Chapter Thirty-Three State of the
After the photoshoot, since we were downtown anyway, I suggested we stop for dinner at a nice restaurant.
I wanted to treat him because he’d made me feel good all afternoon.
We stopped at a gourmet pizza place and got a booth.
We were in the middle of eating when his phone buzzed. He checked it and smiled.
“Who was that?” I wondered who, besides me, could make him that happy.
“That TV show.”
“Did you get the part?”
“Nobody gets cast right off the bat with open casting calls. You have to go through lots of rounds of them seeing you. They want to see me again tomorrow.”
He hadn’t talked about his first audition. He’d said he didn’t want to say too much in case he jinxed things, so I’d assumed his next call from them would be them telling him he got the part.
“What did you do for the first round?”
“Stood in line, mostly.”
“How many other people were auditioning?”
He shrugged. “Thousands.”
“You must have been there for hours.”
“Actually, no.” He was looking at his pizza, not at me, and that pinged my uh-oh alarm.
“How come?”
“Well, I’m standing in line, and this guy in this thirties starts checking me out.”
“Isn’t he old for the part?”
“He wasn’t trying out. He’s involved in production. He knew my name, and he pulled me out of line. I thought he was gonna frisk me for drugs.”
“Did he?”
“No. He took me to this room that had ten other people in it, and he told me to wait there.”
“Why did he pick you out?”
“I don’t know, but the other people in that room were all experienced actors. I’d worked with one of them in a movie once, and I recognized some of the others.”
“You auditioned in there?”
“No.” He still wouldn’t look me in the eye. “A lady at a desk gave me this weird survey to fill out on my phone.”
“Weird how? What did they ask you?”
“It asked me what I thought about polyamory. I didn’t know what the fuck that was. I had to look it up.”
“And what do you think about it?”
“I don’t,” he said.
“What else?”
“It asked me if I was comfortable getting naked in front of a camera.”
I put my slice of pizza down because I couldn’t swallow. “And you said?”
“I said I was.” He shrugged. “The reason I didn’t tell you before was because I didn’t think I had any chance of getting the part.”
“Well, now you do. So, everyone in the city—everyone in Canada’s gonna see you naked?”
“If I get the part, yeah.”
I felt sick. I thought about what my mom would say if she found out.
“Look, Craig, this is the most high-profile thing I’ve ever tried out for, and I’ve got nothing else lined up. I’ll never work with Jack again, which shuts the door on pretty much everything for me. He’s given me most of the work I’ve ever done, and he recommended me for the rest.”
“You’re not gonna go hungry,” I said. “And you’re not gonna be cold because you have no place to live. I can support us both if I have to.”
“You’re not gonna have to support me,” he said. “I’ve paid my way, haven’t I? I pay for half of everything.”
“And how much do you have in savings? How long can you pay your half if you don’t get this job or you’re unemployed for six months? What I’m saying is that you don’t have to take this part or any part where you have to take your clothes off. I can support us both on what I make.”
“It’s my career, Craig. I don’t do it because I have to. And I don’t want to be your househusband. That’s not why I’m marrying you.”
“So, you’re saying you want everybody to see you naked?”
“I’m saying if it’s part of the job, I’m gonna do it.”
“Well, I thought it was special, you seeing me like that and me seeing you. Just between us.”
We didn’t speak for the rest of the meal or on the way home.
I hated being angry at him. And I hated that he was an actor.
I knew you were supposed to accept everything about the person you loved, and I accepted that he was an actor.
But I hated what his career made him do. And I hated that he was okay with it.
When we got home, I got out my tap board, took off my hoodie, and started practicing. He sat on the couch and watched. I kept going, waiting for him to do something, leave, whatever. But he didn’t. After I finished my cooldown routine, he went up to me.
“You want a hug?” he said.
I did, but I just couldn’t right then. “No, thanks.”
I had a shower. Then it was bedtime. He was already in bed when I went into the bedroom.
I lay on the far side of the bed with my back to him.
I usually spooned him at night. It was how we fell asleep.
Maybe I was trying to make a point. If you don’t need me, maybe I don’t need you. I turned off the light.
“Good night, Craig.”
“Good night.”
––––––––
I didn’t sleep, or maybe I did but not much.
I got up super early, got dressed quietly, and slipped out of the apartment without eating breakfast. Work sucked.
I was exhausted. I kept wanting to text him and apologize, but the issue still wasn’t resolved, so there didn’t seem to be any point.
I kept expecting him to call me, but, well, he was all about giving me space, so maybe I wasn’t too surprised.
When I got home from work, he was in the kitchen, making burgers.
“Sorry,” he said when he served me one. “They got burned.”
