Let's Be Mature About This BN (2 page)

He's twenty-friggin'-nine-years-old?! That's a skip away from 30! When I was in second grade he was, like, a senior in high school! Even now I'm barely legal. I'm just an innocent little 19 year old girl! 

Maybe I'm just overreacting. I have a knack for over thinking things. It's not that big of an age difference. Ten years. I'm a pretty mature person, where it counts.

I handed him back his license and started scanning the other items. Toothpaste, grapes, cat food? He has a cat?

"So, you have a cat." I stated dejectedly.

"Yes," he beamed, "Her name's Belle."

I have no idea what look I gave him because I was talking to myself in my head. What grown man has a cat? Oh, a sensitive man. A sweet, sweet man. Sweet like some sort of, well, a fruit. But that's jumping to conclusions, I thought. That really is unfair. Just because he owns a cat named after a Disney princess doesn't necessarily mean that he...

"I'll take this, too." Gavin tossed
Cosmopolitan
magazine onto the conveyor belt. One of the blurbs on the cover read "10 SHOCKING TRUTHS ABOUT GUYS & SEX!"

He's gay. GAY GAY GAY! That was how I found out that he was an old gay man. The end. But just to rub it in my face, after he paid for his groceries he turns and says to me, "I still owe you that dinner." What do you think I said?

"I'm really busy, actually. I'm a pre-med student so, you know how it is."

His lips bent into a heart wrenching, disappointed little frown. "Maybe next time." He winked at me and exited the store. The dude
winked
at me. How creepy is that? Well I wasn't totally lying. I
am
a pre-med student. But I'm actually smarter than I look so I was already done with any schoolwork. I just couldn't bear to sit across from him at a table in some restaurant and look him in those dreamy green eyes knowing it was all just so impossible!

CHAPTER TWO

And here he is again today, dressed very casually in a red t-shirt, black board shorts and red and black flip flops. What is he doing here in the middle of the week? I suppose his weekends have picked up some momentum, what with all the gay bars in the city to attend. Even though I know what I know, my heart still fluttered when our eyes met. "Hey Sydney. How are you?"

"I'm good Mr. Caselle. How are you?"

He gave me a funny look. "Mister? You can call me Gavin. It's much more personal," he said giving me a little smirk, his green eyes twinkling. Alright old man, time to set you straight, so to speak.

"Well, you're almost thirty years old and I'm a vibrant young nineteen-year-old girl so I thought Mr. Caselle would be a respectful title."

Did you sense a little bit of anger in that statement? That's what I was going for.

He seemed to contemplate the idea that he was old for a moment. Then he frowned a bit after realizing his oldness. Then he changed the subject away from his antiquity. "So, what are you secretly reading under the counter?" I raise an annoyed eyebrow at him. "I'm asking because I'm a bookworm. And I'm nosy."

I decided that it was a good time to startle a Caucasian. I slowly raised
Thug Luv
II: Treyvon's Release
from its hiding place for Gavin to see. The front cover displayed an extremely well-built and well-oiled black man shackled at his ankles, wearing an orange prison jumpsuit that seemed to have burst open under the strain to reveal his shining chest and chiseled abs. My plan to startle him backfired. Gavin busted out laughing.

What the hell? Why didn't he fidget around nervously and try desperately to peel his eyes away from the greased up body builder on the cover while muttering incoherently? That's what the other Caucasians did. Oooh, I almost forgot. Perhaps because he's the type of person who would
enjoy
a well-built man.

"You're not seriously reading that are you?," he questioned.

"Why yes, these are my favorite novels. I love to see Black ghetto love glorified through the literary arts," I replied sounding like an apathetic cyborg.

He chuckled. "I'm sure it's pretty, uh, amusing."

It was refreshing to see that he didn't actually think I was reading the book for any life and romance tips. I decided to have a conversation with him and to sound like a human being this time.

"It's quite amusing to say the least. Kind of like watching a bad movie. You should read
Thug Luv I
."

"Yeah, my friends won't find that queer at all," he said sarcastically.

Gavin added a
Cosmo
magazine to his purchases again. "It's for work," he said. "I work in advertising so I like to see what the competition is dishing out."

"Oh. Sooo, you're not reading it for the sex advice?"

His eyebrows raised in amusement. "Oh! Welllll...actually, sometimes, when I'm alone, I use them...on myself."

