Naomi and Ely's No Kiss List

There are all kinds of ways to force yourself to decide. We do it all the time, make decisions. If we actually thought about every decision we made, we’d be paralyzed. Which word to say next. Which way to turn. What to look at. Which number to dial. You have to decide which decisions you’re actually going to make, and then you have to let the rest of them go. It’s the places where you think you have a choice that can really mess you up.

She wasn’t home. That’s the first factor. The doorman let me up, I rang the bell, and she wasn’t there, where she said she would be. Two months ago this would have surprised me, but now it just annoyed me. You know that feeling of waiting for someone. I mean really waiting for someone – standing in front of a restaurant in the cold and having hundreds of people pass you on the sidewalk. And you don’t want to do anything else, because you’re afraid you might miss something – that somehow if you don’t spot her right away, she’ll walk right by. So you stand there and you don’t do anything except think about how you’re standing there. Occasionally you might look at your watch, or check your cell phone to see if it’s accidentally on silent, even though you already checked for that a minute ago.

That’s what dating Naomi was starting to feel like.

I called her and hung up when it answered without ringing, because what good would it be to leave a third voice mail message? What good is it ever to leave a third voice mail message?

I was just standing there, trying to figure out how long I should wait. Then Ely’s door opened and he came out in his bare feet, carrying a garbage bag to the chute. He took one look at me, smiled, and said, “Let me guess.”

We’d never really made it past comes with the territory territory. He wasn’t really into me, because he thought I was boring, and I wasn’t really into him, because he thought I was boring. But when Naomi wanted us to hang out together, we were fine. I got to be the innocent bystander. I wasn’t jealous of him – how could I be, when he was gay? No, I was jealous of them – the way it was like they had grown up watching all the same TV shows, only the TV show they always kept referring to was their own life together, and each episode was funnier than the last. Every now and then, Naomi (and even Ely) would make the effort to explain one of their references to me, but the act of explaining made it even more awkward, even more obvious. My only comfort was that eventually the night would end and Naomi would go home with me, not him. I knew Ely didn’t think I was worthy, but I had a feeling he’d never think anyone was worthy of Naomi. Just like she’d never be happy if he was with anyone else. In old-movie terms, you had to think of it like this: Fred Astaire had a wife who wasn’t Ginger Rogers, and Ginger Rogers had a husband (actually, a few of them, I think) who wasn’t Fred Astaire. But was there ever any doubt who their true dance partners were? I could be Naomi’s boyfriend, sure. I could be the one she slept with (or didn’t). But I was pretty certain I’d never be her dance partner.

Ely asked me if I wanted to come inside, and I figured why not. I mean, I figured this would give me a reason to leave a third message, and would give Naomi a place to find me when she showed up. It was much better than waiting in the hallway.

No one else was home. I was curious to meet his parents; Naomi had alluded to them enough for me to put the story together. I know it’s wrong, but I always pictured his mother, the one Naomi’s father had the affair with, to be attractive. It made more sense that way, at least to me. And Ely was attractive, too. It’s not like I didn’t know that, although I really didn’t think it meant anything to me. It wasn’t like I felt it, the way I felt it when there was a hot girl around. Like Naomi, who was not only hot but actually happened to like having thoughts. I’d found, in my very limited dating and only-slightly-less-limited friendship experience, that there were a lot of people who treated thoughts like they were a nuisance. They weren’t intrigued by them. They didn’t go out of their way to prolong them. But Naomi valued the fine art of thinking. The only hitch was that I didn’t know what she was thinking. I imagined Ely would have a better idea.

We went into one of those rooms that’s lined floor-to-ceiling with bookcases, where the books have been sitting on the shelves together for so long that they look like they’ve merged into one multi-spined line.

“Can I take your coat?” Ely asked. I handed it over and he threw it on a chair. Which should have been obnoxious, but the way he did it – like he was laughing at himself more than me – made it almost charming. I sat down on the couch and he hovered in front of me.

“Can I offer you a drink?”

It would make more sense, perhaps, if I’d decided yes. But I said no.

He said, “Good. Brandy can get you in trouble, I hear.”

