As I get changed into my grey T-shirt and boxers, I notice a blank rectangular space on the wall, four oily Blu Tack dots exposing beige-painted wall beneath.
My Tom of Finland poster is gone.
My breath catches in my throat. She didn’t. Did she?
I march back into the living area and stomp my foot on the pedal to open the kitchen bin.
In the recycling, among Prosecco bottles and cardboard Shining Dragon containers, is my poster.
‘Sabrina …’ I splutter.
Sabrina pauses her show again. She gets up off the couch, leans against the wall beside me and folds her arms over the knitted Baby Yoda on her chest. ‘I tried to talk to you about it,’ she says, blue eyes locking with mine with righteous concern. ‘Zeke, those big men – all hypermasculine and erotic – it’s porn. You know how I feel about porn. And what I went through with Shane. I don’t want this in my house.’
I breathe in and my lungs catch, waterlogged. At once, I am sixteen again, my mother humiliating me at the dinner table after she found the porn in my internet history. My heart is drumming, my legs are ready to flee, my brain is scrambling. I want to tell Sabrina she’s crossed a boundary. But my brain is a sixteen-year-old boy’s, and I’m terrified.
I’m not safe here.
I carefully extract my crumpled poster from the bin. ‘Sabrina, I know you don’t like a boyfriend watching porn – but it’s not the same as Shane … I’m just a roommate … and I’m gay … it’s a totally diff—’
‘Oh, you’re gay again now, are you?’ Sabrina shoots from the hip. ‘I thought you said you were bi tonight?’
I wince. ‘I knew that pissed you off.’
‘It didn’t piss me off. I just didn’t realise you’re a liar.’
A fleeting, out-of-body thought crosses my adrenalised synapses:Me and Sabrina are having a fight. This has never happened before. What do I do?
‘I was young and still working stuff out. I told my parents what they wanted to hear.’
‘Oh, so they’re the ones you lied to?’ Sabrina snaps. ‘Or was it me? It can’t be both. You’re either bi or you’re not. Are yougoing to pin up porn with girls in it next? I honestly don’t know what to expect anymore.’
She’s as merciless as the night she broke up with Shane.
‘No. I’m not bi. Why is this a big deal to you?’
‘Oh, don’t act like you didn’t rip my heart out that day!’ Sabrina cries. ‘I accepted it. You weren’t into women so that made it bearable. It wasn’t your fault you weren’t into me. Except, if you’re bi, all that was horseshit, wasn’t it?’
‘Okay, you’re triggered,’ I mutter.
‘Don’t tell me about being triggered!’ Sabrina arcs up. ‘I studied psychology, not you. This is about trust. I can’t have a relationship with someone I can’t trust.’
The word hangs like an anvil suspended from the ceiling fan. ‘Wait,relationship?’
Sabrina shrugs. ‘Friendship. Relationship. You know what I mean.’
I hear my mother’s words from the revolving restaurant float back to me.She’s clearly still fond of you. You already live together. How much of a change would it really be?
‘Oh my God,’ I blurt out. ‘We’ve been acting like we’re a couple.’
Sabrina’s face is a mix of disgust and – unmistakably – guilt. Realising she can see it too makes me uncomfortable to my bones. Except for the lack of a sex life, we’ve gotten so comfortable we function like a straight couple. My Tom of Finland poster was one of the only visible signs we aren’t.
‘Don’t be silly.’ Sabrina staggers to a sentence. ‘This is about what I allow in my house. I don’t want to live with porn on the walls and that horrible app beeping.’
I swallow. ‘You mean Grindr?’
Sabrina winces like I just said ‘anus’ in the middle of church.
‘Yes,’ she mutters, shuddering. ‘I hear that little boop sound all the time. That’s all you ever do! Empty hookups with grossdirty guys who aren’t good enough for you. Zekey, you should bedating. A doctor or a scientist – someone as smart as you. You could find a much nicer person to have a meaningful relationship with.’
