Getting It (3 page)

In the middle of the playground, amid the brown-skinned Mexican families, Carlos noticed a pair of white adult guys with an Asian toddler girl.

“I think they're
maricones,”
his pa muttered as he sat beside Carlos on the bench.

His pas Spanish word for “queer” made Carlos recall Sal and the wild idea of asking for his help with Roxy. Maybe he should ask his pa what he thought.

“Do you, um, know anyone who's gay?”

“No.” His pa crossed his arms, giving Carlos a sidelong glance. “Why would I?”

His pa often got macho that way—like the time his ma had tried to teach Carlos how to resew a loose button on a shirt, causing his pa to protest, “You trying to turn him into a girl?”

Recalling that, Carlos decided best not to mention Sal. Nonetheless, the makeover idea kept worming its way through his brain.

A
S THE WEEKEND
progressed, Carlos began pondering: If he were to approach Sal, how could he do so without anybody seeing him? After all, probably part of the reason Sal always hung with girls was because no guy wanted to be caught talking to him—at least no
straight
guy

At school on Monday, Carlos began tracking Sal's moves, piecing together his schedule. Sal's bold-colored shirts—magenta, turquoise, pink—and shiny hoop earrings made him easy to follow down hallways. Every so often, Carlos thought he saw Sal glance over his shoulder and spot him, but Carlos quickly ducked away By week's end, he had Sal's schedule down pat, but he still couldn't pick out a good time or place to talk without someone seeing him.

He noticed, however, that after last period Sal walked home alone. As Carlos's bus drove past, he watched Sal turn down a side street only three blocks away from school.

The following day, when the final bell rang, Carlos told his friends he was staying after school.

“What for?” Playboy asked, his eyebrows arched in curiosity.

“I've got to do something.” Carlos gave an evasive shrug. “That's all.”

“Like what?” Pulga extended a bag of caramel popcorn toward Carlos, as if bribing him to tell them.

“Um, nothing.” Carlos took some popcorn and tried looking away, but his three friends had surrounded him. “Just something for school.”

“Is it some sort of secret?” Toro dug into Pulga's bag of popcorn.

“No, its just—it's not important.”

“Then what is it?” Playboy insisted with a burp.

“Nothing, I told you!” Carlos shifted his feet, worried he'd lose Sal. “You're going to miss your bus.”

His buds exchanged confused glances, then Playboy said, “Dude, you're really getting weird,” before the three of them headed toward their bus.

Quickly, Carlos hustled in the opposite direction and out the main door, blending into the students walking home.

He easily trailed Sal's bright lime-colored shirt. Sal seemed to glance over his shoulder once, but Carlos quickly hid his head inside his hoodie and waited for Sal to turn the corner. Once off the main street, Carlos reasoned, they could talk without anyone from school seeing.

When Sal turned onto the side street, disappearing behind a tall hedge, Carlos made his move. He sprinted to catch up, but when he turned the corner, Sal was nowhere in sight.

Carlos stopped and caught his breath. He gazed down the empty street of quiet houses and parked cars. Where could Sal have gone?

Behind him, the bushes rustled. As Carlos turned, Sal slammed into him, tackling him at the waist. Carlos sprawled onto the grass, the breath knocked out of him.

Next thing Carlos knew, he was flipped over, his pack jabbing into his back, his arms pinned to the ground. Sal sat astride his chest, shouting, “Tell me why you're following me!”

“Let me go!” Carlos gasped, struggling to push Sal off.

But Sal pressed down harder on his arms. “Tell me!”

Pain seared through Carlos's wrists as he strained to get free. “Get off!”

“No!” Sal refused to loosen his grip. “Not till you tell me!”

Carlos gazed up at Sal, confused by the situation. If Sal were gay, why wasn't he acting weak and girly? What if he
wasn't
gay? Clearly, Sal could beat the
caca
out of him.

Carlos stopped struggling. “I wanted to ask you something,” he muttered.

“Ask what?” Sal clamped down harder on Carlos's wrists.

Carlos groaned. In light of the circumstances, did he dare ask? “Are you really, um …” He hesitated before squeaking out, “gay?”

Sal stared at Carlos, frowned, and loosened his grip, rolling off Carlos. “Oh, God! Not
another
one.”

