Chapter Text
The driver almost skips right past the street, with the cars around them all nudging him ever so slightly forward till the street is nearly in their rearview. At last the car halts, and a cacophony of sounds unleash: the curt unbuckling of a seatbelt, the crank of the engine stopping, and the unanimous click of the backdoors unlocking.
“Alllright, here’s your stop, just swerve between the cars and it’s the second door down from the fire hydrant. Can’t miss it. You want me to try and pull up the car further?”
“Nah,” Ryan chirps, adjusting the strap of his carry-on. “You can just drop me off here. Thanks, man.”
“Of course,” the driver says, amicable in that arms-length manner strangers maintain towards one another. “Have fun, sir.”
‘Have fun’, he says in reference to the near-week-long hijinks that Grace has premeditated. It feels less like a wedding — a proclamation of binding knots, centered entirely around such a wild and profound happening — and more like an excuse to shovel her parents’ money into a luxurious pit.
See, his friend Grace, the ever-exuberant heiress of the Monroes, has never been one for romance. The concept of it seems to have passed her by entirely; she’s wallflowered most charged approaches towards her, excusing herself lamely from the premises instead of returning the favor. It’s wild to see her getting hitched, much less her jumping into a whirlwind love, when none of Ryan’s immediate friend group has even brushed against a proposal.
There’s talk, because it’s the Monroes; mythology forged from sparse information. One second Grace was announcing abstinence, the next there’s a letter in everyone’s mailboxes, declaring boldly in cursive that this will be the best wedding anyone’s ever participated in.
That’s all Ryan’s been able to pry from her anyway. All he knows is the overview: her name is Destiny, they met in law school before Grace flunked, and they’re allegedly perfect together. Grace has never been good with being average, though, so perhaps their proclaimed compatibility is hyperbolic. But he’s not gonna look this gift horse in the mouth; not when said horse is promising a getaway to Miami he could never otherwise afford.
Why Miami, he’d texted her once.
She’s got family, Grace had said simply. The unspoken, yet to be transcribed, is that it’s not her family she’s veering towards. And, she’d tacked on, in afterthought, it’s Miami. You’d rather party in the cold unforgiving bosom of DC orrrr.
Ryan had teased her briefly on ‘bosom’ being in her lexicon, then dropped the subject. He’s got ghosts too, and he’s not looking for them to be exorcised, in the way that only close friends can perform necromancies.
All this to say, Ryan’s expecting extravagancy when he steps out onto that street, minding his luggage on the thin strip of sidewalk. He double-checks to make sure he’s got everything, given his nasty habit of always forgetting something, then gestures that the driver can pull away.
He turns around, anticipating something other than a thick wall of green in the concrete jungle. There’s a door planted amidst the hedge, and he expectantly opens it.
The airbnb is easily one of the nicest places he’s stayed in. He’s flitting through proper descriptions, given his lack of knowledge on deco outside of the arbitrary. All he knows is it’s a very clean beachhouse, artfully arranged in that stiff, hollow politeness that places for rent emanate. Decor first, homeliness second.
It’s all one-level, so everyone rushes out of doorways to greet the newcomer and is standing in the living room on record time. Ryan recognizes every face that’s turning to him brightly, expressions opening like flowers.
A chorus of greetings and excited yelps break the sound barrier. All at once everyone erupts from doorways or up from their seats to tackle Ryan that’s, at most, reminiscent of his brothers’ wrestling matches. Ryan weathers the hysterics easily — he’s been in mosh pits, sibling fights, actual fights; this is nothing — and ropes his arms around every thrumming body that’s meshing into him, creasing his airport fit.
“What’s up, losers!” he crows to no one in particular, digging his fist into Jesse’s climate-curled hair. Next up is Blake who’s farther off from the group hug, but still within noogie reach much to his chagrin. “I bet you’ve been bored as hell waiting for the main event to arrive, huh?”
“Never mind,” Lake announces, pushing away. Their grin is relaxed. “We didn’t miss you. Is your Uber still outside? Is there still time to bail?”
This won’t stand. Ryan’s next target is Lake, barreling his fist into their newly-shaven head. “Hey to you too, asshole! What kinda ‘nice to see you too’ is that?! Jail! Jail for a million years!”
“Agh—!” Lake sputters amidst the battle for their independence from his grasp. They smartly position their arm in such a way it’s yanked free instantly, leaving Ryan without proper defense.
“Ryan, stop, you’re torturing them,” Tulip assets, but of course without any real vehemence. “Just let them go and hug me like a normal person!”
He obliges, because it’s been months since he’s had physical contact with anyone in this house and it’s been killing parts of him in ways he can’t explain. He brings Tulip in close, cups a hand to the back of her head, minding the ponytail. It’d be weird to breathe her in, but passively he can smell the onions on her (she really is a one trick pony, huh?) and some other fruity fragrance that he can link to Mikayla’s influence, somehow.
Jesse is next, capturing Ryan’s hand in a firm shake before hugging him next. “It’s great to see you!” he says, and Ryan knows he means it. “We wanted to reach out and come to your concert, but the plane tickets were awful.”
Ryan brushes it off. “Ah, it was more of a venue at some sports bar than, like, an actual concert. Don’t worry about it, nothing that cool happened.”
“Still!” Jesse exclaims. “You’re playing in bars, that’s honestly so cool! I bet Lake could join you with their bass sometime.”
“What, the bass I haven’t touched in a year?” Lake jabs. “It’d be like Ryan’s up there with some preschooler with a dream.”
“Aw, I bet your muscle memory’s better than that,” Ryan nudges them. “And hey, you still need to take me up on that offer to battle 1v1 sometime!”
“You’d kick my ass.”
“Which is exactly why I wanna make sure we get around to it.”
Lake punches him in the shoulder, and Ryan shakes it off like their boxing lessons haven’t produced any fruitful results.
He looks around, admiring the decor as an afterthought. The target of his attention isn’t anywhere to be found. “Where’s Kez?” he asks.
“Fashionably late,” Tulip says, giving a scoff. “I wouldn’t be surprised if she caused her own flight delay.”
“I’d defend her, but there’s solid evidence to support your case.”
“She said something about a ‘surprise’ in her last…ominous text thread,” Mikayla adds. “Sounded super excited about it too. I don’t think she’d blow this off.”
Which is a relief; summoning Kez without it being her call first is like private messaging a celebrity sometimes: humbling and privy to zero response.
“You haven’t said hi to me yet,” Blake asserts; it’s true, he’d been an outlier in the reunion jumble, though that was more of a calculated move on his part. Blake’s currently in the transitioning phase where roaming hands is a nightmare, and any embrace has to be thoroughly preplanned lest a touch go somewhere under construction.
“That’s right,” Ryan quips, “I did not. ‘Sup, loser.”
“Hey,” Blake warns, “don’t talk shit to the guy taking your photos this weekend, jackass.”
His overtone is cruel, but Ryan can gauge no real malicious intent behind it, outside of the usual defenses Blake keeps up for show. He imagines that if he gave this kid a real noogie, show him who’s boss around here, he might genuinely rile him up. So, he keeps his hands to himself but produces a teasing wink in the stead of another unwelcome embrace.
“The party’s going to be at…” Mikayla checks her phone’s clock, “7 PM, which means we’ve got a couple hours to get ready.”
“A couple hours,” Ryan muses, tapping his chin. “In that case, I’m gonna need the bathroom everyone’s less likely to use until seven.”
They point him to the bathroom farther down the hall, wedged between a laundry room and a closet. Any port in a storm; it’ll do.
Without Kez, there’s no one who’s privy to astounding makeup to match alongside Ryan, so he opts for something simple: a flash of eyeshadow here, a slice of eyeliner there. Maybe a tap of highlighter on the cheekbones for some semblance of flare.
Well, it’s a bit misleading to say he’s the only one in the house currently interested in makeovers; Mikayla is trying and failing to swindle Tulip into the bathroom for a fresh look, and Tulip is teasing that this implies her girlfriend wants something to change about her appearance.
“Of course not!” Mikayla had protested, hugging her kit close to heart. “It’s just that no one wants to do makeup with me. It’s more fun to do it with someone.”
“Yo,” Ryan called out on cue, “What am I, chopped liver? Get in here and help me decide on my eyeshadow look.”
She giggles at arm’s length; most of their interactions are sieved due to Tulip’s attendance, not that Ryan isn’t fond of Mikayla — he’d never have approved of their relationship otherwise — but she’s younger, and there’s a lot of misplaced pride in your early 20s. Ryan just weathers through it, lets young adults be young adults. And he often does like the personality that he uncovers, when alone with her.
“I’m wearing orange, so should I match with a type of pink or red,” Ryan asks, showing off his eyeshadow palette, ‘or, do I go for some sort of cool teal? Complimentary colors?”
