He nails limes, Granny Smith apples, and nearly ends his streak with kumquats but saves it at the last minute, cheering victoriously—doing that dance from the other night when he won Monopoly. In the light of day, he’s got that undeniable B-boy energy. I could totally see him being a background dancer for a singer at some point.
“Did you ever take dance classes as a kid?”
“I did. When I was in middle school, I joined a step team. I was one of the only guys since most of my friends were girls. Shana, one of my closest friends, was taking a hip-hop class at a local rec center and brought me on bring-a-friend day. The whole thing felt like being in a music video. When I got home, I begged my mom to enroll me, so she saved up her tips and got me a spot.”
“That’s cute.” I picture Leo up on a stage in a school basement wearing shiny pants and platform sneakers, kick cross stepping to the beat of a Jason Derulo song.
Across the way, I grab a cucumber from the collection and hold it up. “All right. Next question, what can cucumbers become?”
“Slap a condom on it and it can become a pretty efficient dildo.” He nudges me with an elbow.
Thank God no one is around to hear that. My cheeks flame up to inferno levels while briefly imagining Leo plus sex toys. I set the cucumber down, flustered. “Leo! Please don’t say anything like that at our audition or, God willing, on live TV. It’s a family show!”
“Weren’t you just saying we needed more accurate queer representation?” He smirks the smirkiest smirk. “What’s more relatable than using produce for questionable self-exploration?” He’s grabbed the cucumber now and he’s waving it at me like it’s a sword.
“I did no such thing.” I’m embarrassed yet electrified, jostled out of my comfort zone. Leo seems exceptionally no-filter, which is equal parts unsettling and refreshing.
“Didn’t make the boy Sims kiss. Didn’t steal vegetables for self-pleasure. From the way you were grinding into me this morning, I hadn’t pegged you for a prude.” He knocks his hip into mine, sending me into the refrigerated display case which has begun its water spray. My arm is wet when I pull it away.
I shake myself dry. “Cucumber is a fruit.”
“Takes one to know one,” Leo jokes with a cheeky wink.
Ignoring that: “There are seeds on the inside!”
“I know all about seed on the inside.”
“I’m not a prude for not defiling myself with produce!” I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with someone I barely know in a grocery store I’ve never been in on the opposite side of the country from my home. This whole trip is outrageous and unexpected.
Not in a bad way, though.
Leo must notice that my defenses are building back up because he lowers his voice, retracts the phallic fruit. “I’m just goofing around. I tend to make jokes when I don’t know what else to do. I don’t come to stores like this often.” His gaze floats away.
“Grocery stores?” I ask, confused.
“Chaingrocery stores.” He scrubs a hand on the back of his neck revealing that small patch of dark armpit hair that drove me wild this morning. The sight. The scent. I...
“My mom and I would go to Koreatown every other weekend to shop for ourselves. My dad was Irish, but my mom made sure I learned about my Korean side through food, which meant long walks to my mom’s favorite market to pick up ingredients for hoeddeok or bibimbop.”
“That sounds nice.” I can tell there’s more to the story when it comes to his parents’ relationship, and it’s clear how much he cares about his mom, given this and what he told me last night over Monopoly, which endears him to me. I like that family is important to both of us.
He shrugs. “She worked a lot. Still does. You and your mom hadMadcap Market. My mom and I had the Korean market.” Leo’s expression lands between dreamy and nostalgic. “I got to know the layout really well and most of the employees would sneak me pieces of sour candy when my mom wasn’t looking. I always loved being able to practice my Korean there, too. My mom and I both work most weekends now—well, not me anymore because, you know—but I still go out there to shop for her when she can’t because it’s habit, which is all a long-winded way of saying I don’t know all the brands or logos or mascots you do unless they stock them in the vending machines at the hotels because I didn’t grow up around them.”
“That makes sense.” I think about how all of these products imprinted on my brain when Mom would wheel me down the aisle of the Shoprite by our house, humming a Cher song to herself. I’d wave to the Jolly Green Giant in the freezer aisles. Salute Mr. Clean as we picked up toilet cleaner.
When I wasn’t looking, Mom would give Buzz the bee on the Honey Nut Cheerios box a funny voice. “Hello, Holden!” he’d say. “Hope you have a great day!” My eyes would widen and I’d cry, “Mom! Mom! Did you hear that? Did you hear that?” And she’d nod her head and smile, eyebrows raised with secretive delight.
“Sorry.” I pull myself from the sudden, vivid memory. “That was completely insensitive of me.”
“I’m not trying to make you feel bad. Why would you know that about me? It would’ve been just as insensitive if you had assumed.” He stops and leans effortlessly on the cart, which is so adeptly in his control that it doesn’t even shift at his weight. Amazing. “I’m just saying this isn’t the part I’m going to excel at. This is.”
He drops the cucumber in the cart and takes off running with it, down an empty aisle, makes a sick U-turn—wheels slightly skidding—then catapults back, riding on the beam. He flies by in a whir with a wave. If there were Olympics for shopping cart riding, Leo would take home the gold.
When he returns to where I’m standing, not even slightly winded, he smiles. “You be the brains. I’ll be the brawn.”
“Okay. That’s fair. But we’re each going to have to be a little bit of both. That’s how the show works. Teams have to do the challenge fifty-fifty.”
His eyes go toward the ceiling. “Good point. You have my permission to randomly quiz me from now until the audition and, fingers crossed, beyond, if you agree to work out with me tomorrow. We’ll whip you into shape.” He flexes, and I hold back an audible swoon.
