Let's Waste Time

I was still working at my desk when the knock came. Technically, I was already supposed to be off the clock, but I had a customer on the phone for forty-five minutes who just couldn't figure out how to get their internet service to work. I stood up and went to answer the door, still attached to my wireless headset. 81 with the black door stood on the front steps with a six-pack of beer and a pizza box.

"Yes, Mrs. Keller," I said, alerting him that he had to be quiet. I motioned for him to come in. "It's the little blue button on the top of the tower." He set the pizza and beer on the coffee table while I shuffled back to my desk.

I could hear him moving around my apartment while I continued the phone call. So I turned to watch him set my pink plastic plates on the table while she complained about the service tech not telling her what to do correctly. Even though she'd already admitted to me that he'd offered to set it up and she declined because she claimed she knew what she was doing. Turns out she didn't. Go figure. So I pretended to shoot myself when he looked back at me. And it made me feel a little better about our movie date that was hopefully not a date.

Eventually, I was getting antsy, and the apartment was permeated with the scent of pizza. So I told her I'd have another tech sent out and logged out before another call could come in. I'd probably get written up for it, but I was hungry, and she wasn't cooperating.

"Jesus Christ!" I exclaimed when I was done. I tossed my headset onto the desk and stood up to stretch.

"Long day?" 81 asked from the couch. He was already making himself comfortable, searching through the channels for the right movie.

"You have no idea. The only good thing is that I get paid extra for overtime." I shut my computer down and joined him on the couch. I was wearing sweatpants and a tank top, and he was wearing sweatpants and a Captain America shirt. So it felt more like a casual hang-out than a date. Thankfully.

"So what's your name anyway?" he asked once we each got a slice of pizza.

"Marley, you?"

"Chris."

"It's nice to officially meet you, Chris." I reached out to shake his hand.

"You too, Marley." We were silent as we got the movie on and enjoyed the pizza and beer. But a little while later, I decided to get the weird stuff out of the way.

"So you said you have a girlfriend?" I pointed out.

"Yeah, she's in Oakland."

"I just wanted to check that this wasn't a date or anything." He shook his head.

"I don't really know a lot of people in the bay area yet. Besides my team, anyway. But they're not really into Lord of the Rings and shit."

"Your team? What do you play?"

"Baseball. Pitcher."

"Right. You mentioned that last night. I forgot. Are you any good?" He shrugged and chewed on his pizza. The light of the TV screen lit up his face. The sun was setting, and the room grew dimmer by the second.

"I don't know anymore. I played in high school. Fucked around too much in college until I dropped out. When I moved to the bay, I decided to try it again. It's been going pretty well."

"You're either really bad or really humble about being really good." He laughed.

"Skill is subjective, I think." I rolled my eyes.

"So really good it is then." He smiled.

"How old are you anyway?" he asked. I took a big gulp of beer like he would snatch it out of my hand when he found out I was underage.

"How old do you think I am?"

"You look like you're about twelve." I scoffed.

"Rude."

"I'm kidding. You look a little too young to drink that beer, though."

"I am too young to drink the beer, but I graduated from the kid's menu." He smiled again.

"I figured. You're living on your own—obviously college-aged. But you don't have any booze in your apartment. So I figured you had to be between eighteen and twenty."

"I'll be twenty-one in two months. What about you?"

"Twenty-one as of two months ago." I nodded.

"You don't look a day over twenty-one and two months." He laughed. It was such a nice, easy laugh. And I was feeling much better about this growing friendship.

After a while, he leaned back and stuck his big feet on the coffee table. It seemed like a subconscious thing that he didn't realize he was doing. As if he was so comfortable in my apartment that he forgot about being polite. My theory was proved a second later when he suddenly jerked his feet off the table and went, "Shit, I'm sorry."

I just said, "It's cool, man," and stuck my feet up too. He joined me, getting comfortable again. Arm stretched over the back of the couch but still too far away for us to touch. "So you're from Oakland?"

"Yeah, born and raised. What about you?"

"I actually grew up in Napa. So both of us are kind of local kids."

"That's cool. Did you grow up on a winery?" I snorted through my nose.

"God, no."

"Just wondering. I've actually never been out there. We always stuck to the city. Obviously, I've been to the bay a lot. But my parents only ever went to Napa when they wanted to go wine tasting. Which means I wasn't invited."

"You're old enough now. Not that you're missing anything anyway. I've never been wine-tasting, but it's mostly just snooty people talking about notes, spitting into cups, and eating cheese. Really boring, actually. Tell me about your girlfriend."

