11
“Justpicksomething!” I yellas I crouch down to check on the frozen taquitos Hal placed in the oven when we arrived at his apartment after we closed up Lokahi.
“There’s an art to selecting the right film for the right person,” Hal says, scrolling through every film on the Criterion Channel. “Sometimes it’s a test—”
“You give adult women pop quizzes to make sure they match your taste level?” I open a beer and return to the couch.
“If she can’t sit throughThe Grandmaster,I’m not inviting her to the Drexel to see a thirty-five-millimeter print ofIn the Mood for Love.”
“No trip to the movie theater, just sex? What a prince,” I exclaim. “I’m flattered that I get a movieandtaquitos. That I paid for.”
“If you can’t handle me at my most pretentious,” he says, “you don’t deserve to watch true crime documentaries with me when I’m high as fuck.”
“Yes, that’s when the real fun begins.”
The oven timer that I forgot to extend emits an ear-piercing series of beeps and Hal forces himself off the couch to turn it off.
“Two more minutes?” he asks as his phone buzzes. He lingers in the kitchen, typing a response. I try not to read too much into the way Hal snorts, texts back, laughs again at the next missive, his thumbs flying as he forgets my existence for approximately forty-five seconds. I stare at my own phone, role-playing a version of the Gillian Flynn cool girl, but also listening really hard as he makes a call.
I can’t help drawing Romily’s matrix on a mental whiteboard and hunting for the most accurate coordinates for us. The variables change every few minutes. In certain moments, I feel emotionally close to Hal. But just as often—i.e.,now—I’m wary of sharing anything deep with him. We’re compatible in the sense that we get each other’s references and share inside jokes, but are we exchanging “assurances”? If and when we make our way to Hal’s bedroom later, things will rearrange themselves again. I’ll feel this intense romantic desire when he’s touching me, knowing full well that we won’t be engaging in “relationship talk.”
“Who was that?” I ask in the most casual manner that anyone has ever posed that question.
“Writer friend” is all he says.
After giving me first pick of the taquitos (see? a gentleman), he returns to the Criterion interface, glancing at me every time he pauses on a thumbnail.
“You’re not going to make me watchPersona?” I ask.
“I think we’re a little beyond the litmus test stage, don’t you?”
Arewe?
I’ve eaten half the food by the time he selectsBroadcast News.
“Wow.” I wipe my hands on a piece of paper towel. “Something in color? Must be my lucky night.”
“As I said, there’s an art to selecting the right film for the right person.” He likes to give his own little introduction, as if I’m the sole guest at his own private screening. “Holly Hunter plays an ultracompetent news producer in a sort-of love triangle with a himbo anchorman and a reporter who’s her intellectual equal but kind of a beta.”
Hal takes the plate fromme.
“It’s a romance?”
“It’s much more complex than a romance.” He shoves a taquito into his mouth and presses play. “Afterward, I’ll ask for your thoughts and you cannot use the phrase ‘it was cute.’ ”
“So, Iamgetting the quiz.” I sit up a little straighter. “I’ll be sure to pay attention so I don’t ruin my shot at making out with you later.”
“I’m angry thata man wrote a female character so well,” I say when the credits roll. Having consumed as many comic books as I have, I’ve acquired a particular sensitivity to this.
“Aaron Sorkin spent his entire career trying to make a better version of Holly Hunter’s character,” Hal says. “And he never did.”
“Why do I always identify with the losers in these love triangles?” I ask.
“You’re an overachiever,” he says, even though it was a rhetorical question. “You have this expectation that if you put in the effort and follow a sequence of steps, it will lead to this specific future state. But love isn’t like that. It’s completelyirrational. The whole point of a love affair is that you don’t know the ending.”
“That is extremely untrue.”
“When two people understand each other too well,” Hal says. “When you can finish each other’s—”
