Chapter 3
3
“ K laus is running a little late with a client,” a receptionist who was more tattoos than person told Curtis. “Take a seat, and he’ll be right with you.”
Curtis dropped his ass into a cracked vinyl chair and tried to look like he knew what he was doing in Rust Tattoo Collective. He didn’t have tattoos, and he’d never considered getting any. He’d made an appointment to see Klaus for reasons that had nothing to do with ink.
Last Saturday, he’d bounced out of a party at midnight to meet Sal at theirs. He’d been hoping for a chat, but Sal had come to the door in a latex bodysuit, and all the thoughts in his head had gone missing. Sal grabbed him by the collar and kissed him hard, and he hadn’t put up much of a fight.
They were making out on the couch when Sal’s housemate, Ammy, walked in. She’d taken one look at the two of them and burst out laughing.
“ This is the guy you’ve been hiding?” she’d asked Sal. “Wow, what a fucking Frankenstein.”
Curtis had been all ready to get flattered until he’d seen the look on Sal’s face. It wasn’t cute ‘we got busted making out’ embarrassment; it was real embarrassment. Like Sal had been caught doing something they wished they hadn’t. They’d grabbed his hand and dragged him to their bedroom, where instead of hooking up, they’d had the chat he’d wanted to have. Not that it had gone the way he’d hoped. He’d invited Sal to his next game, and Sal had acted like he’d asked them to sit on nails.
“I really like you,” Sal had said, looking like they felt the opposite. “And I know I’m not being fair, going quiet and then texting you and going quiet again, but I’m fucking terrified of people knowing about us.”
“Why?”
“Because the second people find out who I am, they’ll find out everything else.”
“You mean, like, OnlyFans? Babe, that doesn’t matter, a bunch of WAGS?—”
“I’m not a wife or girlfriend,” Sal had burst out. “Remember? There isn’t even a sexist acronym for what I am!”
“Who fucking cares? I’m into you and once I tell everyone your pronouns, they’ll use them, or I’ll kick their fucking heads in.”
“And if people make fun of you for being with me?”
“They won’t. You’re hot as hell, babe. Everyone’s gonna get it.”
Sal had shoved their fingers into their hair and pulled like they’d wanted to rip it out at the roots. “Do you fucking get it, Curtis?”
And Curtis had had to admit he didn’t, because no matter how hard Sal tried to explain, it wouldn’t click. He’d left Sal’s place at four, so gutted he was almost in tears. He didn’t know what to do. How to prove his feelings. How to show Sal that he’d spent the better part of his adult life crushed out on them and now that he finally had a shot, he’d do anything to make it work.
Which was why he’d done something stupid. After yesterday’s strength training, he’d gone to Byron Thomas’ office and asked for a word. Byron was behind his desk, still sweaty from running drills, his head clearly somewhere else. “What d’you need, Ingram?”
Seeing they’d once been mates, Curtis could have done without getting called by his last name. He should have seen that as a warning, but as he’d told Sal, he wasn’t known for his brains.
Feeling too awkward to sit, he’d leaned on the back of Byron’s guest chair and tried to maintain eye contact. It didn’t help that Byron and Sal had the same wide green eyes. “I, uh, won’t take too much of your time. I don’t wanna be offensive with this, but I wanted to let you know... I’m, uh, interested in Sal.”
Byron hadn’t said anything in reply. He’d never been much of a talker, but Curtis wasn’t prepared for this level of nitrogen cold silence. He’d rubbed his sweating palms on his shorts and kept going. “I’ve always been into Sal, but I guess this is me saying... we’ve been talking. Dating, I guess. And I want things to go further between us. Dating, I mean, not…” Curtis’ face burned like he’d been shot with a flame-tipped arrow. “I, uh… sorry, I don’t know what I’m doing…”
Byron looked at the ceiling, as though maybe God would save him from this chat.
“But I really like Sal,” Curtis blurted out. “Heaps. And I know Sal’s worried about you and how it’s all gonna go down when you find out about us, so I figured maybe if we talked…”
The silence lasted so long that it felt like someone had hit a mute button.
“Did you, uh, hear what I said?” Curtis asked when it had all become too painful.
“I did.” Byron’s voice was hard. “I also knew you had a thing for them.”
“This isn’t that,” Curtis said at once. “I’m not?—”
“Making up for lost time?”
“No, I’m?—”
“Fucking with the coach’s sister to prove some dumb-fuck point?”
“No, I’m t?—”
Byron stood like he was about to start swinging. “You know Sal’s deal?”
“I know they’re non-binary, and I respect tha?—”
“Shut up.” Byron’s voice echoed around the office, reverberating off the walls.