“I think,” Mikayla muses, “that you should just do a pinkish color. Blue might be too distracting, and it’s just a casual get-together.” She lays out her inventory of creams, bottles, and lashes, strewing them across the counter where they safely don’t mesh with Ryan’s own collection. “Save your bolder looks for the drag brunch, or even the wedding.”
“Hide the light, got it.”
“Just for now! Flaunt what you got when you’re more familiar with people, that’s my protocol.”
On that, Ryan agrees to disagree. But he takes her advice, given that it’s bound to be the only makeup advice he’ll receive this evening. He gets to work on priming his face, and Mikayla, already prepared apparently, has set to work on her foundation.
“Have you been keeping up with Love Island, by chance?” Mikayla asks, apropos of a friendly quiet.
Ryan scoffs. He keeps his eyes trained on his reflection, molding his face between his hands. “Do I look like I keep up with Love Island?” he retorts, playing up his offense. “That’s harsh, Kay. Real harsh.”
But Mikayla knows him, and isn’t deterred. She faces him while arranging her brushes. “Are you though?” she presses again.
Ryan folds. “Nah,” he says. “I’m bad at getting into shows. So hit me, what am I missing?”
“Oh my god.” That was the magic word apparently, because Mikayla perks up like a sunflower in light immediately. She begins applying her foundation with a new invigoration. “Okay, okay. So there’s these two people, Hailey and Craig—”
“‘Hailey and Craig’,” Ryan interrupts, “God, Mikayla, you think I have time for more white people nonsense?”
“Just walk with me!”
“Fiiiine.”
Mikayla claps her foundation closed and reaches for the concealer next. “SO, Hailey and Craig got together after Hailey ditched her old boyfriend Isaac. Turns out! Neither of them are even into each other. Hailey was using Craig to get to Isaac, and Craig was using Hailey to make this other girl jealous.”
She tells the story with such enthusiasm that it’s hard not to board the hype train alongside her, at least a little. Ryan’s always here for the drama, the bloodshed, the tears; so long as he’s not the one who has to initiate any of the above on his own. He suspects he’s made enough interpersonal drama for a lifetime.
He’s one step behind her; while he’s still touching up the base of his face, Mikayla’s already moved on to contouring (Ryan doesn’t tell her she doesn’t need as much as she thinks, because her face is cute when it’s rounder; but when has telling someone to stop growing up so fast ever been a successful lecture?).
“Goddamn, they all need to pick up some type of hobby,” Ryan sighs. “Also, clearly, this story would’ve been better if Hailey and the other girl got together.”
“That’s literally what I was thinking! Queer to queer communication activate,” Mikayla pantomimes transferring radio frequencies from one temple to the next, and Ryan sees so much of Tulip in her that it nearly makes him double-take for red hair and glasses.
He shrugs. “But yeah, cool story I guess. People using each other. Thank god gay people are more functional.”
“You’re hilarious. How’s my blush looking?”
Ryan comes in close to scrutinize, make sure her pores aren’t visible and that the blush isn’t some wild shock of color on the skin. “Mmm, gorgeous,” he surmises. “Just blend it further out and add some on the nose, it’d look super cute.”
“Oh, you’re right.”
Finally, at long last, he gets to contouring himself. Unlike Mikayla’s face, he has a more angular jawline that can keep up with heavy shading. So he goes in more boldly, driving the contour stick down the sides of his face like the slash of a knife.
“How’s Tuls?” he asks eventually, because he feels like it’s his responsibility to. “You treating her right? Not like Craig and…Hannah, I hope.”
“Hailey. And I think so. I hope so.” Mikayla finishes blending out her blush upon request, looks at herself in the mirror and likes what she finds. “We’re getting a new apartment this year since our lease is up, and this one allows pets. God, I want a bunny so bad.”
“Oh, that would rule,” Ryan agrees, beaming. “Spitfire’s still technically not allowed in my flat, but hey, what they don’t know won’t hurt ‘em.”
Mikayla chuckles at the mention of his bearded dragon. “I’m guessing Michelle is watching Spitfire while you’re here? Is that why she didn’t come?”
It pierces straight through the whole of him, her mention. The implied domesticity of it pangs hollow, like it’s expected that she’ll watch his beloved lizard while he’s gone. Like when he returns, she’ll be right where he left her.
Ryan coughs a little. “Uh…no. No, she, uh… It’s my neighbors looking after her, actually,” he says, trying to divert attention away from the implications. “But she’s a good girl, my Spitfire. And I already threatened them if they don’t treat her right.”
The topic stills, and an intermission emerges; both of them return to assorted states of stylization, with Ryan feeling the quiet thudding in him like a sledgehammer.
“So you and Michelle broke up, huh?” Mikayla asks delicately.
Ryan winces; this is not where he wanted things to divert to. It’s still a persistent ache, located in odd spots of his body. Like she’d taken bites out of him before leaving. “It wasn’t gonna last,” is all he says about it; all he wants to say, anyway.
Mikayla still frowns, honeyed with a pity that Ryan can’t stomach. “I’m sorry, you guys seemed like you’d make it.”
He doesn’t like her phrasing, particularly because it sounds like she was going to tack on ‘this time’ at the end, before deciding better at the last minute. He doesn’t need to be reminded of his record of love, and even though Mikayla considers herself some type of expert to whirlwind romances (an addict, more like), he doesn’t like being pressed under a microscope about such topics when he’s such a chronic flunk.
“It’s whatever,” he murmurs, shaking out his hair. He tries to patch up his features, save literal face by shooting Mikayla a cheeky grin. “You think I rock it hair up or hair down?”
Mikayla doesn’t enjoy diversions, but she lends him some mercy now by simply saying, “You rock it both ways.”
“Bi joke. Nice.”
He raises his arm for a fist bump that Mikala, after one agonizing second, returns.
“Dress up like there’s someone at the party who doesn’t know what they’re missing,” she says kindly, though with a dangerous edge.
Ryan grins, passing her his setting spray. “Will do, you little primadonna.”
She simply shrugs in a ‘who me?’ type of manner, and attacks her face with multiple doses of the spray.
The silence that comes afterwards is a little cleaner, and a bit nicer.
Evening crashes into them, running the skies rose-colored. They cease their catching-up to apply the last finishing touches to their introductory outfits, then clamber out the door, tugging on scandals and heels all the way off the welcome mat.
The website that Grace and her fiancee had made for the event claims that the first night will just be an evening full of icebreakers, nothing fancy. This event will be held in a sushi restaurant on the beach, rented out using the Monroe family’s liberal wealth. It’s also, thankfully, within walking distance, so they can all save up on Ubers for emergencies.
Ryan holds Tulip’s hand as they cross streets, slip into crannies all along the pathway to avoid the traffic of the direct route. Mikayla is holding her other hand; Team Jesslake (ship name courtesy of Ryan, thanks ever so much) are also clutching onto each other, traversing the unknown streets of Miami with shared reproach and intrigue. The only person not paired with anyone is Blake, who’s polishing the lens of his fancy camera. He’s the photographer, he’d said. I’m here to capture the moments, so you better give me some shit to work with.
“Take a picture of me in the middle of the road and I’ll fake being roadkill,” Ryan had suggested, to which his proposal was bluntly declined. “Or, wait, no— take a picture of me with my mouth open and then Photoshop it so it looks like I’m giving that building the biggest sloppy.” This was also declined.
“I don’t know if the party can stand any of your japes, mister Akagi,” Mikayla says charmingly. Ryan just poses like he’s due an award for it.
“Yeah, japes or harassment, one of the two,” Blake mumbles, displeased as always. He always has this cloud hanging over him that Ryan has stopped attempting to poke holes into, or warding away like an occult evil. He accepts that maybe some people were born unhappy (figure 1: every poet ever, or fig. 2: himself, if hard-pressed on the matter).
“I think it’s the next one down,” Jesse announces, addressing of course the matter of them being slightly lost, only relying on GPS for a compass. But Jesse’s been eyeing the street names and numbers, and concludes way faster than Google Maps can tell them that they’re in the correct neighborhood.
The restaurant has the same tropical interior as most locations by the bay do, with big windows and tall ceilings to invite the beach in from its sides. The rooftops are slightly tilted so that the breeze slips off like water on feathers, and the wood of the interior is tan; if Ryan had more knowledge on wood outside of mahogany he might be able to identify it.
The staff, who are all presumably on the Monroe’s employ, meander through the clusters of groups being established, passing out an array of booze on golden trays. Gold, Ryan thinks fondly. Of course Grace has smothered her artistic liberties on everything.
He presumes that the fresh touches of bouquets have been brought in for this event, too. He can guess solely because the flora’s palettes are coordinated with the myriad of oranges, pinks, and the occasional sprig of bright green that color the partygoer’s attires.
