Sam gaped.“You don’t mean to tell me you actually attempt totidyupafter this bampot?”Their lilt grew impossibly thicker.“That’s a contact sport, I think; Craig and I lived with him for two years, y’know.We barely survived.”
Craig wheezed a laugh and loosened his already bedraggled tie.“Do you remember the socks in the kettle?I remember the socks in the kettle.”He pointed a beefy finger at Armand, blue eyes crinkling behind tiny round spectacles and above ruddy folds of cheek.
“I’m sorry,” I cut in, eyes falling to Armand who was slumping further into his seat, “socks in thewhere?”
“Of course he don’t remember, didn’t know hisnamehalf the time back then, did he?”
“But he’s changed now.”Florabelle ruffled Armand’s hair, much to his obvious chagrin.“Don’t let us make him out to be some sort of buffoon.He’s a smart lad, got a job and everything.Washes regular, cleans his teeth, and spends all day drawing cartoon bloody penguins.”She giggled into her soda bottle.
“It was cartoon bloody penguins what bought this last round, so shut it,” Armand huffed defensively, his cheeks flushed pink.
I raised my glass in a toast.“To cartoon bloody penguins!”
Everyone joined in, with Armand somehow going even redder.
It was nearly Florabelle’s turn to perform, but the group did me the courtesy of doing a run-down of how these very different humans came together in a friend circle.As Armand had implied in my attempted interview, Florabelle grew up with Armand and currently owned a ballet studio called Code Eight.
“Is that a reference to something?”I asked.
Florabelle quirked a playful eyebrow, but it was Armand who answered.“It’s British code for backup.”
Backup, like backup dancers.I grinned at Florabelle.“Genius.”
Sam had been with Armand the second-longest, having danced alongside him and Florabelle at the DOL House.The grainy video of a very young Armand—whose stage name was something horrific:Schoolboy Lolito—dancing for a much older audience was seared in my brain.I nearly combusted wanting to ask follow-up questions.
“And when I’m not dancing or camming, I’m a cellist for a Balkan dance band,” Sam concluded cheerfully and with more than a hint of enigma.“You’ll see some of that in my next set.”
Craig adjusted his glasses.“And I’m the boring one.I sell ad space for websites.”
“That doesn’t sound boring,” I said, a little too quickly.
“Oh, I assure you, mate, it is.”
Sam and Armand had needed a third roommate and found Craig, hilariously enough, through Craigslist.
It was fascinating.After interview upon interview, and talking with the people in Armand’s life, I was now speaking with his friends.It started to feel like I was getting somewhere, that Armand was coming more into focus.
Except.
Something was clearly missing from the conversation, something everyone was very carefully tiptoeing around, chatting casually but every so often glancing to Armand as if needing permission to continue.I’d asked about the DOL House, how it differed from Boogie Le Bouge, and while Florabelle and Sam seemed obliging enough to regale me with nostalgia-infused stories, Armand would respond with one-word answers and avoid eye contact.
He doesn’t owe you his secrets.But I wanted Armand to trust me enough to share whatever everyone else here knew.
The evening closed out with one more performance from Sam who, as promised, did a sensual interpretive dance while playing a cello, and Florabelle, who did an amazing striptease the way it was meant to be done, with pizazz and confidence.
“Yourmatesare great,” I told Armand as we made it back to his apartment.“Thanks for introducing me.”
“Yeah, I think they really liked you.”Armand looked lost in thought while locking the door.“And they haven’t always liked my boyfriends.”
The breath caught in my throat.Tingles ran through me from head to toe.
Armand realized immediately what he’d said.“Er,” he started, grabbing the back of his neck and standing frozen.“W-which you are ...Aren’t you?”
I could think of nothing to say except, “Oh thankgod.”I cupped his face and kissed him, long and hard, until we were both breathless.“I was so scared you didn’t feel the same way.I mean, we never really put a label on it.”
“Didn’t feel—buggering hell,” Armand trailed off, finally meeting my eyes shyly, his lips a breath away.“I’m not seeing anyone else, you know.”
“Me neither.I’m, um.Really monogamous.”