“Who’s Brandy?” I asked.

“My mother’s brandy,” he said.

I was confused. “I didn’t think you had a mom named Brandy,” I said.

Now he looked confused. “I don’t.”

“But you just said she’s Brandy?”

He laughed. “She’s more ginny than that.”

“She goes by Ginny?”

“You have to stop,” he said, really laughing. “You’re killing me.”

I laughed now, too, still confused. “But who’s Brandy?” I asked.

“I told you – MY MOTHER’S!”

At this point, he was absolutely cracking up, and I found myself laughing right beside him. He was turning bright red, which made me laugh even harder. Anytime it started to subside, he would yell “WHO’S BRANDY?!?” and I would yell “YOUR MOTHER!” and we would break back down into eye-tearing, bladder-threatening snorts and whinnies. I was keeled over, wiping my eyes. He sat down on the couch next to me and laughed and laughed and laughed.

You have to understand: I don’t laugh often. Not out of choice. I just don’t get the opportunity. So when I do, it’s a dam bursting. It’s something opening.

“Knock knock!” I said.

“Who’s there?” he asked.

“Orange!” I said.

“Orange who?” he asked.

“ORANGE YOU GLAD TO SEE ME!” I screamed.

It was the funniest thing either of us had ever heard.

“What did the mayonnaise say to the refrigerator?” he yelled to me.

“YOUR MOTHER!” I yelled back.

“Close the door, I’m dressing!”

We went on like this for at least twenty minutes. Every joke we’d ever heard in third grade was dredged up for a command performance. And if we met a pause, we just yelled “ORANGE!” or “YOUR MOTHER!” until the next joke came.

Finally we needed to catch our breath. We were still on the couch. He was leaning into me. I looked at his bare feet and decided to take off my shoes. As I did, he said, “The other shoe drops.”

And I said, “No – that was just the first.”

He looked at me and it honestly felt like the first time he’d ever seen me.

“I like you,” he said.

“Try not to sound so surprised,” I found myself replying.

He leaned his head so far back that he was looking at me upside down. I actually thought, He’s even attractive upside down. And I couldn’t even feel attractive right-side up.

“It doesn’t matter if I’m surprised or not,” he told me. “It matters that I like you.”

We heard the elevator stop outside. Gingerly, Ely jumped up and looked through the peephole of his front door. I took off my other shoe.

“Just Mr. McAllister,” he said. “Don’t worry.”

I understood the “Don’t worry.” Because I’ll admit: I didn’t want it to be Naomi in the elevator. I wanted to stay like this. I wasn’t just enjoying Ely’s company; I was enjoying my own as well.

“Let’s listen to music,” Ely said.

I said sure, assuming he’d turn on the stereo in the living room. But instead he led me to his room, which was covered with poems he’d xeroxed and photographs of his friends, Naomi especially. He scanned his computer for the album he wanted, then pressed play. I recognized it immediately – Tori Amos, From the Choirgirl Hotel. It seemed to loosen itself from the speakers as it fell into the room. I thought Ely would sit in a chair or lie on the bed, but instead he lowered himself down on the hardwood floor, facing the ceiling as if it was a sky. He didn’t tell me what to do, but I lowered myself next to him, felt the floor beneath my back, felt my breathing, felt . . . happy.

Song followed song. At one point, I realized I’d left my phone in my jacket, which meant I wouldn’t hear it if it rang. I let it go.

There was something about our silence that made me feel comfortable. He wasn’t talking to me, but I didn’t feel ignored. I felt we were part of the same moment, and it didn’t need to be defined.

Finally I said, “Do you think I’m boring?”

He turned his head to me, but I kept looking up.

“Why do you say that?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I mumbled, a little embarrassed that I’d said anything.

I thought he’d turn back to the ceiling, to the music. But instead he looked at me for almost a minute. Eventually I turned on my side so I could look right back at him.

“No,” he finally said. “I don’t think you’re boring. I do think there are times you don’t allow yourself to be interesting . . . but clearly that can change.”