He and his friends are not immune to the dress code, either; Lake and Jesse are matching salmon, Mikayla is in a pastel green dress that hugs her figure, and Ryan is surreptitiously matching Tulip with a bright tangerine tint. The website had warned this would be a casual turnout, appropriate for oceanfront weather; Ryan had just gone for a jumpsuit with a belt tightly wound into his stomach, and embedded his bare arms and ears with an assortment of clunky jewelry. His hair is tied back so no curls would incessantly slap into his mouth from the wind.
“Big turnout,” Jesse notes when they round the corner. They stand still by the entrance, as though waiting for some type of casting call.
“Yeah yeah, I was promised sushi,” Lake dismisses, looking around. “They better be serving it already.”
“It just started, Lake,” Tulip says. “I think this is the ‘icebreaker’ segment of the night.”
In return, Lake makes a very disgruntled face. “Gross. What, I’m supposed to go ask some rando what he thinks about politics?”
“Maybe let’s not do politics,” Jesse forewarns with delicacy. “We could talk about our etsy instead!”
“No offense, Jess,” Ryan crosses his arms, “but I’m not sure the long Furby market is a universal aesthetic.”
“It should be!”
“Yeah, it should be,” Lake agrees, siding with their boyfriend. “Don’t hate the Furbz, Ryan.”
“I’m like your most consistent customer!” Ryan protests. “You think I get compliments during my performance because of my great ass? No! It’s the stupid long Furby scarves, swear to god. They’re like, ‘Oh, Ryan, give me the name of your designer ASAP!’ And I do that for you guys.”
“Maybe tone it down,” Tulip whispers, “because some guy turned when you said ‘great ass’.”
Ruffled, though not entirely embarrassed, Ryan simmers down.
“I’m gonna go find the drinks,” Mikayla declares, and Ryan knows she’s not talking about booze and more like a seltzer, or cucumber water. “You wanna come, babe?”
“Sure,” Tulip shrugs, “But Ryan said he wants to be around when I try my first shot.”
“And I stand by that,” Ryan agrees. “So don’t make any fun mistakes without me.”
“We’ll be back!” Tulip promises, waving goodbye before following her girlfriend into the crowd, melding into the party.
“Yeah, we’ll be back too,” Lake says, taking Jesse’s hand. “Don’t do anything crazy, Ry.”
He finger guns them to hide the disappointment that they’re abandoning him as well. “You too, Pinkman.”
“I don’t look anything like—”
“Nah, you’re just one half of the ship, y’see. We got our Jesse, and we have our Pinkman.”
“It’s ‘cause I’m bald now,” Lake frowns in disapproval.
“It’s because you’re bald now,” Ryan confirms.
“Um,” Jesse says pointedly, and Ryan makes a broad gesture of go on, then. They both depart on that, still holding hands.
Ryan turns around expectantly. “Blake, guess it’s you and m—”
Apparently not, since Blake has also dispersed to presumably do his job.
Ryan sighs. He’s alone; he’s stuck at a party looking hot, but with no plus-ones to marvel over him it’s basically a moot point. He crosses his arms, analyzing the people floating in and out of his field of vision. They all seem…just fine, for the most part; he’s never been great at assessing threats before they show their true nature, but Grace had mentioned that the folks higher up the echelon will be around on the wedding only, on Friday. So at least for most of the days he won’t be surrounded by people who’ve got a roll of a thousand bucks crammed up their asses. The energy of the crowd is relaxed and intimate, giving the impression that this is less of an icebreaker and more of a reunion for most.
Ryan makes to go…somewhere, pointing his foot towards Tulip and Mikayla hesitantly, then to Lake and Jesse, still unsure of who to trail behind like a stray puppy—
“Ryan!!”
He brightens instantly on hearing her voice, scything through the quiet with such authority that some stop their small talk to peek over and see what all the fuss is about. Ryan, meanwhile, is beaming, watching the crowd part to make sure she can be seen.
“‘Sup, Grace!”
“Aw, c’mere, gimme a hug ya’ nerd!” Grace flaps her hand to summon him closer, her voice elevated by the hushed conversations surrounding her. Ryan takes his friend in as he makes to meet her halfway: she’s always been a woman who dresses the part, and no one can deny she swallows the room just like brides-to-be tend to do. Even without any gaudy decorations broadcasting her as such, it’s obvious this is a party catered towards her.
Ryan would huge her tighter, was she not wearing an expensive-looking maxidress and holding a drink in her right hand. He does kiss the side of her cheek for theatrics, and even if she doesn’t react, it sets the mood for how ironic this conversation is fixing to become.
Her glass carried some type of bubbling, anemic bronze liquid; the flute had two different shades of lipstick tattooed on the rim, presumably from tasting it with her fiancée. It’s still full, that skinny glass, but she’s swaying a little, so it’s presumed this is a refill.
“Happy birthday, girl!” He greets her jokingly, spreading his arms as much as the cramped space allows, all teeth.
“Try again.” On cue, Grace presents the gold band on her finger, commonplace amidst the other gold jewelry she arranges on her hands. Her grin is cheeky. “Check it.”
“Oh, damn,” Ryan is authentic here when he reaches out to cradle her hand, admiring the ring. It’s engraved with some type of wavey, ornate pattern, and nestled in its center is a polished red gemstone that Ryan’s going to guess is a ruby.
He falls back to sarcasm, gasping. “You don’t mean…?” And here he interrupts many conversations to declare, “Attention, everyone! My friend is getting married! Give a big round of applause for Grace Monroe, ladies and gents!”
The outburst is taken courteously, earning a few scattered chuckles and a small number of golf-claps.
“You’re so extra,” Grace teases, unmarred by his jokes. She’s often impenetrable to his jabs, either matching them with quips or allowing him to be the funniest guy in the room. It’s why they became quick companions.
“I’m extra?” Ryan repeats incredulously. “When you told me this would be the wedding of the century, I thought you were being dramatic.”
Grace startles in faux-offense. “Akagi, you wound me,” she says. “You think I’m just talk?”
“I think you’re just petty.” Ryan flits his gaze around before he leans forward, murmuring, “So uh, between you n’ me, is this costing your folks a pretty penny?”
Her demeanor shifts upon their mention, and it does make Ryan feel a bit bad for prying. But Grace answers courtly, “They’re just glad I’m marrying someone that fits their rubric.”
“I’m impressed you even managed that,” Ryan admits, “considering their scoring system for your lovers has the same harsh gradations as the fucking Olympics.”
Grace usually takes comfort in bashing The Parents, so there’s a newfound twinkle in her eye, her mouth tumbling into a smirk. “Be nice when you see them,” she still warns, though as a prerequisite scolding, the type you’d give to a cat about to knock over a glass. “They’re flying out tomorrow and they’re already pissed I started this without them.”
“That’s on them,” Ryan answers coolly. “Orrr, maybe, you putting the wrong date on their invitation and no one else’s could have something to do with that?”
Grace’s mouth purses and relocates to the left of her face, her eyes lifting up to convey a very sarcastic ‘oops!’ without vocalization. “Accidents happen,” is all she manages.
“You’re an evil bitch, Miss Monroe.”
“Hey, Mrs. starting Friday,” Grace points out. “You’ve met Destiny, right?”
“In passing,” Ryan admits. He scopes the masses, like he’ll be able to recognize his friend’s fiancée amongst a sea of unfamiliar faces. He retreats from his investigation, clueless. “Where is the lucky lady anyway?”
“Catching up with friends, I think,” Grace hones in on the outer rim of the party, pointing her out much quicker than Ryan ever could. “There, the hottie on the left.”
Ryan follows her finger as a guide, which leads him to a woman with her back to them. He can only catch her profile when she’s talking to those beside her, but he remembers her now. Long face, gentle features, thick and heavy braids tumbling down her backside, skin darker than Grace’s; she’s equipped with a strapless green dress made of some sleek material that shimmers in the light.
He appreciates her overall aesthetic, and though he can’t judge her personality from afar she seems to be all smiles, possessing a room the way that beautiful girls often do.
“You’re a lucky woman, Grace,” Ryan tells her.
“I know,” Grace says. Her tone isn’t flushed with pride, but more of that solemn affection one unlocks only with someone very special. “We were actually gonna host this all in Jamaica to be closer to some of her relatives. But we had to think, ‘have people been updating their passports? Are we asking too much?’”
“Man,” Ryan clicks his tongue. “That would’ve been fun. I never went to Jamaica, how far’s that from the Bahamas?”
“Like a short flight away, why? Have you been there?”
“Nope. Just seems cool.”
Grace hums. “You should do a world tour, that way you can get funding for an international bender.”
