“You like him then?”
“Yeah, I like him. Like I said, wish I didn’t. Was hoping he’d turn out to be an asshole so I could hate him but I can’t. He loves Benji how you love me. Completely. And the worst part is he’s good at it. He’s better at loving Benji than I am right now because Dante has never once introduced Benji as the help.”
“You gotta admit, that’s a low bar, Mickey.”
“I know it’s a low bar. That’s the point. The bar is on the ground and I still tripped over it. Benji told me something interesting about Dante once, though. He said Dante has a saying — that by the time someone gets close enough to shake his hand, Dante already knows exactly how he wants that person to feel about him.”
Tex stops chewing. “Damn,” he says. “That’s deep. I need to sit with that for a minute.”
“Yeah, it is.”
A lifeguard walks past the towels. Young guy, tan, broad-shouldered. He nods at them and keeps walking. Then Benji stands up, calls out to him and the lifeguard stops and comes back.
“What’s he doing?”
“Looks like he’s talking to the lifeguard,” Tex says.
Benji’s hands are moving. The animated gestures, the way his whole body leans forward when he’s interested in a conversation. His smile is visible from up here, wide and bright, the smile he turns on like a floodlight when he wants someone to feel like the most important person in the room. Then his hand reaches out and lands on the lifeguard’s forearm. It stays there.
“Now he’s openly flirting with the lifeguard,” I say.
“Looks like it.”
“He’s touching the lifeguard’s arm. He’s smiling at him. He’s doing the lean.”
“The lean? What’s that?”
“The forward lean. Where he tips his whole body toward you and his eyes lock on yours and you feel like nothing exists except the two of you. I know the lean, Tex. He did the lean on me in the hospital bed. He’s doing the lean on a twenty-three-year-old lifeguard on a public beach.”
“Didn’t we just discuss how Benji touches everyone? It’s not flirting. It’s Benji.”
“Looks like flirting to me.”
“Everything Benji does looks like flirting,” Tex says. “Benji ordering a sandwich looks like flirting. Benji asking for directions looks like flirting. The man has one setting and the setting is ‘I’m the most interesting person you’ll meet today and we both know it and isn’t that fun?’ That’s charisma.Besides, it’s no fun to flirt with the lifeguard when you’re heartbroken. The lifeguard is a prop. The audience is you.”
The lifeguard moves on. Then Benji lies back on the towel. Dante shakes his head and even from up here I can tell Dante is smiling. He reaches over and pushes Benji’s hair off his face.
“Look at them,” I say, waving a hand. “They touch each other constantly. Have you noticed that?”
“How could I miss it?” Tex says. “Their hands are all over each other. Dante keeps rubbing and rubbing that sunscreen.”
“It’s nonstop. Benji touches Dante’s arm when he talks. Dante fixes Benji’s hair without being asked. They lean into each other when they’re laughing. Benji puts his head on Dante’s shoulder. Dante steers Benji by the elbow through doorways. It’s like watching two bonded puppies who grew up in the same litter. They can’t be in the same room without some part of them touching some part of the other one. They’re so handsy.”
“Maybe it’s a Miami thing,” Tex suggests.
“It’s not a Miami thing. It’s a Benji and Dante thing. They’ve been doing it for seven years and they don’t even know they’re doing it. Or maybe it’s a Benji thing. He does it with everyone he cares about.”
“Not everyone,” Tex says. “He doesn’t do it with me.”
“Because you’re the size of a building and you’d crush him.”
“I would not crush him. I’m extremely gentle. Stormy will attest to my gentleness. I am the gentlest large man in the Florida Panhandle.”
“You cracked a man’s drywall with his own body.”
“That was a different context and a justified use of drywall. The point is, Benji and Dante touch each other like it’s breathing and you’re watching it from a window. It’s making you crazy because you want to be the one he’s reaching for.”
“I’m not crazy. Can you imagine if we did that? You and me? If we touched each other the way Benji and Dante do?”
