Night In Heaven

I was with him last night and I don’t understand what happened. Of course my first inclination is that he is gay but in denial. Not that that’s a bad thing. It is, however, a waste of my time. It’s 2020 and we live in New York City. Well he lives in Queens. I live in Brooklyn. Point is it’s okay to be gay. This isn’t Lawton, Oklahoma and it’s not 1957. I wish that I could have shook him and said “Just figure out who you actually are, god damn it!”
Of course he claimed that he was just tired. I offered him sex twice! I said it out loud: “We can have sex if you want.” Both times: “No. I’m tired. Sorry. I think I’m good.” Like what the fuck is that?

I half expected to never hear from him after he walked me down to my Uber Pool the next morning. I had suggested that we get brunch - the appropriate, if not obligatory thing to do after a night of mild to moderate love making - but again got a: “No, I’m kinda tired. I think I’m good,” so I put my clothes on and pulled out my phone. The Uber Pool arrived and we kissed (both brief and rather dry) and I rode off into the blinding late May sunlight. That was Saturday.

Sunday evening, he texted me asking if I wanted to go to the Jim Henson exhibit the next weekend and I almost threw my phone across my shared workspace in frustration. It took me three hours to text him back. Luckily I had a wedding to go to so I instead recommended that we get dinner Friday night. He texted back “Sounds great!” Maybe he had just been tired. I’ve been there where I haven’t been in the mood. But most of the times I just go through the motions although I do recognize that it might be different for men. Like a lot of the time they are the ones doing more of the work.

A few of my friends were meeting in a bar to celebrate my friend John’s birthday and so I invited him to come along. I thought it would be fun!

Text message: “Hey, so sorry to do this but like I’m trying to be more honest about the things that make me uncomfortable and give me anxiety and I get uncomfortable and anxious around people that I do not know or like when they are in large groups of people that I do not know. So I think I’m going to have to pass. Sorry!”
Fine. Whatever. Anxiety sucks and I get that but also like what the fuck! So I suggested that we could maybe get dinner before. And then I could go to John’s birthday party. He said that sounded good and also said that I had come to Queens so much and that he would be happy to go to Brooklyn instead. So I recommended a spot (Sage, on Graham) and he texted “Great!”

I’m telling you this because I can’t tell him. Because I need to tell somebody my side of the story. Because I know that he’s out there wondering why things did not work out. And I guess my answer to that is that sometimes things don’t work out. And that if it feels like work on the ninth date (it did!) then there’s something wrong. Because I have spent enough time around my parents to know that it will reach a point where it will all feel like work, but it shouldn’t nine dates in.

We had one terrible date. We’ve texted a little bit since then. I think that’s going to be it. And it is.