Chapter 16 Marco
Marco
Brin starts belting out lyrics, and I don’t really mind her badly tuned singing. It does make the time pass faster as we wrap present after present.
She’s facing away from the window, so she can’t see the swirls of snow falling in the glass behind her. It’s been snowing ever since I went on the second grocery run, the clouds from this morning’s sunrise having fully moved in.
With the snow in the window, the flicker of Brin’s candle, and the holiday music, it feels cozy inside.
It makes me nostalgic, not for my childhood Christmases, but for the last Christmas I celebrated, the one where my brother was still alive and we were living with his best friend, celebrating with our friends instead of our family.
There are about thirty minutes left of chill time on the cookie and Brin is (badly) duetting with Mariah Carey when both of our phones ding.
@everyone: The city has been blessed with fresh snow this morning. It should clear up soon, so we suggest you get out there and build a snow sculpture. Send a selfie with your creation within the next hour and earn three points!
Brin and I glance at each other and then scramble up from the floor. We’ve got thirty minutes till the cookies need to go in the oven, half the time other teams get to build a sculpture and be as creative as possible.
We get to the park closest to us, and talk while we work to build a base. “A snowman—or woman—would be pretty straightforward. What if we dress it up as a memorable character? Like, Buddy the Elf?” Brin suggests.
“We don’t have the time to get clothes together for that,” I point out. “What do we have at home that we can use?”
“Umm . . . I don’t know how we would get pants on it.” Brin taps her chin. “What about a sundress? Oh! We could go with a full-on summer theme: sundress, sunhat, sunglasses.”
“That’ll work. Go grab whatever you can spare and I’ll keep piling snow.”
Brin runs off and returns a few minutes later when I’ve just started looking for branches and rocks to make the arms and face. We wrestle the dress onto the human-shaped snow, having to stop a few times to make the snow person thinner since Brin’s so small.
I remember this sundress, though. It’s got huge flowers on it, with capped sleeves and a skirt that flairs from the waist. Brin wears it in the summer when she takes the neighbor’s kid to the park and it’s sweltering.
Brin’s got lean legs, strong thighs. I rarely get to see them, except when she’s in this dress.
We get the dress on and Brin finishes our creation off with the hat and sunglasses. We have to press the sunglasses into its face to get them to stay and my rock smile looks unhinged, but it works. We crowd into the selfie together.
“Do they have a name?” I ask while I send the picture.
Brin studies our cheery, Frankensteined monster. “Shelley.”
I sputter. “As in Mary Shelley? Like Frankenstein?”
“Yeah. Or it could be short for Sheldon. I’m not going to force our snow person into binary gender norms.”
“I was literally just thinking about Frankenstein’s monster too.”
“Really?” She flashes me a huge grin and holds her hand up for a high five. “Great minds think alike.”
“And so do ours.” I smack her hand with mine while she cackles. Then I pull out my phone and we pose for a picture.
Brin puts her hands on her hips. “I do want this dress back, but it feels rude to strip it off our snow monster.”
Rude or not, we do it. Then we hustle back to the apartment to roll out the dough. We don’t have a rolling pin, so we use an empty wine bottle. While the cookies are in the oven, we make hot chocolate (one point) and finish wrapping the day’s presents (four points).
We pull the cookies out of the oven right before we race off to Rockefeller Plaza, so we haven’t decorated them yet. We’ll have to do it tomorrow.
I lace my skates up and then offer Brin my hand while she gets to her feet.
“Okay,” she says, once she’s standing. “One goal achieved: stand on skates. That’s all I actually have to do, right? Stand long enough for a picture?”
“On the ice,” I clarify. “You can do this.”
She’s wobbly on her first step, so I offer her my arm. She takes it lightly, and we shuffle to the edge of the rink and step down onto the ice.
“Whoa!” Brin grips my arm tighter. Her knees knock together and her skates angle out. I quickly steer us out of the flow of skaters and into the middle of the rink by putting my hands on her hips and pushing.
Once we skid to a stop—I have to brake for both of us—I bend over and lift her pant leg up. She’s dressed for her shift at the restaurant, so she’s in black stretchy slacks that cover the top of the skates.
“They’re too loose,” I tell her. “They need to feel solid on your feet, no wiggle room.” I get to my knees on the hard ice in front of her and unlace her right foot.
Brin’s hands fall to my shoulders as I work, bracing herself against me. I tie the second laces tighter and get to my feet.
