falling in love at a smoothie shop part b
A date. Jesse is going on a real date, with a real guy, and he’s not asleep while it’s happening. He’s never really come out as gay, in fact, he hasn’t even been aware of his own not-so-platonic affections towards other men until the past couple years, but he’s been suppressing it as much as possible. Being out certainly won’t help his career, and he’s seen how... vicious people can get. As a self-hating person, he’s not going to add to that.
But Andrew. Andrew’s arms look so warm and safe, his eyes are so, so brown. His hair looks so soft, and Jesse would just love to dig his fingers into it and pull while sinking his teeth into the pale skin on his vulnerable neck. He can’t do that in public, though, couldn’t even do that in public if he was out or if he wasn’t under the watching eye of the cameras.
Andrew picks the perfect place for them to eat. It’s an ice cream bar, mainly, but it has booths along the walls, and serves food like Boardwalk fries and pretzels and burgers. It’s the cutest darn place Jesse’s ever seen, and he’s more impressed with the choice than he would be a fancy restaurant. Andrew tugs his arm over to a booth, pulling Jesse right down in next to them. If the waitress who comes to take their order recognizes him, she doesn’t let on.
They order a boat of curly fries to share and two milkshakes. The waitress takes their orders and Jesse fiddles with the salt shaker while they wait.
“So,” Andrew says deliberately, cheekily leaning over the table, “how are your cats?”
Jesse raises an eyebrow - he hasn’t mentioned them, but it’s kind of common knowledge that he has at least three cats in his apartment at any given time. “They’re good,” he chuckles. “Major’s recovering from his ordeal with tapeworms and Luna’s healthier than she’s ever been. Which is bad for me, though, because it means I’ll have to relinquish her soon.”
“Major and Luna?”
“Um - yes.”
Andrew looks amused, or impressed, Jesse can’t tell. “I’ve never owned a cat,” he says. “I had a dog, growing up, back in England. But... I don’t think I’ve even come close to petting a cat in several years.”
“Would you like to meet them?”
It’s an invitation for more than that and they both know it. An invitation for Andrew to enter Jesse’s life. To come into his home, to see what makes him happy. See how he lives. Meet his cats, the closest thing he has to family in this concrete jungle. Be with him. Not be with him. But just to be. Jesse doesn’t know what this is turning into, but he isn’t questioning it.
Andrew’s eyes shine with something Jesse can’t place. Something he’s never really seen directed at him before. “Yes,” he nods, definitively. “Yes, I would love that.”
//
Jesse’s apartment only holds one bedroom, a tiny bathroom and the room he calls his study, where he goes to read, to write or to draw in peace. The cats beds are planted on the floor near the large window in the sitting room, but they seem to prefer the couch, which is where all three of them are when Jesse pushes open the door, Andrew behind him. It’s a sweet picture; three heads poking up off the couch, sniffing in the air at the unfamiliar scent. The tabby cat tears off to the bedroom immediately (“Don’t take it personally,” Jesse assures Andrew) but the white cat slinks off the couch, padding slowly.
Andrew crouches, holding out his hand as the most sociable of the cats sneaks across the space separating them until its head bumps Andrew’s hand. Andrew freezes, like he doesn’t know what to do, before gently stroking down its back.
“Which one is this?”
“That’s Snow Leopard.”
“Major, Luna and Snow Leopard...” Andrew recites to himself, shaking his head with soft laughter as Snow Leopard now targets Jesse for her affections, rubbing up against his legs. He lifts her up, leading Andrew further into the apartment. The scruffy gray cat doesn’t move, but watches them carefully.
“Which one’s that?”
“Major.”
“May I ask about the inspiration for the names?”
Jesse laughs, shaking his head. “Well, when we got him, he looked like he’d been through a war. He’d been attacked by a fox, and he survived, but not without some serious injuries - torn ear, some broken limbs... he’s the only one I’m actually keeping. Had him for a while; the others come and go whenever the shelter decides.”
As Andrew moves closer, he notices the cat only has one eye.
Somehow, he resists cringing. He looks over at Jesse, who rubs the cat’s head as if nothing is amiss. And maybe for Jesse, nothing is. Maybe Jesse can take a mutilated, eyeless cat and love it as much as a Persian. They’re almost the perfect match, the two of them; Major, with only half of his vision and probably a good deal of his pride lost. Broken, he found Jesse, who would treasure him as much as anything else. Jesse’s broken, too. Andrew knows that much, even without the limited information he already has about Jesse, he can see it in his eyes.
Maybe Jesse took Major, the one-eyed cat in, because he saw some of himself in it. Loved it back to health maybe out of some hope that someone would, someday, do the same for him.