How can you spend hours every day trying in small ways to figure out who you are, then have a near-stranger give you a sentence of yourself that says it better than you ever could?

We lay there looking at each other. It made both of us smile.

Then, out of the blue – the blue deep within me – I found myself saying, “I like you, too. Really. I like you.”

There is something so intimate about saying the truth out loud. There is something so intimate about hearing the truth said. There is something so intimate about sharing the truth, even if you’re not entirely sure what it means.

And that’s when he leaned in and kissed me once, lightly, on the lips. As if he’d read exactly what I needed.

It broke the spell. It’s not that I stopped being happy. I was still inexplicably, utterly happy. But suddenly the happiness had implications.

My face must have shown it.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” Ely said, his voice freaking out a little.

“No,” I told him.

“Really, I shouldn’t have.”

He sat up, and I lay there a few seconds more, staring at the space he’d just left. Then I sat up, too. And stood up. And found myself leaving, without actually deciding to leave.

He stayed where he was, but turned to face me when I got to the doorway. I made noises that sounded like excuses for leaving, and he made noises that sounded like understanding why I had to leave.

But before I could go, he said, simply, “I wanted to.”

And I waited until I had decided to really leave before I told him, “I did, too.”

Then I was gone – out his door, putting my shoes on, grabbing my jacket, then out the front door, past her front door, down the elevator, out of the building, deciding to cross streets, deciding to wait for lights, deciding to put my hands in my pockets. Deciding that none of these things mattered. None of these things involved who I was, only what I did.

The whole night, the whole morning, the whole afternoon now . . . I miss Ely, and I miss Naomi. I miss how much easier life was just twenty-four hours ago.

I think about him a lot.

I think about her a lot.

But I think about him more.

“Really. I like you.”

I decide to take out my phone for the first time since I scared myself away from him. I decide not to check the three new messages. I decide to make a call. To start to wrestle with the implications. To maybe get back closer to the happiness.

I just have to decide who to call.

I’ve tried everything. Ambien, Lunesta, melatonin, counting sheep, The Best of Johnny Carson: The 1970s, Charlie Rose: The Present, Charlie Daniels, MTV2, 976-SLUTS4U, the complete works of Dostoyevsky, the complete works of Nicholas Sparks, completely jacking off, Jack Daniel’s, the Jackie Chan oeuvre. But nothing and no one can get me to sleep at night.

Blame Naomi.

She was seven. I was five. Our mommies had hustled us into the elevator, but in their two-second pause in the hallway to exchange mismatched mail, the elevator door closed and Naomi and I were left unattended. The elevator went up. Naomi said, “Would you like to see my underwear?” I nodded. She lifted her dress to her stomach. She wore the same kind of pink hipster briefs with elastic lace around the waist that my twin sister, Kelly, wore, but on Naomi, the hipster briefs looked entirely different. Bewitching instead of stupid. I can still recall that exact moment when Naomi dropped her dress back down to her knees and stuck her tongue out at me. Because my heart? It actually leaped, and hasn’t returned to me since. Naomi owned it forevermore.

Flash forward ten years to last spring, Naomi and I in the elevator at the same time again, only this time we’re taller, curvier (her), hairier (me). It’s not like we didn’t see each other regularly at school and in the building, but somehow, for reasons the universe has never bothered to explain to me, this time was different. Naomi appraised me head to toe as the elevator went up. She announced, “You’ve filled out nicely, freshperson.” “I’m a sophomore,” I corrected her, grateful my squeaky-voice stage had long passed. “Even better,” she said. “Come here, sophomore.” I ventured closer to her. She smelled like baby powder and pretty girl shampoo. She leaned into me, her head slanted, her mouth opened ever so slightly. I thought, No, the wet dream of what I think is about to happen could not actually be about to happen. I mean, it’s not like I’d never kissed a girl before. How many Spin the Bottle parties had I thrown just trying to make such contact with Naomi, anyway? If only I’d known all I needed to do was trap myself in an elevator and wait for Naomi. Then, contact. It happened. Naomi kissed me – slowly, on the mouth, sucking my soul into hers, floors four through fourteen. She tasted like she’d just eaten a Snickers bar. I love Snickers.

