Red Light, Green Eyes, True Blue

Chapter 1-3

Goody-two-shoes Abby and Major, one on either side of me like always, had worked hard not to snicker. Abby could imitate Mr. Bollow perfectly, as long as she was certain he was out of ear shot. As I looked into the dining room, seeing her standing there with her parents, no doubt having a conversation similar to Major’s and mine, the memories kept coming.

“It’s your education, young lad. If you wish to squander it, then that is your prerogative,” she’d say whenever I wanted to hit the hookah pipe instead of studying once at SUNY. Then we’d crack up laughing—every time.

“Was that a major chord or a minor one?” I’d once asked, regarding the tenor of our cackling.

“That wasn’t music at all, Sally. You laugh like an unbalanced washing machine.” Major had imitated the undesirable sound, more like a blender full of gravel to my ears.

“Oh. Geeze.” My face had fallen. I’d slumped down in the booth at the hookah bar. It was rather funny in retrospect, how we’d always thought going there would make us seem cooler. “I didn’t know.” My voice had maybe cracked. “That…that’s how I laugh?”

“Now you hurt his feelings,” Abby had said, patting the hand I’d used to swipe at my deep brown puppy dog eyes.

“I can’t even help it, Maj.” I’d wrung my hands together and had worked hard to create tears. “I have this condition, see…in the back of my throat. I can get can you a doctor’s note if you want.” I couldn’t quite finish with a straight face.

“Jerk.”

“HRH!” I’d pounded the table, as always. “Say it, Maj.”

“HRH!” All three of us had.

Despite my considerable charm, wit, and handsomeness, I’d never really made friends easily. Being a hot gay nerd, “a classification always popular within the species Homosexual Perpetually Horny Erectus,” Abby always joked, I could find a guy to f**k any night of the week—and did.

“Why look for ‘the one’ when I can bang with the thousands?” That was my motto. I liked things shallow. Did I have to know a guy’s life story or last name? Nope. But Major and Abby were different. In the event I ever actually had a deep thought, I knew I could share it with either one of them. If ever I felt a true emotion, I knew they’d share my happiness or comfort me through grief. They even came together to get me released from campus jail when I got drunk and pissed on a statue. I kind of had a dual personality in college, part Hogwarts student, part Animal House.

“You came,” I’d said, relieved to be sprung from the university hoosegow. “HRH!”

“Do that one more time,” the security officer had warned, “and I’ll keep you locked up a week.”

They not only took me back to my dorm that night, they also did my homework for me so I wouldn’t flunk Business Administration.

It all flashed in my brain. From collecting leaves as a sixth grader to smoking them as a college senior, from my first crush on Coach Wolczek, to running after the last guy I got naked with who’d tried to steal my wallet, Abby and Major had always been there. There at Darby’s. Listening to a new song, a pensive, modern one, something suddenly dawned on me. I probably had some work to do on myself as well.

“We’ll mature together,” I suggested. “I’ll be the one to take care of you for a change…the supportive one.”

Major brushed my cheek with his knuckles. “Thanks, Sal, but the tickets are bought. Bags are packed, Packed for a honeymoon, but…” He shrugged. “I can be depressed in a bathing suit.”

“You don’t need to be depressed alone. It’s not good.”

“I haven’t grieved my parents, Sally. All I’ve done since…all I’ve ever done is check things off on a list. High school: check. College: check. Marriage: check, at least almost. Life has to be more than an itinerary. The world has to be bigger than Pawling and Albany. Maybe if I see some of it, I’ll figure out where I belong.”

“You belong with Abby, man.” She walked by, and I grabbed her. Catching one of her tears just before it dropped off her cheek, I wiped it on my dress slacks, and then took her hand instead of her wrist. “She’ll take you back right now. Won’t you, Abs? You can…you can go tell her parents it was all a misunderstanding.”

The Underwoods were huddled in a corner, Abby’s parents and her three scary-looking brothers. The mom’s lips were downturned, her eyes all puffy. The men all glared as if ready to punch someone. I’d throw myself in front of them for Major if I had to.

“Let him go, Mick. He has to do this,” Abby said. “We have to. Both of us have known for a while.”

“Known what?”

“That we rushed this,” Abby answered. “All of it.”

“How is it rushed? It’s been eleven years! Romeo and Juliet got married after a week.”

Neither of them corrected my literary reinterpretation, but rather just looked at me pitifully.

“I’m sorry.” I punched my thigh. “I push too hard for love…out of love.”

Major shushed me. “That was going to be our first dance tomorrow.” He nodded back toward the main dining area. “‘Still Into You’ by Paramore.” He brushed Abby’s bare arm, like he had my cheek. “I think I might not like this song anymore after tonight.”

Abby took his hand. “Maj…”

“Don’t hate me,” he said to her.

“Never.”

“Or you, Sally.”

“Dude…” I shook my head.

“With my parents gone, I think maybe I was afraid to end up alone.” Major steeled himself. “Now, I think that’s what I need for a while.”

I grunted. I would not cry. I refused. “Yeah, but…you guys…”

“We’re going to be fine.” Abby was a rock. Despite the tears, she seemed resolute and almost calm. “Time…that’s all, Mick. It can’t hurt. If Major and I are meant to be together, we will be, in whatever way is right. No matter what, this isn’t the end for HRH. Say it. Both of you. HRH!”

“HRH.” It was, perhaps, the most pathetic exclamation of solidarity ever.

“We both love you very much,” Abby promised, making me feel the same way in that moment I had when my parents told me they were splitting up. “And always will.”

“Good,” I replied. “Because I’m going to need a couch to crash on in a month or two when Mother finally throws me out because I can’t get a job, since all I really learned in school was how to cheat.”

Major smiled. It felt good that I could make that happen.

“You got it,” Abby said.

“You will always be right here.” Major touched his heart, and then kissed the top of my head. He gave Abby one more hug, whispering something in her ear I didn’t need to be privy to, then turned back one last time at the door. “HRH…to be continued.”

As I watched him walk out while Abby tightly gripped my hand, I wondered if we’d ever see him again.