Andrew reaches down and scratches behind the cat’s ear. Major purrs, a loud, rumbling noise, pushing his head against Andrew’s palm, stretching his paws out on the couch in contentment. He’s found a home here.
Maybe Andrew could, too.
“and Luna-” Jesse’s voice brings him back into - oh, right, real life - “well, you might not see her at all. I hardly see her.”
“Right. Well, they’re all beautiful, Jesse.” And he means it, even one-eyed Major.
He takes a moment now to look around the room. The hard wood floor is made comfortable with an oriental rug. The couches are a dark brown of something that looks like leather but knowing Jesse probably isn’t, and the oak furniture matches. He sees no television, but a coffee table with books and magazines strewn across it, a stack of coasters. A fat Sudoku book that looks like it’s been leafed though many times.
It’s mostly kitchen. In the kitchen, there’s a single table with two chairs, and a blue tablecloth. Newspapers piled on it. An empty mug. Pots and pans hanging from a rack above, all different colors. A stove that looks like it was purchased a decade ago and no dishwasher that Andrew can see. The set of washcloths, hanging from a rack on the side of the counter, looks like they were all purchased at different places and different times; no two match each other. Everything seems to be a little thrown together, but somehow it fits, that little touch of Jesse.
“I don’t suppose you’re hungry?”
“No, but I could use the bathroom.”
Ah-” Jesse points, down the little hallway. “On the left.”
Andrew shuffles over there quickly. The bathroom is the same beige color as all the other walls, but the shower is colorful stripes, the rug is a gentle, fuzzy green. It feels good between the toes of Andrew’s aching feet. Yeah, he could live here.
When he comes back, Jesse’s halfway inside a cabinet, all three cats swarming around his feet. There’s Luna, the tiny tabby one, a runt for sure, Major, the gray with the still-scraggly coat and a lump in his walk, and Snow Leopard, the great white.
Jesse laughs as he removes himself from the pantry, holding some sort of triple-cat-dish - and he’s put his glasses on. He sets the bowls (bowls?) on the floor and has to step over the cats to get back to Andrew.
“I guess they were hungry.”
“Yup, and they give me hell if I miss their feeding time.” Jesse tilts his head at Andrew, with that look in his eyes again, the calculating, investigating, figuring out look. It feels like Jesse’s undressing him with his eyes, but not in the sexual way, in the way like Jesse can see him right down to his bones. “So, I-” he stops, looking around. “I don’t have a TV, or anything,” he laughs. “But I-”
“That’s okay. We don’t need a television. I don’t like television.”
Jesse pauses, continuing with that look. “I really enjoyed today, Andrew,” he whispers, sincere. Andrew takes a step forward, and whispers “I did, too, Jesse...”
Andrew reaches out and brushes his hand over Jesse’s cheek; Jesse can’t help but lean into it, just like the cats he cares for. This apartment feels like it’s their own world.
“Jesse?” he whispers, and Jesse’s eyelashes flutter as he blinks up at him. He realizes he’s breathing a little heavier, and right now would be the perfect moment for a kiss--
And then Luna’s meowing, at Jesse’s feet, weaving between their legs and they have to break apart so they don’t trip on her.
//
Jesse pulls a Scrabble set off a cabinet; it’s one of the really nice ones with the turn table and the dark oak letters. They sit in the middle of his apartment; Jesse sits cross-legged and Andrew stretches out on his side. They don’t talk while they play, but there’s the quiet, comforting sound of the whirring of the air in the ventilation ducts around them.
Jesse takes it home with the word 'aboideaux' on a Triple Word, for fifty-seven points.
“Jesse, you can’t use a French word! That’s - that’s cheating.”
“It’s not a French word, Andrew, it’s perfectly correct terminology.”
“Then what is it?”
Jesse launches into some definition about farming and bridges and high tide and low tide, but Andrew stops him, shaking his head and laughing down at the board. Obviously, it is impressive, and if Jesse knows what the hell it is then he supposes it’s fair. “Alright, alright. Fine, you win.”
“Do I get a prize?” Jesse asks with a ridiculous triumphant grin, and Andrew’s surprised; he’s never been that straightforward. If he’s really flirting.
Andrew could think of a million prizes to give Jesse but he chickens out, just grins, as he helps Jesse clear the board, tossing the tiles into the little bag. “Hm. How about another dinner?”
Before he leaves the apartment that night, he finds the score sheet - which Jesse balled up and tossed in the wastebasket by the couch - and flattens it out, folding it and slipping it into his coat pocket, clutching it as he finds his way back home through the maze of New York traffic.
*
Their next date is at a vegetarian restaurant that Andrew picked out specifically thinking of Jesse, and if Jesse wasn’t totally smitten already, he is now. Andrew always rides his skateboard to these places, Jesse his bike.
