The display case is wider than my armspan and towers a few feet above my head. The contents inside range from Indiana Jones’ bullwhip to the Hanzo sword from Kill Bill, which I consider stealing on my way out, but can’t quite figure how to hide it under my tank top and gym shorts. “Pretty sweet,” I say. He nods in agreement and continues the tour of his room. On the merlot-colored wall next to the weaponry is a poem painted in black script. I read the first words out loud: “Some say the world will end in fire — Oh my God! I know this! It’s Robert Frost. I can do it.” I spin around to face the opposing wall, cross my arms behind my back, and begin:
“Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if I had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.”
I feel like I just sank a free throw after doing a series of round-offs and handsprings. “You said ‘If I had to perish twice,’” he corrects. “It’s actually ‘If it had to perish twice.’” I roll my eyes. “Well then,” I say. “It thinks you’re being a dick.” He puts his arm around me and kisses me on the temple. “I’m just messin wit ya,” he says sweetly. He walks over to the nightstand and picks up one of those massive electronic cigarettes. It’s easily eight inches in length and has a clear compartment in which brown syrup sloshes around. He takes a deep breath and blows a thin line of vapor in to the air. He sets the pipe next to an alarm clock that reads 4:10AM.
I don’t usually take Adderall, but I thought I was going to be working late and I wanted to fire on all cylinders. My friend Ellen swung by and dropped off a tiny, 20-milligram pill, off of which I chewed a corner (less than half), and worked my way through my entire hot list for the next work day. I was home before 1:00AM, feeling wired and confident, so I struck up a conversation with a guy on Facebook named Nolan, who I think I met on Grindr, but I’m not totally sure. He was pretty, with yellow hair swept across his forehead and lips that hung agape in a scowl. We made conversational debris until he invited me to come hang out at his place. “Maybe so,” I said. “It’s late, but I’m jittery and I don’t think I’ll be crashing anytime soon. Where’s your place?” “It’s about 30 minutes from Lafayette.” “Yeah,” I said. “I’ll head over soon. Just don’t pass out.”
On 1-10 West, the fog was a thick, continuous wall that I collided against over and over and again. I took the Iota exit, which led me through a ghost town bordered by miles of rice fields. I followed a dirt road that cut trough the stalks of rice and onto another dirt road that did the same. Siri said “The destination is on your left,” and I arrived at a brightly lit farmhouse that didn’t have a neighbor on either side for the visible horizons. He was standing in the driveway, barefoot, in a sweatshirt with the hood pulled up and shivering under a regenerating cloud of his own breath. “Sup,” I said. “Ma Ambien hasn’t kicked in yet, so let’s see how this goes,” he said. I half-hugged him and followed him through the side door and into the mudroom. We walked past two meandering Great Danes in the kitchen and his sister, who was fast asleep on the couch in the living room.
Here, in his bedroom, everything smells like stale menthol and the time is 4:10AM CST. Nolan takes off his hoodie, under which he is wearing a highlighter yellow workout shirt that looks like a child size medium. He is extremely skinny, which I don’t mind, but I don’t really prefer either. But frankly, at this hour and in this part of the world, I’m in no position to have preferences. He sees me eyeing his torso and he takes another drag from his mechanical cigarette. “I know I’m too skinny,” he says. “I can’t help it.” I throw myself onto his bed, pointing my feet towards the display case. “You’re not usually my type,” I say. “But you’re very handsome.” He takes off his shirt. “What about now?” he says. His body is spotted with tattoos. I tell him to come closer. Across his collarbone is a series of roman numerals, which he points to and proclaims, “That’s my birthday!” He turns around to show me his lower back, which is emblazoned with the words, Better To Be Feared Than Loved, from which a river of stars snake up his spine and onto the nape of his neck. Finally, in an Old-English typeface on the left side of his rip cage are the words, To Thine Own Self Be True. “Good one,” I say. “Classic.” “Yeah,” he says. “It’s from my favorite Reba song.” A few moments of silence pass while I register what he just said. “Um. You know Reba McEntire didn’t write that, don’t you?” I ask, even though I already know the answer. “Huh?” he says. “Yeah-huh. That’s from a Reba song. She’s the best.” “No,” I say. “That’s from Hamlet. It’s Shakespeare.” He flops down next to me, takes a puff from Cruella de Vil robot cigarette, and says “Whatever.”
What happened next made less of an impression than the Reba/Shakespeare mix-up. I mean, how could a 26-year-old man permanently ink himself without knowing the source material? I don’t expect everyone to have a minor in Brit Lit, but give me a fucking break. Reba? You thought the same lady who wrote “Fancy” also came up with “To thine own self be true?” It bothered me on the car ride back to Lafayette. It bothered me just as much as when he took drags from his stupid cigarette machine while we were doing it. Let me repeat that: He smoked his weird android pipe while we were hooking up! At one point, I said, “Hey, I know we just met and this isn’t exactly the most romantic experience ever, but can you not smoke that thing right now?”
I expected the sun to be rising when I left Iota, but it wasn't. The roads and the sky are as empty as the condom wrappers in my pocket. I think about Nolan’s other tattoos, and the Frost quote on his bedroom wall he painted himself, and the display of replica weapons, and when he played Rihanna’s “Take A Bow” on the keyboard while I sat on his bed and listened politely. He might not have known Shakespeare, but he wasn’t a complete dumb ass. Rude with his smoking habits, but not stupid.
In his bedroom, above the doorframe, written in the same black script as the Frost quote are the words: People Always Leave. I think about that a lot now. It’s simple and nihilistic, but it's beautiful. Plus, it’s such a funny thing to paint above a doorframe, isn’t it? I don’t know if Nolan does that kind of thing often — invites strange, jittery men to his home in the early morning — but if he does, I hope he gives them the full tour like he gave me.
A few days later, in a bar on Frenchmen Street, I will meet a very charming vet school third-year, and I will often wonder throughout our conversation if he also owns a replica of the Sword of Gryffindor. Or if he can play Rihanna on the keyboard. Or if he's got any tattoos he doesn't fully understand. And eventually, I will excuse myself to the bathroom, circle around the booths in the back, and make my way out the front door and into the street.
Because that's what people always do.
Or so I've been told.
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