I know I know I know. I shouldn’t love a girl who toys so casually with other people’s feelings, specifically mine, but it’s not like my mind has the ability to overrule my heart – and the other parts of my anatomy. See, what people (and by people, I mean my sister, our friends, and most of the Facebook community) don’t understand about Naomi – except maybe Ely, he gets her, but I hate him, so his understanding doesn’t count – is that there’s more to Naomi than just the obvious evil. They don’t know how she tests out gummy bears for me, pressing them between the plastic cover to find the ones that are freshest, the way I like. They don’t know that despite her brazen kisses, her symbols and her lies, her obsession with visiting and chronicling every Starbucks in the universe (though she never orders a single drink; she just plops down in the big purple chair and waits for some guy or girl to fall in love with her), Naomi’s really a nice, simple girl at heart. I know this about her. I know that for all her boasting,

The problem, says my sister, Kelly, is not that I can’t get over Naomi – it’s that I refuse to. You are correct, sir! Loving Naomi and waiting for her to come back to me – it’s not a stalker thing, but more like a personal mission. A job. Wake up, think about Naomi. Go to school, think about Naomi. Come home, eat dinner, do homework, think about Naomi. A few games of Xbox, a few IMs with whoever’s available while thinking about Naomi (except for Ely – blocked! blocked! blocked!), download some porn that looks like Naomi, try to go to sleep. Count Naomi sheep. Fail to fall asleep. Naomi Naomi Naomi.

When insomnia prevails and I don’t have Naomi physically present to comfort me through it – although in every other way, believe me, she’s there – I know I can count on an emergency meeting of the Bruce Society to get me through the night. In the spacious lobby of our one hundred–unit apartment building, the Bruces Below Fourteenth Street convene to pass the dark hours. Sleepless? Big deal. We’ve got important issues to discuss – specifically, the Burden of Being a Bruce.

We are:

• Mr. McAllister, who alleges to be named Bruce, but I don’t imagine anyone would ever dare address him by a name other than Mr. McAllister.

• Gabriel the graveyard-shift doorman, middle name Bruce (fact-checked on driver’s license).

• One of Ely’s moms, Sue, who may or may not have once been married to someone named Bruce. The University Place Stitch ’n’ Bitch knitting circle is hot with rumor over that one.

• Random persons hanging out in the lobby between late-night laundry loads, Bruces in spirit.

• Bruce the Chihuahua, also known as “Cutie Pie” by her owner, Mrs. Loy, but renamed by the Bruces-in-spirit because I’m the one, not Naomi, who feeds and walks her when Mrs. Loy goes out of town. I’m the “nice boy” (take that, Naomi’s sainted Ely) who uses the secret key under Mrs. Loy’s mat to tap on Mrs. Loy’s apartment door for the dog to hear, but not so loud as to wake Mrs. Loy, when Cutie Pie-sometimes-called-Bruce yelps for a midnight walk.

The problem with the Bruce Society is that I want to talk about being a Bruce, but the other Bruces, they want to talk about insomnia. What insomniacs don’t realize is that the more you talk about your inability to sleep, the more you will be unable to sleep. It’s like a whole mathematical problem that equals up to a solution called: Why Not Just Face It, You’re Screwed. The other members – I question their dedication to the Bruce Society. I suspect they care more about their sleepless nights than about what it means to be a Bruce. Because think about it. There’s the legacy of great Bruces whom we should honor and hope to emulate: Lenny the brilliant comedian; Mr. Springsteen; Master Lee; Robert the Bruce, aka “Braveheart.” But there are also those Bruces whom we need to seriously consider repudiating, and striking from our namesake society: Willis, Jenner, Hornsby.

Sue/Bruce never fails to dodge the importance of being Bruceness. Instead she asks me, “Honey, have you talked with a shrink about the sleeping issue? I’m worried you look awful tired. You’re too young to be an insomniac. Don’t you have SATs coming up? You need to get this sleeping issue resolved before then.”

