Back to Normal
Miles makes his way down the staircase, unable to focus. He was going to see Gwen. He was going to see her smile and her playing the drums and her laugh. God, thinking about her was healing. He felt his heart swirl at the thought. He’s also seeing Pavitr in gym tomorrow, and that’s also as exciting, he gets to see his dimples and his round eyes and maybe even his shirt o
What?
He nearly stops in his tracks from the shock. Why is he thinking of Pavitr? With his shirt off, no less..? Why was his face heating up and his heart beating so fast; There were so many questions at once that his head started to spin, heart pounding in his ears, but the thoughts didn’t stop coming at him “I want him to lie next to me and talk about soccer, and I want to kiss him like he can kiss his girlfriend.”
WHAT???
Was he…gay? There’s no way, right? Well, Mami has a gay cousin. She seems fine with him, even if he doesn’t come around a lot. And dad works with a lesbian. Would being gay be ok with them? Is being gay ok with Miles? Miles loves Hobie, and he knows Hobie was definitely unapologetically not entirely straight and not entirely a “boy”. What would he even do if he was gay? What would Mi think? Oh, he’d definitely stop being his brother. He’d get AIDS or something and Mi would forget he even existed. It’s a stupid thought, really. He’d just never bring it up.
So, Miles is definitely not gay, because his world would practically end if he was. He likes Gwen, obviously. Besides, Pavitr has a very beautiful girlfriend who he loves very much. Why should he be gay and disturb their happiness? Maybe this was part of his plan, too, he thought as his sneakers squeaked against the linoleum floor. To make Miles not only be his friend but fall in love with him. This has to be psychological warfare. Miles refuses to lose this. So he is definitely NOT gay. He is 100%-
“Yo,” Mi turned him around by the shoulder in the middle of the hallway, right outside the cafeteria.
“Im not gay.”
Mi blinked visibly taken aback. “O. Ok? I was gonna ask where you were eating.” He raised an eyebrow, looking away and then back towards Miles. Miles’ confidence in his statement immediately dropped. So much for never bringing it up.
“Band room. With Gwen. Who is a girl. And I like girls.” Miles said flatly, digging his own grave with every word. Mi just stood there, nodding slowly.
“Have..fun?” He glanced back at him as he entered through the cafeteria doors. As soon as he was out of sight, Miles broke into a sprint towards the band room. He needs to get rid of these thoughts.
When he nearly bursts through the doors in a more secluded part of the main floor, Gwen almost drops her drumsticks in surprise. She catches her breath quickly, then turns to face him while sitting at the electric drum set.
“Hi? Did you run all the way here? Dude, we have like, an hour.” She tilted her head slightly. Miles smiled gratefully at the familiar gesture.
“Just…wanted to see you. Chemistry sucked,” he knew he was lying deep down, but he remembered that he was not going to validate those feelings. He set his bag down at sat at a seat in the soundproof room, gesturing towards the set. “Play. Er- Play what you were playing.”
Gwen smiled and shakes her head, starting to fill the room with noise. Miles beams with the excitement of the loud drums; this was normal, this was familiarity. This was the girl he’s liked for almost a year now. He admired not only her ability to play, but her ability to put her entire self into it. The music she liked, and the music she played, was a reflection of all the things he liked about her: she was confident, she was unrelenting. But she can also be soft, complimentary, but at her own discretion. Gwen Stacy was rhythmic, Gwen Stacy was ceaseless.
She finished the song, and cried out in joy for how much she liked the sound. “That song is so good!” she waved her hands back and forth in excitement, “It has to be my favorite song on the album, it is so fun to play.” She rolled her wrist around in her palm to relieve some of its soreness. Miles could feel his fondness grow as his smile followed suit. He was right, she really did put her entire self into her music.
