6
I practically sprinted upstairs and hopped in the shower. I sang Bill Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine" and smiled like a loon every time I replayed that sentence in my head: "I got an email from Roman's manager. Ex-bandmate? He wants to know if he can get in touch."
At a late lunch with John, my mind reeled with all things him.
Suddenly I recalled how he’d sit at the edge of the bed and watch me sleep.
Whenever I woke and found him there, he’d wink at me so subtly I was unsure if he had at all.
Quiet mornings. The adulterous hours. Times that urged us to get dressed and separate before our team came to wake us for work.
In the ensuing years without him, waking up alone had been an incalculable downgrade. Like going from a Lamborghini to a Toyota Prius, full stop. Like scaling the heights of Everest, only to be confined to sea level the rest of your life. Mediocrity was a bitter pill to swallow.
Long after our first moment of weakness when I was seventeen, our habits evolved swiftly.
Often fumbling in the dark, hands breaching waistbands.
Sometimes kissing until we were breathless beneath the sheets, losing a night’s sleep.
Back then, it hardly ever went beyond making out and usually faded by the light of day.
The morning after called for nervous laughter and a return to business as usual.
Frequently blaming our indiscretions on boredom, loneliness, and alcohol.
And since neither of us had the balls to put this thing under a microscope, it grew without hindrance and began to impact other areas of our lives.
The older we got, the more discerning we became, and consequently the more our compunction grew.
Our resolution was simple, really. Never discuss it.
And in refusing to talk about it, we failed to define it; so, it technically never ended.
Rather, it subsided at times, filtering to a hush, but always simmering beneath the surface.
He got on with our separations better than I could, and found love with his ex-fiancé.
She was blonde and female, precisely his type.
I, however, had become a one-man cult to all that he was, consumed with what we weren’t and what we could never be: normal.
Beyond a cult leader and elusive lover, he’d been an unlikely mentor in my youth; one indispensable to the man I became.
He taught me everything he knew, sympathizing with my brotherless upbringing.
Lessons included the little things my dad left out, or the things my mum hoped I'd never learn. Like how to smoke a cigarette or roll a joint. How to fuck. How to fight. How to cook a mean curry and ride a skateboard. How to style my hair and accessorize, although some of these things still escaped me. Whatever I may’ve taught him paled in comparison.
I was Protestant, bourgeois, and average for my age.
He was poor, Byronic, sex-addicted, and from a deeply devout Catholic family. Endlessly intriguing. Boy Wonder.
The older we got, the more intentional his teachings became—the more pragmatic.
He bought me my first set of pots and pans for my new house, encouraging my love of cooking because his mum had gifted him a mutual appreciation of culinary arts.
Some nights we'd stay home alone and have furious cook-offs, blasting dancehall from the 90s; bickering and growing impatient of each other’s kitchen habits.
What I depended on most in this transaction where we exchanged knowledge, culture, and strange intimacies through the years, was his introducing me to a world of new music—hip hop, reggae, old school R captivating every memory I held of him and our time in the band.
Though the secrets of us may one day be cast away with infirmity and old age, I took comfort in knowing they’d be inscribed on my skin long after I’d forgotten my own name.
When one day I reeked with incontinence and longed to die, he would still be a defining part of me.
My biology. Love maimed us in so many colors, and the tattoos were like battle scars.
He was the first person I had allowed to ink me and the pain had been exhilarating.
I trusted him beyond reason. Beyond wit, beyond wisdom, and plain mortality.
To this day, a few facts remained. Roman was the most fathomless lover I’d ever known.
He was the first guy I'd ever kissed, and the only one who'd ever been inside of me.
Corroding my deepest kept convictions and self-perception.
Redefining everything I thought I knew of masculinity and intimacy.
What did I know of anything, really? Of men and of women?
Of sex? Of sneaking around unlit places?
Of meeting in hotel hallways after hours?
Of kissing boys who really liked girls but had made an exception for me?
After taking pics with a few fans, I pet a passersby's dog—a mean little pug—and spoke to the owner about the best breeds for families with small children. My hands felt gross after they left, so I stepped away to wash them. When I returned, John cocked a brow at me.