There have been pictures, says Justin. Pictures of Jesse and his mystery boy laughing together on the street, or sitting in the restaurant, taken on a grainy phone camera. Jesse, somehow, doesn’t really care. Andrew hasn’t mentioned it, so he either doesn’t know or it isn’t enough of an issue to bring up.
Back home, Major and Snow Leopard greet Andrew with purrs and nuzzles at his ankles. Andrew lifts Major, tentatively, afraid that he might break the poor frail thing in half. Major blinks at him with his one eye, pressing his head into his cheek. Andrew cradles him in his arms, feeling the warm fur against his chest.
Justin can’t stand Major - repulsed by his appearance, steers as clear as he can from him when he visits Jesse’s apartment. Which is rarely. The fact that Andrew cuddles him and coos over him like he’s a fluffy kitten again just reassures that he’s perfect.
Full of pasta, soup and breadsticks, they go to sit on the couch together; Jesse turns on the radio. Some station Andrew’s never heard of. Jesse sits with his knees up, stretching his legs out a little, so his foot rests against Andrew’s knee. His hand sits on the plush of the couch, and Andrew’s fingers creep an inch forward. When Jesse doesn’t pull his back, Andrew connects their hands.
Jesse squeezes, tight, his palm just as warm and soft as Andrew imagines his lips would be, but he’s silent.
“What are you thinking about?” Andrew whispers, after giving him some couple minutes to reflect.
“Well...” Jesse sighs. “The Oscars are coming up.”
Oh. Right. That’s how this all started. “Yeah...” Andrew whispers “are you nervous?”
“I don’t deserve it. I shouldn’t be on that list. I’m going to be with all those people - so much better than me, so achieved -- people still know me as the Zombieland guy or sometimes they think I’m the guy from Juno and I don’t belong. I’m going to stick out. It’s--”
“Jesse.”
Jesse stops abruptly, not lifting his head but looking slowly up at Andrew. “What?”
“None of that’s true. You are your own worst critic. You are nominated. And they nominated you because you deserve to be on that list. You are nominated because they saw - they see it in you. It’s always easy to see the bad things in yourself, Jess - but you. You need to take a step back and see the good things. You’ve gotten this far and that’s an accomplishment in itself.”
Jesse is silent. It doesn’t look like he’s able to refute that logic. But after a moment, he whispers, “I didn’t ask for this.”
“But you earned it.”
“No, but I--. I couldn’t even make it in school, Andrew, how am I supposed to do this?”
“Because you’re not seventeen anymore. Because you can. Because I believe in you.”
“Well-” Jesse’s cheeks turn read before he smiles tightly, like he’s trying to repress it. “At least I know who I’m taking.”
“Who?”
“You, obviously!”
“Ah-!” Suddenly, Andrew’s nervous too. He’s never been in front of a camera, and though he’s done performances in front of an audience, those were all scripted and rehearsed and the viewers didn’t leave their seats. But. If Jesse can do it, he can. Still, he feels the red heat crawling up his cheeks and he moves his whole body a few inches closer.
“You know,” Jesse sighs, turning to face forward on the couch, leaning over and resting his head on Andrew’s shoulder (making Andrew hold his breath) and looking up at him. “I haven’t told many people.”
“Told them what?”
“That I’m gay.”
“You are, then?”
“Yeah. My family knows. But that’s about it.”
“We don’t have to - you know. Show anything.”
“But I feel like that’s too much of a lie,” Jesse swallows. “They’re going to ask who you are, and what do I say?”
“That... I’m a friend.”
That’s what they are, right?
“But...” Jesse lifts his head, “you’re not. Or, at least, I don’t want you to be. I mean, I want you to be... more.”
Without evaluating it, without thinking of what could be the possible repercussions of his decision, Andrew finally closes the gap between then, which he’s wanted to do for days. His lips are soft against Jesse’s, sweet and wet as he threads his fingers through his curls. It’s just a little kiss first, a peck, and directly after that another, slower, deeper until Jesse’s sucking on Andrew’s tongue and his hands are nudging under the hem of his shirt.
It’s Major that finally breaks them out of it, leaping on the couch between them with his gravelly mews, giving Jesse a look that says ‘who is this newcomer? I need some attention too!’.
They both laugh, and Jesse bends down to pick the cat up. It nuzzles under his chin and on his cheek, purring all the while. It’s Jesse Eisenberg’s one-eyed cat and it’s happy to be alive. Andrew is, too.
“Andrew, do you...” Jesse pulls away slightly, glancing out the window. “It’s getting kind of late -- I mean, it’s really cold out tonight. And dark.”
