Oliver
Four years and three hundred and sixty four days later
The thing about the New York subway is that you’re never the strangest thing on it.
I look down the half-empty car at a guy in a neon-green jumpsuit who’s got a boa constrictor wrapped around his body.
Dude’s just casually taking the train with a whole-ass snake.
With brows drawn, I turn to the other end, where there’s a couple doing some kind of acrobatic pole dancing. There’s not even an upturned hat masquerading as a tip jar, they’re just practicing their skills.
This is why I never hold the poles. Chances are, it was rubbing someone’s unmentionables.
I shake my head, refocusing my face forward because the best show is actually the one in front of me—a sweet-looking little old lady in comfortable shoes with a French loaf in her purse and a Kindle in her lap.
The text is oversize because she must need help seeing the words.
Words like throbbing member and wet folds—
I chuckle to myself, unable to complete the thought, because it really is always the innocent-looking ones. Although, good for her. At least she’s getting some kind of action the day before Valentine’s Day.
All I have is the company of Benny, my best friend, who’s sitting next to me on our way to a Chinese restaurant, owned by an Italian dude, in Hell’s Kitchen.
Those three qualifiers aren’t even the strangest part about my day.
Nope, it’s that we’ve been hired to play Cupids.
To entertain a bunch of ladies as some kind of paid-under-the-table Galentine’s Day brunch show.
We’re singing for our supper, so to speak. Here’s the thing, Benny can’t sing. Neither can I.
But we need rent money.
My eyes close for a moment, letting that thought sink in, because this is what my life’s devolved into. I’m a twenty-seven-year-old out-of-work actor, forced to become a singing Cupid just so I can survive. I have, in fact, hit my career low.
Benny looks up from his phone.
“Damn. She canceled.”
“Huh?” I answer, lost in thought watching someone’s nonna highlight my fingers couldn’t fit around him.
“Jesus Christ, is she doing a Coke can?” Benny whispers, having upside-down read what I did too. “That feels like a hospital visit . . . He’d have to have some kind of infection to get that kind of girth, right?”
I clear my throat, forcing him to stop talking.
“Who canceled?” I redirect.
He grins and teasingly winks at the lady when she looks up before he shifts his gaze back to me. “The girl I’ve been talking to.”
“The vet?”
He nods. “Yeah, she said spending the night together was moving too fast.”
“How long have you been dating?”
“Whoa . . .” he draws out. “Easy on dating. We just started talking.”
“So why’d you ask her out for the day before Valentine’s?” He grins, making me shake my head. “You didn’t know tomorrow was Valentine’s, did you?”
He winces. I laugh. What a dumbass.
But Benny recovers quickly. “Let’s go to Patty’s after we’re done here?”
Patty’s is an Irish pub below our shared apartment. It’s for lifers and the occasional bachelorette party.
I shake my head because I’m not in the mood. Not even to drown my sorrows over my life.
“Come on, we have to,” he presses, but I ignore him, crossing my arms and leaning back to close my eyes. “Oh my god,” he groans dramatically before clicking his tongue. “You’re doing that thing again.”
I frown, hating that I know where he’s going with this.
“What thing?” I pause. “No, I’m not.”
He scoffs and sits silent long enough to make me reopen my eyes and stare back at him.
“What?” I toss out, annoyed.
“You do this every time you’re out of a job for too long, and we have to do something skanky . . . You’re having an existential crisis.”
“I’m absolutely not doing that.” I might be doing it a little.
“Yes, you are.”
“No. I am not.”
“Yes . . . you are.”
I sigh, uncrossing my arms and slightly tossing them up in the air as Benny shakes his head, speaking first.
“How many times do I have to tell you that acting isn’t for you?”
“Dude. You literally have a magnet on our fridge that says, Friends support each other’s dreams. That sentence was the opposite.”
He looks at me like I’m dumb. “I bought that for our lesbian neighbors in the hopes they’d let me become a third. Pay attention.”
Before I can tell him what a degenerate he is, he wags his finger in the air. The way he always does when he’s about to tell me the truth.
“Your show getting tanked was a blessing—”
How unemployment is a blessing basically sums up the kind of rationale only Benny can understand.
“Last month you turned down two auditions just so you could hang out with those feral little rug rats at the community center. What were you doing? Oh yeah, teaching them how to do a dramatic pause, a.k.a. looking like they’re holding in farts.”
My face turns to the little old lady across from us so I can mouth an apology.
Benny doesn’t even notice. He’s too busy getting up from his seat because we’re almost at our stop, all while still running his mouth.
“You gotta stop believing the BS that people who can’t do, teach. I think people who are good at something should teach. You’re an amazing actor but an even better teacher. You love it.”
I sigh, standing too, waiting for the doors to open. He’s not wrong, I do love it. It was unexpected, but the Children’s Community Playhouse is always the best part of my week. The problem is that it barely pays enough to keep me coffee’d up.
“Can we just focus on today and not the rest of my life? I only have the patience for one. And you still haven’t given me all the details for today . . . What’s the final song list?”
He shrugs noncommittally as the train slows, and Fiftieth Street is announced through a crackling speaker nobody can understand.
“Benny . . .” I press as the doors slide open.
But he walks out quickly. Son of a . . . And this is why you don’t let your best friend find side hustles on Craigslist.
“What’s the final song list, Benny . . . You said I needed to prepare three and you’d pick one . . .”
He’s taking three steps at a time out of the subway, but I’m right on his heels, just in time for the crisp midmorning air to hit. The only saving grace for today is that it’s miraculously not snowing in February.