“First off, I’m not that much of a raging junkie,” Ryan says, partway amused. “Second, bold of you to try and support my world tour dreams now after you’ve gone and erased me out of your wedding lineup. I mean, a random quartet of guys jazzing their hearts out? We could’ve been listening to the classics. I could’ve been covering Joan Jett! For the sapphics!”
Wounded, Ryan is referring to the men in shimmering pink suits, belting out low jazz in one sanctioned-off wing of the restaurant, next to the open bar. Their cheeks are swollen pink from blowing their instruments for such a prolonged period, but the tune is sultry and winds through conversations easily, without overpowering the ambience.
“Sorry, Mom’s hand, not mine,” Grace sighs, tinkering her manicured nails against her drink. “Even without her being here, she still has to have her requests fulfilled. Or else it’s bye-bye funding.”
“I’m sorry.”
His friend shrugs, though it’s tightly-wound. “I’m sorry too. I would’ve loved your music at the reception, it’s just…my parents.”
Ryan nods. “They think I’m a menace, no worries. I’d rather be on their bad side, anyway, it’s more fun.”
“I think,” Grace pitches, “that calling them Second-Rate Vanderbilts didn’t do you any favors.”
“Oh, I almost forgot about that. That was pretty fucking good.”
Now his friend is smiling fully, carrying in her demeanor a kind of catharsis. “I’ve missed you, Four Eyes. I don’t wanna be this busy, but I just am. And it sucks, ugh! Am I becoming my mother? You’d tell me if I was becoming her, right?”
“Hey,” Ryan assures, clapping her back, “if you were like her, I wouldn’t have come at all.”
“Aw.” Grace looks down so her long mascara-plush lashes shield her expression. But the sides of her mouth are digging into her cheeks, and she looks like a picturesque example of bashfulness.
Ryan grants her that beauty without teasing, because this is special to her. Gorging her parents’ funds is a bonus, yes, but he’s genuinely happy for her. It’s not easy to find someone to settle down with, and she’s a woman who stays committed to hard work.
Upon noticing them, Grace calls over a server who’s passing out ambiguous shot glasses, grabbing two to split between them. They trade ‘cheers’ before snapping their heads back in tandem.
“Hey, don’t be mad,” she prefaces, “But, uh…remember Madonna? She’s here for a couple days.”
The sensation of the shot paired with the news is a rude one, causing Ryan’s reaction to be both delayed and slanted. “Whuh.”
“Madonna Dixie,” Grace repeats, knitting her brows closer. “She’s here now, so…just watch out for yourself, is all. I care about you both, but I know there’s some history there.”
It hits his conscious mind like the brief lag between a slap on the cheek and the stinging pain that follows. His ex, she’s talking about one of his exes from the road. That history strikes him all at once, shifting his mood like deep seismic shifts in the pit of his chest.
Ryan smacks his lips against the sharp aftertaste of the shot, like drinking nail polish. “Jesus,” he mutters, “is this just tequila? You really are a party girl. No salt rim either”
“I…remember us putting out some, yeah.” Grace isn’t pleased with the diversion. Her gaze grows darker, more calculating. “You’re gonna be okay, right?”
“Pff, Grace, babe, I’m gonna be so zen you wouldn’t believe it,” Ryan dismisses on a scoff, flapping his free hand. “Mads is here? Great! Bring her over, in fact, contact Marcy too. And Holly, make it a real party.”
Now her face is creasing with minor upset, and Ryan is feeling bad. The shot swirls around his head like an encircling bird or fly that hasn’t stuck the landing. He’s not tipsy, but if he keeps this pace he will be, and that’s a dangerous route to tread when an ex he mentally ruined is amidst the ranks tonight.
But, screw it. Danger is his middle name. Ryan calls down another staff member and pulls back another shot, this time it's something with a sugared rim.
“Ryan,” Grace warns. “Down, boy.”
“Alright, starting now, I’m gonna be zen,” Ryan promises, slamming the glass onto the tray. “I’m over it, I swear. I got someone new to hold my interest anyway! I’m chill.”
Grace’s eyes go alight. “Oh, really? Does that mean you’re seeing someone?” Ryan opens his mouth and she leans forward a bit; he can smell a pungent booze on her breath. “Who’s the lucky guy-slash-gal, Akagi?”
This is his first mistake of the night: Ryan falters. Two shots in, and he’s already floundering because he’s on the cusp of the world’s worst punchline. The joke was going to be that Grace was the one holding his interest, because she would slap his arm and say, ‘shut up, man’, and the party would continue. Now, he’s found himself in a different route entirely, one with too many caveats. He could continue with the tease that really isn’t that rewarding in hindsight, or—
“Mrs. Monroe!”
The call originates from somewhere in the tangle of citruses and pinks and whites, its owner made known when a balding older man grins and waves in their direction. Ryan knows at first glance this is not someone Grace would like to spend any time with, further illustrating when she turns to safely transfer a mild eyeroll and trill of her lips, where the man can’t see.
She swallows the rest of her drink with one short swig, staining the glass with more of her maroon lipstick. “Pray for me,” she whispers, then jabs a finger into Ryan’s chest, her features rekindling that mischievous spark that suits her well. “This isn’t over, I will be finding out who your date is.”
Ryan opens his mouth again, uselessly like a dying fish on land might, and stammers, “Well, actually—” long after she’s swiveled around to walk towards the stranger.
Second mistake: not chasing after her to amend the misunderstanding.
He only has a moment to feel bad about leaving her hanging for ultimately nothing at all, before another server dives in and offers a platter of flute glasses similar to what Grace was holding. “Dom Perignon?” they offer tactfully.
Oh, that’s top-shelf stuff, isn’t it? Well, Ryan’s certainly not gonna blow a paycheck on this by himself, might as well revel in it while it’s free. He knows he’s in trouble when the first sip goes down smooth like water.
He stops counting his mistakes after that.
Goddamn, this champagne is the shit. Ryan’s not even that type of guy, always averting wine when it’s extended to him. He makes exceptions for the cheap, red shit, but that’s not for indulgences so much as it is emergencies, one-way tickets to being a special level of drunk.
He’s searching for his friends in a crowded, medium-sized restaurant and coming off empty-handed. If he were to guess, really, really strain: he recalls Jesse and Lake talking earlier about absconding to the beach if there happened to be a lull in the party. As for Team Mikaylip (ship name also dubbed appropriately by Ryan, thanks again), they’re nowhere to be found. It’s not even that they don’t stand out — with Tulip’s ginger genetics, it’s a wonder she’s not sticking out like a sore thumb amidst the black and brown heads.
Shit, shit, shit. There’s a foamy swelling in his chest and head, inflating him like he’s going to drift away at any moment. His feet aren’t where he last left them. He needs food, when the fuck are they going to serve the damn sushi at a damn sushi restaurant??
Ryan’s not far enough underwater to think he isn’t drowning. He knows he’s probably drinking too fast, talking too little, hunched over in corners and nooks like a starved animal. It’s just that he doesn’t know anyone here, and the ones he does know have either abandoned him or outright don’t want him. And that’s a vicious thing to live with, battling into the wings of his lungs and echoing in the chambers of his brain: You’re not wanted.
It’s cruel but it’s a fair assumption, especially right now when there’s little evidence to prove the opposite is the case.
And now— oh god, now — he has to face Grace and tell her upfront that it’s been a month since his last relationship fell through (his fault, of course, always his fault)
He’s asking for another drink to guzzle down, that is handed to him without heed. He thinks, remotely, that this is a bad idea to keep enabling him like this, and that, following a thread of conversation earlier, that he does have a great ass, thanks so much! So suck it Lake, or Tulip or whoever…
Turning, Ryan looks in the trenches for his flock, deciphering the unfamiliar surfaces of the guest’s fronts and backs, trying to find anything resounding—
And something in him splits like a rotten fruit. Like meat under carnivorous teeth.
Because Min-Gi is here.
He’s on the outer rim of the party, keeping appearances with stiff nods and squared shoulders. Occasionally he’ll flash a smile that shows the tops of his teeth, but it’s so plastic it could be going on clearance. His dialogue is lost in the bustling around them, but Ryan doesn’t have to strain to remember the resounding, ochre-deep cadence, the low hum that’s always caught in his throat when he’s quiet, the tender accent and the way it pops out on exclamations.
Denial is his lifeboat — maybe it’s another face, another haircut because it’s been almost a decade, even if he never changed that stupid hair — but it quickly sinks the moment they make eye contact. Because Ryan knows those eyes anywhere. They’re imprinted on him like a physical organ, burned into his soul.
The second sign is how quickly the other person’s face drops. His features are erased, shocked into emptiness, his mouth and all the lines etched into his former expression disappearing. There’s an electric air of knowing which thrums from across the room, the flare of lightning at eye contact before the thunder rolls in.