“Yes...” Andrew follows his gaze, then looks back at Jesse’s face, hoping that this is going where he thinks it is. Jesse decides they’d save time and energy if he stopped beating around the bush.
“My bed is warm,” he whispers. “And big enough. If... you don’t have a place to be in the morning.”
“I can’t think of a place I’d rather be.”
//
“Jesse, for goodness sake, you look fine!”
Jesse exhales slowly as he adjusts his tie before, for the third time, growling and undoing it completely and going to reattach it.
“Christ, Jess, you’re going to wrinkle it!” Andrew shakes his head and snatches the garment. “Now stop fidgeting.”
“Sorry,” Jesse groans. “Just.... this is the Oscars. It’s not the MTV Awards. I have to... I need to prove I belong here.”
“But you do, Jesse.” Up until now, Jesse’s grateful that the whole ordeal and the movie haven’t really been mentioned. “You do and you will show them. But looking like you’re about to have a seizure is not going to do that.”
Good point. Jesse sighs and leans back into Andrew’s chest, letting him fix the tie, nimble fingers moving effortlessly. Andrew’s surprisingly warm and comforting, pressing his nose behind Jesse’s ear (having traded his glasses for contacts, just for tonight. He looks a little uncomfortable in the pressed suit and tie as compared to his usual flannel and denim, but he hasn’t complained.) Jesse takes a moment to wonder about the ridiculous circumstances that brought them together. He secretly hopes that Andrew won’t just be an ‘Oscar date’.
“I haven’t come out,” Jesse whispers.
“I know,” Andrew coos. “It’s okay. You can just say that we’re friends.”
Jesse’s not sure if he wants to do that - straight out lie just for his own comfort. “People will be taking pictures, asking you questions...”
“I know.”
“And if - if we were - if we ever were to.... there would be cameras all around us, and pictures, and articles, and questions, and crazy fans and crazy not-fans and, and...”
“I know, Jesse. I know. I wouldn’t be here if I had a problem with that.”
“It can be pretty scary.”
“I’m prepared.”
“And even if we did - if I told the truth, they’d be all over both of--”
“Jesse. It’s okay. I’m ready for anything.”
“I don’t deserve this nomination.”
“Shut up. I don’t date people who lie.” He steps back, studying their reflections. “It’s time to go.”
“I’m not ready.”
“You’ll be fine.” Andrew says it dismissively, like it’s not even worth his time arguing about. Jesse pulls his lower lip into his mouth.
“Kiss for good luck?”
“I’ll kiss you for any reason, Jesse.”
Andrew’s lips on his are like a warm, soothing wave, like the drugs Jesse used to take to relax only much more pleasant and effective. He sighs, muscles and bones relaxing into a heap against Andrew’s body and mouth. Andrew will be his security blanket, at least for tonight.
Andrew pulls away, giving Jesse a tight squeeze, and whispers “let’s go, Jes.”
*
“...Colin Firth.”
Jesse leaves the scene as soon as he’s able without attracting attention. He takes Andrew’s hand, squeezing it as tight as he can as he ducks through the crowds, avoiding people, cameras, prying eyes.
He knew he wasn’t going to win. He knew it, of course. He didn’t in a million years expect to win, but the loss has only reassured his belief that he’s not good enough, never will be good enough. He. Does. Not. Belong. He doesn’t blame them; he should have never come here.
“Jesse...” Andrew whispers, clutching his hand for dear life as they weave their way out. Jesse doesn’t want to be stopped. “Jesse, Jes, Jes, it’s okay, they don’t know--”
“No, Andrew, don’t, don’t even, I shouldn’t have been nominated in the first place.”
“Jesse, that’s a lie, and you’ll see - the Academy made a lot of bad moves tonight, you’ll see, people will agree, you--”
“Andrew.” Jesse feels the tightness in his chest and struggles to get a lungful of air. “Stop - just stop. It’s okay. I didn’t expect to win.” He closes his eyes, taking a deep stomach-full of breath and letting it out slowly. He’s not going to freak out, here, in front of all these people, in front of Andrew.
“There will be other awards,” Andrew whispers, “you’ll be back here for sure.”
“I’d rather not, to be honest.”
“Well, Jesse, people are going to like you whether you like it or not. You’ll be back. I know you will, and you know you will.”
Jesse pushes his body against Andrew, shaking his fingers off to wrap his arm around Andrew’s hip. Andrew is his protection in this world, all that he has on his side.
So the next time they’re stopped by a lady with a microphone and a man with a camera - this is a new one - and when she again asks who this man is with him they’ve never seen before, Jesse pulls Andrew closer, looks right at the lens and utters the line he’d been practicing in front of the mirror for days; “This is Andrew. He’s my boyfriend.”