1

The ice in my Blue Raspberry clinked against the glass when I sat it down, my heart a one-man band in my chest. I knew this moment was coming and waited all night for it. Looking into Ethan’s gorgeous dark eyes agleam with anticipation, I told him plainly, “No.”

            His eyebrows arched in surprise, no the last thing he expected to come out of my mouth. “No?” he said as if he’d misheard. “So, all those times you flirted with me… Batting your eyes and shit. What was all that?”

            Rising above the chatter of sixty conversations was the hip-hop bass of a Megan Thee Stallion song. Inspired choice, DJ. In my head, I thanked the Universe for acknowledging that I was a bad bitch.

“I’m sorry,” I told him, but I wasn’t. I was working him. Ethan Reyes would appreciate me more the harder he worked for me, as logically any man would.  Xander Harris said it best on Buffy: The more unattainable, the more attractive. “I didn’t mean to lead you on or anything. It’s just… I know where this will go. I mean, are you even gay?”

            Ethan looked down at his interlaced fingers on his lap. I could tell it was a question he didn’t know how to answer yet, and I felt like a dick for asking it. Following a moment of quiet, he looked at me and said, “I dunno.” Truth be told, this was a terrible answer. Part of me appreciated his honesty; it’d save us a lot of time. People needed to wave their red flags more. “All I know is I like who I like. It doesn’t matter what they got.”

We were at a bar called Oasis, a little hole in the wall on Security Boulevard. It wasn’t exactly a Black gay bar but might as well be. On Friday nights you saw everybody here: kids my age (and younger) in cut-off shorts and crop tops, stout men in polos cackling with their gwals over margaritas, queens with a full beat in blonde wigs and little else displaying themselves for muscle-bound trade in tight jeans and tank tops. The floral scent of perfume clashed with the manly man smells of beer and buffalo wings. It was 10p.m., so I didn’t see my colleagues, who usually came after work for a quick drink. Sankofa Headquarters was a ten-minute drive down the road.

            As sorry as I felt for Ethan, I’d feel even sorrier for me if I greenlit a relationship only for him to up and cheat on me with a woman. At 21, I wasn’t about to be a tool for a straight man to satisfy his bi curiosity for a season. “Maybe not today, but what happens when a girl with a tiny waist and a big ole juicy butt walks by? Then what? You’ll dump me and go back to swimming with fish.”

            He reached over the table and gripped my hand, desire aflame in his eyes. “I like you, Will,” he said, his thumb rubbing against my hand. If his voice was a color, it’d be blue. He had this cool, mellow way of speaking, a voice as smooth as gelled hair. I almost believed the sincerity in it. Almost. “I want you. That I am sure of.”

            I pulled my hand back from his. “Ethan…”

            “Please.” He was practically begging now. “Give us a shot. What, you talking to other dudes?”

            Laughter escaped my lips. Yes, the more unattainable, the more attractive but moreover: the more desired, the more desirable! But I didn’t want him thinking I was a ho. “It’s not that...”

            “So what is it?” He laughed, more nerves in it than humor. “Am I ugly?”

            Now that was laughable. A perfectly round fro sat on his head like a dark brown sun. If I had to describe his features in one word, it’d be narrow. His eyes were slits. The hair on the lower half of his face framed a mouth that was pencil point fine, his nose a slender arc I hadn’t seen on many Black men, not even his fellow light skins. The way his plaid shirt hung over his khaki pants like a poncho fit his whole ‘I woke up like this’ aesthetic. He was a Starburst for the eyes. “Shut up,” I said as my eyes rolled. “It’s not… I mean, we work together, Ethan. What’ll happen when we break up?”

            He let out a joyless chuckle. “When?”

            I gave him a look. “Are you saying you’re my forever?”

            His lips curled in a coy half-grin that revealed the dimple in his right cheek. Be still, my heart. “I could be.”

            “Please. You hardly know me.”

            He looked at me as if I were the most frustrating man on the planet. “So let me. That’s why we’re here, aren’t we?”

            I nagged my brain for an excuse, somewhere between fact, that I wanted him, and fiction, that I didn’t. “You’re a catch. But we work together. Things’ll get messy if we hooked up.”

            His stare shot into me like rays. “Technically we don’t. We both work at Sankofa. But I’m an agent. You’re still a student intern.”

            He got me there. He was at the stage in his career where he did actual field work. I spent most of my days at work scanning and filling. “Until I pass the Ram and become medallioned. What then? We’ll be legit colleagues.”

            He sighed, probably as tired of hearing my excuses as I was of giving them. “You won’t be eligible to take the Ram until next year. And by then, we’ll be madly in love and this conversation won’t matter.”

            A Sapphire Medallion separated legitimate demon hunters from wannabes. To earn one, you had to pass The Ram exam. Unprofessional demon hunters weren’t common, though. Most of them died before they made a name for themselves, and those that survived their first hunt typically weren’t dumb enough to attempt a second.

            “I don’t need distractions,” I said, “I need to start prepping for the Ram now. Surely, you remember what that’s like. You finally got your medallion in February. I plan on taking the Ram only once.” The Ram exam was available in the first and third quarters of the year. While you could keep taking it until you passed, your professional career would be in limbo until the examination period opened again.

            “A lot of agents don’t pass The Ram their first time. So?”

            “Nothing against them, but it’s different for me.” I come from a family of legends. Failure was not an option.

            Groaning, Ethan shook his head “You’re hopeless.” I detected a note of annoyance in his voice. He was about sick of me. Good. I was making him work for it. Hell, I’d be worried if he wasn’t the teensy bit agitated. Wanting what you couldn’t have was annoying. If he didn’t care, he’d sound like it.