Again, Curtis considered leaving. Again, he’d fucked up. “Sal likes me, I know they do?—”
“So, you think you can just waltz in here and tell me you wanna fuck my non-binary sister like you’re doing me a favour? Like you’re the bachelor of the fucking year or something, and I should be grateful?”
“No!” Curtis’s stomach had dropped to his feet. “I don’t want to date a non-binary person; I want to date Sal, and?—”
“Fuck off, Ingram. Take your bullshit somewhere else.”
Curtis had held up his palms. “Easy.”
Byron tensed, his hands balling into fists, and again, Curtis wondered if his old friend was going to hit him. “I’m not talking to you as a coach; I’m talking to you as Sal’s brother. They spent a long time getting to a place where they’re happy. They don’t need some fucking footy player treating them like some medal they’re gonna win, then checking out when it gets too hard.”
“I won’t?—”
“You will. I don’t want you sniffing around, making them uncomfortable. They don’t need you fucking up all the work they’ve done?—”
“W-What?” Curtis had sputtered. “I just told you, I don’t mind that they’re non-bi?—”
“Yeah, aren’t you fucking nice. I don’t mind that you play on this team, but if you don’t get the fuck out of my office, that will change.”
“Mate—”
“Shut up,” Byron repeated, and again the words seemed to ring around the room. “Fuck off and stay fucked off. Sal’s my family. They’re blood. You’re not right for them, and you never will be. Get out of here and don’t come back.”
Curtis had known he was done. The rage simmering in his coach was only going to get worse. He turned heel for the showers, feeling stupid, angry, and two sizes too big for his body.
But that hadn’t been the worst part of his fuck-up. That had come a few hours later when Sal called.
“You spoke to my brother?” they’d said, without even a ‘hello.’ “Why did you talk to my brother? What possessed you to talk to my insanely protective brother, who is also your coach?”
Curtis had been in his car, listening to MF Doom and feeling lower than dirt. Again, if he’d been smart, he would have waited and gotten his thoughts together. Instead, he just went for it. “Sorry. I thought maybe it would help.”
“With what ?”
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “I dunno. I’m kinda drowning here, babe.”
“I get that, but holy fuck, Byron’s giving birth to a zillion cows right now. He thinks you’re gonna, like, ruin my life. My sister-in-law had to put him on the back porch with a six pack and a box of Ibuprofen Rapid.”
“Shit.”
“Yeah, she says he keeps mumbling ‘the disrespect’ over and over.”
“Fuck.”
“Why, Curtis? Why? ”
“I just wanted to try to move things forward. Show you there’s nothing to worry about?”
“By freaking my brother’s nut and getting benched forever?”
Despite his stress, Curtis had snorted. “He can’t bench me, babe. He can’t make that call.”
“Yeah, focus on that, why don’t you? He can still fuck with you,” they snarled. “He hates that we’ve been going out. Why couldn’t you let this thing go at my pace?”
“Because it’s been ages, and you won’t let me tell anyone we’re going out, even though all the boys already know I’m seeing someone.”
“How?”
“Because I don’t…” He scratched his hairline. “It doesn’t matter.”
Sal laughed. “Because you don’t smash mad puss after away games anymore? Lucky me.”
Curtis couldn’t remember a conversation ever going worse. “Babe, I swear I don’t want to fuck this up. I want you. I don’t want anyone else. I’m just worried you’re never gonna come around on us.”
He waited for Sal to say he was wrong. Instead, they said nothing at all.
“Shit,” he repeated. “You are gonna come around, right? You’re into what we’re doing?”
There’d been another long silence, and unlike the ones that had happened when he’d been with Byron, Curtis didn’t think Sal was thinking about ways to kill him and get away with it. “Babe?”
“Sorry,” Sal said, and he realised they were crying. “I hate that this is so complicated. I hate that I can’t figure any of this out.”
“Byron’ll come around.”
“It’s not that,” they said, their voice thick with tears. “I just don’t think I can do this anymore.”
“Fuck.” He’d rubbed a hand over his eyes, suddenly fighting back his own tears. “Are you… Is it over?”
“I don’t want it to be. I… Why does this have to be so hard?”
“I don’t know. I’ve told you I don’t care that you’re non-binary.” There was a short silence, and he knew he’d screwed up yet again. “Sorry, I mean?—”
“I wish you did care, Curtis. I care .”