It took a few seconds for me to realize that he was kidding. And that he wasn't gay. Then we shared a good laugh. He's still old, I thought, but he's a nice funny man. I guess I shouldn't judge a book by its old, dusty, ancient cover. Who am I kidding? He looks my age!

"Gavin, your total is $33.68." He handed me a fifty, I gave him his change and his receipt.

"Thanks for calling me Gavin and not Mister," he smiled and grabbed a pen from the counter to scribble something on the back of his receipt. "That way when you call me to take you to dinner I won't hang up on you thinking you're a bill collector." He handed me the receipt. It had a phone number on it. And after being so forward about taking me to dinner he gave me a shy smile and left the store.

***

"Elizabeth, it's no big deal!" I whined. She whipped around to glare at me and then continued chopping celery at the kitchen counter. So domestic.

"Gaahh!" baby Sara announced as I bounced her on my lap.

"See, even Sara agrees,” said Elizabeth. “Why won't you let yourself feel happy and excited about something, Syd? Be a dreamer for once!"

"I am! Every night. Then when I wake up from being a dreamer, get out of bed and go out into the real world, it helps to use some rational thought."

"Rational? So you're going to just be miserable until the day you croak? Seems more rational to spend your time wisely, enjoy yourself while you're young, and stop making so many excuses."

"I'm not like you, okay? I'm not ready to just rush in on life. I don't want to run off and get eloped and start a family like you and Evan did."

"Who the hell said you had to marry the guy!"

I covered little Sara's ears from her mother's profanations.

My best friend Elizabeth was only eighteen when she married her high school sweetheart Evan. Trust me, I told her not to do it. I told her to give it some time, but she did what she wanted to do. So here she is, nineteen and a stay-at-home mom. Even though I shudder at the thought of having a baby to take care of and a husband to submit to, I can't help but be a little jealous of her and Evan's relationship. I never had a high school sweetheart. I've never been as happy as Elizabeth seems to be.

I run my hand through Sara's soft baby hair. She coos and tries to gnaw on the pointer finger of my other hand that is holding her middle. She has the same dark skin as her dad. Her mom is extremely light skinned. I'm coffee with a little cream. Sara is my goddaughter and I love her very much. I just don't want to have kids. Ever.

"Earth to Sydney!"

"What do you want from me, woman!"

"I just..." Elizabeth walks out of the kitchen wiping her hands on a dish towel. "It's just that I think you spend way too much time...alone. I want you to get out there and meet people. This Gavin guy sounds really interesting. You could learn a lot from him. Call him."

"I know. I should respect my elders. I'll call him tonight."

Elizabeth rolled her eyes at me. "Ten years is not that bad."

"Yeah? Just wait until an eighteen-year-old Sara brings home 28-year-old Dirk." The frightened look on Elizabeth's face was priceless.

"Anyways, call him now. It's Saturday. I know you don't have any plans."

"Um, I'd rather call him in the privacy of my own home."

"Whatever, just do it!"

"Thanks Nike. I'm gonna go home now." I kiss Sara on her round cheek and lay her down into her baby bouncer seat. I hug Elizabeth and head out.

"Call and give me an update tomorrow!"

I respond with a grumble and leave Elizabeth's cute little house and out the white picket fence to my car.

I sat inside my red Honda Fit and let the tears cascade down my face. Now, I'm not usually a crybaby. The last time I cried was when I was sixteen and my grandmother passed away. I was crying because at that moment I knew without a doubt that my life as I've known it was going to end. Things were going to change and I never handled change well in my life. I always fought it stubbornly until the bitter end. It's not a fear of growing up. It's a fear of losing myself. Even if the way I've been living my life, apathetic, passionless, and "being realistic" for almost two decades was wrong, it was so hard to let it go to be a different happy person. My attitude had become a bad habit that was hard to quit.

Gavin stirred up strong emotions in me. And emotions, irrational little emotions, could lead me to huge mistakes. I could end up humiliated and alone if I fell for him. I'd rather be alone and still have some dignity. A guy can do some ghastly things to a girl. I've heard the stories. It might seem like I'm getting ahead of the situation because I don't even know if anything is going to happen between Gavin and me. But the fact that I'm sitting in my car crying and worrying about it seems to suggest that there's kind of a big possibility.