THE IT PARADE
BY
J
INX
W
IATT
Â
Fill in the Blanks
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It used to be so easy for the caddish man who got the heave-ho. He'd eitherplay house with the woman (usually a slut) who got him kicked out in the first place, or he'd crash on the couch of a buddy (usually a creep that the girlfriend/wife hated) who waxed lyrical on the glories of single guydom. America's jilted prince (his heiress wife said good-byeand amen) chose a more complicatedsituation with door number three: Bunking with the gay friend who openly swoons over him. Only in the new millennium, darlings.
19
Finn
“Tilly kicked me out,” Dean Paul said, his voice casual and lacking any emotion. He could have just as easily announced, “Tilly gave me a sweater for my birthday.”
Finn hung on the line, suddenly seized by an intense anxiety.What upended him the most was the immediate sense of the unknown.
They had a routineâFinn and Dean Paulâbuilt around Dean Paul's
Hollywood Live
gig and his marriage to Tilly.When they talked, when they worked out, when they grabbed lunchâit was all dictated by Dean Paul, and Finn always made himselfavailable to take advantage of his company.
Finn's reaction to this announcement that the inevitably doomed marriage had become an imminently doomed one was fear. After all, their friendship had been sealed in the crucibleof Tilly's insistence that Dean Paul relinquish his ties to his carousing straight buddies. With Tilly out of the picture and Dean Paul's notorious history of forming attachments and then moving on with little remorse, the possibility for the whole connection to evaporate was there.
This scenario swirled inside Finn's mind as he hesitated, searching for the right words. Finally, he spoke. “Are you okay? Do you want to meet for a drink and talk about it?”
“Yeah, that sounds good,” Dean Paul said. But his tone was mocking. “Will you hold my hand and encourage me to
feel the pain
?”
Finn felt stupid. And Dean Paul had an uncanny knack for making him feel that way. “Your wife just dumped you. I thought you might be upset. For a minute there I forgot about what an incredible asshole you are.”
Dean Paul laughed. “I need a place to crash for a couple of days. Do you mind?”
Finn's heartbeat picked up speed. “You want to stay with me?”
“If it's inconvenient, I can just go to a hotel.”
“No!” Finn exclaimed, his protest coming out far more desperate than he intended.
“Okay, calm down, I'll stay with you. Jesus.”
“No ... I mean ... it's no inconvenience. Really.”
“Good. Because I'm right outside your building.”
Finn rushed to the window and gazed down.
There, sixteen floors below, standing on the sidewalk with an overnight bag in his hand, was Dean Paul Lockhart.
Finn experienced a moment of pure rapture, though he felt positively imbecilic as a result. He was a well-educated man who had traveled all over the world. That this could be the most fantastic thing he had ever seen in his lifetime just seemed pathetic. But it truly was.
“Can you handle it?” Dean Paul asked.
As he watched him from above, Finn touched the windowpane,downright giddy over the fact that Dean Paul had come to him in crisis. “Handle what?”
“Me sleeping in the next room.”
“I'll try to manage.”
“Just in case you can't control yourself, I'm sleeping with a Taser gun.”
“Hey, that sounds like kinky fun. Come on up.” Finn disconnectedthe call, then tidied up the apartment in a mad frenzy until the fateful sound of three loud knocks rapped the door.
Finn sucked in a deep breath and stepped over to open it. “Just so you knowâyou're not the first unhappily married man to show up here unannounced.”
Dean Paul smiled. “Oh, I have no doubt.” He walked inside,surveying the sixties mod décor with an affirmative nod. “Nice place.”
“Thanks.”
“I can't believe I've never been up here.”
“Well, consider it home.”
Dean Paul gave him a strange look.
“For as long as you want to stay,” Finn clarified.
“That's sweet. Does a robe come with that? Maybe a pair of slippers?”
“Okay, dickhead, I give up. The study's all yours. You'll have to move the desk to fold out the sofa bed. Sheets and blankets are in the hall closet.”
Dean Paul stepped toward the bedroom and peeked inside.“Is that a queen size bed?”
Finn gave him a fuck you smile. “What else?”
“It looks comfortable. What's the problem? You can't share a bed with me and keep your hands to yourself at the same time?”
Finn regarded Dean Paul carefully, stunned to discover that he appeared to be serious.“You want to sleep in the same bed?”
“I don't
want
to, necessarily, but it sure beats a lumpy sofa bed.”
Finn fought to contain his excitement and delight over the idea. In a faux display of no-big-deal, he shrugged. “It's fine with me.” One beat. “Unless you snore, of course.”
Dean Paul shook his head. “You won't even know I'm there.”
Hardly
. Finn knew that the proximity alone would keep him up all night. “Okay.”
Dean Paul broke out into a gotcha smile. His teeth gleamed. “Dude, I'm not going to sleep with you.”
Finn fought a superhuman battle not to let his disappointmentshow.
“The sofa's fine,” Dean Paul went on. “I'll already be makingone of your dreams come true by staying over. Two would just be spoiling you rotten.” He laughed at his own joke. “I need to get hammered. What do you have to drink?”
“Vodka.” He glanced over at the near-empty bar. “And more vodka.”
“That'll get the job done,” Dean Paul said. He dropped his bag with a thud and kicked back on the living room couch with a frustrated sigh. “This won't be a clean break like the last time. I said good-bye to Aspen and never had to look back. But I've got a kid with Tilly. I'm always going to be linked to that crazy bitch.”