I ate it anyway. Ketchup helped.
“I invited Tommy to the wedding,” he said.
“Okay.”
“He wants to bring Edgar.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I said he could. Tommy’s not gonna know anyone there except me. He’s not a social butterfly. He’ll have a bad time if he comes alone. Are you okay with that?”
“I guess.” I didn’t care as long as Edgar stayed away from me and Eddie.
We didn’t say much while we ate. It was super awkward.
“How was work?” he said.
“Same old.”
“I’ve gotta get your parents something for Christmas. You know what they want?”
“They emailed me a list. I’ll forward it to you.”
“Maybe we can go out and shop together this weekend.”
“Sure.”
Afterward, he washed the dishes. When he was done, he joined me on the couch but didn’t sit too close.
“How was your audition?” I said.
Part of me hoped he’d tell me he’d dropped out of the process, or they’d rejected him. But he wasn’t acting like he needed cheering up.
“I didn’t audition. I had an interview with five people. One of them was the showrunner of Tens. Turns out he’s the guy who pulled me out of the line on my first day. Apparently, he’s seen my movies, and he’s a fan.”
“So, it looks like you’ll get the part.”
“Maybe,” he said. “I don’t know how many other people made it this far. And I still haven’t auditioned.”
“I’m tired. I’m gonna go to bed.” I got up.
“You want company?” He sounded uncertain.
“Sure.”
We went to bed, and I turned off the light and lay on my back. Like last night, I didn’t go near him.
“Promise me you’ll never do anything to yourself,” he said.
“What?”
“Promise me you won’t try to hurt yourself, ever, no matter what happens.”
“What the fuck, Eddie? I’d never do that. Why would you think that?”
“Tommy used to.”
“Well, I’m not Tommy.” I was angry at first, then I realized why his voice had cracked when he’d said that last part. I also realized how it must have fucked him up, his boyfriend hurting himself. He was so good at hiding his pain, it was easy to forget I could hurt him.
“Shit. I’m sorry, Eddie.”
“You want to make an appointment to see your therapist?” he said.
“I see him every week.”
“I could come with you next time.”
“Why?”
“I think we gotta work through some stuff before we get married,” he said. “Like how you feel about me being an actor.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
“Look, Craig, we’re gonna be okay. But only if you trust me.”
“Yeah.”
He clasped my hand under the blankets.
“Maybe I won’t get the part,” he said. “I haven’t auditioned for them yet.”
“What’s the show called?”
“The Heart You’re Dealt.”
I guess it was, since you couldn’t choose who you fell in love with.
“Talk to me,” he said.
“I don’t know what to say. I need to process this.”
He leaned in and kissed my top lip gently. Then he kissed me full on the mouth. He was great at kissing. I couldn’t stay mad at him forever. My hands moved to his waist, and we lay like that, holding each other till I fell asleep.
––––––––
He joined me at my next therapy session.
My therapist was on board with that. We spent the whole hour going through everything.
Eddie felt like I was attacking him. I didn’t realize that being an actor was such a huge part of his identity, like being a tap dancer was a huge part of mine.
He wasn’t going to budge. And there wasn’t a compromise.
He said he’d take the part if they offered it to him, so he was going to do anything they asked.
Well, not anything. He had a line he wouldn’t cross, but it wasn’t in the place I wanted it to be.
We clearly weren’t going to resolve this in one session, so he agreed to come to my next one after the holidays.
During the session, I felt heard in a way. We weren’t going to break up over it, which was what mattered. But things still weren’t settled.
We went home together on the subway, not talking much, but it was a more peaceful silence than before. At one point, he reached out and clasped my hand. I looked at him, and he smiled.
We had a quiet dinner at home, and that night, while he was in the bathroom, I got the framed photo out of my backpack and put it on my bedside table.
He spotted it as soon as he came into the bedroom. “What’s that?”
I picked it up. “I made it after our cottage trip.”
“Is that me?” He took it from my hand.
“Yeah. I downloaded a still from your honey commercial, blew it up, printed it, and bought a frame.”
It was a picture of him looking up at the camera, face partially hidden behind a big, yellow kite. The picture wasn’t sharp because the video quality wasn’t high.
“It’s my bedside table,” I said. “I can put what I want there.”
“You’d rather look at that than me?”
“Well, if you get that TV role, you won’t be here much. If I’m trying to fall asleep, and I don’t have the real thing here, I’ll need something to jack to.”
“Geez, Craig.”
“What? It’s not like I’m cheating on you with a younger man.”
He put the photo back. “I’m right here.”
I grabbed him around the waist and pulled him onto the bed until we were lying face-to-face. “So you are.”