Chapter Seven Dog Day Afternoon, dir. by Sidney Lumet #3
“Either way, I think I’m safer on two legs. The people in this city can’t drive anyway.”
“Fair.”
“Okay, so...” Eli sets the water bottle down, turning toward Peter once again. “If I’m going to learn to do this, be my
teacher.”
“Your teacher?”
Eli nods. “I’m your dating coach; be my climbing coach. Where do we start?”
Peter just stares down at Eli, smiling that smile that’s already become so familiar. “Okay, okay... let’s go over here.”
***
Eli’s body aches, his arms feel like jelly, his thighs are burning, he feels like he can’t catch his breath, and he’s so sweaty
his hair has become permanently plastered to his forehead.
And it’s been barely thirty minutes.
“I don’t like this wall.” They’d decided to let Eli stick to the N walls, though he’d managed to graduate from the N-0 to
the N-4.
“You can’t learn if you don’t challenge yourself,” Peter says from his spot right next to Eli. It’s like he’s deliberately showing off, the way he follows Eli’s every step during his climbs with ease. “Make
sure you’re keeping your center of gravity closer to the wall, falling back only forces your body to work harder.”
“That much I can do.” Once again, Eli’s cheek is rubbed red from just how close he rests while holding on to the wall.
“Okay, go for this one next.” Peter taps on the blue rock that’s just out of Eli’s normal reach.
“I can’t. I have short arms.”
“Your arms are average,” Peter tells him. “And you just have to go for it, lunge. Get some momentum going and grab it.”
“What level did you say this wall was again?”
“Novice five.”
“That doesn’t seem accurate.”
Peter shrugs. “Sometimes they’re a little loose with the ratings. But you can do this, come on. Just brace your foot here,
bend the knee, and go for it!” Peter’s excitement somehow works its way through Eli’s nerves.
“Okay, okay, yeah. I can do it,” he says, mostly to himself.
Eli does exactly as he’s told, bending his knees and lurching forward. It’s not quite a jump, because there isn’t enough room
for that much force. But Eli still goes for it, feeling as inspired as he ever has.
Except he misses the hold.
Well, he doesn’t miss it exactly . Eli grabs ahold of the blue rock, but there’s not enough grip, or really any grip at all. And he makes the mistake of letting
go with his other hand far too early, meaning there’s nothing keeping him on the wall.
So he falls.
“Peter!” he calls out, yanking on Peter’s shirt, but the fabric slips free of Eli’s chalky hands, and he just falls and falls
and falls.
A whole five feet, landing on the cushy floor and bouncing for a bit before he settles.
“Eli!” Peter yelps out, leaping effortlessly back to the floor as he crouches in front of Eli. “Are you okay?”
Eli can tell that Peter’s totally caught off guard when he sees the smile on Eli’s face, Eli picking his head up with a wide
grin, laughter spilling past his lips.
“That was fun!” Eli does his best to bounce on the floor.
Peter smiles, letting out an exasperated sound. “I’m glad you’re finally having a good time.” Peter starts to sit beside Eli, then scoots back. “Come on, get away from the wall, we’ll take a breather.”
Eli looks back, following Peter’s lead as they move toward where they set their things.
“So, I’ve been dying to ask,” Peter starts, squeezing water into his open mouth.
“Shoot.” Eli does the same, but not without spilling some all over his chin.
“Why did you let me choose the date night?” he asks. “I thought this entire experience was to teach me how to date? I don’t see what this taught me.”
“Well,” Eli starts to say. “I wanted you to pick what we did tonight because dating is a partnership. Both parties have to
be enthusiastic, they have to show interest in one another, in their hobbies. If I were a real date, I like to think tonight
would’ve exposed me to a part of your personality.”
“And that’s a good thing?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“I don’t know,” Peter says, suddenly quiet. “When we got here, I was worried I’d picked the wrong thing. Rock climbing can
be a lot for someone.” He lets out a shaky breath. “And you’ve seen my personality.”
“Do you care about rock climbing?” Eli asks.
Peter seems surprised, like he’d never expected anyone to ask him such a question. “Yeah, I guess I do. To a certain extent.”
“You guess?” Eli pokes a little harder.
“Yeah, I mean it’s fun. I’ve always liked working out, feeling strong. It’s why I stuck around on the football team for so
long, even when I hated it.”
Peter looks away, like that isn’t the whole answer. Eli can spy a something just below the surface.
“Then why push yourself?” Eli feels like he can see where this is going from a mile away, but he wants Peter to be the one to talk about it. Interviewing means asking the right questions, knowing exactly where to steer things in order to get the most information.
