Rhymes with Waiting

Boy Meets Boy

Introduction

On Dating

Excerpts:

"Don, the Pizza"

"Rhymes with Waiting"

"Giving It Up"

"Apple Tree"

Boy Meets Boy

"Rhymes with Waiting"
By John McFarland

From Boy Meets Boy

I am sitting in my apartment reading a book about compassion and how to develop it. I am waiting for a call from somebody I met on the street earlier this day. The somebody -- let's call him David, because that's his name and he should be held accountable -- is working late but is supposed to let me know when he's through so that we can meet for a drink and whatever follows. I'm excited. I'm waiting.

It's getting really late. How late can David be working, I ask myself. The book is making me furious. Fuck compassion, I think, I want the phone to ring.

So, I go downstairs to get my laundry out of the dryer. I know that once I leave the apartment David will call, and then he will have to wait for a change. I have learned his much, although I have yet to learn compassion.

When I come back upstairs, there's a message and I think of David's cute little butt in his black slacks as he walked away from me and how it'll probably look out of those same slacks. I hit the PLAY MESSAGE button. It's not David. It's zany old Frank telling me about his latest job disaster. He ends with, "So I took my apron off and walked. Don't cry for me, John, they just didn't get me there. By the way, I got a better job starting tonight. And I'm in love. Don't you fucking laugh. This time it's the real thing. Kisses. Ciao, baby."

That's the only message. I am in a rage at David, him with no pager for times like this. I decide that I'm not sticking around anymore. I call a cab, planning to go out to a club and be surrounded by mindless diversions and some cute guys. The cabbie shows up and I tell him the address.

As I'm settling into the backseat, the cabbie starts relating a story about the glamorous fare he had earlier. He says that she took his breath away so bad that he didn't know if he was going to be able to talk. Once she had folded her swell self into the cab, he managed to clear his throat, make eye contact with her in the rearview mirror, and ask, "Where to?" Out of the fare's mouth came this deep bass voice and the no-nonsense order, "Take me to Buddy's." (That happens to be the same place I'm going.)

"So," I ask, "are you going to see her again?"

The cabbie just gives me a look.

Inside Buddy's, I'm standing next to a hot man. Various people on the dance floor come to a complete stop, not knowing what to do, when some audio relic by the Bee Gees blasts out of the speakers. Others boo. The man next to me breathes out an extremely sexy, "God!" and rolls his eyes at me. I roll mine right back and say, "You can't fight this." He gives me the once-over and says, "Oh, yes, you can. Usually I bring my friends and we take over the place." I say to him, "Until your friends show up, let's be brave," and we hit the floor. Later, in a cozier environment, he also hit the floor. Things work out fine. No thanks to David, that asshole.

The next morning, looking pretty good considering what I've been through, I'm at the bus stop on my way to work and one of my neighbors, whom I know on a nodding basis, bounds up to me. "Hi," I say, "how are you?" He smiles and says, "Fine, now that it's decided. You know, four years here is more than enough." I say, "You guys are moving?" He grows distinctly cheerier and says, "I am. We just broke up, and I'm on the loose. Enough already." I guess he thinks we're closer than I realized, and I counter with, "Good for you! Action is always better than suffering and waiting."

He gives me his new telephone number. He writes down his name: Charles. "Maybe we can go out for a drink sometime," he says.

I give him my number, too. I don't ask if he works late and expects people to wait all night, although I am tempted.

A couple of days later, a Friday, there's a message from Charles. He says he's working late that night but is wondering if I want to meet for a drink at eleven-fifteen. I begin to shake. I wonder if I'm being psychic and having a full-body premonition that this will end badly, or whether I'm just still raw from that unreliable tramp David. I try to decide which, but can't. I call Charles to say I'm going to a play but will meet him at eleven-fifteen at Buddy's, since it's on my way home from the theater. Then I hang up and check out the paper to pick out a play. I decide on one by Moliere that shouldn't contain any unsettling references to voice-mail torture or waiting in general.

I'm at the theater by seven, ready for the doors to open. The setting sun is blazing hot, and all of us waiting in line are dying to get inside where it has to be cooler. As I feel sweat beading up on my back, I'm imagining the people behind me eventually being splattered by my copious sweat. I tune into their conversation, which is being carried on in a discreet whisper and requires real effort on my part, to see if they are concerned about the swamp spreading and spreading on my back.

One is saying, "Tomorrow isn't supposed to be as hot. We could go paddleboating." The other doesn't say anything as far as I can hear. The first one asks, "Was that a yes?"

"Either way," says the other one, but blankly.

"If you don't want to go, say so," the first one says. "You always say we never do anything and this is a chance to do something. Do you, or don't you?" The first one is starting to lose it by the time he demands, "Yes or no?"

"Yes," the second one says.

But this answer isn't good enough for the first one, who starts in, "You don't say that with much enthusiasm. And if you can't be enthusiastic about it, maybe we should forget it."

At this point I wish I hadn't started to listen in, but at least I know that they couldn't care less about being splashed by the sweat now pouring off my back in buckets. I can't control my curiosity any longer. Pretending to look for friends in line, I turn around to check out the two lovebirds. The nag is one dried-up prune and the laconic one is very, very cute. This relationship is doomed if the nag doesn't lighten up. I actually feel something like compassion for them -- I've been on this date once or twice myself.

I get to Buddy's at exactly eleven-fifteen to find Charles with a beer in his hand. He says, "You're on time!" and smiles.

I say, "I'm a fanatic about it."

"Good. You can't imagine what a mess I become when I have to wait. I think the other person isn't coming. Ever."

I laugh, but I don't tell him the whole story. Not yet. I save it for the third date when we're in a paddleboat and it feels more serious than having a simple beer at Buddy's.

JOHN MCFARLAND'S poems and essays have appeared in many periodicals, and are also included in various anthologies such as The Badboy Book of Erotic Poetry and Letters to Our Children. He lives in Seattle.