            “So… what do you want to do now?” he asked. “Up for a movie?”

            I laughed. I’d thought nothing of it, but the look on his face told me he didn’t appreciate it. “Isn’t it late for a movie?”

            That cool half-grin again, too damn charming to be arrogant. “It’s late to you?”

            “Well, I mean… what’s open?”

            He shrugged. “Security.”

            I might’ve thrown up in my mouth. “That dirty theater? Ew.”

            Ethan rolled his eyes. “Fine. What do you want to do?”

            I knew what I wanted to do, and it involved us wearing less clothes. But practicing this thing called restraint, I threw the ball back in his court. “This was your idea, not mine. You’re supposed to have ideas.”

            “Jesus, Will.” He massaged his temple. “Why are you being like this?”

            I feigned ignorance. “Like…?”

            “Like a…” The purse of his lips told me exactly how that sentence would’ve ended if he hadn’t stopped himself.

            I wasn’t offended, though. I was being a bitch. There was a method to my madness here. The nicer you were to men, the easier they got over you. I mean… whoever found a doormat sexy? Be a little mean, give them a little pushback and you imprint yourself on their minds. The line between love and hate was paper thin. Bitches dominated the minds of men in a way nice guys and gals simply didn’t. I didn’t make the rules.

            Pulling his wallet out of his khakis, he started to rise off the stool he was sitting on. “Going to close this, then I’ll… take you home, I guess. Cool?” he said in a somewhat listless tone. Somehow that silky voice had the edge of a dagger.

            No, that wasn’t cool at all, but he was gone before I could say as much. I checked the time on my iPhone, which read 10:15. It was still early, but he was ready to call it a night. Uh oh.

            It’s fine, I thought, It’s fine…

            We were on I-695 for what felt like days. The problem wasn’t traffic. For a Friday night, traffic was light. The problem was my anxiety, the sinking fear in my gut that I blew it with the guy I was crazy about. On my first day at Sankofa, Ethan was one of two people to talk to me (having been interning a week before me, he was pretty green himself). We'd learned the ropes together, though he had more to teach me than I him, being that he was in his third year of undergrad at the time. When I should've been studying after work, I was in the training hall with him. Did I downplay my abilities a little to feel his strong hands on my hips, pushing me up so that my chin passed the pull-up bar or over my arms, maneuvering them to a position that’d maximize the effectiveness of my spellcasting so that I wasn’t just waving my arms about willy-nilly? Yes, yes I did. Every time he noticed it, he called me out. Though the way his hands would rest on my skin longer than they needed to and the warm whisper from a mouth that always found its way within an inch from my ears, gave me the impression he didn’t mind it as much as he claimed.

            Despite this, I just knew there was no way on God’s green Earth the man was gay, bi, pan, whatever. He was nice to me because he was decent, not because he wanted to be with me. Flirting with him was fun and…yes, I admit to hearing a voice in my head asking, But what if?

            I tried to resist it. That voice led me down a path of heartbreak many a times and I wouldn’t fall for it again. Once he got his Medallion, he got too busy for little ole me anyway. We hadn’t trained together all year.

            Imagine my surprise when I found him waiting in the Grand Garden to invite me for drinks tonight. My heart damn near exploded. But I had to play it cool. Returning a man’s interest seemingly repelled them. I didn’t want Ethan to be another disappointment, built up to nowhere, so I thought I’d change my strategy. I tended to go full steam ahead with relationships after a single date. An air of indifference may keep this one interested, I thought. Stupid. Now Ethan wasn’t speaking and I didn’t know how to fix it.

            “We’re here,” he said with the emotion of timber. Indeed, I looked over his shoulder and saw that we were parked outside my apartment building on Milford Mill Road.

            I opened the door but didn’t get out. I couldn’t let the date end like this. “Ethan, wait,” I said, staring into the pale glow of the moon reflecting off the puppy dog eyes was giving me. A smile formed in his blue-white stare, and it clicked. He was working me, too.

            I kept my smile from becoming a smirk with the barest effort. “Um… never mind. Have a good night.”

            That’s right, keep him guessing, I thought. I would’ve fallen for those mopey eyes when I was 19, 20 or even four months ago, when I was too young to know the games boys played. I was a slow learner, but eventually I did learn.

            I got out of his car, a Honda Civic the color of roses. Wanting to salvage what was left of his night, he’d ask to come inside. And mustering up every ounce of restraint I could draw from my mana cells, I’d turn him down. Again. All the work I’d put into roping him in my web would collapse if I gave him the goods in the end.  

            “You know,” he said, and I wasn’t at all moved by the chill in his voice. We were both playing games, and only one of us would win. “I was hoping to meet the real Will tonight. Shit, maybe I did. Enjoy the rest of your weekend, man.”

            I turned towards him as he was pulling off. You’d have thought he popped me in the mouth. He didn’t say, See you Monday, but Enjoy the rest of your weekend, like he didn’t intend to speak to me tomorrow, Sunday or hell, ever.

I opened my mouth to apologize for being a clown and beg for another choice, swear to him I’d be real from now on. But I was chasing the wind. Ethan was gone.

            Hoping to reach him before he turned onto Reisterstown Road, I pulled out my phone and got to textin’.  I’m sorry for being so stupid, I typed, the truth is… I like you. I like you a lot. In my warped brain, pretending I didn’t so you’d like me more somehow made sense to me. Please come back. So we can have a real conversation.

            He didn’t respond.