You Are They

When Chris volunteered to clean up he didn’t expect it to take longer than an hour. Nick and him had been cleaning up vomit and beer cans for what felt like forever.

“Thanks again, Chris.” Nick said.

“Yeah, no problem.”

He glanced at the clock. It was 3 A.M. He had hoped to be asleep by now. If he hadn’t gone to the party at all he could’ve been asleep by 11. But he couldn’t just not go. Despite everything in him telling him he was going to have a terrible time he knew Nick would be upset if he didn’t. Nick was the only person who would invite him to a party. 

“Sure,” he had said to Nick when he’d first approached Chris, “I’d love to.” He wouldn’t really love to, but it was Nick. He couldn’t say no. And, of course, there was one other reason.

“Bella’s coming, too,” Nick said. Chris perked up. “I didn’t expect her to say yes, to be honest, I thought she hated me.” Chris nodded, not listening at all. He was busy pondering the opportunity he had before him: to talk to Bella.

“What about these lights?” Chris asked. “Should they come down, too?”

“Yeah, that’s probably a good idea.”

Nick always liked Chris. He thought Chris had a sort of spark you didn’t see in other kids on campus. Everyone was always tired or lazy or dumb or wasted or hungover. But Chris had interest, he had determination. If you caught him one on one, you could have a very insightful conversation. Nick’s invitation was an attempt to introduce Chris to the world around him.

“Really, dude? He’s so lame.” Mike was an athlete and musician. A prized soccer player who was trying to get his debut album out into the world. Nick and him had become friends over the past year or so.

“You just gotta give him a chance. I promise he’s cool.” Nick hoped he could leave Mike and Chris to talk while he finally made his move on Bella.

Mike let out a grunt of begrudged acceptance and continued to strum chords on his guitar.

“The T.V. was kind of old anyway, it doesn’t really matter.” Someone had smashed the screen at some point during the night. It was actually a fairly new T.V., but Nick didn’t want Chris to worry about it. “Just toss it in the dumpster out back.”

As Chris carried the T.V. down the stairs, he couldn’t help but think about all the chances he had to talk to Bella. He wanted to chuck the T.V. as far as he could. She sat there for a full hour doing nothing, he thought, I should’ve done something instead of sitting on my ass waiting for everyone to magically disappear. He had quite the habit of indecisiveness. He had, in fact, sat in the corner of the room continually glancing at Bella, waiting for the group of people around her to disperse so he could walk up to her alone. The crowd never left. He had another chance when she went to refill her drink, but by the time he made the leap of faith someone else appeared next to her: Nick. What the hell is he doing? Nick said something to her and smiled. Bella laughed. Chris sunk back in his chair. It was 1:30.

While Nick picked up paper plates, he wondered what Chris had been doing the whole night. He’d seen him sitting in one of the chairs in the corner around midnight.

“You wanna come outside?”

Chris was distracted by something at the other side of the room. “No, no. Maybe in a little bit.”

Nick spent most of the party out back. Chris never came. Why wouldn’t he come hang out? Nick went back inside about an hour later, finally talked with Bella (he thought he nailed it), and when he glanced at Chris’ chair he was gone. Nick searched his whole place but Chris was nowhere to be seen. He knew Chris would leave, it’s just his nature. I should’ve been more insistent. Nick was hoping he’d get the chance to show Chris how fun parties can be. He knew Chris just had to get comfortable in the environment. I guess it’s too late now.

“Where’d you go later on? I was looking all over for you.” 

Chris physically retracted upon hearing the question. He had just returned from his dumpster run. Nick knew the question was a risky one, Chris had a hard time with confrontation.

“I-uh, I dunno. Just around.” Chris’ eyes darted across the room. He made his way to the kitchen to find something else to clean up.

Upon finally understanding Nick’s true intentions behind inviting Bella, Chris escaped to the bathroom at 1:32 to regain some sense of sanity. He looked in the mirror and saw a loser. He probably looked like an idiot in that chair. Staring at Bella the whole time. Then Nick waltzed right in and swept her off her feet.

“You are they,” he said to his mirror self. A phrase his therapist told him. Everyone thinks the same way as you. Remember, you don’t criticize someone else as harsh as you do yourself, and it’s exactly the same for everybody else. He took a deep breath and spent a little while longer basking in the beauty of isolation. When he checked his phone, he realized he’d been in there for half an hour. “Holy shit.”

The doorknob was not cooperative with Chris, and when he finally got the door open he saw drunk couples and frat boys making their way out the front door. It’s over. She’s gone. Nick was nearby making sure they got out safe enough. Chris and Nick’s eyes locked for a brief moment, and Nick’s eyebrows raised in surprise. Chris immediately looked down and walked the other way. He didn’t want to try to explain to Nick where he was or why. It was all too much for him.

And so here Chris was, facing the very situation he tried to avoid an hour earlier.

“Where’d you go later on? I was looking all over for you.”

He heard Nick following him into the other room. There was nothing really to clean up in there, so Chris stood awkwardly in the middle of the room with his back to Nick.

“Did you meet anyone?” 

Chris didn’t want to deal with this right now.

“Did you talk to anyone?”

The way Nick said talk knifed its way deep into Chris. As if he never talked his entire life. As if talking was something entirely foreign to him. As if he wasn’t trying to talk to Bella the entire night and then Nick comes in all casual and confident and shows Chris how pathetic he is. As if talking wasn’t something he tried to do every single day of his life, something that made him want to sink into a pile of quicksand but he got up and made an effort anyway. 

No matter who it was with, every time Chris began a conversation he saw it break off into many different branches, almost all ending horribly, with him doing or saying something stupid that changed the other person’s view of him entirely. These thousands of parallel universes he saw before him almost never actually occurred. In fact, what actually happened was usually quite mundane. But the effort it took to swim past all those possibilities and convince himself you are they wore him out. Sometimes it felt impossible. So when Nick said talk like Chris had never even tried it before--that unleashed something in him. It was anger, pure anger. But he couldn’t be angry at Nick. He couldn’t be angry at anyone. More of those universes rushed past him, and all of that anger, all of that rage, flowed out like a river from his eyes. Tears he couldn’t hold back, as much as he wanted to.

“Hey man, are you-” 

Nick couldn’t see him like this. He looked like a loser. Pathetic. Why am I crying? He hurried out of the room before Nick could get a good look at him.

“Dude, wait-”

This is so dumb.

Chris hurried through the front door and just kept going. 

Until he stopped. 

He sat down. 

He put his head in his hands. 

From the darkness of his eyelids he saw flashes of situations--of lifetimes he could have led.

He thought about Bella. 

He thought about Nick. 

He took a deep breath.

You are they.