“I guess, I dunno, I was afraid.”
“Why?”
Peter smiles for the briefest of moments. It’s an uncomfortable expression, and Eli almost slams on the brakes.
“Growing up in Comer, it was scary. Being one of like four Asian kids at school already made me someone that people didn’t
like. If they knew I was queer, I can’t imagine how they would’ve reacted. I guess I just wanted to be someone that others
didn’t mess with. I never wanted to give people a reason to think I was weak.”
Eli sits in silence, suddenly regretting bringing this up at the gym of all places.
Then, Peter chuckles. It’s a soft sound. “Sorry, shouldn’t have gotten so dour out of nowhere.”
“No, it’s okay.” Eli hopes that Peter believes him.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure.”
“Why me?”
“For the article?”
Peter nods. Because what else could he have been talking about?
“Well, why does a journalist write any article? I think that you have a unique perspective, and I’d like to write about it.”
“But why me ?” Peter asks.
Eli stares at him. He doesn’t really know how to answer Peter’s question. He isn’t sure what it is about this disaster of
a man that has drawn him in with such interest. “I don’t really know,” he finally says. “I just think that you’re an interesting
person. And I think you have a lot to share.”
“Pfft, first time anyone’s said that to me.” Peter lies back on the padded floor, tucking his hands behind his head, giving Eli the full picture of his muscles flexing. “So why writing?”
“I started in high school. It’s not even like I knew I wanted to do it since I was a kid or anything. My school had an extracurricular
requirement, and the journalism club was the only one with an opening by the time the deadline to join clubs came around.”
“So, you joined because you had to?”
Eli nods, laying his head down not too far from Peter’s. “But I fell in love with it. I didn’t want to at first; I resented
the whole thing. But Mrs.Jackson kept challenging me, then eventually I got to write my own pieces, I was interviewing and
reporting, breaking stories about what was happening at our school. I was even head editor in my senior year.”
Peter smiles at him.
“What about you? Did you have to do any writing in college?” It occurs to Eli that he has zero clue what goes into earning
a computer science major.
“Writing? Me?” Peter responds almost too quickly, turning his face away from Eli. “No, I’ve never had to do that.”
Weird , Eli thinks to himself. But he decides to drop it. For the time being, at least.
There’s never silence in a gym, not with people grunting and shouting and running and falling. The zip of the rope climbers
rips through the gym, the sound of shoes falling onto the padded floor. The slam of weights. The pop song playing distantly
over the speakers.
But silence is all Eli gets from Peter. He dares to turn his head toward the other man to see his eyes focused dead ahead
at the ceiling. From where he lies, Eli can see the softer angles of Peter’s face, the roundness of his cheeks, that sharpness
of his nose, the brown of his eyes.
“Do you seriously think you’re not interesting?” Eli asks.
“Why would I? You didn’t like me on our first date.”
“It wasn’t you,” Eli tells him. “That wasn’t the real you. That was the nervous you, the you that was going on your first
date.”
“As opposed to the me that’s been on two?”
“Three,” Eli corrects. “And yeah, I’d say this Peter is an improvement over the first.”
“It does feel easier,” Peter says. “Like I’m already more comfortable around you.”
“And you’ll find that with another person,” Eli promises. “You’ve just got to open up to them the way that you’re opening
up to me.”
Peter doesn’t say anything. He just gives Eli a sad expression that he tries to turn into a smile, but Eli can see through
the pretense.
And when Peter asks Eli if he’s ready to climb some more, he says yes and takes Peter’s hand, letting the man help him to
his feet. Eli mostly watches for the next hour and a half, letting Peter climb his heart out as he scales walls with a speed
that Eli could never imagine.
He gives it an honest go a few times, managing to climb up the first three walls without much trouble by the end of the night.
But his arms and legs start to ache like never before, and he has to bow out, watching Peter from the floor.
“You kind of are like Spider-Man,” Eli says as Peter continues to show off for him.
“If only I could swing on webs,” Peter tells him with a smile. “Are you ready to go?”
“Sure.”
They walk to the locker room to grab their things and switch shoes.
“Did you drive here?” Peter asks him as they turn in the shoes and the locker keys.
“Oh, God, no. You think I can afford a car?”
Eli watches as Peter heads to a branded bright yellow refrigerator filled with energy teas all bearing the same logo as the
fridge. “Do you want a ride?”
“I can wait for the bus, it won’t be that long.”
“But you live in the Castro—that’s like an hour on the bus, plus it’s late.”
“I promise you”—Eli pushes on the bar for the door—“I’ve lived in this city my entire life. I’ll be—” He pauses as they step