“Benny,” I yell at his back one more time, watching him stop in his place and turn around with a smile. People weave around us, passing by as he tries for nonchalant.
“You know what, come to think of it . . . I forgot to tell you there’s been a tiny change of plans. We’re not singing . . .”
He doesn’t elaborate, just turns back around and hustles down the street.
Not to be too dramatic, even though I’m an actor, but the theme song of Law & Order begins to play in my mind because I’m going to kill him.
But considering how fast we’re walking, I only have a few minutes to premeditate my crime. I’m grumbling under my breath as he points to a sign.
“We’re here.”
I look up at the name of the place, suddenly confused. Antonio’s Fine Italian Chinese Cuisine is lit up in orange neon.
There’s no way this is a real restaurant, it has to be a mob front. What the heck is Italian Chinese food?
A slew of quiet curse words are whispered as Benny opens the door, and I walk in first. The place is dimly lit, with beads hanging down from the top of the entryway separating the dining area from the lobby.
And the hostess is behind a stand that has a tiny replica of the Leaning Tower of Pisa and one of those cats whose paw bobs up and down.
Oh yeah, definitely a mob front.
“I’m not doing anything illegal,” I say, pointing my finger at Benny, my back to the hostess.
He has the audacity to look surprised.
“Trust me,” he rushes out.
That’s unlikely. I know him.
I’m about to say just that when Antonio himself joins us in the lobby.
All three pounds of chest hair and golden Italian horn.
He’s got a voice that projects even though his stature is more Joe Pesci.
Still, he makes everything he says sound like you’re his best friend. His arms spread wide, greeting us.
“Benny . . . my guy . . . Come ’ere. Come ’ere.”
Benny mimics the approach, embracing him. They pat each other on the back before Pesci kisses his cheeks.
“Sal. How are you?” Benny smiles.
Oh, okay, so not so much an Antonio.
My best friend looks over his shoulder, motioning toward me.
“This is my friend Oliver. He’s a good guy . . . you know . . . the actor I was telling you about.”
Sal makes his way over to me, tugging me into a hug, then patting my cheek a little too aggressively. I’m not complaining because I’ve seen Goodfellas. I’d prefer not to sleep with the fishes.
He looks back at Benny. “He’s a good-looking kid . . . a good-looking kid.”
If this really were a mob movie, this guy’s nickname would be Sally Two-Times, because he repeats everything twice.
“Thanks,” I offer, sincerely hoping that Benny didn’t get us into trouble for tonight.
I need rent money, not a felony conviction.
Sal says something quiet to the hostess, who nods before he waves us toward the hanging beads.
“Come on, yous guys, let me show you where the costumes are. The ladies are gonna eat you up. Benny, I owe you one for thinking this one up.”
Costumes? Thinking this up?
“This was you?” I whisper as Benny just shakes his head and holds up his hands. But still I add, “Dead to me.”
Something tells me by the end of the night my only option might be witness protection.
“You’ve gotta be kidding me,” I say to myself, staring in the mirror.
Costume was an overstatement because I’m shirtless, in a pair of gold lamé short-shorts, my hand closed around angel wings.
We’re in a small office in the back of the restaurant that has a bathroom and stacks of papers all over a desk.
Benny walks out, the toilet flushing behind him.
“We were never singing, were we?” I say to myself again.
It’s rhetorical, because I already know the truth, but my ex–best friend answers anyway.
“I mean . . . define singing.”
My head does a slow drift as I turn my face toward his.
He smirks. “Don’t look at me like that. I told you, he’s a sweet old guy whose business isn’t doing the best. Plus, his daughter is smoking hot. The idea was there for the taking. Have you forgotten we need rent? Two birds, my friend.”
I ball my hand into a fist as he finishes.
“And technically we are making music. It’s just with our bodies, not so much our mouths.”
I lunge, but he jumps back.
“Benny,” I roar. “This is Spirit Halloween meets Magic Mike.”
But before he can say anything, Sal walks into the office holding, in one hand, a tiny little harp, and in the other, a bow and arrow.
How is it possible that it’s getting worse?
Although, too bad the arrow only has a suction cup at the end and not an actual tip, or I could shoot my best friend.
Sal smiles wide, one gold canine tooth sparkling. “Who wants what? Huh . . . huh?”
I wipe both hands down my face, because truth is, Benny’s right, we don’t have a choice. If we don’t do this, we’re not making rent. And skirting homelessness is squeaking out a win over being seen in these shorts.
Benny hands me the bow and arrow with a sheepish grin as Sal leaves, saying, “Ten minutes till showtime. Let’s shake some ass for love. For love, baby.”
The minute the door closes, I scowl at my ex–best friend, grinding my jaw.
“I hate you. I actually hate you.”
But he doesn’t believe me, I know, because he’s laughing too hard while he stuffs his crotch with a sock.
“Want one?” he offers.
“No,” I hurl back.
Jesus, what has my life turned into? I’m a classically trained Shakesperean actor. I was on Broadway . . . even if it only lasted a week. And now I have to dance for the eleven a.m. Galentine’s brunch show next to a guy with tube socks stuffed down his pants.
My father used to tell me that there would be a moment in my life that would define me as a man. Never once did I think that would entail gold lamé shorts, angel wings, and Sal Antonio’s Fine Italian Chinese Cuisine.
But the gut punch in all of this is that I can’t dance. I close my eyes, steeling my spine for the indignity of cosplaying a god who has no rhythm.
Sal peeks his head back inside the office. “Five minutes, fellas.”
“Psst,” Benny calls, drawing my eyes, but I wish I wasn’t looking because he points to his crotch. “Too much?”
This is the worst day of my life.