I don’t know why I like Sue so much. Maybe because she’s not the DNA part of the Ely equation (I don’t think), or maybe because she’s not part of the Naomi & Ely parental situation that got the co-op board into such a state. I mean, it’s one thing to turn fifty and all of a sudden cross over into being midlife-crisis “flexibly” gay; it’s an entirely different matter to mess with your neighbor’s real estate standing. The consensus from the Bruce Society, in those middle-of-the-night insomniac gossip sessions when Sue isn’t present, is that if Ginny had needed to “experiment” so badly, it would have been helpful for the fifteenth-floor residents of our building if she had chosen a man who lives in, like, a different building entirely. And, a man more discreet than Naomi’s dad. We’d totally pass a resolution in support of Sue if ever called upon by the co-op board.

Since she doesn’t seem to have a clue, I tell Sue/Bruce, “I like not sleeping. Sleeping is time not spent living.”

Mr. McAllister the Bruce says, “Sixteen is an age not worth living. Too stupid to know any better. I read in Cosmopolitan that sleep apnea is linked to . . .”

Proof ! Naomi swears Mr. McAllister steals her mother’s fashion magazines from the garbage-chute-room recycle bin. According to Naomi, the models in those magazines are like porn for old guys too cheap to buy an Internet connection to get it like the rest of us.

Sue / Bruce ignores Mr. McAllister / Bruce like she always does. She pats my shoulder. “Have you given more thought to where you’d like to go to college? Last time we discussed it, you were hung up on colleges that have presidents with Bruce in their names. I’m hoping I was successful in talking you out of that idea?”

She’s so nice, Sue/Bruce. “You were. I have a new college plan, as of today. This morning I saw an ad on the subway for a college called PolyTechnic University. According to their slogan, it’s a university for people who aren’t mono-thinkers, but who are poly-thinkers. Must mean it’s the college for me.”

“That’s what you are – a poly-thinker?”

“Yes,” I state.

What else could I be? If I were a mono-thinker, I probably wouldn’t be an insomniac. How is a poly-thinker supposed to fall asleep, and more importantly, stay asleep, when thoughts just won’t stop darting! darting! darting! through my head?

Lights out. What is Naomi doing this very minute? Is she naked?

Tucked in. Has Bruce the Second seen her naked?

Fluff pillow. I’ve seen Naomi naked.

Mono-hand maneuver. Jesus Christ. Why bother with porn?

Discard Kleenex under bed. True, she kept her panties on. And I wasn’t allowed to touch. But I’ve SEEN.

Toss. Turn. Torture.

A poly-thinker is left no choice but to get out of bed, retrieve Cutie Pie, and go down to the building lobby for a Bruce Society meeting.

I really want to ask Sue/Bruce, “Do you think Ely has ever seen Naomi naked?” but I don’t. Because I’m sure he has. Gay guys get all the perks with none of the responsibility. It’s so not fair.

I hate that I only got to see Naomi naked because last summer Ely was seeing some boy and Naomi hated not having full access to Ely’s time so she gave me access to hers. And then Ely dumped the boy and Naomi dumped me.

Someone ought to dump something on Ely.

Did Naomi just walk by, barefoot and carrying a laundry load, or am I dreaming? I’ve got to be, because she is an insomniac’s most dire and darling vision, wearing a tiny, tiny, dreamy, dreamy black dress, the kind she wears when she’s going out partying with Ely, and it’s got to be the highest form of injustice how Naomi does not realize that she could look like a dump truck for all that Ely would notice her in the way she wants him to notice her.

The highlight of Bruce Society meetings comes when Gabriel the doorman notices he has nothing to do after midnight. He leaves his station, walks over to our area, and dumps a deck of cards onto the coffee table in the middle of the square of lobby couches. “Five-card stud?” He sits down with us and shuffles the deck.

Our members dutifully pull the rolls of quarters from our pockets that serve in place of poker chips as Gabriel deals. Since he took over the night shift last June, I think it’s fair to say that Gabriel has become a very rich guy. I don’t know what kind of salary a novice doorman with no experience makes, but Gabriel could easily fund laundry loads lasting into eternity with all the quarters he’s won.