“Better. Okay, here’s what you do.” I show her how to push off with one foot and we make it a few wobbly paces while she gets a feel for it. I drift alongside her, keeping my eyes on her and our fellow skaters.
I have to dodge a young kid, so I turn and skate backward right in front of Brin.
“Whoa,” she says, tottering, distracted. “How did you get to be such a good skater?”
“Played a bit of hockey as a kid.” That’s all I offer, but Brin’s never minded me being tight-lipped about my childhood. “Are you ready for us to get a picture?”
“Yeah.” I let go of Brin’s hand to glide toward the nearest spectator. I slowly rub my thumb over the inside of my hand.
It felt nice, holding Brin’s hand. Better than nice. Super innocent and sweet and addictive.
That’s something I haven’t felt in a long time. I’m more of the hookup type, quick to fuck, open with my friends and prospective partners.
I am not ashamed of my sexuality or my history, but it puts it into stark relief how different we are.
I shake it off as I skid to a stop in front of the guy, who agrees to take our picture. I skate back to Brin and we pose, smiling.
“Thank you so much,” Brin says to the man as she shuffles her way to me as I take my phone back. We join the flow of traffic and I check the pictures.
“Uh.”
Brin looks at me. “What is it?”
I swipe. And swipe again. He took three pictures of us: one before we posed, so I’m still moving and blurry; one with Brin’s eyes closed; and one where he pulled the phone away as he was pressing the shutter so everything’s blurry.
I show Brin the pictures and she blanches. “Ew. I look like I’m high. Do you think that will get us creativity points? Skating while under the influence?”
“Maybe negative points. Let’s try again.”
She lifts her chin toward a guy standing at the edge of the rink looking at his phone. “We can ask him.”
I draw my brows together, confused. “Why him?”
“His daughter is skating over there.” She nods toward a young teen spinning in circles near the center. “She skated over a while ago and he helped fix her hair and gave her a snack. He’s got airport dad vibes. Why don’t we ask for a video, then all he has to do is point it in the right direction.”
I make my way over to the guy. “Excuse me?” He looks up. “Would you mind taking a quick video of us?”
“Sure.”
Two minutes later we have a halfway decent video of me skating back to Brin and then the two of us waving at the camera.
“Thanks so much, I appreciate it.”
“Yeah, thanks!” Brin’s caught up to us and offers Airport Dad a warm smile.
“No problem,” he says. “Great date idea.” He gives me a nod, like “you’ve done well,” and Brin laughs.
I take her hand and skate us away from him. We’re quiet for a moment and then Brin says, “Have you ever taken anyone skating on a date before?”
I think for a minute. “No? Not that I recall.”
“You should,” she says. After a beat, she continues. “It’s very . . .” She waves her free hand in my direction. “Competence porn, watching you skate.”
I snort.
“You should take a date skating,” she repeats, but almost like she’s talking to herself. “I’ve never even heard you mention having a date.”
“Pot. Kettle.” I gesture between us.
She laughs. “It’s just surprising, because . . . you know.” She gestures at me with a “duh” tone.
“I’m not going to bring someone home to the room we share.” I return her tone.
She rolls her eyes. “Obviously. But, like, what’s your type?”
I think about my answer. Redheads that barely come up to my chin. Five-foot-something balls of energy. Someone who is too nice to be with an asshole like me.
That’s not an answer that I can give, so I go with some honest history.
Brin already knows I’m bisexual, but she doesn’t know how widely my tastes range.
“My first crush was confusing because it was both the boy’s locker room bully and his cheerleader girlfriend.
And then my best friend, a nerdy gamer. Then a drag queen—both in and out of drag.
Pretty much any type of queer man for a while, because that’s who I hung out with the most. The last person I slept with was a woman, a model I met at one of William’s parties. ”
“Billy Bob,” she says absentmindedly.
“What about you?” I ask. “What’s your type?”
A dark look passes over her face, but then she yawns.
“That”—I point at her—“is a problem. I knew you needed a nap.”
“I’m fine,” she insists. But she also doesn’t argue when I steer us both toward the exit.
We heel-toe to the bench seats and Brin sits down hard. “We’ll get you some caffeine,” I say as she yawns again. I get down on my knees and unlace her boots for her.
“I’ll be fine once I get to work.”
“Let’s hope so,” I mutter.