Our rideshare takes us through the towering front gates. A signpost is stuck with wooden arrows pointing every which way to various weird attractions.
To our right, an old oil tank was turned into an ogre—green, mean-looking, and lurking in the nearby copse. To our left, a field ofbrightly painted tires gives way to a disused helicopter and an even more impressive tank. A dinosaur made of old bicycle parts presides over them, givingJurassic Parka run for its money.
I recall being enamored by this labyrinth as a child. Skipping with CeeCee through the defunct driving range. Playing games of hide-and-seek along the short fairy trail festooned with bird feeders, where statues of winged mystical creatures mingled with the real-life winged creatures that came to munch on the seed left every morning by the owner. He was an older man with a penchant for turning junkyard scraps into silly creations that made kids smile.
The driver lets us out in front of the museum proper, which isn’t much more than an archway into an open-air exhibition of fossils and gems and minerals (oh my). It’s right beside a single-story building with a tiny screening room for educational materials and a rather extensive gift shop. Despite this attraction being entirely free, it’s rarely known to those outside our pocket of New Jersey, and mostly afloat because of the ginormous banquet hall that became a staple for weddings and proms, including Drew and mine.
It dawns on me that we are thirty here, close to marrying age. If I do have to stay this way forever, would I be emotionally mature enough to pursue something with Drew? Could I learn to live without those seven years of memories while making amends for them all the same?
No, I can’t think about that. This crystal huntshouldwork. I’ll get back to my real timeline, fix my mistakes, and forge a better future where maturity and marriage will come with experience and time and no expanse of missing memories.
Drew points to a sign written in red marker that’s taped to the door: BE BACK SOON. When Drew jiggles the handle, the door to the gift shop is locked. “Bad timing,” he says. “Weird sign too. Soon? That’s such a proximate word. It only has meaning if we know when they left. How are we supposed to know when they left?”
“That sign,” I say as we begin to stroll around the grounds looking for an employee, “is hardly the weirdest thing about this place.” To prove my point, we enter a cave where a beat-up Trans Am spray-painted to look like a tiger is bursting through a gaping hole in the wall. A motion sensor makes it honk loudly at us. Drew jumps. “God, I’m glad this place is still here. A weirdo’s paradise.”
“I always found it kind of creepy,” Drew says before clocking the shock unfurling on my face. “I moved here when I was a teenager, so I never came here on class trips or with my mom or anything. My only frame of reference for this place was prom.” His neck and face turn ruddy, so he angles himself away from me.
He’s gone and poked the sleeping bear of our past with a prom-sized stick. That was the night when, overcome with magic and imminent change, we first kissed.For practice.It didn’t mean anything on either end. At least, I don’t think it did.
I offered to help him get his first kiss out of the way so he wouldn’t be nervous when he met up with his “summer guy” on an upcoming vacation, and he accepted the offer.
Nothing more than an exchange of lips.
But now, being back here, I get the strange sense that I might’ve missed something.
It appears as if Drew is about to say more, but someone interrupts us first.
“Need a map?” asks a woman about my height whose hair is pulled back in a tight ponytail, a chestnut-colored flannel knotted around her waist. “Sorry I wasn’t here when you arrived.”
“All good. We’ll take the map,” Drew says, stepping forward to take the pamphlet, obscuring his face again. Even though I know it’s still red from thinking about our high school selves.
She inspects us both. “You two with the scout troop?”
“No,” I say, and then watch as recognition settles over her. She’sseen me before, and I have a feeling I’ve seen her too in a different context. “We’re just visiting for the day from the city.” I’m seriously hoping she doesn’t snap a photo of me here and post it online. If Jessalynn caught wind of where I am and who I’m with, they’d be furious.
“Wait a minute,” the woman says, vowels stretched out like pulled taffy. “Drew and Nolan, right? It’s me. Stephanie Hopkins. We went to school together. Pride Alliance and senior prom.”
“Stephanie,” Drew greets her congenially. “I thought that was you.”
Memories sweep in. Drew and I didn’t go to prom together, but we basically did. Our dates—Stephanie for Drew and Gemma for me—were girlfriends who weren’t comfortable coming out to their parents prior to prom. They’d go away to Rutgers University the following fall and make it public, but at the time they needed dates who wouldn’t be offended when they ditched them for their own slow dances and make-out sessions. Drew and I volunteered, which is how we ended up wandering away from the noisy dance floor and ultimately kissing.
“What brings you city people back to the burbs?” Stephanie asks, coming alive a little, then directing her next question at me. “Aren’t you, like, famous now?”
“In some circles,” I say. Because it’s not like I’m starring in movies. Yet.
She snorts at that. “What are you doing here?”
“Visiting,” I’m quick to reply.
“No, I meanhere.” Her hand spirals toward the fossils and the encased gemstones, the plaques and the posters. There’s a suspicious tone to her voice as her eyes dart between us. “Are you two finally together?”
“Finally?” I ask, a healthy dose of curiosity and confusion sprinkled in my tone. I didn’t even have feelings for Drew back then.
“Yeah,” Stephanie says with an expanding smile. “The Pride Alliance had a little will-they, won’t-they pool going for you twoback in the day. Come to think of it, I should be kind of mad at you two. I bet good money you’d be boyfriends by senior prom. Gemma and I thought we were playing matchmaker.”
If Drew was blushing before, he’s on fire now, stammering slightly.
“How much did you lose?” I ask, simultaneously thinking back on all those conversations Drew and I had when we first came out about how two queer guys could be friends without romantic or sexual feelings developing. What was everyone seeing?