They just looked at eachother for a minute, no longer uncomfortable because this became normal over the course of their friendship when words couldn’t do justice to their bond. He examined the map of her face for what seemed like the billionth time, though he never got bored of it. His eyes scanned over to the part of her hair where it goes from blonde to pink. Just like watercolor. It was the reason he started to practice painting with watercolors, because his markers just didn’t do the transition justice. He can remember sleepovers (after weeks of trying to convince his parents) in his room with Mi and Hobie (for supervision) fast asleep while he was slow to get tired, so she stayed up with him (on his part of the bunk bed, no way he was gonna let her sleep on the floor). Her eyelids were low and she definitely nodded off a few times around midnight, so he eventually lay still and tried to suppress his giggling so she’d get some rest. He sat up, and just watched her in the dark room, her light colored hair visible under the moonlight. Was this creepy? He didn’t know. He just knew he wanted the rest of the world to disappear. He wanted to be in their shared bed in their shared apartment with a cat sleeping atop the covers, and he wanted to run his fingers through her light colored hair so she could fall asleep. He could feel his heart ache, knowing that he was in his own room with Hobie and Mi snoring above him, 14 and too scared to tell her how he really felt.
Her eyebrows were arched, dark and pierced; silver just worked on her. He’d love to see her in anything, really, but he loved her in silver so much more than he did her in gold. Her eyes were blue, check. Most people with blue eyes intimidate Miles, or at least freaked him out, but Gwen’s blue eyes complimented her.
“Hey,” she broke the silence, a slight chuckle in her voice.
“Hey,” he responded, mirroring her mannerisms by tilting his head slightly.
“What made chemistry suck so hard? Apart from the obvious.” She absentmindedly twirls some of her hair around her pointer finger, sitting back on the stool of the drum set and going back and forth as it swiveled.
Miles sighed. Was this gonna be a reoccurring topic? He was just starting to forget this guy. Should Gwen know? How much should she know? Would she hate him? It definitely felt like she would, or at least never talk to him. He guesses it would feel like…some sort of betrayal? They were never dating, of course, but he’s liked her for so long and he’s been told teasingly that she must like him back (he still refuses to believe this, if she liked him he’d know), that it would definitely make him guilty if he thought about someone else the way he thought about her. And that’d never happen, right?
“The obvious- note taking, yknow? And..uh,” he glanced over from his the spot his eyes found on the wall that was definitely not her. She gave him an urging look, curious to hear more.
“Your friend. Pavitr. He was in my class and it was awful, Gwen!” He exclaimed, slumping in his chair and whining like a kid. Gwen laughed at his predicament.
“There’s no way. Pav’s so nice, man. What happened?” He should’ve known.
“He’s TOO nice! The teacher had me give him my notes and they were wrong. But he told me in the nicest way possible!” He stood up and held his arms out in front of him. He was pacing now. “And then- he wouldn’t stop talking to me and complimenting me and invited me to his party!” He looked at Gwen, stressed out and expectant.
She broke out in a fit of laughter, making Miles groan in embarrassment, hiding his face in his hands. As she started to calm down, she wiped a tear from her eye, which felt a tiny bit over kill. “Dude, it’s not like you to be paranoid. But he’s trying to be your friend, he probably thinks you’re cool.” She says it slow and methodical, like she’s trying not to laugh again.
“Why would he think I’m cool?” Miles asks, laced with desperation.
“Cuz you hang out with me, duh. But, seriously, I’m glad he he thinks you’re cool and invited you cause you *are* cool and deserve to be a highschooler sometimes. I know he has this whole ‘perfect life’ thing going on, but he’s a genuine guy.” She swivels around in her chair again.
He was getting tired of explaining this, even if it was only to two people so far. Pavitr can’t derail his life like this, not if Miles could help it. So many different feelings at once was making his brain hurt.
“Let’s forget him. Teach me the drums.” He walked over to the set, inspecting each of the crash cymbals.
She blinked. “Teach you…the drums? You cried when Hobie tried to teach you piano.”
“He’s a very unconventional teacher, my fingers kept doing the wrong thing!” He threw his hands up in defense. “It can’t be that hard.”
Gwen got up from the stool and offered him the seat, handing him the drum sticks. “Alright. You have 3 toms, floor, high, and mid,” she pointed to each of them. “Snare, bass, 2 crashes, a ride cymbal, and a hi-hat.”
Miles stared at her.
“Ok, different approach,” she smiled. She took some post-it notes from the whiteboard and scribbled a number 1-9 on each of them. “I’m gonna say a number, and you’re gonna hit that drum, ok?” She placed a bright pink slip of paper on every part, crouching down so she could label the bass.
Miles nodded eagerly, and she listed off numbers, and he was doing relatively well. He could remember where to hit without having to look.