If Ryan could conjure up a thought at all, he can’t guarantee it would be kind.
A wind tumbles in through the open patio leading out to the waters, sweeping folds of clothes and ruining conscious placements of hair. Min is a victim to the breeze, his slicked-back strands falling around his upper cheeks, but still he doesn’t move. This is not reassuring.
Ryan realizes he could be making a move too, instead of just being a victim to the reunion. He could just flee and find some place to vomit up this champagne, and that sounds much more appealing than sticking around.
He turns, gets away, just away. There’s a sensation like biting at his heels when he thinks, he swears, that if he strains, he hears a familiar call. But he can’t answer to it, even when his movements temporarily yield. There’s twin reactions which curdle and blossom in equal measure in his guts at the promise of a sound. That was his person, once.
“Ryan?”
Ryan stops. This time, the reaction that ensues is definitely a negative one. He winces, wants to curl into himself like a wilted flower. But he’s twenty-seven now, and he’s not usually one for running. He looks towards the source.
Madonna Dixie, setting down a margarita glass on a nearby table so she can assess him proper. Her hair is tamer now than it was back then, is Ryan’s first conceptual thought that isn’t just an elongated scream. It’s shorter, more like a mullet, and greased with some type of product that he distantly wonders about, whether it’s a spray or some gel.
“It is you,” she says, and there’s so much buried in that but it’s pulled taut towards casual. So that’ll be the overall mood of the meeting, then.
Ryan cycles between a few methods of a greeting — teasing, sincere, apologetic? — and settles last-minute on simple. “Madonna, what’s up!”
His chest is still hurting, still whirring like so many bladed, electrical things, bound to overheating. He feels eyes on him. He swears there’s a hand reaching out.
“Oh, nothing,” Madonna plants her hands on both hips, ignorant to his suffering (or just in favor of it?), “Just at the wedding of the century. You know Grace and I, we uh—”
“Right, right. You guys hit it off in dance class,” Ryan says, practicing an easy grin. There’s no blades apparent in her answer, no lingering venom. But there’s still that bristling unease, waiting for her to open her mouth to reveal fangs.
He trudges on, “So uh, how’s it hanging, Mads? You getting into any trouble?”
The use of the nickname tugs on a muscle somewhere in her expression, it twinges deep in his chest and joins the rest of the awful in him.
“Oh you know,” Madonna lists, “Still in grad school, trying to become an EMT. I got a tattoo!”
“No shit!”
“Yeah, it’s on...hold on,” she yanks up her high-waisted shorts to reveal the meat of her thigh, where a nude mermaid swims up her skin, the lines of the figure stippled with red. “My buddy Mark opened up his own parlor and I was his first client. Told him to put something on me that I was iffy about.”
Ryan kneels down to observe the tattoo. “Huh. How come?”
Madonna shrugs. “I mean, you can’t really live in fear, right? And I thought that facing my fear of getting a botched tattoo…I dunno, that it would be one less thing to worry about, if it became a reality.”
He whistles lowly; if there’s a depth to her words, it eludes him. “Looks gnarly. You think you could hook me up? I’ve been dying to get some new ink.”
“He’s in Vancouver,” Madonna says. “So, probably not a great idea.”
“Yeah. Maybe not.”
Like most conversations with a wounded ex, the mundane talk grows viscous, hard to navigate without feeling grimy. Ryan feels bits of himself being tucked away more and more as the silence grows, filled by the acoustics of the jazz band and the chatter around them.
Madonna wasn’t an easy breakup, but then again none of them truly were. But she was special in giving him so many chances, in not leaving immediately when he unfurled to reveal his innate ugliness. He’d tested her, and he feels awful about that now, but at the time it was his greatest act of love: biting and lashing out, seeing who mended the wounds and stayed, or who would bite him right back. Madonna had done the former for a long time. He’d built her up to the latter.
They really could’ve been great together. Two trans adults against the world, dancing nights away, taking it all easy and as it comes.
It took four different playlists, strong edibles, and a pint of Ben & Jerry’s Half-Baked to get over the hump.
Ryan puts his hands into his pockets, mentally cursing how little they can actually are. “So, uh, anything else going on? You still hosting mad ragers?”
Madonna shrugs. “Sometimes. Not like I used to. I still dig the scene, don’t get me wrong, but between school and work I just don’t have time.”
He forges a playful grin. “Don’t go growing up on me, Mads.”
“Some people have to, Ryan,” she says, dropping the mischief and making Ryan feel like she’s gone and shucked his shirt over his head. She continues with an air of disinterest, “What about you? How’s your…music?”
“It’s…good,” Ryan strains. “I’ll sell copies occasionally, but, yeah. There’s this venue by my house that usually gets me for gigs, and the pay is pretty good. Nothing’s really come out of it, though.”
“I see,” she says mildly. “So you’re still chasing that dream, then. Record deals, fancy contracts, billboards…”
Ryan shuffles. “I mean, I’d be happy with just a deal…”
He doesn’t like the way it’s phrased, that this is some immature gamble he’s taking with his career. It’s still a career, even when it isn’t much. Even when the emptiness persists, even when he’s a parasite to rhythm and song, even when his solos seem to suck life out of a room rather than rejuvenate it.
“I’m happy, Madonna,” he snaps, when it’s a lie. “I don’t know what else you’re wanting.”
Madonna flinches a muscle in her jawline, her gaze evolving to carry hate in them. She looks at first like she’s going to puff up like an animal going defensive, or one ready to strike.
“…You know what, I don’t think I want anything, actually. Anything at all,” she decides, going frosty. Her expression remains befitting of when he’d last seen her, when she preferred to jump out of the car and get another ride home than spend one final second with him. She asks, “You dated anyone since me?”
Ryan maintains a taut reserve, since she’s going to act like this. “I have.”
“Have they lasted longer?” she pries.
“Some…”
“‘Some.’” Madonna’s glare tightens, and it looks like she’s gaining the courage to spew more rancid aggression. But then her expression levels, and she exhales. “Listen, Ryan, I didn’t come here to fight you. I’m sorry. And if this— whatever this is, if it's going to keep up, I just wanna say, for the record, that I am seeing someone.”
I’m seeing someone. So she’s moved on without him like they all do. Marcy did too, because he wasn’t good enough to give her what she needed. Now Madonna is leaving him in the dust, in the wake of all his mistakes. It’s a thick, syrupy kind of rejection that boils and festers deep in him, before he realizes — fuck, she probably thinks this is some kind of flirting. That he wants her back. And despite it all, despite the loneliness, the aches...
“Oh!” Ryan physically yanks himself farther away in realization. “God, no!” I wasn’t— I’m not trying to—”
Madonna looks relieved, somewhere; maybe her shoulders drop, or her face softens, but there’s a visual change. “Okay, good,” she says, then her gaze lands on something just over Ryan’s head. Her lips lift. “Oh, here she comes now. I, um…I actually think you’ve met?”
“Huh, really?”
“She’s mentioned you,” she explains. “And we used to frequent the clubs she and her band played at.”
“For real?” Weapons drawn and sheathed, Ryan can’t help his curiosity and trails to where Madonna’s eyes land. “Well, who’s the lucky la—?”
He stops cold in his tracks once he spots her.
She hasn’t changed — why would she, anyway, when she already perceives herself as so perfect? The only thing missing from her ensemble is her usual sunhat, discarded instead for a pale wheat-colored one whose wings expand longer, and decorated with bits of flora. It matches the pattern on her dress; she’s always been put together, no time for stray bits of hair or string to flatten the allure of her appearance.
She stands behind him, jutting out a hip, her gaze judiciously upright to assess the whole of him in one swoop.
“Ryan,” she says tightly.
“Holly,” he returns. He looks between the girls. “You’re…”
“I’m with my girlfriend,” Holly says as an introductory line. Her words are always tilted in that sweet note of melancholy, like what she’s saying will fly away on a whistle of wind. She addresses Madonna first, “Is he giving you trouble?”
“No, no,” Madonna dismisses. “He’s harmless.”
The girls then do the second-worst thing they could do to him all evening, outside of outright killing him. Holly has arrived with two fresh drinks and supplies one graciously to her (ugh) new girlfriend, wrapping around each other like ribbons. They look at him intensely, like it’s his next move and they’re preemptively calling checkmate.
It’s a pain Ryan resounds in, one he experiences in both mental highs and lows. This trembling, awakening of an ache. And suddenly he’s not there at all, he’s an outline of a person with nothing but a heart in the middle of him. He experiences all the hurt at once, every symptom of agony a human can have. He wishes he were being dramatic when he says it’d be a mercy if someone had just gone and poured wild fire all over him instead.
He tries to open his useless, stupid mouth, say something that can get him out of this gracefully. “I…”
“Ryan!”
