Great Expectations

I've been standing at the bar for less than ten seconds when Tung grabs me from behind, swings his arm around me, and demands the bartender put my drink on his tab. "Whatever he’s drinking, I got!" he says loud enough for everyone within a 50-foot radius to hear. "You really don’t have to do that, buddy," I say with disingenuous bashfulness. He smiles as wide as he can. "It’s so good to see you, man!" He's radiating happiness. I smile back and I mean it. "You too," I say. It's been 11 years since we've seen one another.

The girl hands me my drink and Tung ushers me through the crowd and onto the patio. I expected The Bulldog to be much more swamped than it is, what with it being Jazz Fest weekend and all. Every twentysomething this side of Carrolton Avenue with a bachelor’s degree should be here, but they must be as exhausted as me. Tung and I cut through the patio and under an archway that leads to a private courtyard. Here, somewhere between 15 and 20 of my schoolmates from St. Andrew the Apostle have gathered for our reunion. Tung barrels past me, waves his hands in the air, and yells, "Hey, y’all! RYAN’S HERE!" Everyone looks at me, and I try really hard to appear gracious and shocked, even though I knew this was coming. People woot and raise their glasses and a few even clap. I see Adam sitting near the front of the archway and we smile and roll our eyes in tandem.

Adam and I were classmates from Pre-K through high school. We even carpooled for a few years. Then, when we were juniors, we began dating two girls who were also best friends. We have a lot of history, me and him. Now, when we see each other at the gay bar in Baton Rouge, we screech when we talk and refer to one another as "Britney" and "Christina." It doesn't matter who's who. As long as I'm Britney.

When we bumped into each other at Splash three months ago, we couldn't stop talking about our collective anticipation for the reunion. We threw our heads back and cackled about what a fuckmess it was sure to be. I said I wouldn't leave until tits came out. Mine or someone else's. It didn't matter. But now, standing here in the courtyard, scanning the crowd for stray breasts, I can see this is not what I had in mind.

With the exception of Tung, who is shithoused in the way that my dad's friend Buster, who owns a gas station and drinks Taaka and crushed ice out of a to-go cup gets shithoused, everyone seems pretty mellow. Adam is sitting next to Kathryn, who is still one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen in person. I say hi to them, then make my way around the courtyard, asking questions about everyone's careers and families, and fielding questions about three very specific topics:

1. My recent promotion.
2. My sassy, offensive Facebook posts.
3. My blog.

I spend 20 minutes speaking to Ashely Adler about the recent suicide of a mutual friend. I discuss Cameron Yorke's plans to go to culinary school. Everyone looks just like their Facebook pictures. Everyone is doing great. No one grew up to be a disaster. No one is faking enthusiasm. My former classmates are just as happy to see me flourishing as I them. This isn't what I had in mind, but that's okay. Still, one rogue titty would've been welcome.

I circle back to Adam and Kathryn. "No one got an introduction like you did. Just saying," says Kathryn, smeyesing harder than I've ever seen anyone smeyes before. Adam leans across Kathryn and says, "I’m going to The Pub at midnight. Come." "I don’t know," I say. "I’ve been at Jazz Fest all day. I’m whipped and don’t think I want to be around a million fags right now. You’re enough."

It's two hours later, and I'm standing on the balcony at The Pub overlooking Bourbon Street with Adam and a bunch of fags. "That was nice," I say. "I wish some of them would've gotten fatter, though." "I know, right?!" yells Adam. "No fatties at all!" "More than half of them are still in school, though," I say. "I've been out of school since 2010 and I've advanced in my career every year since. I'm kicking ass aren't I?" He looks down at his phone. "Shit, my boyfriend just got here. I gotta go run downstairs and meet him. Stay here," he says. He leaves and I'm alone with my drink. I see my friend from Alexandria, Brandon, across the balcony, so I walk over to say hello. Standing closely behind him are five guys — none of whom appear local. Based on their unified effort to show the world that tucking t-shirts into belted jeans is a good idea, I guess Central Louisiana or somewhere swampy like Thibodeaux, maybe. One of them is wearing a blue, gingham button-down and he’s cute in the way that stuffed animals are cute. But among the other men in his immediate area, he’s clearly the most attractive. While Brandon and I discuss the benefits of living Uptown versus Midcity, I keep an eye on the Monchhichi doll in the gingham shirt. I don’t catch the last thing Brandon says, but it sounds like he’s waiting for a response, so I say, “I know, right?! Plus, Whole Foods is right there, and Uptown traffic isn’t really a thing until carnival season. Hey, are those your friends?” I say, gesturing with my chin to the gaggle behind him. “Yeah. Do you want to meet them?” he asks. “No, not really,” I say. “Just the cute one."

"Ryan," says Brandon, motioning to the man in the gingham shirt. "This is Joel."

Joel works for a bank that does banking for other banks, so you can imagine how exciting and funny he is. Which he isn't. But he is handsome and he smells like cinnamon gum. He talks about work and I wonder what his face looks like during sex and if my friends would like him. I can tell he's into me and also very anxious, so I do this thing where I bite my lip and I look down at my feet saying, "I know this is going to make the next few seconds weird, but I think you're really cute and I'm actually kind of nervous right now." In my head I just made a basket from the free throw line. He offers to buy me a drink, I decline, and then I give him my number and tell him that I have to meet some friends across the street but will come back a little later. Then, I leave.

I'd be lying if I said I didn't expect him to text me immediately. But he didn't. And later, when I returned to The Pub, I couldn't find him anywhere. At three in the morning, I say goodbye to Adam, Brandon, and the rest of my friends, and walk alone to my car on Royal Street. I listen to Alice Smith on the ride home, and when I get there, I quietly unlock the front door so I don't wake the dogs. Before heading upstairs, I kick my shoes off and grab a family size bag of Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos from behind the bar. In my bedroom, I strip to my briefs and sit Indian-style in front of the TV. In my head, I compartmentalize tonight's events — rolling the memories around and wondering how exactly they'd led me to being naked and alone in my bedroom, eating Doritos by the handful and watching a black guy confront a white guy who was pretending to be a black girl on MTV's Catfish: The TV Show. This isn't what I expected to happen. But then again, that seems to be the theme of the night. From my St. Andrew reunion to my encounter with Joel, the banker with Monchhichi hair, my expectations were met with objection. The wild titty rumpus turns out to be a mature get-together among old friends. The career-oriented gentleman whose underwear I'm charming off turns out to be not so interested in me, after all. I wouldn't call this feeling disappointment. It's more like surprise. The type of surprise you feel when you learn an offbeat science fact or that Norah Jones is the daughter of Ravi Shankar.

I smile to myself when I recognize the irony of Catfish being the show I settled on, and chip-by-chip, I finish the entire bag of Doritos.