“Yes, it was sleazy,” Bix confirmed to her. “And not very nice. That's a lot of bullshit. But there are plenty of people out there who behave like him. Men and women. It's not exclusive to either sex. They're just not very nice people. And they don't play by very nice rules. You shouldn't have to ask if a relationship is exclusive. Decent people don't want to sleep with several people at the same time. I didn't. Steven didn't. But some of the people I dated were just like Chandler. They're still out there getting laid. So what? The sad thing is they're not getting loved, and most of them aren't capable of loving anyone, not even themselves.”
“I always feel like everyone else has the instruction manual, and I don't. It made sense to him, and he was very convincing. The only problem was I wasn't convinced. I would hate myself if I lived like that. The one thing it taught me is that I don't ever want to sleep with someone again who doesn't love me. I thought he did. Or I thought he was falling in love with me, and I was falling in love with him. I don't think it was love. I think it was lust. And look what I got.”
“You got a hell of a nice handbag out of it,” he reminded her, and she laughed.
“Yeah, I did. That's a hell of a trade. My integrity for a purse.”
“You didn't sacrifice your integrity. You didn't know what was going on.”
“I thought I did. I assumed, that was the mistake.”
“Well, you won't do it again. And it broke the ice. You lost your virginity. Now you can go out there and find a nice guy.” Bix smiled at her. He admired her honesty, and was sorry Chandler had been such a horse's ass, but he wasn't surprised.
“How many frogs am I going to have to kiss first?” she asked, looking worried. She seriously questioned her own judgment.
“A few. We all did. If you get warts on your lips, you can always get them taken off.”
“I'm not sure I have the courage to do a lot of this. It really hurts,” she said honestly.
“Yes, it does, and it's depressing as hell. Dating is the shits.”
“Thank you, Peter,” she said, sounding bitter for the first time. “I can't believe he condemned me to this.” Bix nodded. That was the way it worked. One person walked off with someone else, and the other guy got tossed into the pit, and had to survive the snakes. It wasn't much fun. “I should hate him for doing this to me, but I'm not sure I do yet, or ever will. I just hope I don't miss him for the rest of my life. I still do every goddamned day,” she said, with tears in her eyes. “And I can't believe that at my age, I have to go out there like some dumb kid and date. How disgusting is that? And pathetic.”
“It's not pathetic. It's just the way it is. And even if a relationship works, sooner or later, somebody dies, and the other one is left alone, and has to start again. It's rotten, but that's life.”
“Like Steven,” she said solemnly, thinking of Bix's partner whose lover had died nine years before. “But he got lucky.” She smiled at her friend. She felt as though they had been friends for years, instead of months. “He found you.”
“Nothing's perfect,” he said cryptically, and she looked at him, wondering if they had had a fight too.
“Is something wrong?” She wanted to be there for him too, as he was for her. He had been a good friend since they'd met.
“Could be, someday. Not yet.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means no one comes out unscathed. Steven's partner died of AIDS. And he's HIV positive. It may not hit him for years, or ever turn into full-blown AIDS. But it could at some point. I knew it going in. I figured however long we had would be worth it in the end. And it has been. I don't regret a minute I've spent with him. I just want him to live forever.” There were tears in his eyes, and hers, when she came to give him a hug. They held each other for a long moment, and he smiled at her through tears. “I love him so damn much, he is such a wonderful man.”
“So are you,” she said with a lump in her throat. Life was definitely not fair.
“You know, if I were ever attracted to women, which I'm not, thank God, men are complicated enough thanks a lot… you would be my first choice.”
“Should I consider that a proposal?” she teased, as she smiled through her tears.
“Absolutely… but not exclusively … sorry, I'd still have to sleep with boys … and I wouldn't tell you about it… but you could definitely assume we're not exclusive. Would that do?”
“Where do I sign up?”
They both laughed, and Bix shook his head. He liked talking to her. She felt almost like a sister to him. “I told you Chandler was no good.”
“I knew you'd say that eventually. But he talked such a good game. He told me he hadn't felt this way in fourteen years. What was that all about?”
“Snowing you. Guys like that say anything that works. When you meet the real thing, you'll know it. He wasn't.”
“Apparently.”
