate, are you?” he asks insinuating that I shouldn’t be.

“Is there a problem if I am?”

“Big, big problem cause I really want to kiss you right now.”

“Well, I’m not.” So we kiss.   

I look over just in time to catch Sunny D roll his eyes, turn around and start walking over to the platform.

Even before we step into Eastern Bloc, our destination in the East Village, the tension between the two boys is explosively high, and I’m their Berlin Wall. In theory, it sounds awful. I should’ve been completely uncomfortable in this situation, making sure I was going out of my way to appease both sides. But in actuality, I was having a fantastic time. It was obvious that a tinge of jealously, mixed with alcohol, was running all throughout their bloodstreams, driving them to act more forceful in their pursuit over me. Toy Soldier and Sunny D seized every opportunity to catch my attention, display their affection and try to impress me so that they would be the one coming to bed with me that night.

The competition continues at the bar, where the testosterone overload encourages all of us to get as many drinks into our system as possible.

Toy Soldier and I start dancing next to each other except he’s so wasted that it looks more like just a series of abrupt hip twists. I find him adorable. Sunny D comes over to try to interrupt our primitive mating ritual. As he approaches, Toy Soldier flings his arm around knocking down Sunny D’s gin and tonic, spilling it all over the lower part of his white button-up shirt.

“Oh shit,” Toy Soldier says. “I’m so sorry!” Sunny D looks at me and all I can do is give my sympathy face. Toy Soldier can’t handle the awkward moment so he stumbles away to the restroom.

“I’m sorry,” I say once Sunny D gets closer. “He’s wasted,” is my justification for the transgression.

“Yeah, he could at least offer to buy me another drink,” Sunny D says wiping his shirt with a napkin. “If I knew we were hanging out with a gorilla tonight, I wouldn’t have worn my favorite shirt.”

“Hey! It was an accident.”

“So this is what you go for, eh? Guys like him? No wonder…” he says trying to make an issue out of Toy Soldier’s brusque ways.

“Excuse me!” I spit back. “Don’t act like, just because we’ve been living together for—what, two months?—that you’ve got me pegged and all figured out! It’s condescending!”

“He’s a dick!”

“Who’s a dick?” Toy Soldier comes back, just in time.

“Who do you think?” Sunny D is very aggravated, and yeah, it’s the liquor and the shirt, but there’s something else. Maybe the fact that I just called him out on some of his bullshit. Otherwise, I’m sure things wouldn’t have escalated to this degree.

“We should go,” I say trying to prevent the orange situation from turning bright red. “I’m leaving.”

“Wait, we’re leaving because of his fucking shirt?!” Toy Soldier shouts. “Fuck that! I was so excited to see you and we just got here. Let’s hang out.”

“You think he wants to hang out with you?!” Sunny D shouts back. “You think he wants to stay up all night listening to you? Oh yeah, because I bet you’re so interesting… to talk to! You know, on his phone you’re listed as ‘Toy Soldier.’ That’s what you are to him, something he can play with whenever you’re in town and then toss aside and forget about. And he just loves your whole Army story; he loves talking to all his friends about how he’s fucking a soldier! You don’t think he’s using you?! That’s what he does! It’s who he is!”

Before I can even fully digest this direct onslaught and with how little hesitation Sunny D brought out the firing squad, Toy Soldier loses it and lurches forward, grabbing Sunny D by his shirt and shaking him. He really shouldn’t have worn his favorite shirt. I try to intervene and separate the two parties, but I’m not sure how long my wall will last.

The bartender notices the commotion and steps from behind the bar to break it up and kick us out. After he lets go, Toy Soldier steps back a bit, looks at me and gives one final detonation, “So you’re really going home with this faggot?”

“I’m going home alone,” I respond and walk out the front door. I’m so drunk and upset, but I still manage to notice Sunny D trailing me a block away. We do live together, so our paths were bound to cross at some point. I stop, wait a few seconds for him get within hearing distance and turn around. Finally, it’s my turn to talk.

