THE WISH LIST

Florian

“Come on, Flo, dance with me!”

I grin at the gorgeous man swaying his hips in front of me, attracting many, many looks that he fully ignores, his eyes on me. Strangers would think he’s throwing everything in his stride to seduce me, lifting his long curls from his slender neck, swaying on the spot, sliding his hands on my knees as I stay on my high stool next to the bar.

Let’s be honest, the man is irresistible, and when he pouts, I give up, let him drag me by the hand toward the dance floor.

An older man, with a serious face, grey temples, dark jeans and a button-up opened on his tanned chest, waiting for his drink, lifts his chin at me. “If a minx looking like that, moving the way he moves was in front of me, he wouldn’t have to beg, lemme tell you.”

Teddy laughs with a tilt of his head before throwing his hair behind him in a sassy move. “Why thank you, Sir! But he loves me begging. And he loves playing hard to get, I’m just always winning.”

I follow his gale of laughter and grab his hips to turn him toward me. “You know you’re ruining me, right?”

He sways on the spot, bending his knees and lifting his hair again. Even after all these years, I’ll never get used to the level of attention he gets everywhere he goes, and the level of jealousy I get when I’m with him. Which he ignores all, not because of arrogance, but because he simply doesn’t see it.

“Ruining you? Darling, I thought I ruined you twenty years ago…”

“Ok, now you’re cocky. Should I remind you of the fact that you were five years old, twenty years ago? Don’t get nasty now, I was just starting to like you.”

Teddy laughs, unimpressed, and wraps his arms around my neck when the song changes for a slow one, putting his head on my shoulder to take a breath. “God, I’ll miss you, Flo…”

I try to ignore the pit in my throat, it’s not the first time Teddy goes away, and it won’t be the last. If that new gig he scored isn’t a fluke, he’ll be famous not only in our town or state, but worldwide, very, very soon. Trying not to think about the fact I’m not gonna see him for months, I wrap my arms tighter around his waist and turn him on the spot before bending forward, making his hair almost touch the floor, smiling at his pearls of laughter, making again so many heads turn to us like wilting flowers to the sun. “Let me tell you why you’re ruining me. Here you stand, wrapped around me like a greedy monkey all night, and everyone standing here around us thinks we’re a couple. Tomorrow you’ll be gone, and I’ll have not one chance whatsoever to meet someone, you realise that right?”

He chuckles, putting once more his head on my shoulder. “That’s not true and you know it… I mean, look at you, who could say no to this body and this face? And when they’ll know you…”

“They won’t.”

I try not to get bitter, but I’m revealing something that sits deep in me, not hiding when he lifts his face with a question in his eyes, and I shake my head. “You know they won’t. How many men have we met until now who tried to really know us?”

His eyes turn liquid and I shake my head again, “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to drag us down, forget it.”

The truth of the matter is that I am already feeling down. After years of struggling with a growing modelling career, Teddy finally scored an incredible contract with a very famous brand. Since he started it with a photoshoot for a men’s hairdresser and hobbyist photographer, who wanted big posters to advertise his salon, Teddy has met some success, with other local brands not willing to pay huge bucks for big advertising companies. He does more than getting by, now, he’s recognised quite a lot and is as successful as he wished to be. But in the run to get there, he’s also been conned by a fake agent, then a real and very dishonest one, a photograph who tried to convince him to take off his clothes, and one lewd asshole who try to blackmail him with pictures advertising underwear that he attempted to sell as “adult pictures.”

And all these years, I felt like it was my job to protect him.

His eyes are knowing when he watches me, still swaying in my arms. “You know I’m not five anymore, right, Flo? I’m ok, you can breathe. You know I’ll be safe, because you and your lawyer vetted my contract, that brand is famous for their clean reputation… And I can take care of myself, now…”

I nod, unable to speak for a while. I feel like a father bird watching his kiddo birdie taking off the nest for the first time, ready to see him splatter on the ground, face first. It’s not that I don’t believe in him. He has the talent to impersonate whoever the photograph tells him to, pouty, sassy (one of his favorites, and natural ways of being if you ask me), sexy, he can be femme, but he can also be ultra seductive in low hips jeans and a cowboy hat like you wouldn’t believe. It’s just… It’s the rest of the world I don’t trust to handle him with care.

