“Will you go with me?” My hands move excitedly in front of Benny, forming the signs and constructing the question as the words leave my mouth in a mumble out of habit. My phone screen is lit up on an Instagram post from The Green Garage about their upcoming 18 and Up EDM Night and pushed toward him. “I’ll buy the tickets.”
Benny’s eyes go from my hands down to the phone, and he flips through all of the photos in the post, his mouth open and forming a wide smile. When his head comes back up, he gives me quick, short nods and his right hand, formed into a fist, mimics the motions. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
“Cool, I—” the sound of the bell ringing through the cafeteria and bodies suddenly rising from tables and heading out of the building interrupts me. My hands are left awkwardly hanging midair when the commotion makes me forget what I was going to say.
“My house after school?” he signs.
“Yes,” I reply with a grin before slinging my backpack on. “Text your dad. Tell him I can drive us.”
During my last three classes, all I can think about is Benny. My best friend Benny, who I met on the old, creaky swing set in kindergarten, who taught me ASL so we could communicate in what felt like our own secret language no one else knew but us, and who knows me better than anyone else in the world. Who I’ve always thought of as my best friend until some point last year, when seeing his smile and this charismatic energy he exudes twenty-four/seven started putting this pressure on my chest, as if every moment was a tight hug.
And it hit me like a punch to the gut: I have a crush on Benny. I like him. Well, actually, I’m pretty sure my feelings for him go a lot further than like. As much as that scares the shit out of me.
So, now when I think of Benny, it’s of him dancing to the beat of Duke Dumont and ODESZA. How his mood is so contagious when he’s dancing to EDM. That the fact he can’t hear doesn’t stop him from enjoying it, because he can see and feel and connect with it in a way that transcends some ability or sense. I imagine glitter covering his thick poof of hair and his dark skin glistening with sweat under orange-yellow lights making him look golden. Godly.
There’s no reality where I keep myself together in that sort of situation. I don’t. I can’t. It’s not possible.
But I’m going to. He’s my friend. We’ve always talked about going to a rave, and now that we’re both eighteen, here’s our chance. I just need to tell myself over and over again that we’re going to this as friends.
Just. As. Friends.
And it’s totally fine. I’m bendito as fuck to have someone like Benny as a best friend. Stop making shit complicated.
…
How am I supposed to de-complicate the situation when the first thing Benny does as he gets home is throw his shirt off? He pulls his black-out curtains together, creating as much darkness as he can before turning on the Nanoleaf panels his parents got him for Christmas. And then “Real Life” comes on, the light blue, purple, pink, and white lights begin going to the beat, and he gets only a couple inches from me and starts shuffling. Waving for me to join him.
I’ve got it so, so bad.
But it’s okay. I don’t think he can read it on my face or in my eyes. And if he does, it’s not something he acknowledges. I’m still deciding whether that kills me a little inside daily or makes the situation better.
Sometimes I’m sure he can tell. Not that I want to be obvious, but, shit. There are times when I’m dancing next to him in his room with the music turned up so loud I’m sure the entire neighborhood can hear it. The beat vibrating through my entire body. And I catch myself just want so badly to hold him still for a minute and kiss him. Wanting to let it turn into another minute, and then another after that. And I’ll have to pretend to go to the bathroom or get some water. Anything to clear my mind and get blood back into my head.
Usually by that point, Benny’s tiring himself out and I’ll come back to him splayed across the length of his bed. The brightness on Nanoleaf panels are turned up so we have enough light to sign to each other. In my particularly weak moments, when he pats the empty space of the mattress, asking for me to lay next to him, I have to turn right back around and pee again or rehydrate. Today I’m a little more together. Able to throw myself down beside him and act like I’m extremely collected about this.
He adjusts his body so he’s lying on his side and his left arm and hand become more visible. “What should we wear?”
“I don’t know. You have any ideas?”
T-H-O-T-T-Y, he spells out.
I laugh. “Is there not a sign for that?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. So, yes?”
“There are a lot of different ways to be thotty. Basic thotty? Pokémon thotty? Glamour thot?”
Benny lets out a sigh and looks up to the far corner of his room where the wall meets ceiling, busy in thought. Or, I guess, thot.
“I’ll figure it out,” he tells me. “You’re in charge of tickets and ride. I’m in charge of outfits.”
“Deal."
…
My only instructions for tonight are bring your white Chucks. Every time I’ve asked Benny for a hint over the past week he always comes back with a “don’t be nosey” and “it’s going to be a surprise.” He loves that kind of shit. Building up my anticipation until I’m screaming, and he’ll just shrug and tell me “sorry, I can’t hear you.”