Fuck.
—FUCK!! Why does he have to know that voice? He knows it innately, has heard it warp and change over decades. Why does it have to appear now, followed by the sounds of background shuffling and footsteps that Ryan swears he could pick out of any mob?
“There you are,” it’s Min-Gi, exhaling like he’s been battling the masses to get to him. He’s balancing one flute of champagne in one hand without drinking it. “I thought that was you. I…shit, I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
He wants to say more, obviously, but seems winded by both navigating the crowd and the situation he’s stepped into. His face goes odd, the tender lighting above them accentuating the planes of his face to make him look more somber and serious. Ryan doesn’t know how to approach his best friend that he hasn’t seen in ages, where ‘best friend’ seems more like a title applied for the sake of manners.
He has some options here:
One, easy: bail out and perform a walk of shame. Just shake these people off, act like he doesn’t know any of them, and avoid them for the rest of the party. Two, harder: apologize profusely for his own existence because everything he touches burns. On that same wave of thinking, there’s three: lash out with fangs, tell everyone what he really thinks about them, mic drop and flee from the wedding entirely to camp out in the airbnb, tipsy and alone.
Or…
There’s another route here. One more treacherous and with a lot more risk. But the alcohol is sinking in now, dragging him under, and he’s losing his grip on sensibilities. Suddenly his mind is on what Mikayla was saying, about Bailey and Greg or whomever the fuck, and it’s enticing. It just might work.
So.
Ryan flips around to face his childhood friend fully, regarding him for one final moment, before he takes the plunge:
“Aww, is that for me?” he asks sweetly, referring to the drink in Min’s hold. He takes it and Min, limp-wristed from confusion, lets him have it, swallowing a good amount. “Thanks, babe. You always know what I want.”
Min-Gi’s expression does a full stutter, as expected; he’s not good with status changes like this, and Ryan needs him on the ball with this right now. “Wha—”
“Love you!” He tops it off with a swift kiss on the cheek that feels gross, given everything, but he soldiers on, batting his eyes prettily in the girls’ direction. All would-be innocent. “Sorry, what were you ladies saying?”
There’s a near-comedic air that floats in when both girls flit their gazes in unison from Ryan, to Min, to Ryan again. Like there’s some hidden puzzle piece here, a mystery to be uncovered. Holly speaks first, her question sluggish, prolonged, like she’s thinking as she’s speaking. “This is your boyfriend?” she asks.
No use backing out now. Not when she’s using that tone, like she can’t believe someone would ever willingly get with him.
Ryan hooks his arm with Min’s — it’s soft, it’s strong, it’s familiar — and practically preens. “Yup. This is my ride or die right here, mister Min-Gi ‘Butterface’ Park,” he gushes. For good measure he leans back and only meets the curvature of Min’s shoulder; damn it, when’d he get so fucking tall? “Man! It’s like dating a skyscraper, gotta climb him like King Kong to give him a smooch… That’s a joke, obviously. We joke all the time. Don’t we, babe?”
They’re clearly on different pages of the script, and it doesn’t help that the script is still actively being written and edited. Min-Gi is dumbfounded, scrambling for any purchase, a semblance of nuance. “I…guess?”
Madonna and Holly, meanwhile, remain starkly neutral. They’re judging Min up and down with a fervor that Ryan feels slightly bad about bringing onto Min to begin with.
Finally, out comes an arm for a handshake, an armistice. “I’m Madonna,” she concedes, like surrendering. “Min-Gi, right? I’ve heard…a lot about you.”
Min-Gi blinks, blithe to their hidden threats, their claws and teeth. “You have?”
Ryan intervenes quickly. He presses his palms to Min’s chest and gently steers them both away from the vicinity, saying over his shoulder, “WELP as much as we’d like to chat, Min and I were gonna go find some sickass seats near the bride n’ bride, we’re like super close with her. Like you wouldn’t believe.”
Madonna raises a brow. “Alright?”
“Cheers, loves,” Ryan dons a British accent for no other reason than that he’s panicking. “Nice to see you again, Madonna! I’d tell you to follow me on Instagram but you blocked me!”
The girls limply wave as they depart, both abandoned in various states of bemusement. Madonna seems more genuinely perplexed, Holly is the one silently seething, her eyes in slits and her painted frown pursed.
Min has been trying to get Ryan’s regard for some time now, calling his name or interjecting with ‘wait’ or ‘stop’; Ryan doesn’t listen till they’re a safe distance away and round a corner where neither Madonna nor Holly’s eyes can automatically trail them.
“That was close,” Ryan puffs, finally settling next to the edges of the party. His movements all hit him like whiplash and suddenly the colors around him are bleached, black dots materializing in his vision. He doesn’t realize he’s leaning a bit too far forward until he’s caught by a familiar set of arms.
“Whoa! Whoa, Ryan, hey,” Min-Gi’s voice feels like it’s being filtered through water, but his hearing returns in pulses, in sync with his heartbeat. “Are you… Ryan? Are you with me?”
Concern has defeated any anger Ryan swears that Min would otherwise be feeling, if he wasn’t just about to faceplant into concrete. He slurs a swear under his breath, finds that breath is hot on the fabric of Min’s short sleeve.
“We’re really gonna need to work on your performance,” he manages upwards, to Min.
Before Min can respond, there’s a white light followed by a mechanical whine. Ryan whips around, migraine be damned, and snaps, “Blake!!”
Sure enough, the little shit is exuding boredom as he sets his camera down, whipping a white polaroid in the air to make the photograph materialize. “Just capturing the moments,” he repeats, then positions the camera again, its black lens boring down into Ryan’s soul like an omniscient eye. “Say cheese, weirdos.”
To Min’s credit here, he doesn’t seem to like the picture either.
They were going to find a spot next to Grace, or Destiny at the least, but all the seats seem to be taken up by family of Dess, leaving no room to squeeze in and accompany the other bride. Not that Grace seems entirely bothered; she’s busy holding court, and it looks pretty good on her.
It’d be a shame to trample her evening by getting her involved in the mess that Ryan’s orchestrated.
Min-Gi had gone and gotten him some cucumber water to wash out the migraine and stave off an awful morning tomorrow. Ryan had gulped it down greedily, and because of his condition they didn’t immediately delve into what had happened, though it hung between them like a third body, waiting to be acknowledged and invited in.
Ryan’s only word for a few moments was one of thanks, then on the second glass when the clouds in his head began to part, that’s when he knew he was in trouble. Because Min was giving him that look, one that he remembers back from childhood. One he’s worn right before big arguments, when he wants to deal with frustration in grace and (often) fails to.
Min-Gi starts, “So…”
“So.”
“I’m going to take a guess at what just happened.”
“Hit me.”
Min darts his gaze around first to ensure they’re not catching stray eavesdroppers, but so far everyone’s invested in their little social circles as they make to settle beside the brides. Ryan and Min end up on the farther end of the restaurant, away from familiar faces — which might be for the best, since Ryan isn’t sure he can keep this up around companions.
“So we haven’t seen each other in years,” Min-Gi comes in close to murmur, “we’re obviously the farthest thing from compatible, but there was something about those girls that riled you up and you have — yet again! — roped me into your bullshit because you’d rather say you were with someone than be lonely and humiliated.”
Ryan barely follows along, his thoughts trailing more towards curiosity on what’s taking their food so long. Though the starter dishes do look appetizing, as few and far between as they are.
It takes him longer than it perhaps should to respond to Min’s allegations. “Meh,” he flaps his hand like so-so. “Partial credit.”
Min-Gi’s eyebrows furrow in a budding frustration. “I think I hit the nail on the head,” he says.
Ryan’s whole body slips to the left in an eyeroll, even if it hurts to do. “God, why are you always so…so smarmy?” He registers a server passing by and lamely attempts to flag them down. “Drink please!”
“No! No drink, thank you,” Min-Gi calls back, nodding in commonplace appreciation for customer service. He whispers harshly towards Ryan, “I think you’ve had enough of those tonight.”
A string snaps, a wave crashes; a great ebb of anger, age-old, bursts forth and puppeteers him.
“Oh my god, WHAT is the big deal, Min?” Ryan hisses. “So I lied to two people, whup dee fucking doo, I’d be surprised if you found a guy here that hasn’t committed the unspeakable atrocity of the White Lie, just to get out of an uncomfortable chitchat between two of their exes who are now dating!!”
Maybe it was too much to absorb, but Min’s glare flashes from defensive to dumbfounded in seconds, and he seems to get the bigger picture easily.
“They’re…?” he trails off, then returns with an empathetic, “Wow.”
“Yeah.”
“That’s…that’s rough.”
“Yep.” They finally sit, being welcomed into the middle of the booth. Ryan says to one guest, “Pass me the peppers.”