I guess in my mind, Teddy is not the gorgeous sexy man with slither moves slipping along my torso right now, but still that young boy I felt I needed to protect.

He was five and I was ten, a couple of weeks into a new school year, when this new, shy kid with beautiful doe eyes shiny with tears, and long, long hair like a girl, gorgeous brown waves, heritage of his Brazilian mother, appeared on school square one morning at the start of the day, clutching his lilac schoolbag. He was toast from the moment he showed his colors, literally, and I knew fucking brats like Kai and Darcy would eat him raw. First, because I was choosing to babysit Kai and Darcy for a little money when their parents had a night out, and I knew these two to be able to be the rowdiest little shits when they wanted to, and second because even at that age, I understood how prejudiced the world was. I heard the whispered slurs following the new and quite effeminate veterinarian, and his “roommate situation” no one believed. I heard the bigger kids make jokes about the football team’s number one after he was seen smooching his boyfriend behind the bleachers after training. And there was no way that, in my watch, some five years old kiddo would be bullied for his hair or the color of his bag.

I don’t know if I have a hero complex like Teddy says. I don’t think so. It’s just something you do, you don’t watch five years old pushing and slapping another kid around without saying anything, you don’t watch people do that whatever their age is, for that matter. Kai and Darcy were spoiled brats and not the slightest scared of me, and I was no meany. Soft spoken and gentle was more my style, often cooed at by adults for behaving like “such a good kid, Gordon, Maeva, you must be so proud of him.” I just knew that I was the one holding the cards high where Kai and Darcy couldn’t reach them: the possibility, or denial, of an ice cream, a later bed time, or even a movie or a sports game if they were good.

From that day, Teddy followed me like a shadow. Sneaking in the cafeteria to sit with me and my classmates, waiting for me after school, with a book in his hands, like it was an unwritten rule that I would walk him back to his grandmother, or that he would follow me home and I would read to him. I didn’t mind, I was walking the same way anyway.

Year after year, that kid followed me, but it didn’t take us long to become friends. A ten years old and a five years old, speaking about adventure books at first, that his grandmother read to him. Tame your Dragon was his preferred story. I introduced him to The Princess Bride, Narnia, and the Neverending Story. I took him to the library with me, once a week. Even as a small kid, he was sharp and funny, witty as fuck, and he could make me laugh.

Call me a nepo child, but growing up in a small town where your father owns the only realtor business, well known and wealthy, has one perk: people don’t try to shit with you too much. My little shadow never became a reason for me to be bullied, I was lucky that way.

When I moved to middle school, then high school, we stayed friends. When I moved into my own little apartment, thanks to my father, to study Business in university, Teddy’s grandma was sick, tired and not up to the moods of a teenager. My guest room became his, there was never a question about it. I was there for his graduation, pushing small Grandma Amanda in her wheelchair, a mere weeks before cancer took her away. I was there to help Teddy bury her and grieve. I was there when he figured, maybe inspired by the group of schoolmates I was with, that he was gay as well, and I was the one to answer his questions, no matter how personal or weird he thought they were. I was there every time he was approached by a new photographer, reading his contracts and checking and double-checking that he would be safe. The only times he didn’t ask me were the ones where someone took advantage of him.

But slowly, my best friend opened his wings, simply asking me to trust him, coming to me to consult on a new possible contract. And now, as a result, he’s been offered a year of travelling on the most beautiful beaches all over the world, for a long series of photoshoots for diverse projects for 🌈That’s Just Us, an extremely famous label focussed on non-gendered clothing, perfumes, make-up, sports and swimwear and jewelry.

I’m happy for him, I’m proud of him, I’m scared shitless he’s gonna get hurt on the other side of the world where I won’t be there to give him a hug, and he’ll be all alone to face everything. And I’ll miss him like mad.

But for now, I’m gonna dance with him for a little while longer, before he goes home, grabs his suitcase, rolls it to the airport and takes a plane to effing New Zealand for his first shoot. He’s excited, he’s gonna meet the CEO of 🌈That’s Just Us. He’s happy and I’m not going to spoil that anticipatory happiness and jitters for him.

Time to smile, shake it off, and enjoy my friend for as long as he’s still here.