Douche.
And then feeling his face watching mine when I get to his house and see matching white shorts that have to be, at most, a two-inch inseam and white pleather harnesses and bottles of glow-in-the-dark paint, I know he’s having the time of his life seeing me try to form words. My right hand is still in the air, making small motions but nothing intelligible because I honestly don’t know what I’m thinking.
“Where did you get these?”
“The store.”
I glare at him, my hand moving quickly into the words no shit. He only shrugs. Super proud of himself.
“Why the white?”
“Because we’re EDM virgins,” Benny replies.
I can’t help but let out a cackle at that thinking as I brush a hand through my curls. “And the paint?”
“Gay.”
Could’ve assumed that one.
Benny grabs a couple brushes and the blue, purple, and green paints, setting them on his dresser. “You can have these. I’ll use red, orange, and yellow.”
“Okay.”
“Can I paint you?”
I blacked out for a second. I know I did. And now I’m standing here, in front of Benny, wondering if I read his hand correctly. I imagined it. I let myself think that thought. This isn’t real life.
“What did you say?”
“Is it okay if I paint you?” Never mind. This is real. “It’d be easier.”
“I—” The sound comes out of my mouth like I’m being choked.
Benny sets his middle finger over his pointer finger, making the letter R before turning his hand around and letting it rise like a staccato closer to him. The sign for best friend. His title for me when I became someone too invested in his seven-year-old life for him to be signing Raúl all the time. His eyes look into mine, searching for a response, or at the bare minimum, my attention.
My right hand goes to my chest, making small circles. Sorry.
“So, you don’t want me to paint you?”
“No. Yes.” Shit, this is getting hard to explain with my hands. “I do want you to,” I vocalize, knowing he can read my lips. Something I rarely do. Only when my mind refuses to work with my hands.
Benny’s face changes into a beaming smile. He reaches for the blue paint before quickly turning back around to me, curiously watching me continue to stand in the middle of his room.
“Are you going to take your clothes off?”
RIP in peace to me.
…
A small part of me is glad that Benny isn’t able to hear the “huhh” moan out of me when his palm, covered in cold, blue paint stamps the right side of my chest. But his quiet laughter gives him away: he felt my reaction. The vibrations that accompanied the sound and the ways that my body responds to the chill.
He continues, mainly using his fingers to paint lines and shapes on my skin in this Keith Haring-esque style. I try my best to stay still. Stay calm while I can feel Benny’s breath on my stomach, back, and legs. And not that we haven’t seen each other in only our underwear before, but this is so far from any ordinary situation.
And every time his paint covered hands touch a new part of my body, I flinch from the cold. Especially when he gets to my spine and every single nerve in my body screams. Benny uses his free hand to hold onto my side, trying to keep me from moving too much and messing him up. In no way realizing everything that he’s doing to me.
I need to go to the bathroom.
Benny hops up, placing all the paint and brushes back on his dresser before holding up both hands to shoulder-level, palms facing him and then turning them, so the palms face me. Done. And then sets his right hand close to his chest, moving it away from him while bringing his middle finger and thumb together. His head cranes toward me, and his eyes become expressive with curiosity. Asking if I like it.
I inspect my body and all the colorful shapes and paintings covering my skin while shaking my fist at him. “Yes. So much.”
He gives me a cheesy, ecstatic smile before quickly throwing off his shorts and stretching his arms out in the most dramatic, an angel attempting to sprout wings way. Ready for me to paint him.
I’m not artistic in the least. And worried that whatever I come up with Benny will hate. But I start with what comes to mind first: copying him and covering my hand in red paint, then placing it on his chest. His body tightens and he squeezes his lips into his mouth, trying to stifle his own moan.
Now you know how I felt. Ass.
Every ounce of strength I have in me is being used to keep my fingers calm. In my free hand, I have Chella Man’s website up on my phone, looking through his art, thinking of how I can interpret Benny’s favorite artist onto his body and have it not look like complete shit.
In the end, it’s not terrible. Benny loves it, so that’s all the validation I need. Short sounds come out of his mouth like he does when he gets really expressive and he almost hugs me before realizing that his paint’s still wet.
He tosses me a pair of shorts and one of the harnesses, waiting for me to move. His hands moving frantically as his eyes bulge and his entire body beckons me to start getting dressed. “Hurry! Time to party!”
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