I eat the cheese.
“You should try this properly,” Diego tells me, and begins layering a cracker with a fruit spread and prosciutto and Brie. I eat that too.
It’s been a long time since I kept kosher. Almost as long as it’s been since I felt bad about breaking kosher—which says a lot, I think, about how nervous it makes me to be back in New York. But it’ll be worth it, of course. It’s got to be. I’ll have the chance to work with Wyatt Cole, who is only my single most favorite photographer of all time.
And it’s easy, here with Ophelia and Diego, to forget everything else I’m afraid of. I used to dream about living in a place like this, with people like this. I sat through classes with my books open but my mind among the stars, fantasizing about eating cold pizza on the floor and watching bad sitcoms with friends who didn’t care what religion the protagonists were or what gender they preferred to kiss. But even in my most florid fantasies I didn’t imagine Diego’s hot-pink stiletto nails or Ophelia’s taste forambient music that sounds like a slowly evolving minimalist tone but turns out to be the Windows start-up chime played in slow motion.
“This is the sound they play when you die,” Diego says.
“You’re fucking weird,” says Ophelia.
They’re both fucking weird, but it turns out I like that. “Fucking weird” is what I thought I’d be when I moved out to LA—as if living on the West Coast would somehow transform me into a svelte and sun-glazed bohemian with too much style and too little money. Instead I just turned into one of the emaciated Venice Beach junkies who used to beg me for cash when I first moved there.
It took me four years to crawl my way back out of that hole. But ever since getting clean, I’ve existed in this liminal space where I’m afraid to have a personality, like if I think too hard or feel too deeply I’ll find myself spiraling down, down, and this time I won’t come back up again.
“It’s the sound that Quicksilver hears when he starts up his computer,” I suggest, and Ophelia smacks both hands down hard on the island, the sound loud enough that I jump.
“Oh my god,” she says, her voice rising in pitch. “Finally.Finally.”
“Um…?”
“Ophelia’s been pining for an X-Men nerd to come into her life for like three years,” Diego informs me.
Ophelia nods effusively. “Yes. Diego literally couldn’t tell you the difference between Magneto and the Juggernaut. I’ve been dying here.”
I lift a brow, and—in the end—I just can’t help myself. “One’s a tormented antihero fighting for social justice,” I say. “And the other isthe Juggernaut, bitch.”
This earns me another screech from Ophelia and a hearty eye roll from Diego, who covers his face with both hands like he’s in physical pain.
“Sorry, Diego, normies wouldn’t get it,” Ophelia declares. “So exactly how many arguments did you get into on Tumblr about whether or not Erik could have controlled the direction of the bullet that paralyzed Charles inFirst Class?”
“At least three,” I say. “I also wrote a forty-chapterPhantom of the Operacrossover fan fiction starring Magneto as the shadowy opera ghost.”
“Wait,I’ve read that one,” Ophelia says, jabbing a finger toward me. “That was you? No shit!”
I make a face. “To my great shame.”
“No, shut up. I commented on likeeveryupdate. You aren’t allowed to be embarrassed.”
Diego groans loudly. “Please stop talking about bad comic book movies. I literally cannot stand another second of this.”
“We’re actually talking about a fan fiction crossover ofgreatcomic book movies and Broadway musicals—” Ophelia starts, but she’s interrupted by a piece of prosciutto flung in her face.
Dinner ends up being a mishmash of Diego’s cheese-and-pork towers plus some leftover lo mein and a rather impressively green salad that Ophelia concocts out of lettuce, scallions, cucumber, and a slightly overripe avocado. I’ve never been happier to consume what I imagine “college food” would have looked like if I’d ever actually attended college and explored its culinary idiosyncrasies.
“We have to go out,” Diego declares once dinner is finished and the dishes are cleaned and it’s getting close to the time that I would normally start making excuses to turn in, especially with tomorrow being my first day at Parker. “It’s Ely’s first night here; she needs to go to Revel.”
“Right,” Ophelia says, “it’s Ely’sfirst night here. She doesnotneed to go to Revel.”
“What’s Revel?” I ask from my spot on the sofa, where I have beached myself for the past half hour, still waiting for my overstuffed stomach to deflate.
Diego fixes me with his laser gaze, which is extra piercing thanks to his lime-green mascara. “You’re gay, right?” he asks.
“I…”
Ophelia grimaces and says, “You don’t have to suffer the Inquisition if you don’t want to, Ely. Say the word and we can punt Diego safely back into his bedroom where he can’t bother anyone.”
“Do you like guys? Girls? Hot nonbinary people with lots of piercings? All of the above?Noneof the above?”