"What's up, dude? You're doing something weird in this general area…" He circled his mouth.
"What? Smiling?"
"Way too much. There's this weird little smirk action going on. What's good?"
"Uh..." I grinned, accepting our water as it arrived. "Nothing really, I think." I took a sip with my pinky up in hopes he might lose interest.
"Absolute creeper…”
"Alright, sue me."
"What's up? Should I be worried? Is this like the time you side-swiped that guy downtown and didn't tell me because he almost beat the shit out of you?"
"Heyyy..." I frowned. That was a sensitive topic. "No, of course not—"
"Now the smirk's becoming more of a leer and I'm officially terrified—"
"Fuck’s sake, mate...it's Rome," I said, as if the name alone justified my behavior.
"Roman? What about him?" he squinted through the breeze that swept the table.
"He called."
"Again?"
"Mate, what do you mean 'again'? He never called before."
"So…you spoke?"
"Yeah. Well…not really. It was, uh, more of an email to voicemail sort of ordeal."
"Ok… enlighten me. How'd he get your number anyway?"
"It was more like his assistant got in touch with my assistant sort of thing. They left an email, and then eventually I heard about it."
"Sooo...no one actually spoke, right?" he clarified, just short of calling me pathetic. My embarrassment mounted.
"To be honest, no. It was all emails and secondhand shit."
"And that's what you're smiling about? Really dude?"
"Mate, c'mon. It’s something."
I grabbed a hold of my glass but didn't drink. I was relieved when the waitress came and took our orders, but mortified that he wasn't impressed. It wasn’t his fault. He had no clue what’d gone down between us.
No one understood the innerworkings of the cult.
I was Susan Atkins, practically frothing at the mouth over a third-party email chain, and he was eyeing like I needed to be 5150-ed.
I lost my appetite upon realizing how fragile the Roman connection was.
It was dependent on multiple peripheral parties and tons of circumstantial factors that had the potential to fail or separate us for another six months.
I had to be proactive. Before I could even ask John to reach out for me, he started up again.
"Hearing good stuff about the Spielberg thing, bud."
And just like that I was on to something else. The WWII miniseries I’d auditioned for.
"Already? Holy shit, that's incredible, right? To be fair, uh, I thought I fucked that up. Fuck’s sake, I was so nervous."
He laughed, scrolling through his phone which he held directly in front of his face. He refused to be examined for prescription glasses.
"They said we're still in talks. Haven’t ruled anything out yet. Said they liked you for the bit you read, but also for something else. They said—well, they asked about your schedule. They’re thinking they’ll need you for all eight episodes.
" He grinned to himself before reading the next part.
"They said: Would you consider cutting your hair if the part required? "
"What'd you tell ‘em?"
"I said: hell no! That’s a deal breaker. It’s your thing. It’s what you’re known for. Told ‘em you’d walk."
I threatened to dip my finger in his wine. "Mateeee...quit fucking with me."
"'Course I told them you'd do it. Obviously, there were no soldiers with hair that long."
“Still…that’d be difficult to do. I think maybe I could wear a toupee or something.”
"Yikes. That’d be horrid." He set his phone aside, keeping it unlocked for an active text thread. “Maybe it’s time to change up the look a bit? Maybe grow a beard? Mature you a little? What’re we thinking?”
“I dunno. I like being clean-shaven. The girls like it too. They call me angel-face on the forums. I feel like my hair’s my personality at this point. Without it, who the hell even am I?”
“Tragic. That’s who.”
The salads arrived and we scarfed them down with too much bread.
A few more fans approached and I began to regret dining al fresco, especially once the sunlight became direct.
I followed his lead and ordered Pinot Gris with my entrée, realizing too late my stomach was still a little weak from the night before.
"What's wrong? Indigestion?" he asked through a mouthful of penne, as I pressed the top of my gut. I belched into my fist and tried to straighten up. I couldn't be sick again.
"M’good...I'm good."
"You ever gonna finish telling me about this Roman—oh, excuse me,” he snarked. “—this Rome thing, or what?"