The line had disconnected, leaving him alone in his car with his thoughts. He’d been spinning out ever since, knowing there was something he wasn’t seeing with Sal, something he couldn’t get right. The answer felt stupidly close but a thousand miles away. He stayed up half the night, searching for shit online, but the information on queer identities overlapped and got so confusing that he had no idea what anything meant. Around midnight, he’d realised he needed a guide. Someone to walk him through this stuff. Only he didn’t know anyone else who was non-binary or even gay. Then he remembered Klaus. Sal had said they were still friends, and he’d been really helpful when they were first coming out as non-binary. After a bunch of umming and ahhing, Curtis had found the guy on Instagram and asked if he could chat with him about Sal. He’d expected to get ghosted, but minutes after he'd sent Klaus the DM, he’d agreed and invited Curtis to drop in at the tattoo studio around 3pm, which had brought Curtis to the Rust Tattoo Collective.
Knowing his luck, the guy was probably going to tell him to fuck off, but it was worth a shot. If it didn’t work with Sal, Curtis wasn’t sure he’d ever feel this way about anyone again. He’d had crushes before, but nothing like this. Just the thought of Sal’s big green eyes made him all stupid in the head. Yesterday, Damien Mills had kicked a footy square into his face, and he’d barely noticed, he was so out of it.
Someone appeared behind the front desk, and Curtis’ heart jolted—but it was just the receptionist with a cup of tea. He pulled out his phone and scrolled through his and Sal’s texts. There were thousands of jokes, reels, pictures and memes.
It can’t be over , Curtis thought. Please don’t let it be over…
“Hey, mate, how’s it going?”
Curtis looked up to see a tattooed guy smiling at him. He had stretchers in both ears and was as tall standing as Curtis was sitting down. “Klaus?”
“Yup. Come through. You want a coffee?”
“Nah, I’m good, thanks.”
“Then come through. Let’s chat.”
Curtis followed him past the desk and into one of the tattoo rooms. Klaus closed the door and swung himself onto the tattoo bench.
“Take a seat,” he said, pointing to a normal chair nearby. “Sure you don’t want a drink?”
Curtis shook his head and sat. He’d seen photos of Sal’s ex on Instagram and been a bit of a cunt about him, wondering how the fuck a dude who looked like a goth Christmas elf pulled such a fox. But now that he was looking at Klaus, he got it. The guy was utterly relaxed, grinning at him in a way that made Curtis want to smile back.
He’d never be a dick to Sal . He’d never get all confused when they’re talking.
“So?” Klaus said. “You’re seeing Sal?”
“I, uh, I-I dunno,” Curtis stammered. “I want to. I like them. I like them, but, uh, nothing seems to be working. Because of me, I think.”
Klaus nodded slowly and Curtis wanted to fucking die. He’d come here to talk about non-binary stuff, not recruit Sal’s ex into a free therapy session. He stood up. “I’m sorry, man, I have no idea what I’m talking about.”
“It’s fine,” Klaus said. “There’s no stress here. It’s cool you reached out.”
The blip of relief Curtis felt only made him want to leave more. “It’s not. I just dunno what to do. I’m so into Sal, but no matter what I do, I just keep fucking stuff up and… God, this is fucking ridiculous, huh? I’m making a complete knob out of myself, aren’t I?”
“Not at all, mate. Take a seat, and I’ll get us a coffee.”
“But—”
“Let me,” Klaus said gently. “It’ll help. Seriously, sit and try to breathe it out. I’ll be back in a sec.”
He hopped off the bench and left, closing the door behind him. Curtis sat, exhaling what felt like the entire contents of his lungs.
“I get it,” he muttered to the room. “He’s a nice fucking guy.”
Klaus returned a few minutes later with two cups of coffee and retook his seat across from Curtis.
“Start at the start,” he said, pulling out a vape. “Or wherever feels right. I don’t have anyone in for another couple of hours. We’ve got heaps of time.”
And so, Curtis talked. He told Klaus how he and Sal met at the party. Sal didn’t want anyone to know how they'd been dating. He didn’t want to talk about how he’d been a dick to Sal back in the day, but once he got going, it was hard to stop and soon, he’d laid it all out. The sex, the balls-up with Byron Thomas, the fact that Sal wouldn’t let them meet any of their friends, and how he felt like it was because they wouldn’t like him.
“I’m their friend,” Klaus said through a massive cloud of smoke. “I like you.”
Curtis, drained and kinda lightheaded from whatever was in Klaus’ vape, almost started crying like a five-year-old. “Cheers, mate. ‘Preciate it.”
“I mean it. You stuck your neck out coming here to talk to me. That takes guts. And I know Sal’s into you.”
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.” Klaus grinned. “They’ve only been going on and on about you since you ran into each other at that party.”