Carlos took a huge breath as Sal's weight left his chest. He quickly sat up and peered over at Sal. “Not another what?”

Sal propped himself up, then stood, dusting off his jeans. “Another so-called straight guy who wants a blow job. You're the third one this year. I'm not interested, okay? So leave me alone.”

“Huh?” Carlos scrambled to his feet, pulling his hood onto his head. “That's not what I want!”

Sal perched his hands on his hips and gazed at him dead-on. “Then what do you care if I'm gay or not?”

Carlos shifted his feet. Now that he actually stood face-to-face with Sal, the whole makeover idea seemed not only crazy, but embarrassingly stupid. Yet, given what Sal had thought Carlos wanted, he felt he had to explain himself. “It's just, um, I wanted to ask … if you could, um”—he cleared his throat—“help me?”

Sal gave him a long, steady look. Then his brow softened. “Look, dude,” he said gently. “If you think you're gay, you probably are. I can't tell you if you are or not. Join the Gay-Straight Alliance we're starting. That'll help you figure it out. In the meantime, try visiting some porn sites—gay ones and straight ones. Whichever turns you on more, that's probably what you are. Okay?”

“No!” Carlos protested. “That's not it! I
know
I'm straight.”

Sal threw his hands in the air. “Then what the hell do you want?”

Carlos answered slowly, trying to make his shaky voice sound confident. “Um, I want you to help me with, um … a girl … you know, to get her to like me.”

Sal gave Carlos a sideways stare, till finally he asked, “Are you for real? You're straight? And you want
me—
a gay guy—to help you get a girl?”

“Yeah.” Carlos shoved his hands into his pockets, feeling foolish.

Sal rubbed his chin as if doubting. “And you're
straight?”

“Yes!” Carlos felt like saying,
Forget it!
Instead he said, “You know, like on that show
Queer Guy”

“You mean
Queer Eye?”
Sal corrected. “Okay, let's say you are straight. And I should help you
because …?”

Carlos realized he'd never stopped to consider that. “Um, I guess … because … I need your help.”

“Right.” Sal smirked. “Just like you helped me last week in the cafeteria when your asshole friends gave me shit.”

Carlos gazed down at the ground. He didn't like Sal calling his buds assholes. “They didn't mean anything by it. They're good guys. They just act like that sometimes.”

“Oh, yeah?” Sal said. “Well, let me ask you something: Why should a girl like you when you just stand by, watching your friends act like jerks, and even defend them for it? Because you know what? That makes you a jerk too.”

Carlos stared down at his shoes. Sal was right: Why would any girl like him?

Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Sal turn away down the sidewalk. Then Carlos looked up and shouted,
“Please?”
He felt pathetic saying it, but if Sal didn't help him, who would?

As if reconsidering, Sal stopped in front of a ranch-style house and looked back at Carlos. But then he waved his arms, shooing him away “I told you, no!” He climbed the front steps and disappeared into the house, slamming the door.

Carlos waited several minutes, hoping Sal would come back out. Then he turned toward home. As he trudged the twenty blocks, squinting into the afternoon sun, he pondered his bleak life ahead, wondering: Was he destined to be a girlfriend-less virgin forever?

T
HE FOLLOWING DAY
at lunch, Playboy bragged about some girl who'd shown him her boobs on web-cam. But the blurry, depth-distorted photo on his cell phone made the breasts look more like a pair of pancakes.

“Hey,” Pulga commented with a burp, “that looks like my breakfast.”

“I wish I'd had her for breakfast,” Toro chimed in.

Abruptly, another boy's voice intervened: “Okay, I'll do it.”

Carlos sat up, stiff as a Popsicle. Sal loomed over their table, staring directly at him.

“On three conditions,” Sal continued. “First …” He held up his index finger. “You tell your creep friends here not to give me shit—ever again.”

Carlos felt his throat going dry. Didn't Sal realize this was supposed to be a secret?

“Second …” Sal added another finger. “It'll cost you six bucks an hour plus expenses. Believe me, I'm letting you off cheap. Start by bringing twenty bucks tomorrow. And most important”—Sal flicked out a third finger—“you help start our school's Gay-Straight Alliance.”