"Her name is Heidi. She didn't fuck around in school and still has another year left. She's not too far, but we don't get to see each other often anymore. Kinda tough once high school is over, you know? What about you? Are you in school?"

"No. I lasted like three semesters in community college before I dropped that idea. It was never in the cards for me."

"What about your boyfriend?" I took another sip of my drink and sat it on the coffee table. I wasn't sure how to answer that question.

"Oh well—he already left school, actually. He's a pilot. He doesn't actually live with me. He comes around when he can, but sometimes flights get canceled."

He made a face. I wasn't sure what it meant. If I had any brains at all, I would have figured it out instantly. Just in those few short sentences, Chris had already made up his mind about Trent. He didn't like him. And I wasn't sure what exactly it was that did it. The fact that he was obviously older than me. Or that he wasn't around often. But I was oblivious. And in my mind, Trent's only flaw was that he wasn't divorced yet.

"That kind of sucks," he said. His voice should have tipped me off. And when I got to know him better, I would have recognized it. But I barely knew him then.

"Yeah."

We didn't talk for a bit after that. We watched the movie until my favorite part came. When the hobbits were being chased by black riders. I leaned forward because the Ringwraiths were always my favorite.

"So um—let's just pretend I'm not like—a girl," I said. "Not that I'm not a girl. And you need to pretend I'm not a girl. Assuming you even like girls." He gave me a perplexed look. One eyebrow rose in question. I realized I was speaking nonsense again.

"I honestly don't know what you're trying to ask. So I can't answer that." I laughed and shook my head. I felt stupid again.

"No, I just—I don't want you to treat me like—I don't like—like we can't be friends. Like, let's just be bros, okay? I don't want you to treat me any differently just because I lack—well—dudeness. All my friends are dudes, and they're just like my bros, you know? I find that friendships are a lot better when people don't overthink gender differences."

"I mean—okay—what?"

"I just don't want there to be this weird 'She's a girl, so I have to act differently around her,' kind of thing. I just want you to be yourself, and we can be buddies or whatever. No weirdness."

"Okay. I can work with that. A little lack of dudeness never bothered me." I snorted again, glad that he understood what I asked. Gender had never been an issue for me either. But that didn't mean I didn't occasionally make friends with guys who eventually whined about "the friend zone."

"Alright, I'm glad."

"So you have bros? What are they like?"

"I only have like three friends, really. And the fact that they're all men was an accident. Not because I don't like being friends with women or anything."

"No judgment."

"They're kind of huge dorks, actually. They mostly just play D and D and stuff at the comic shop Albert works at. And that's kind of all they do. Besides pester me."

"Do you play D and D?"

"Not really. They invite me into their campaigns sometimes, but I always do the wrong thing and die immediately. Or get everyone else killed. So they got tired of trying. Also, I don't do the roleplay thing very well. So it felt really awkward, and they said I was weird." He laughed.

"I'm not that good at it either. I'm not very creative, and the roleplay part always gets me."

"I get it. What about your friends, though? What are they like?" He shrugged.

"I haven't really kept in touch with most of my high school friends. Just a few of them. Otherwise, I only ever hang out with the guys on the team. Some of us work together too. So it's kind of refreshing to hang out with someone who doesn't live and breathe baseball. Pretty much all they do is work and play ball. Kind of need to branch out my friend group a little, you know?"

"I totally understand. I've never been friends with a sporty person before. So I get it. I don't know anything about sports, though. So I won't be any help in that department." He smiled.

"That's alright. I think it's good to have friends with varied interests."

"Probably."

When the first movie ended, we'd drunk the entire six-pack, and there was only one piece of pizza left. I was getting kind of antsy again. Usually, I could sit still and watch a good movie just fine. Provided that I'd never seen it before. When it was something I'd seen before, I got fidgety. If Chris found this annoying, he never said anything.

"Goddamn, I forgot how long these movies are," he finally said when the end credits began to roll.

"Lord of the Rings is usually kind of an all-day deal. So we probably can't watch them back-to-back." He nodded in agreement.

"Two Towers on Wednesday?"

"Sounds good."

"Alright, I'll head out then."

"Okay. I'll see you later." He took the pizza box and empty beer bottles and left. I was grateful since that meant I didn't have to clean up beyond washing the two plates. I still felt a little lightheaded and giddy when I got ready for bed.

If only my brain had been smart enough to recognize it for what it was. Not the buzz of alcohol. But something much more potent.