“Ok, now no sticky notes.” She peeled them off as Miles stammered, wanting them to stay on. She persisted though, and wouldn’t budge until he at least tried. But he kept hitting the wrong one at the wrong time and confusing the numbers, which got WORSE when she started saying 2 or even 3 numbers at a time.
“Ok, here.” She stood behind him. Miles could feel his breath hitch in his chest. He felt too scared to move. “Just keep hitting the bass drum.” He felt her hands wrap around his from behind. He knew her hands were soft, but how often did he get to hold- or be held like this? His heart beat was picking up at the same tempo as the bass drum, and she guided his hands to a simple rhythm. It was hard to focus, with her body heat radiating onto him for the second time that day and her soft hands on his.
“There. Now you can ‘play drums’” she looked down at him warmly, before something flashed across her features and she moved from behind him, clearing her throat and hiding her face.
“So..will your parents let you go on Friday?” She uncaps a marker and starts doodling on the whiteboard, right next to a written note that says “Do not use when director’s away”.
“If I decide to go,” he reminded her, “if I give a good enough excuse.” Being in New York he had a great deal of freedom that he was very grateful for, but being 15 with a cop dad, parties were definitely on the “do not ask” list.
She doodles another sunflower. “Man. I was gonna use you as my excuse.” She looks over her shoulder and smiles.
Miles winces. “I would’ve used you as mine.” He tied and untied his shoelaces to busy his hands. “We could say we’re going to Ganke’s, if your dads cool with that.”
“If you 3 go, I can go. Lemme know how that works out with him, ‘kay?” Miles nods, thinking about the scolding he could get if he didn’t coordinate it like it was a science. There were always rules and loopholes established the first time you hung out with someone and wanted to do something you know you wouldn’t be allowed to, like needing a neutral party (typically Hobie, it took Officer Stacy and Morales a while to fully trust him, let alone understand him), and if you were Gwen, there needed to be another girl. If you were Miles, you couldn’t hang out with Gwen alone, and the same went for Mi (though he very regularly broke that rule). Margo and Hobie didn’t have restrictions like this, and if you asked them where their parents were while they were out past 12 on a Saturday they’d probably say “tweaking”. And be 100% honest.
Planning a night out with a few white lies wasn’t exactly unheard of for him and his friends, they were teenagers after all, but for this? He’d literally never get to leave the house again.
“Oh my god. I never told you about that one time. Hobie, Gayatri and,” she rolls her eyes playfully noticing how Miles hangs on to her words in case she says a certain someone’s name, “her boyfriend and I told our parents we were gonna hang out at ‘his’ house. We were really going to Coney Island- and we thought it was smooth sailing.”
Miles nods, intrigued by the story of his other friends and their rebellious behavior. “But we’re taking the train home. And I look over. And I am face to face with my dad on patrol.” She runs her hands down her face as she recounts the embarrassingly ridiculous memory. Miles is trying his best not to laugh, gripping the bottom of the stool.
“Don’t laugh, it’s not funny!” She groans, though not serious, “I could’ve DIED, right then and there! And he had us drive home in the back of his cruiser, oh my god Gayatri was so scared to pull up in front of her house and have her cop dad see that we had to pull over so she could dry heave at the side of the road.” Gwen covers her face again, leaning against the whiteboard.
Miles is calming down from his laughter, when a few thoughts start to cross his mind.
“What’s Gayatri Like? ‘Cause that you’ve hung out with her before.” He tries to ask in a way that totally doesn’t give him thinking about how guilty he feels about all of this away.
“Oh, she’s so nice, literally so selfless. She tutors, volunteers often,” Gwen counts these on her fingers, “super friendly. Would you believe she likes Paramore? She’s got all their songs from Limewire.” She looks far away, dreamily describing her friend.
That definitely did not help Miles’ guilt. But the bell is ringing now, and it’s time to get to art across campus. He sighs as he gets up, not just because of the walk and all the thoughts that will invade his head as soon as he steps through the door, but the fact that he has to leave. He always feels so disappointed when he has to leave Gwen, like there was so much more he could’ve done, he could’ve look at her more and made her laugh more and savored the moment more.
“I’ll see you later, ok?” Gwen grabs her bag and sticks, patting Miles on the back and heading out the door. He’s not offended by her quickness to leave, because her class is also on the other side of campus and the last time he hassled her to stay a bit longer she was marked late. So, he picked up his own pace a little and started making his way to class.