With the word “gay” all eyes turned to Carlos. He cringed, wanting to crawl beneath the lunch table.

“Now for your first lesson.” Sal dabbed a finger across the corner of his own lips. “When you're eating, wipe your mouth.”

Embarrassed, Carlos quickly swabbed his mouth with his sweatshirt
sleeve, smearing a mustard-yellow line across the olive green.

“Dude, not with your sleeve!” Sal groaned and spun around, shaking his head as he walked away.

When Carlos glanced back at his buds, their eyes were all trained on him.

“What's up with that?” Playboy's face scrunched up as if he'd eaten something sour.

“What're you paying him for?” Pulga scowled.

Toro leaned forward, whispering, “Are you friends with him?”

“N-n-no …” Carlos felt like a chicken bone had caught in his throat. “I just, um, asked him to help me with something.”

His three buds exchanged suspicious glances. “With what?” Pulga asked. “Getting BJs?”

“Shut up.” Carlos stared down at his tray

“Dude …” Playboy sounded concerned. “You're not turning queer on us, are you?”

“Fags are gross,” Pulga remarked, but then added, “although lesbians are cool.”

“I'm not turning queer.” Carlos crossed his arms.

Toro asked, “Then how come you're going to help start that gay club?”

“I'm not!” Carlos shot back.

“Pendejo,”
Playboy said solemnly, “you're holding out about something.”

For the first time, Carlos saw the hurt in his friends' eyes, and he couldn't blame them. The four of them had always known every secret about one another, no matter how personal: how Carlos's pa had ditched his ma for a younger woman; how Playboy had gotten crabs from a hookup last summer—and how he had to shave all his body hair to get rid of them; how Pulga had secretly tied a condom to the principal's retractable car antenna so it flapped in the breeze as he
pulled in and out of the faculty parking lot for three days before he noticed; how Toro had gotten noticeable wood during a wrestling match. How much more personal could you get?

Yet, this was different. How could Carlos explain that, when it came to girls, he felt like a hopeless loser compared to them?

“Look, I asked him to help me with a project, that's all. I'll tell you about it later. In the meantime, leave him alone, okay?”

His three friends looked at one another. No one said any more about the incident. When the boys boarded their bus that afternoon, Sal seemed forgotten. But on the ride home, Playboy sat farther away from Carlos than usual. Pulga didn't make any of his usual wisecracks about women in passing cars. And even when they pulled beside a convertible, allowing them to see straight down a woman's sizable cleavage, none of them went the remotest bit crazy.

A
S
C
ARLOS WALKED
home from the bus stop, about a billion questions bounced around in his brain. Should he tell his friends the truth about his makeover idea? What if they laughed at him? Why had Sal changed his mind? Was he planning to try something funny? He'd better not; Carlos only wanted his help to get a girl, nothing more. Also, what had Sal meant by expenses? And one more thing: What the hell was a Gay-Straight Alliance, anyway?

Upon getting home, Carlos grabbed some corn chips, cookies, and root beer. Then, out of curiosity, he did a web search on Gay-Straight Alliances—GSAs.

He spent over an hour reading about them. Apparently, they truly weren't gay clubs. They were supposed to “build understanding between straight and gay students” and “help address homophobic name-calling.” The groups sounded interesting, but when Carlos woke for school the following morning, he still couldn't decide whether to actually agree to Sal's terms.

Nevertheless, he searched for bills and coins beneath the piles of crap on his desk and dresser. Somehow, he managed to scrape together twenty bucks.

When the lunch bell rang, Carlos waited in the water fountain alcove outside the cafeteria, pulling his hood low over his brow so no one would recognize him, and pretended to get a drink. When he spotted Sal, Carlos signaled him.

“Um, here.” Carlos quickly shoved a fistful of coins and crumpled bills into Sal's hands.

“Don't you have a wallet?” Sal asked, unfolding each bill.

“Um, I don't really need one.” Usually, the only things Carlos carried in his pocket were his lunch card and school ID.

“Well, get one anyway,” Sal ordered. “You want girls to think you're poor? Wait, on second thought, I'd better help you pick one out. Let's get started this afternoon. I'll take the bus with you.”