Russel Middlebrook: Double Feature Part 8

"Before," he said. "In one of the other scenes."

Otto thought for a second. "Well," he said firmly, "if the director wants us to do that kind of thing now, he'll tell us."

I couldn't help but be reminded of how Kevin hadn't spoken up before, when this same guy had started picking on us "nerds." Sure, he'd hesitated, but then he'd joined right in. Otto, meanwhile, was completely immune to this kind of peer pressure.

Soon the cameras were rolling again, but this time none of the zombie-jocks b.u.mped me at all.

Later, during a break, Otto asked me, "So who's that guy?" "Who?" I said, even though I knew exactly who he meant.

"That guy we were talking to before."

"His name is Kevin. Didn't I introduce you?" "Yeah, you did. But who is he? How do you know him?" "He's just a friend." I thought for a second. "Well, actually, he used to be my boyfriend."

"That's the Kevin?" At camp, I'd told Otto all about him.

116 "Uh, yeah."

"I thought you weren't talking to him anymore. That he didn't want to come out, so that made it impossible." Apparently, I'd told Otto all about him. I'd forgotten that.

"Oh," I said. "Yeah. Well, we weren't talking, not until he signed up to be an extra in the movie too. Then we started talking again."

"Doesn't he worry about being seen with you?" What was with the third degree from Otto? But of course I knew.

"Um, Kevin came out," I admitted.

"When was this?"

"Just last week, actually."

Otto didn't say anything for a second. I could tell he was surprised.

"Why didn't you tell me any of this?" he said at last.

Why hadn't I told him any of this? At first it was because I wasn't sure if I still had feelings for Kevin, and I hadn't wanted to hurt Otto's feelings. But why hadn't it occurred to me that Otto was going to be a zombie extra too, so he'd eventually figure things out? I should have filled him in. Now I'd made him all suspicious.

"It just never came up," I said. "It's not any big deal."

This wasn't the whole truth. Then again, the issue here really wasn't Kevin. It was Otto, and the fact that he lived 117 so far away.

Otto stared at me. "Russel," he said, "what's going on?

I'm really trying not to be all clingy and insecure. But there's obviously something going on between you and Kevin that you're not telling me about."

"There's nothing going on!" I said. "It was all a misunderstanding!" Why was it that telling one sort-of lie always meant you had to tell a whole bunch more?

Otto sighed. "Okay, whatever. But that doesn't explain why you've been acting all distant."

I froze. How do you respond to the accusation that you're being distant without either (a) seeming more distant, or (b) confirming that you are being distant? But finally I nodded.

If there was any time for the truth, this was it.

"I'm just really sad that you have to leave," I said to Otto. "I can't get it out of my mind. You just got here! And I know it'll be months until I get to see you again. That is, if I ever get to see you again, which is going to be tough the way my parents are talking."

"Well, there's always next summer. I'll come back for camp."

"Next summer! That's forever."

"What are you saying?" Otto said. "You want to break up?"

118 "No!" I said. But I'd said it too loudly, like I was trying to convince myself along with Otto. "No," I said again. "Then what do you want?"

And that was the thing. I still didn't know. Which was totally unfair to Otto. How could I be honest with him when I still hadn't been honest with myself?

For the time being, I decided to change the subject.

"I want you, of course," I said. "It's this thing with my parents. It has me all mixed up."

Otto nodded sympathetically. "It's okay. I understand." But for the first time, I wondered if maybe he wasn't telling me the whole truth either.

That afternoon, production a.s.sistants shepherded us into the cafeteria for another shot. They divided us into groups of about five each according to our costumes and directed all of us to different lunch tables. A fake corpse lay limply on the top of each table.

I spotted Min on the other side of the room. They'd dressed her as a cheerleader again-a zombie-cheerleader, with green skin and blood-spattered pom-poms. I waved, but she was staring over at the band-geek table, so she didn't notice me.

The director spoke to us all, explaining how we were supposed to pretend to be chomping down on the fake corpse in front of us. Then Brad and Christy, the two 119 main characters, would come in and see us and say some dialogue. The scene was obviously a joke. It was supposed to be just like lunch at a normal high school, with all the jocks at one table, the cheerleaders at another table, the band geeks at another table, and the computer nerds at yet another table. Only the jocks and cheerleaders and band geeks and computer nerds are all zombies, and rather than eating lunches, we're eating human corpses. Get it?

