Drew Smith - Arcade

“Hello?” he said. He didn’t sound angry or even annoyed. He sounded, as he always did in his slow, country voice, pleasant and patient and completely balanced and calm. He was exactly the kind of police officer you would want to encounter in the real world, being in natural possession of two qualities that most police officers famously lack: reasonableness and tolerant good humor. I had come to see him as an accidental Buddhist capable of experiencing the present moment as if from a great distance of time, seeing both its depth and its absurdity. The only place where his wisdom failed him was in his insane new romantic entanglement, which was utterly beyond my comprehension.

“Hey, it’s me,” I said, tripping over a cheery tone I should have practiced beforehand.

“Hey,” he said. “What’s up?”

“Did you just miss a call from me?”

“Yeah, I was on the radio.”

“Oh. I’m just trying to figure out if there’s something wrong with my phone. This one’s acting really weird lately.”

“Huh,” he said.

“Anyway. So, how’s everything going? Anything new happening?”

“Not really. Just the usual stuff.”

“You guys all settled in at the house now, got his stuff all moved in?”

“Yep, it’s all pretty much come together now.”

“That’s great.”

“Yeah, so far so good.”

“Very cool. I mean, I still think you’re completely crazy moving him in so soon, but I’m sure you know what you’re doing.”

“We’ll see one way or the other, I guess,” he said. “Listen, I can’t stay on for too long tonight. I’m supposed to go talk to this guy about these scammers who keep sticking these ‘we buy houses’ signs everywhere.”

Oh, I loved when he let slip those little details about his world. A conversation about bandit sign scammers! It was both fascinating and utterly mundane — a tiny window into his daily life. Collecting those facts, gathering them together like a great nest made of tiny shreds, I could feel that I knew him inside and out.

“But you’re doing okay, sounds like,” he said.

“Oh, sure, everything’s fine. Everything is just normal and regular like always.”

I debated bringing up the arcade. Keeping secrets seemed like a bad idea when I was doing my best to execute a complete reversal and demonstrate my ability to be a perfectly open and transparent person. I went back and forth about it. Maybe my stories from the arcade would give me the appearance of being an adventurous, independent, and unpredictable person, the kind of man he would want to live with forever and ever, enjoying an endlessly changing and unknowable future together. Or maybe it would make me seem like a typical promiscuous homo whose claims of desperate, eternal love were all talk. He might even use it as an excuse to sever ties with me, as the kid was undoubtedly pressuring him to do. Then again, maybe it would spark some jealousy in him that would grow and grow until it changed everything. I decided not to mention the arcade yet. I could always bring it up later.

“I was thinking if you’re in the mood later this week, maybe you could get away and meet me for lunch. There’s a place right between us. Next to that motel on the highway. That diner that supposedly has such good fried chicken?”

“I can’t meet you for lunch.”

“We don’t have to eat if you don’t want. We could just hang out. Or even just get naked and have a little fun. Not that you’re not getting enough of that as it is.”

Silence.

“I mean, you know, I really do miss you a lot,” I said, “if that still means anything to you.”

“I know you do. You’ve just got to calm down a little. Let the dust settle.”

“I’m calm,” I said. “Honestly. I’m totally calm. I don’t want you thinking I’m not, because I’m doing a lot better. I mean, maybe I had too much caffeine earlier or something, but really I’m totally calm.”

“Good,” he said. “That’s good to hear. But, listen, I’ve really got to go now.”

“Right, no problem. I was just calling to say hi.”

“Well, take care of yourself.”

“You too. And we’ll talk really soon. I might try you back tomorrow or the next day to see if you’re around.”

“Actually, don’t. We’re going out of town for a long weekend.”

“Oh.”

“But we’ll talk another time soon.”

“Where are you going?”

“I really have to go now. We’ll talk soon.”

“Okay, I wasn’t trying to keep you. I was just wondering. But I understand. Okay. Have fun.”

“You too. Take care, buddy.”

“Okay then. Bye.”

SOMETIMES I COULD HEAR TOKENS DROPPING INTO Acontainer behind the screen, the sound like a quarter falling into a pile of quarters in the bottom of a plastic five-gallon bucket. Usually only one clerk worked the arcade at a time, and sometimes he’d have to go into the little hallway behind the booths to resolve a maintenance issue. Alone in a compartment, I could hear the opening of the heavy door leading into the tight passage. I could see the light come on through the coin slot, a bright white light different from the other lights in the store. Putting my eye to the slot, I could see inside. It was like looking into the workings of a pinball machine. Everything was indistinct, and it was hard to tell what was happening. I could see the figure moving around if he stood in the right place. Then, very quickly, because they couldn’t leave the sales floor unattended for long, the light would go out and I would hear the sound of the heavy door closing. Then I was alone in the booth again. I spent a lot more time alone in those booths than I ever did with someone else.

HOME FROM THE ARCADE LATE ONE NIGHT, I DISCOVEREDan email from Malcolm. I hadn’t heard from him in several months. Malcolm, who didn’t know my real name, my regular email address, or even my phone number, addressed me as Sam, a name I sometimes used with men. We had been in communication off and on for a couple of years, sometimes speaking for days in a row and sometimes falling out of touch for long spans of time. I considered him a kind of friend since it was undeniable he knew many things about me that no one else in my life ever would.

We’d met online during one of several periods when I felt I absolutely had to have sex with another man in order to feel like a normal human being again. I thought of it like an illness, the way vampires felt compelled to drink blood even if they didn’t want to be vampires and were in fact moral beings who had been transformed quite against their will.

When we met, I hadn’t had much experience, just quick and risky things, sometimes in motel rooms, but mostly in cars — hurried blowjobs in parking lots that made me come so fast out of nervousness and excitement that the experience itself was only ever a fraction as long as the drive to the agreed-upon location. For days after, I was sleepless with shame, swearing through hour after hour of insomnia that I’d never do it again.

During one of my frenzies, Malcolm responded to an ad I’d posted online. He emailed me several pictures of himself, and I replied in kind, stopping short of sending any of my face, which I always refused to do. His photos revealed an attractive, balding guy in his mid forties, hairy-chested, with about thirty pounds of extra weight and a tasteful, expensive-looking duvet cover. We traded the usual emails about what we wanted to do to one another and things we didn’t want or refused to do. His was the typical “no scat or pain” requirement, whereas I detailed my prohibitions in a lengthy bullet-point index to which he replied, “Haha, nice list.” I liked him. Like a zookeeper who had by chance encountered one of my species before, he seemed to intuitively know how to deal with me. Most people had no idea.