8. Elías #3
Especially the guys at work.
The regret doesn’t arrive like a scream or kick the door in. It slides in quietly and takes a seat at the edge of my bed.
Elías
Everybody?
Fabián
You know… TikTok.
Junior.
The market… just everybody.
I stare at the list.
Elías
I didn’t ask you to make a public statement.
Fabián
I know.
Elías
I didn’t ask you to kiss me in front of a line at the market.
Fabián
I know that too.
Elías
It’s not like I’m asking you to be my boyfriend. I mean… We fucked… once.
You’re making this into something it’s not.
I’m not going to out you.
Technically we aren’t anything to each other. Just two guys that fucked.
The second I send it, my chest hurts. I don’t want to boil us down to the bare minimum… because to me it felt like more than that.
It was more than that.
Boyfriend—what a tragic little word.
Fabián doesn’t answer right away, and ten minutes later when he does, the message is worse because it is careful.
Fabián
I know you didn’t… and please don’t be like that.
Elías
Like what?
Honest? What are you even asking me?
Fabián
I’m asking for time. That’s all.
That should be fair. It’s more than fair.
He deserves time—everyone deserves time to figure themselves out, to decide what they want, and to peel old fear off their skin without someone rushing them through the process like it is a line at the DMV.
I know that.
I know it so clearly; I hate myself for hurting anyway.
Elías
Time for what?
Fabián
To figure out what I’m comfortable with people knowing and when.
Wanting me and feeling things for me already happened. It’s letting everyone else see it that scares him.
That is what hurts.
Elías
Okay.
Fabián
Don’t say it like that.
Please don’t say okay like that.
I laugh once, and there’s no humor in it.
Elías
You’re reading tone in a single word now?
Fabián
I know you…
I’m not trying to hurt you, Lalo.
God, I swear I’m not.
Fuck him.
Fuck him for saying things like that after making me feel like something he has to manage.
Elías
Yeah.
I believe you.
I put the phone down on my chest and stare at the ceiling, letting myself sit in the feelings. Maybe it would have been different if we had done all of this at his place; at least then he’d have to live with looking at his bed and seeing us there.
He sends one more message.
Fabián
I don’t regret you, please know that. Not for a second. And I’m not saying I never want you again. I just want a little time to work through all these new feelings and what it all means.
I’m just not ready for the whole world to know who I’m sleeping with.
My eyes burn, knowing those words should help. That I wasn’t some one-night stand he’s never gonna call again. It does and it doesn’t.
I mean, I believe him.
That’s the worst part. I believe he doesn’t regret my mouth, my body, my bed, my hands, or the way he came apart inside me and cried like he couldn’t stop himself from feeling.
I believe he doesn’t regret me in the dark.
But daylight is different.
Church is different.
Family is different.
A comment section on the internet is different.
Men like Fabián can want you like you are air in a locked room and still flinch when someone opens a window.
Elías
I know.
Fabián
Do you? Because I feel like you don’t and you’re just saying you do.
I mean, you are allowed to feel however you feel. I can’t control that… but all I’m saying is that I need to figure out myself… before I come out to the world. You know?
Elías
Yeah. Trust me I get it. But not regretting me isn’t the same as choosing me, and what you mean and how it reads over text are two different things.
The message is sent, and my whole body goes cold because it was too honest and way too fucking soon. Fabián doesn’t respond for fifteen minutes, and all I do in the time between is smash my face in my pillow and try not to cry.
I’m so stupid for feeling this way. It’s not like I actually thought we’d end up together, right?
Fabián
Lalo…
Maybe this would be better if we talked about it in person.
I close my eyes, knowing that he’s right. Text can make things messy, and I really don’t need messy right now. So I get out of bed because if I stay there, I’ll drown in sheets that still smell like him. My legs protest immediately, and I hiss through my teeth.
Great.
Sore and emotionally bruised.
Very sexy. Very mature.
I grab my towel and head to the bathroom, phone in my hand like an idiot because apparently I want front-row seats to my own bad decisions. In the mirror, the hickeys are still purple at my throat, and last night, I wanted everyone to see them.
Today, they look different—loud in a way I am suddenly not so sure they can survive. I touch the darkest one with two fingers.
Fabián was here. Don’t touch.
I laugh under my breath, but it comes out wrong because maybe the sign was never for other people.
Maybe it was for me.
The warnings he kept giving me.
He can mark you.
He can want you.
He can kneel.
He can beg.
He can even stay, but that does not mean he knows how to be seen with you.
Fabián
I promise you this isn’t me trying to bitch out or anything.
I stare at it for a long time. Of course he would say something like that.
Elías
I know.
Another pause.
Fabián
I’m sorry if that’s not enough for you right now.
Elías
Go pray or whatever.
Fabián
Lalo
Elías
I’m serious…
Your tía is gonna clock you texting through the homily.
Fabián
How do you know it’s the homily?
Elías
I’m spiritually gifted.
Fabián
More like annoying.
You make it hard to focus on anything but you.
Ugh, why does he have to say things that make my stomach want to do backflips?
Elías
Yeah, the big man did me a lot of favors in blessing me with this face and ass.
The old rhythm tries to crawl back. More like it limps. He doesn’t answer after that. Maybe this time he really does put his phone away. Or maybe his tía catches him and smacks him with her prayer book. Maybe he kneels and stands and prays and tries to make his peace with wanting me.
I shower, and the water hits my neck, and the hickeys sting. I let it. Maybe I’m the masochist? When I get out, I wrap a towel around my waist and wipe steam off the mirror. There I am: a man who spent all night making another man ache, then let himself believe the ache meant something solid.
I lean both hands on the sink and watch the stupid tear fall from my eye.
“Pendejo,” I whisper to my reflection.
By the time I get back to my room, there are no new messages.
Good. Fine. We’ll just leave it at that for now.
I dress in clean shorts and an old shirt, strip the bed because I am not letting my mother discover evidence and send me directly to the Vatican for processing, and shove the sheets into the laundry basket.
And because I don’t want to smell him every night when I’m in bed alone.
My body moves through the room, but my brain stays on one sentence.
Not regretting me isn’t the same as choosing me.
I wish I hadn’t sent it, but a small part of me is glad I did. Both things stand side by side, arms crossed, looking a lot like Fabián in my head. My phone buzzes one more time while I’m changing the pillowcase.
Fabián
Mass is over.
Can I see you later?
My chest hurts because there’s the want. I type three different answers.
Yes. No. Maybe.
I delete all of them.
Then I send:
Elías
You working the market tonight?
He replies fast.
Fabián
Yeah.
Elías
Then you’ll see me there.
The dots appear, disappearing for a second, and then come back again.
Fabián
That’s not what I meant.
And you know it.
My throat tightens, and I look at the hickey in the mirror across the room.
Elías
I know…
I set it face down on the dresser before he can answer and sit on the edge of my bed, clean sheets bunched beside me, sunlight creeping across my floor, and press my palms to my eyes.
So this is regret.
Not the fun kind.
Not the “I shouldn’t have worn the tiny shorts” kind.
Not the “I let Crop Top Papi leave bruises on my neck and now TikTok has questions” kind.
This is quieter and meaner. This is waking up sore and happy, giving him your number, letting him say soft things from church, and realizing somewhere between the hickeys and the homily that wanting each other might be the easy part.
Being chosen in daylight? That is the part that hurts, because I’m not sure if Fabián knows how to want me where people can see.
My phone buzzes again, but this time I leave him on read.