"And make it real!" the director said. "Get right down into those corpses with your hands and faces!"

We did a rehearsal, then stood around waiting for Declan McDonnell and the actress playing Christy, and for the lighting designer to finish positioning the lights.

The only person I knew in my little cl.u.s.ter of computernerd zombies was Gunnar, which was just as well. I'd wanted to talk to him anyway.

"Here's a fun fact," Gunnar said, looking down at the corpse on our table. "The same company that makes many of Hollywood's fake corpses also makes a line of life-size s.e.x dolls."

I interrupted him. "Gunnar, I think I screwed up."

"Now what?" The makeup artist had made it look like someone had jammed a set of Dungeons and Dragons dice 120 into his forehead.

I told Gunnar about the conversation I'd had with Otto. "Oops," he said. "That's not good."

I appreciated his not saying "I told you so" about needing to figure out what I wanted before I said anything to Otto.

"So what do I do?" I asked. "What should I tell him?" But before he could say anything, the director called to us from over by the cameras. "Rolling!" he called. "And . . . action!" Brad and Christy had arrived.

Gunnar and I and the other computer-nerd zombies bent down and started pretending like we were eating the fake corpse. Ours was a middle-aged fat guy in gym shorts and a T-shirt-the gym instructor (a nice touch, I thought, since we were all computer nerds). The body smelled like latex and Vaseline, but it was eerily realistic-looking: wet and glistening. We could even dig in to actual plastic entrails.

For a second, I felt kind of stupid, smelling that latex and making growling noises that I knew no one would ever really hear.

But then a funny thing happened. I sort of got into the moment. We all looked pretty real, and the body did too. So suddenly I was a zombie. There was nothing I wanted more than to rip chunks of flesh off the luscious, b.l.o.o.d.y pile of fat in front of me. I even lifted a b.l.o.o.d.y arm and 121 started gnawing on it, growling all the while.

It's not like I have this secret hankering for human flesh.

Mostly I think it was just fun to not be me for a second. A minute or so later, the director said, "And . . . cut!

Excellent! Good work, zombies!"

And in a flash, I was my old, non-zombie self again. For better or for worse.

I looked over at Gunnar. "Well?" I asked him, meaning the question I'd asked him before, about what I should say to Otto.

He thought for a second. Then he said, "Tastes like chicken."

"Huh?"

He nodded down at the corpse. "The body?" Finally, I clued in. "Gunnar!" I whacked him on the shoulder. But I laughed too.

"So," he said at last. "You're asking me for relationship advice yet again, huh?"

"Yes," I said, "and I'd appreciate it if this time you skipped the little happy dance and we went right to the advice.

You're two for two right now, you know. Don't blow it." "Well, you're in luck. Because I figured you'd come to me for advice again, so I prepared. How about, 'Love is a great risk, but not loving is the even greater risk'? Or, 'To 122 live without love is not really to live at all.' "

"What'd you do?" I said. "Break open a bunch of fortune cookies?"

"Yeah, actually. But I also thought of a story to tell you."

I sighed. "Okay, let's hear it." But to tell the truth, Gunnar was making me smile, as usual.

"You know how my family always goes to Echo Lake for vacation?"

I nodded. This was a little lake with cabins about a hundred miles from where we lived.

"Well," he went on, "a couple of years ago, I was up there, and I decided to go for a walk in the woods by myself. Stupid, I know, but I was fourteen, so what can you do? Anyway, the trail was really faint, but I kept walking all afternoon. Finally, I decided to turn around, but almost immediately I came to this fork in the trail. I didn't remember any fork in the trail, so I started to panic. Which was the way home? I didn't know. The two paths looked exactly the same."

"So what did you do?" I said.

"Well, I knew that buried somewhere in my head was the right answer. And if it wasn't, maybe there was some force outside myself-G.o.d or the spirit of the forest or whatever- who could give me the answer. So I cleared my head and stared at the two trails. I stood there for the longest time. 123 And finally I knew. I went down the trail on the right." "And you'd picked the right one."