Curtis stared at the tattoo artist, wondering if, despite everything, the guy was an asshole and he was fucking with him.
“They’re really keen,” Klaus went on. “And I think you can make this work. You just, uh, maybe shouldn’t have gone to see Byron. I get why you did, but that wasn’t the move.”
“You’re telling me,” Curtis groaned. “So, what next? How do I fix this?”
Klaus didn’t say anything for a minute. He drew on his vape, his eyes slightly unfocused as he stared at the ceiling.
“Everything okay?” Curtis prompted. He’d had enough long silences for a lifetime.
“Yeah, sorry, I’m just trying to figure out…” Klaus’s gaze snapped to his. “I know you and Sal have talked about their gender identity, but what I think you’re missing is that no matter how they feel on the inside, Sal’s always gonna be femme-presenting.”
Curtis frowned. “Sorry?”
“Unless they make a lot of serious changes—which they don’t want to do—Sal’s probably always gonna have strangers assuming they’re a girl. And that’s shit. It makes them feel really self-conscious.”
“I get that.”
“Good, well, you know how Sal doesn’t talk to their parents?”
He nodded.
“They went through a bad time with their folks when they first came out. They’re better now, but they never want to be in a position where they have to question their identity all the time. They want to surround themselves with supportive people.”
“I’m supportive!”
“You are, but Sal keeps trying to tell you that it doesn’t matter how much other people see them as a girl, they aren’t one. And they need to know you don’t see them that way.”
Curtis was starting to feel like he had a cement mixer for a brain. A shitty one. “I’m trying, but I’m attracted to Sal because they’ve got the face and the body they do, and I don’t know what that means except I don’t care that they’re non-binary.”
Klaus gave him a look Curtis remembered from his science teachers.
“I’m sayin’ dumb shit, aren’t I?”
“Uhh…?”
“I am.” Curtis buried his face in his hands. “Fucking hell, I’m never gonna get this.”
“Hey,” Klaus said in a soothing voice. “It’s not like that. No one knows all this stuff when they start, and your heart’s obviously in the right place. You’ve gotta understand how what you’re saying comes across.”
“How does it come across?”
“Well…” Klaus said slowly. “It sounds like you’re only willing to put up with Sal being non-binary because you’re attracted to them.”
“What!? How?”
“You said you don’t care that they’re non-binary.”
“I don’t!”
“But this isn’t just some quirky thing you’re willing to entertain because you like them. This is who Sal is. Okay, okay, let’s bring this in.” Klaus held up his hands. “How’s this for an example? You’ve got a friend from another country. A place where everything’s fucked up and corrupt and shitty, but whenever they try to talk to you about their country, you say, ‘oh it’s fine, I don’t care that you’re from there. I don’t even notice.’”
Realisation hit Curtis like a knee to the head. He sat back in his chair, thoughts churning. He had family in Ukraine—cousins fighting to leave even as he sat talking to Klaus. If they ever Facetimed to let him know how hard they were struggling, and he said he didn’t mind that they were from Ukraine…
“Shit. So it’s, like… saying ‘I don’t care Sal’s non-binary’ isn’t the same thing as saying ‘I love that about you and I’m here for you no matter what’?”
Klaus smiled like he’d just cracked the secrets of the universe. “Couldn’t have put it better myself, mate.”
“Christ.” Curtis pushed the heels of his hands into his eye sockets. “I’ve said I don’t care about a million times. I think I told her brother that too.”
“Yeah, that probably wasn’t a good idea…”
“Jesus, no wonder they don’t want a bar of me.”
“They do,” Klaus said. “Besides, now you’re getting it. It’s not enough to love Sal. You’ve gotta support them and try to make the world a better place for them.”
Curtis’s heart stopped in his chest. “Love?”
“You dropped the word first, mate. ‘Saying I don’t care Sal’s non-binary isn’t the same thing as saying I love that about you.’ ”
“Fuck!” Curtis pushed his palms in further. “I can’t believe I told Sal’s ex that. I didn’t wanna tell anyone that. Especially since everything’s in the shit.”
Klaus laughed. “It’s all good. Sal’ll get there. If they’re not there already.”
“Dunno if I agree, mate…”
“You should. Sal’s patient as fuck, and they’re obviously into you. Anyway, I think I know what you can do to get back in their good books. If you wanna hear it?”
“Christ, yes! Lay it on me.”
Klaus checked his watch. “I just had a cancellation, so I’m done for the day. You wanna go get a beer?”
It wasn’t where Curtis had thought the afternoon was going, but as he headed outside with Klaus, the five-foot-five doofhead whisperer, he was pretty happy it had.