They oblige, and Ryan fills up his ivory plate with bundles of charred, soft shishito peppers. He’s less articulate than average when he stuffs them into his mouth. He twists the body of the pepper between his teeth first, relishing in how it squishes and erupts on his tongue, before yanking and spitting out the stem.
Min-Gi watches him with an interest Ryan can’t place as admiration nor disgust, but rather the idle appreciation of another person beside him. Being watched like this, like an artform, has something constrict in Ryan’s chest like someone’s gone and pinched him, a mild sensation he cannot place as anger or embarrassment or something lurking much, much deeper within him. An odd, eldritch emotion.
“None of this food seems all that spicy yet,” Min-Gi strains for normalcy, lifting up a fork to spin it in his forefinger and middle. “I’m a little disappointed. I asked Grace for some spicier options on the menu and she said my taste would probably result in some emergency room visits.”
Despite it all, Ryan smirks in fondness. “Still liking that kick, huh?”
“I guess…” Min-Gi stalls for time by messing around with the utensils, as a nervous habit Ryan recognizes. He goes on, “So, um, if we’re supposed to be dating right now, should we, uh, hold hands or something?”
Ryan snorts, finishing off his food. “What are we, virgins? Look, we can just treat this like my parents do, we make passing touches and never acknowledge the other one unless we need something, and we just do that for several years till all the kids move out, where we use all that free time to…uh.” Memory strikes him of some rather unsavory scenes, and he grimaces. “Never mind. Let’s be like your parents, all boring and cute.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever even seen my parents hold hands,” Min-Gi says unhelpfully. “All they do is sleep in the same bed and talk about the news.”
“Oh my god, you Parks are all like, like sexy cutout cardboard sometimes. (“Please don’t call my parents sexy in any capacity.”) Fine, fine. We’ll be like…” A lightbulb flickers over his head, “like Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love!”
Min-Gi narrows his eyes. “Kurt Cobain killed himself.”
“Fuck,” Ryan strains to think again, but the action makes his head throb. He’s locked off sanctions of himself from the booze and it’s hard to retain any particulars. “Um…Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham?”
“Breakup.”
“Sonny and Cher??”
“I think they divorced.”
“Oh my god you’re so impossible— Addams Family!”
Min-Gi eyes him oddly but what else is new. “Not a band.”
“You know what I mean, though,” Ryan insists. “You’re picking up what I’m putting down, you’re a smart guy. I’m saying, we be all cute and mushy, so mushy that everyone looks away and we can be left alone quicker.” Ryan leans back in a how’s that taste-like gesture. It’s possible he’s exuberating more pride than the situation allows, considering how many musician couples he just fumbled.
Like always, Min-Gi doesn’t appear convinced. Ryan’s tipped some lenience, at least, when Min actually looks like he’s assessing the damages of his plan, weighing out their options.
“....JOHNNY CASH AND JUNE CARTER,” Ryan suddenly belts out, ‘eureka’-esque, all equating back to a topic that has since died. He imagines he turns a few heads, but his only priority is how Min hushes him gently.
“Okay, okay,” Min-Gi pats his shoulder awkwardly, like he’s trying to smooth-talk the alcohol out of him. “Johnny and June, got it.”
Now that he’s out of peppers, Ryan is left basking in the discomfort between them. All of the unspoken, all the history, it’s left to be tugged and toyed with incessantly like the pulp of a freshly-pulled tooth. A gentle pressing on a bruise to confirm it still hurts.
“We don’t…” Ryan stalls; we don’t have to do this. I can find somebody else. I don’t have to hurt you again. He shakes his head even when the motion pulses unpleasantly — especially because it does. “What do you say, Casanova? You ready to give this one more shot, tell those gals to suck it?”
Min-Gi stares at him. “You want me to pretend to date you because you don’t want your exes to know you’re single, okay, I understand that.” He sets his utensil down after whole minutes of just toying with it relentlessly. “What’s in it for me, then? I mean, we haven’t spoken in years. We haven’t…done anything romantic since—”
“Yoooo, what up dinguses!”
Another familiar voice, except this one is heavensent. Ryan immediately perks up, feeling awash with both surprise and comfort. The latter, of which, is not usually the case when the owner of said voice calls him out across the way.
Kez is there at the entrance, having completely missed the memo of what’s appropriate to wear at this gathering. She’s sparkling and puffy, wearing a cloud that looks like it’d float away from her lithe frame. Her blush is a bright red stripe across the middle of her face, covering up the galaxy of freckles collecting in the bed beneath her eyes.
She immediately sprints to them, running into tables and chairs like she’d expected them to move out of her way. Like always, she catches some stray glances, but judgement hasn’t dented Kez’s demeanor in quite some years, her bony shoulders still held high by the time she rushes over to the table, barely avoiding collision with the staff.
“‘Sup Kez!” Ryan exclaims; if he weren’t locked in the middle of the booth side of the table, he’d have reached out for a side-hug. He knows her glitter would dust his clothing, and he's so far gone he wouldn’t mind.
And then, shockingly: Min-Gi smiles too. His eyes go warm, the black irises housing a particular affection. “Hey, Kez,” he says.
Ryan spins towards him way too fast and feels spikes in his temples, but he can’t help it. “You know her?” he asks Min, dumbfounded.
“Whoa, you know each other??” Kez is much more pleased by this lore drop. She throws her head back in one of those short little laughs that fancier women do. “Hah! Small world! I guess it makes sense, I thought you were talkin’ about another Ryan Akagi all those times y—”
‘Great!” Min-Gi cuts off that line of dialogue abruptly. “But yeah, Ryan and I…know about each other. We w…we are close.”
To engage with Kez requires a level of patience and a type of methodical approach, like talking someone off a great height, or just out of a terminal case of bad decisions. Kez is entertaining, that’s for sure, but she’s not dependable. But, too, she’s a bad liar. So even with Ryan drifting in and out of this conversation, floating on champagne, he can interpret her words as truth. That in her words lies a confession he’ll have to unravel: Min-Gi talks about me.
Besides. There’s bigger fish to fry here, being: Kez has one arm preoccupied, looped around the thick, sturdy arms of a dark-skinned girl Ryan has never encountered. Her eyeliner and lipstick are the same evocative shade of neon pink, drawing automatic notice to her expression of chivalrous delight.
Min-Gi seems to recognize her, based first upon how his expression drops, his eyes going slightly wider. It’s confirmed when he inquires, “Clarissa?”
The girl perks up, her shoulders trembling with a gesture that Ryan best describes as laughing and bouncing in place, literally trembling with glee. “Hey, Min!” she says. “May we sit across from you?”
“O–Oh! Yeah, yeah, sure,” Min-Gi beckons them with a spread arm, as if introducing them to the table. “Come on in.”
‘Come on in’ is so stupid, Ryan thinks in what he can only describe is a mild sensation, like something’s pinching at him in odd areas. He can’t decipher the emotion, can’t really interpret much of the monsoon of his inner body outside of blaring warning lights, telling him to not engage too closely, because he is DRUNK. Capital D-R-U-N-K.
It doesn’t stop his stupid blab mouth from saying, “Yo, Kez, you’ve got game! Congrats!”
His declaration is accepted as well as he’d, in hindsight, expected it to be: Clarissa hides her giggle by biting a lip, Min-Gi shoots him a Look he can hardly make sense of, and Kez starts stammering.
“HaHA yeah! Yeah, I, man…” Tripping on her eloquence, or lack thereof, Kez looks over at the woman she’s dangling off of with a brimming sort of wonder. “Yeah, I guess I do. I really do.” She seems to startle herself out of that wistfulness to continue, “Ryan, Clarissa. Clarissa, Ryan. We met at Purim! Since Mr. Workaholic didn’t wanna come get wasted with me—”
“You’re welcome, by the way,” Min-Gi interferes as a friendly fire. He’s grinning but only a little.
“Whatever, you grouch. Anyway, long story short, she came to my tours and I would come listen to her mixtapes. She’s got quite the collection! Ry, I think she’s the kinda gal you could party with.”
“You’re still working at the haunted mansion then, huh,” Ryan guesses.
“She just looks so cute in her undead getup,” Clarissa says. “But we should probably sit, you’re right. It looks like they’re gonna serve us any minute.”
The girls scoop the ends of their dresses up so they’re not wrinkled by taking their seats; they settle parallel to Ryan and Min-Gi, talking in hushed tones that Ryan can’t catch, but it has to do with swapping a stick of presumably gloss between them for Kez to reapply.
“Gay,” Ryan comments. He doesn’t know why he’s saying much at all, when his mind is so jumbled and abyssal that he can’t see the bottom of it.
“I accept any and all charges,” Kez admits haughtily. She makes a show of popping her freshly-done lips in the boys’ direction, then comments something like ‘thanks babe’ in undertone.