Finn busied himself prepping a batch of dirty martinis. “Were you asking for it?”
“Asking for what?”
“For her to tell you to leave.” He dashed into the kitchen for ice and proceeded to shake up the night's poison, not bothering to talk over the ear-piercing rattle. When he finished,he went on. “The scene at the club with that girl ... well, let's just say it was anything but discreet.”
“Nothing happened. I barely dry-humped her.”
“And if Tilly hadn't shown up ... would it have ended there?” He poured, garnished each drink with a plump green olive, and headed over to the couch.
“Whose side are you on?” Dean Paul asked. He impatientlytook possession of the martini and started to drink fast. “By the way, don't sit down yet.You might as well make me another one before you get settled.”
“I'm on the side of logic,” Finn said as he doubled back to the bar. He returned with a half-full bottle of Pravda and a shot glass. “There. My bartending skills would be wasted on you tonight anyway.”
“So you think I asked for it? Where's your sense of male solidarity? Wait a minute. Don't answer that.”
Finn glanced at the coffee table and zeroed in on Benji's sleek mobile phone, the one with the damning video of Dean Paul dirty dancing with Juicy, the one he had confiscated in exchange for the promise to help reintroduce Benji to the New York social scene and media influentials as something more than an opportunistic fraud. He reached for the device and played the little movie.
“How many times have you rubbed one out to that?” Dean Paul asked.
“You stupid fucker!” Finn roared. “If I hadn't stepped in, that shit would be all over You Tube and TMZ and every trashy entertainment show!”
Dean Paul laughed. “Play it again.”
Finn rolled his eyes and did the honors.
“Man, I look pretty out of it,” Dean Paul commented, watching himself with a smug sense of marvel. “She's hot, though. I should've fucked her.” He finished the martini, ate the olive, and poured a generous shot of vodka. “I mean, same end result and everything.You know?”
Finn slammed the phone shut and tossed it back onto the coffee table.
“Who is she anyway?”
“As I understand it, her name's Juicy.”
“And I bet she is. Get her number for me. I won't let you watch, but I'll give you a detailed play-by-play.”
“So I'm already your hotel and your bartender, and now you expect me to be your pimp,” Finn said. The sick part was that he was already factoring out in his mind how to track down Juicy.
“I know you want to be everything in the world to me, dude. I'm just giving you a chance. Take advantage of it while you can.”
Finn tried to give Dean Paul a serious stare. But sometimesit was difficult to gaze too long. He was not merely good-looking or even exceptionally handsome. The man was beautiful. And with his naturally tousled hair, three-day beard growth, wrinkled white Oxford, and lived-in jeans, he was putting forth zero effort to be that way. Which made him even more gorgeous.
There was the rare benefit of no distractions tonight. Finn decided to take advantage of
that
. “Why do you say those things?” he asked.
“What things?”
“You're always putting it out there that I'm obsessed with you and just praying for the day.”
He gave Finn an annoyed look. “It's called a joke. I thought you could take one. My mistake.”
“But it's a joke that never seems to end,” Finn continued. “Sometimes it's funny. I mean, I can get a laugh out of it, too. But ... sometimes I get the sense that you think of
me
as the joke. Like I'm just a stupid faggot.”
“What are you talking about?”There was a wounded expressionin Dean Paul's piercing blue eyes. “I never think of you that way.You're my best ... you're a friend.”
Finn's feelings were all over the place. He loved Dean Paul deeply ... as a friend ... and as someone more than that. The unrequited aspect was something that would probably never die. But hearing Dean Paul almost slip and utter the qualifier
best
in front of friend filled Finn with an almost nurturing sense of joy and pride.
“Don't pay attention to most of the shit I say,” Dean Paul went on. “Sometimes I talk just to fill the airspace.” He tossed back the first shot and poured another one. “I didn't realize it bothered you that much.”
“Usually, it doesn't.”
“I see the way you look at me sometimes, and it's not the way that a buddy looks at another buddy. Joking about it helps me deal. Takes the edge off, I guess.”
Finn could feel his face grow hot. His cheeks were burningwith embarrassment.
“I joke about it, but I'm not making fun of you.Well, I am, I guess. But not in a mean way. Does that make any sense?”
“You're being sensitively insensitive,” Finn said.
“Yeah ...
sensitively insensitive
... that's me. I talk smack to you, but I don't feel any attraction at all. I've never even been curious.”
Finn had drained most of the martini and in spite of the awkwardness could feel himself start to relax.
Dean Paul laughed. “I can't believe this shit.”
“What?”
“My wife kicks me out, and we're sitting here tiptoeing around your schoolgirl crush.”
“Actually, you've made more references to that tonight than you have to Tilly, so I figured ...”
“That I'd come rushing into your arms?”
Finn gave him a weary look. “Okay, let's talk about Tilly.”
Dean Paul waved off the notion as he poured a third shot. “Fuck that. I'm over it.” He chased down the vodka. “Everybody'sgiving me a chance to start over.”
“What do you mean by everybody?”
“Tilly dumped me.
Hollywood Live
fired me. I'm a free agent all the way around.”
Finn lurched forward in alarm. “When did that happen?”
“This morning,” Dean Paul said easily. “Today was a one-twopunch.” He seemed to be considering a fourth shot but made no move for it. “The show's tanking fast. It's probably a good thing not to be around when it officially dies.”