"Nah," Gunnar said, "I picked wrong. I ended up in this nettles patch, and that was the time I got those ticks, and then later I got sick, and I was sure I had Lyme disease." "Gunnar!" I cried. "What kind of story is that! You picked the wrong trail?"

"Did I?" Gunnar said. "I'm standing here, aren't I?"

I stared at him. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, obviously I made it back to the cabins. I lived, right?"

"Yeah, but you walked through nettles and ticks, and you thought you had Lyme disease! If you'd gone the other way, none of that would have happened."

"Oh, yeah, the other path would have been a much better choice. But at least I picked one. Because if I hadn't, I'd still be standing up in those woods."

Finally, I saw what he was getting at. Sometimes there's a choice you don't think about-the choice of whether or not to decide. At this point, one way or another, I finally had to decide between Otto and Kevin.

I had to admit it once and for all: Gunnar gave d.a.m.n good advice.

124.

Kevin or Otto. Why couldn't I decide? Well, because it was a hard decision, that's why! Give me a break.

But I had to decide. Gunnar was right about that.

I loved Otto. He was right for me. That was obvious whenever I spent time with him. And he was such a thoroughly decent guy, the kind of guy who always did the right thing, which was no small matter when it came to boyfriends. But the big "but" was that he lived eight hundred miles away. When you thought about it, that made him not much of a boyfriend at all. He was more like a character in a book-someone you "love," but can't cuddle up to.

Meanwhile, Kevin was real. Maybe the only reason I wasn't choosing him was because I didn't want to feel guilty about Otto. But guilt was no reason to stay together with a guy. On the other hand, Kevin was flawed. He was charming and handsome, which are not the worst boyfriend-qualities in the world, but he wasn't strong. I'd trusted him once before, and he'd really jerked me around. Sure, he'd come out to the whole school, but when push came to shove, he usually didn't do the right thing.

I knew what I needed to do. I had to talk with Declan McDonnell. Yes, I wanted just to bask in his presence again. But I also wanted to ask him what to do. He'd already proven to be pretty wise, my own bathroom angel. 125 He alone would have the answer I sought. (And maybe he could also tell me what the h.e.l.l a "brain zombie" was!) I went back to the restroom where we'd met those two times before. This time I was certain that he would be there.

He wasn't. I was all alone.

"Great," I said out loud. "Just great." It echoed off the cold tile. Well, at least I could try again later in the day.

I turned to go, but as I did, I caught a glimpse of something along the wall.

A zombie watched me gloomily.

It wasn't Declan McDonnell or one of the other zombie extras. It was me, in full zombie makeup, reflected in one of the bathroom's cracked and cloudy mirrors.

And that's when I knew the answer. Otto or Kevin? It was so obvious!

I had to tell the guy I had chosen. But I couldn't do it at the film shoot, with other people around. No, I'd do it that night, when we could meet and finally have some time alone.

There was just one problem. It happened when I got home that night, right after the film shoot. My parents were in the kitchen eating ribs from a bucket. Their fingers and faces 126 were covered with barbecue sauce. I hadn't wanted to join them, but I did have to eat.

"Where were you?" my dad asked.

"What do you mean?" I said. "You know where I was. I was on the movie set."

"I don't mean that. I mean last night."

"Last night? You know that too. I was over at Gunnar's." "Who else was over at Gunnar's?"

"What do you mean?" I was trying to evade the question again, but I was pretty sure where this was heading: my parents had learned about Otto. I guess their sources of information were moving faster now. It had taken them eight months to learn that I was gay, but only three days to figure out that Otto was in town against their wishes.

My mom slapped the table. "d.a.m.n it, Russel! Tell us the truth!"

"Okay, okay," I said. Like I said, I didn't lie to my parents. "We'd been planning this visit for months," I went on. "But at the last minute, you say he can't stay here. Fine. Well, he isn't staying here. You didn't say he couldn't stay at Gunnar's. And even if you had, I don't see what business that is of yours."

My parents stood up from the table at exactly the same time.