“So is that really what you think of me?” I ask as I begin to walk back towards him. “That I just use guys? They’re totally disposable to me? Is that what I thought of you?” The last question is particularly poignant because I’d recently expressed my feelings for him. He’s silent, so I continue. “What the hell was that all about? You have a boyfriend, remember?! So just… leave me alone and let me fuck whomever I want. Let me be the giant slut you think I am!” I drunkenly shout on Avenue A. For some reason, no one thinks it’s weird. “Oh… and by the way? Here,” I say getting closer to Sunny D, flipping my phone open and pulling up my contacts, “it’s Josh. He’s listed as Josh.” After making my final point in the list of things I made in my mind to bring up, I turn around and continue to power walk towards my apartment expecting silence the whole way back.

“I didn’t say you were a slut,” Sunny D says. I can barely hear his words even though he’s right behind me. I don’t stop or turn around, but I’m listening. “But don’t tell me that you actually see yourself with this guy. Doesn’t it just get tiring? All these one-night stands? I don’t want to see you keep hooking-up with all these random guys.”

“It’s just sex!” This time I do stop and turn around to look him directly in the eye.

“But you’re not looking for just sex.”

“How do you know what I’m looking for?”

“You told me.”

The next day, I wake up and go out to our kitchen to grab a glass of water in an effort to get rid of my hangover. I’m just wearing my boxers. It’s Sunday afternoon. Sunny D is sitting on the couch with the television on.

“Hey, I went to Blockbuster this morning. I got Amores Perros ’cause you said it was one of your favorite movies. I’ve never seen it,” he says, and like a puppy, he’s so cute when he shows he’s sorry.

“It’s really good,” I say after taking a drink. It would take a lot more than just that to make me forgive Sunny D for all the missiles he fired last night. But there’s always a place to start.

Where There’s Smoke… (Part I)

My best friend and I couldn’t be any more different. He’s from a small town in the Midwest; I grew up in San Francisco. He joined a clean-cut fraternity our freshman year of college; I was never really into institutionalized spanking. He was Captain Spirit, tailgating before every football game; I was Juvenile Delinquent, always on the verge of getting kicked out.

He really hates staying up past his bedtime, his favorite fruit is pomegranate and he lost his virginity the night of my 21st birthday party. I know pretty much everything about him. And he knows pretty much everything about me. Except that one night I slept with his boyfriend.

Captain Spirit is the type who always has a Mr. Right, a caring, cute, smart guy he can spend his nights in with while I rummage out and about, drinking Redbull and making out with dicks (sometimes literally).

Of course, I was always supportive of my best friend even when his picture perfect boyfriends turned out to be all photoshop, but deep down, I couldn’t help but resent Captain Spirit and his All-American, well-bred knack for monogamous bliss. If we are completely opposite, and he’s the relationship type, then what does that make me?

I was never jealous of the cute boys he was with. Not surprisingly, we go for different types. My best friend embraces the stable, and I like my fireworks. That’s why I was so surprised when he introduced me to his current Mr. Right. Sure, he looked like all his past Mr. Rights, but instead of cool and composed, this guy’s personality was more volatile, like he could explode at any minute. In other words, he was my type.

So upon first meeting him, my best friend alarm instantly goes off, and I keep feeling like we’re entering a danger zone.

They had only been dating a week or two, when they decide to meet up with our mutual girl friend and me for an after hours party at Evil Olive. It’s obvious that this boy, Mr. Danger, has already caused a shift in Captain Spirit’s sleeping schedule.

We are all on the dancefloor, and I’m dancing with my tipsy girl friend to Kid Cudi’s “Day N Night” while Mr. Danger and Captain Spirit linger closely behind us. Captain Spirit leaves to go to the restroom, and as soon as he’s out of sight, I catch Mr. Danger approaching. I dance with him for a couple of minutes but then feel awkward when Captain Spirit, who’s not much of a dancer, comes back. I make my way back to the girl and keep dancing with her.