Clarissa calculated it correctly, in that the servers arrive instantly and en masse. They’re holding bouquets of sushi, arranged within bushels of greens, edible flowers, and thinly-spun strings of daikon. In the middle of the table is a very large fried fish, its dried, imploded eye staring at some direction west of Ryan’s vicinity.
The audience cheers in different degrees of excitement and awe; some clap, some murmur ‘oooo’, some bark out cheeky comments to the waiters like they’d concocted the meals.
“Impressive,” is Min’s only remark, and even then it’s half-baked. Ryan views him sideways, as if he needs permission to dive into the food first. He’s not a starving kind of drunk, but getting some food in his system will do more aid than harm, he knows.
Kez talks with her mouth full, not letting her sushi rolls rest on the plate for more than a second. “So, you two,” she says, wagging her chopsticks between the boys. “I need the history now. Like, what is the beef exactly? Or the tea, as the kids say? I’m getting ahead of myself. Okay okay, beef first, then tea.”
Min-Gi looks tired already; it’s the best way to tell that he’s known Kez for quite some time. “Kez—”
“I’m being for real!” Kez protests. Then, without a breath in between, she explains to Clarissa, “Okay, first, he was being all mopey about not having a date, now he’s sitting basically in his ex bestie’s lap right now?? Make it make sense, Clar. Also,” she tacks on, still stuffing her face, “Ry-guy, you n’ I haven’t kiki’ed in, what? Two months? So if Min ain’t sharing beef with you now I definitely am.”
“Chew with your mouth closed, hon,” is Clarissa’s only input.
“I’m just saying,” Kez messily swallows, sauce on the border of her lips, “that ya’ll are keeping your homegirl outta the loop and it should be punishable by death.”
There’s a quiet that follows where Ryan suspects he’s meant to feel bad for keeping secrets he doesn’t have. Kez knows everything about him at this point, it’d be ridiculous to insinuate she needs more of him, when he frankly can’t offer anyone much outside of music and some laughs.
Then:
“You’re right, Kez,” Min-Gi announces very suddenly. His back straightens as though it’s been wound up, possessed by some higher state of self. “I haven’t been keeping you updated. The thing is,”
And then, Ryan feels a big arm snaking over the top of his shoulder, reeling him back a little bit so he’s leaning into Min’s chest. “Ryan and I have actually been dating.”
If Ryan had the capacity to absorb this fully, he would’ve noted two things. One, Min is now a consensual participant in this nonsense due to motives Ryan cannot decode. Two, he’s leaning farther into the contact with Min like a Pavlovian instinct. But because he’s tipsy and the sushi hasn’t digested yet, neither can the scene playing out before him. He’s an audience member, he’s an understudy, he’s the supporting cast in the role of a lifetime and all he can do is sit and watch.
“No shit!” At least Kez is unbothered by the planet’s momentary shift. No, she actually looks pleased, a contentment that seems adjacent to what Min’s confession really means. It’s all just more lies, more stories, more time with Min-Gi Park for the rest of the week.
“Congratulations, Min,” Clarissa says nicely. “I’m glad you finally realized what you wanted!”
What does that mean?
“Hell yeah, you’ve been pining hard,” Kez concurs, momentarily struggling with chopsticks. She shapes the a in ‘hard’ into a boisterous o. “I like what Clar said, that word ‘finally’. Lemme tell ya, never been a more pleasing word in the English dictionary when it comes to you and Ry-guy!”
What does THAT mean??
“Right,” Min-Gi speaks like he’s not fully comprehending either. He gives himself a minor physical shake: a reset. “You and Clarissa, though, Kez. I think that’s much more interesting, I know you’ve been chasing her for a while—”
“Min-Gi Park I will strangle you with my bare hands,” Kez intercepts cheerfully. Clarissa shelters her own reaction behind a bite of sashimi.
“I’m just saying, don’t dish what you can’t take,” Min-Gi’s intonation reflects that same intimate teasing Ryan used to be familiar with; what he used to receive on a daily basis. Hearing it now, directed at someone else, is something else he folds away in his mind like a piece of paper to reread later, an emotion he’ll have to evaluate.
“Ryan?” Clarissa asks in a low murmur, as Min-Gi and Kez get invested in their plates. There’s a sweet inflection in his name, and Ryan imagines her to be a good receptionist, or nurse. “Are you feeling okay?”
Instantly, Ryan knows any admittance would be confidential — he wants to scream SOS on the problem he created — but they’re surrounded by a group of touchy people overtly content in their meals, and are likely to intrude on any private matters.
See, Kez is a close friend — perhaps one of his best, he fears — and any girl she picks to swoon over is (usually) a friend as well. She’s great, but friends are work, always aching to be impressed with triumphs and novels.
All this is so overwhelming that it stills his tongue. Nothing comes out but the occasional closed belches he contains in his mouth, the kind that jumps the shoulders in a startling manner and only draws more attention to one’s drunken state.
He wants to say, Yes, I’m fine! Don’t worry about me! He’s said that so often nowadays he should just get it tattooed, or printed on a shirt at least. That way when people ask him over and over he can redirect them to a bicep, or a thigh, or another muscle.
(He thinks, subconsciously, that people are posing this upon him for a reason. That there’s an energy he’s emitting out to the world that needs to be analyzed. He squanders this instantly.)
“Well, anyway,” Clarissa has given up on Ryan entirely and instead redirects her speech over his hunched head and to Min. “Like Kez said, we’re happy for you two. And hey, this is a great getaway for a date, right?” She leans forward a touch. “Did you hear about the spa day tomorrow?”
Oh, great. Another obligation to be handsy and flirtatious with Min-Gi. This is secondary school all over again.
“I haven’t,” Min answers evenly.
“Oh, dude, it’s gonna rule,” Kez jumps up and down a little in her seat; her medley of jewelry announce her movements. “It should be on the site but yeah, Clar and I checked our reservation and we got early morning slots!” She proudly tumbles sideways into her date’s shoulder, and Clarissa eagerly crashes right back into her with a free smile. “Ya’ll should check and see if we’ll be in the spa around the same time.”
“I don’t know whether I’m more impressed you’re actually going that early,” Min-Gi says, “or that you read the website at all.”
“I contain multitudes,” Kez winks.
Ryan slinks back into his mental throes whilst battling a bite of tempura shrimp. He’s stopped being wanted in this conversation a while ago, all he’s left to do is pick up on the slivers of the conversation that actually stuck in his memory at all. Tomorrow, spa day, got it. Min-Gi deflecting questions about their relationship, appreciated. Four more days of this shit, fucking fantastic.
There’s scattered bits of chatter throughout the dinner, but overall Kez and Clarissa have returned to their food, Min-Gi is sipping water like it’ll provide the same relief booze might, and none of Ryan’s friends are in his immediate peripherals.
“We met in school,” Ryan says broadly; he doesn’t plan on talking, not when things have gotten so quiet there’ll likely be eavesdroppers. But when you’re drowning, you don’t fight against the current.
The girls peek up at him. He feels Min-Gi’s stare.
“Yeah, it was school,” Ryan nods to himself. He’ll go with that, pretend there wasn’t anything before. “We dated and just, never really broke up. It was easy to get back together.”
Kez flits between the boys with a brand of uncertainty. Her big blue eyes pierce through Ryan first, inquisitive, then more definitively at Min for answers. “Is that true, Gi-man?” she asks. “That’s where it started? High school sweethearts?”
Min-Gi is burning a hole through Ryan’s head now, he’s sure. But to be honest, staring at anyone right now wouldn’t yield any satisfactory results. No, Ryan’s certain that if he looked at Min right now, the expression would project as a kaleidoscope of all things serrated and indecipherable in his wine-addled mind. He doesn’t need sobriety to know that Min doesn’t approve of what he’s declared, anyway. He knows he’s a failure in Min’s eyes no matter what, might as well bite the bullet about it.
Finally, Min-Gi says, “It’s true. We were.”
“Whoa,” Kez sounds fascinated. “And you just—” it sounds like she’s making some kind of motion to indicate a collision, but Ryan is focused on his food, “—like that?"
“Yeah,” Min-Gi murmurs. “Just like that.”
“Damn. You guys are like, confirmed soulmate material then!”
“That’s us,” Min-Gi says, this time more muttered, not meant for anyone’s ears but his own. But Ryan hears; it’s his curse, to hear Min, to find him everywhere he strains his hearing. “Just two soulmates.”
(It’s the way he says it — hollowed in the middle, evoking tints of blue and purple. There’s a past, a present, a future in the word ‘soulmates’. ‘That’s us’, he says, like referring to photographs. That was us, once.
Ryan doesn’t remember much else of the evening following this.)