A few minutes later, I feel someone coming up from behind and dancing up on me. Dancing up me real close. I turn around and see Mr. Danger right behind me and biting his lower lip. Captain Spirit is there too, watching this. I feel guilty even though I know we’re not doing anything wrong, but the last thing I want to do is cause a scene, so I just nonchalantly push Mr. Danger away and bring my best friend closer to us.

The rest of the night consists of moments like these, of moments of me pretending like Mr. Danger is just being a friendly dancer with no concept of personal space. But the way he is looking at me and dancing next to me, following me whenever I make the slightest move to try to avoid his incriminating presence on the dancefloor, he’s leading me on.

As we’re closing our tabs by the bar, Captain Spirit asks Mr. Danger to get in a cab with us and come back up to campus.

“Should I come up?” Mr. Danger asks seemingly in general but looking directly at me with his almost-menacing blue eyes.

“Do whatever you want to do,” I say instantly in a rather defiant tone, as if to say, “fuck off.” But the words come off more as posing a challenge. Do whomever you want to do. Despite how hard I try to act like he repulses me (or maybe because I try so hard), he senses that, really, I’m attracted to him. And my put-on hatred is fueling a flirtatious fire. And just like playing with fire, the game is both dangerous but extremely enticing.

I’m leading him on too. And he’s not going to let it go.

“Fine, I’ll come up,” Mr. Danger replies smiling and still looking at me and then grabs Captain Spirit’s face and gives him a big open-mouth kiss. I see his tongue going in deep right before, and I’m truly repulsed.

The next week, I’m having lunch with Captain Spirit who, after much bitching about his lost phone, confesses that things with Mr. Danger are getting kind of serious. I, for once, keep my mouth shut and just stick to using one-word, vague adjectives when he asks me what I think of him. “He seems nice.” “He seems cool.” But Captain Spirit doesn’t catch that my brevity might suggest bad news.

That night, we are all out at MiniBar for a quick round of drinks. I’m not looking to stay up too late because I’ve planned a huge party at Sonotheque the next night. All of my comrades are on the same page. Except for Mr. Danger.

As we’re leaving the bar, he turns to me, puts his two fingers up to his mouth and quietly says, “Smoke up at my apartment?”

“Sure,” I say, and although I think it’s just going to be a big, chill after party, I still have to make sure, “is Captain Spirit coming?”

“Yeah, of course, but keep it on the DL. I don’t want a whole bunch of people over,” he says.

We all get on the Red Line, and I get off at his stop like we had agreed on. The train continues on, and I notice that Mr. Danger and I are the only guys that have gotten off and standing alone on the platform. It all starts to feel way too DL for me.

“Where’s Captain Spirit?” I ask with an open arms motion signifying total confusion.

“I don’t know,” he responds, not confused at all. “I thought you had talked to him.”

“You said to keep it on the DL, it’s your apartment and your pot, and he’s your boyfriend,” I say feeling guilty and feeling guilty for feeling guilty.

“He’s your best friend.”

I pick up my phone and dial Captain Spirit’s number. The call goes straight to voicemail, and I realize that he still hasn’t replaced his lost phone. I don’t leave a message. We get off the platform and start walking towards his place in Lakeview.

[Where There's Smoke... (Part II)]

Noise Complaints (Part II)

After a few drinks out in the balcony, Chico Rock and his friends are ready to hit the city, and he wants me to join them. So I go back to my room through our connecting balconies. I take off my flip-flops, put socks on and my black shoes and change my shirt. I dash to my closet and get my jacket. It might rain tonight.

When I get back, I learn that the girls are not coming out with us; they have some birthday party in Salamanca to go to. So it’s just going to be me, Chico Rock and his friend, who has not spoken a single word to me the whole entire night. He feels threatened, I can tell. And I like it.

We get ready to leave the house, and Chico Rock whispers for us to be quiet going down the stairs and out the front door. He lives with his parents and older brother and they’re usually asleep by this time, I gather.

I try hard not to make a sound, but it’s the Bacardi shortly before midnight that causes me to giggle at even the slightest distraction. This tipsy, even a subtle touch from a cute boy can make me lose my composure.

We get on the Metro and get off in Chueca. Our first stop is Rick’s, a discrete gay bar a few blocks away. It doesn’t take me very long to realize that the Mediterranean décor and photos of Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman hanging on the walls play up an allusion to Rick’s Café Américain in Casablanca.

Chico Rock gets me a drink and hands it to me, then begins dancing to some trashy Spanish pop song. I take a minute and just look at him dancing slowly in front of me. I like the way he moves, controlled sways in one direction then the next, like a drunken rockstar on stage. It’s enticing. All I want is to dance up against him.

“Que haces aqui?” (What are you doing here?) his friend asks in a cold and condescending tone, disrupting my fantasy. It’s obvious that he is not very pleased that I have intruded on their boys’ night out.

“Estoy estudiando por unos meses,” (I’m studying for a few months) I’m short with him. It’s a defense mechanism, or maybe the thrill of the competition, that prompts me to blatantly treat him with indifference.

“Pero, tio, que no eres Latino? Sabes Español perfectamente.” (But, man, aren’t you Latino? You know Spanish perfectly).

“Eso no quiere decir que no pueda aprendar algo nuevo,” (That doesn’t mean I can’t learn something new) I say without looking at him. My sight is still fixated on Chico Rock. I down my drink, put the glass down on the bar and drag him to the small dancefloor a few steps in front of us, leaving sour-faced friend by himself.

What follows are a few minutes of getting up close and personal, of me getting so close to him that I can feel his breath on my neck.

“Oye, chico rebelde sabe bailar!” (Hey, rebel boy can dance!) Chico Rock yells to his friend, making sure he doesn’t feel left out. They have already given me a nickname, Rebelde, stemming from the time my ancestors beat the crap out of the Spaniards in the Latin American revolutions of decades ago (with the help of the French, let’s not ignore some historic justice here).

I don’t really know what to make of these two guys and their past. Obviously, there is some territory being contested, and we’re all looking to conquer. But the exact details of their friendship (or more) remain unclear. They’re both being intentionally vague whenever I ask.

Their night out turns into a night tour of real Madrid, not found in any gringo guidebook. I’m in the passenger seat; Chico Rock is my guide.

So after hitting some other bars, we end up at an infamous sex club not too far away. There are no signs and only locals know what lies behind the heavy metal door. I’m pretty wasted at this point, but I reject the thought of any frisky business going down. Despite my impulsive and often reckless behavior, I know how to take care of myself, and having a threesome, maybe even an orgy, in public with complete strangers does not sound that appetizing for this romantic. But would I say no to having a peek inside the underworld?

Look but don’t touch, Rebelde.

My vision is blurry, and it doesn’t help that the place is pitch black. Even after my eyes adjust, all I can make out are silhouettes walking slowly from one back room to the next—a Laberinto de Pasiones, Almodóvar would say. In the first room, an erotic film is being projected onto a blank wall. It flickers on and off. In the next room, the soft red lighting helps me notice that along opposite walls, there are booths with thick, red velvet curtains to conceal what’s going on inside. But I can still figure it out. Noises can often tell a fully story, especially this dark.

Finally we get to the very back room. A chandelier shines some light on maybe 12 or 15 bodies, touching and moaning, laying on a giant circular table, and a crowd of spectators gathered to watch the intimate exploits and ecstasy.

We decide that, for us, showtime is over; time to wake up. It’s pouring when we leave the club, and the street lights are so bright compared to the dungeon we just walked out of that it takes a few minutes for our eyes to adjust back to reality.

Chico Rock guides me to the nearest Metro stop and tells me how to get home. And right before I run down the stairs to the station, he grabs my face and kisses me as we’re getting drenched—the beginning of a beautiful friendship (or more).

But as I wait for my train, I remember that Chico Rock lives right next door. Why aren’t we taking the same train home? Why isn’t he coming with me? Where is he spending the rest of the night?

[Noise Complaints (Part I)]