UNTITLED MEMOIR

CHAPTER SEVEN

I fought hard to keep myself out of the cast of “The Goosebumps Horror Side Show.” It was the newest stage show going up at the Disney/MGM Studios where I worked as a street performer. The popular series of books written by R.L. Stine was a sensation with kids all over the world, and true to form, Disney had secured the rights to create a stage show to capitalize upon the craze.

As soon as I heard that Mickey was mounting the show, I knew that I wasnʼt interested. Iʼd read a couple of the Goosebumps books, debating whether I would buy a few to mail to Christopher. I decided against them. To me, they were a commercial gimmick, not to mention the weird attempt Stine made to make blood and gore sellable to kids of the kindergarten set. It creeped me out. I also didnʼt like the books because I resented fads. Like the Cabbage Patch Doll craze of the eighties, parents were scrambling to stores in zombie-like droves to snap up Stineʼs latest release. I found the greedy stampedes disturbing.

Iʼd managed to exclude myself from working on the show all the way up until it actually opened. Curious, I went to watch it after my shift one afternoon, and I quickly realized that my instincts had been dead on. There was no way to sugar-coat it. The thing was embarrassingly bad. I felt sorry for the poor sap theyʼd convinced to play “Amazo the Magician.” The guy stumbled awkwardly through the horrible script trying desperately to make palatable his assigned role. The entire show was barely a step above in quality from one of those automated puppet-shows youʼd encounter at a Chuck E. Cheese restaurant. However, at least the Chuck E. Cheese shows were inside an air- conditioned building.

The Goosebumps stage was obviously an afterthought attraction thrown up overnight, hidden almost completely in a far away corner of the New York City street set. It had gone up so fast, there werenʼt even benches for the audience. The guests were forced to stand on the hot asphalt to watch the show. And the whole time, the tour trams rumbled by about five feet away, emitting exhaust fumes into the overheated crowd. For the guests whoʼd been dragged to the show by their eager children, the passing trams became a blessing in disguise. More often than not, bored parents would point to the shiny red and yellow tram and say to their kids, “We donʼt want to miss it! Letʼs get on that!” It proved an effective means of escape from the drudgery of Amazo, The Mummy and the Giant Mutant Hamster.

As a contracted performer in a Disney theme park, I became, in a way, company property. Itʼs evident to those who know about it that the parks entertainment department is run very much like the old Hollywood studio system. If you were one of the lucky few to be offered a role by Disney, you suddenly enjoyed an almost unheard of luxury as an performer; a forty hour a week acting gig with health insurance. There was no denying that to land a job at Disney was an exciting accomplishment just brimming with a long list of attractive benefits. But soon, I was made to understand that if I was not prepared to acquiesce to the fact that you I had just become a prop (and an expendable one, at that) then Iʼd joined the wrong club. Thereʼs a good reason why working there was often compared to enlisting in the military. Preferred members of “The Mickey Mouse Club” are expected to show up to work each and every “magical” day smiling wider than an Uncle Tom, without any personal opinion, and generally compliant in every way. At every opportunity, I was reminded that there were hundreds, if not thousands, of other actors ready to take my place. To question The Mouse was to risk my good standing with him. Sure, Mickey smiles a lot, but if you pull his tail, thatʼs when the white gloves come off.

At the beginning of my time there, I wasnʼt totally clued in to exactly how similar working for Disney was going to be to the old Hollywood system. My biggest surprise came with the realization that although I had auditioned and signed a contract for a role as Francis Floot in Streetmosphere, my contract also required me to willingly accept any and all roles that the Company might see fit to cast me in otherwise. It brought to mind the many battles that were fought with MGM by such stars as Mickey Rooney, Judy Garland and Joan Crawford. They were oftentimes forced to play roles that they didnʼt want to, but ultimately, they had no choice in the matter. Although an actor at Disney might be chosen to portray Captain Jack Sparrow in a show at The Magic Kingdom, he might soon after find himself hoisting a giant, forty pound fish-puppet above his head in the Finding Nemo show over at The Animal Kingdom.

Of course, I certainly could have “gotten in good” with the management by making friends with some of them. It seemed that most of my fellow cast mates felt this a worthy practice. And it worked for many of them, too. I watched as a few of the more skilled ass-kissers stroked and cajoled their way out of any undesired assignments. For whatever reason, though, I was never able to make myself do it. The truth was, there wasnʼt a manager that I liked or, more importantly, fully trusted. And it simply wasnʼt in my make-up to commit to the time required to push my own agenda by stroking the already soaring egos of my bosses. I learned very quickly that if ever I did want for something, or if I had something to say, it would be better to be free of any personal ties with anyone above me. Because of this, I think, I was never one of their favorites, and I was summarily branded as “too passionate,” a “loose cannon,” and a stubborn actor with too many opinions of my own.

The day that I signed my first performerʼs contract at the Disney/MGM Studios, was a month after I had auditioned for and was offered the role of “Francis Floot” in the very popular and well-respected “Streetmosphere” cast. The name Francis Floot came from me. Well, really, it came from Shakespeare first. At the time that Iʼd auditioned for the company, I was performing in a community theater production of A Midsummer Nightʼs Dream as Francis Flute, the Bellows Mender. Improvising a character on the spot at the audition, one of the directors asked me what my name was. Francis Floot was the first thing that came from my mouth, and it stuck for the next fifteen years. Surprisingly, in all that time on the streets as Francis, only two guests ever told me that they knew where my name came from. I always considered this a very sad testament to the American public school system.

The show itself was called Streetmosphere to serve as an abbreviation for the much lengthier description “Street Atmosphere Entertainment.” The show had opened with the park in 1989 and was still going strong nearly a decade later. When I arrived, there were about thirty-two of us playing a wide variety of original characters. We each were assigned a particular “type” (the blonde bombshell, the movie director and the has-been film actress, for example) and then set free to create our characters within that framework. Francis Floot was what was called a “boy off the bus,” new to Hollywood, naive and full of pep, with stars in his eyes. Altogether, these thirty-two characters appeared daily, seemingly from nowhere, to inhabit the streets of “Hollywood.” The guests (the ones who noticed us, anyway) loved it. And for years, so did I. Even though the reality was that Iʼd merely landed a trivial role in a fictional version of Tinseltown, for the longest time, I was as thrilled as if I had made it big in real-life Hollywood.

By the time management came to me to “ask” me if I would step into the role of Amazo the Magician, a fair bit of the Hollywood luster had already worn off for me. Unfortunately for me, my mouth operated faster than my brain and I responded much too honestly for them.

“Ooooo,” I said a bit too cynically. “I watched that show the other day and it was really bad. Iʼd rather not, if itʼs all the same to you.” My statement seemed to puncture this particular managerʼs magical facade and her perpetual smile appeared to actually deflate before me. I wasnʼt all that surprised by it because she was known to be one of the more austere managers of the bunch. Deftly, I tried to plug the hole Iʼd made by joking, “I hope you arenʼt the one who wrote it. Ha-ha. Insert foot in mouth, right?” I knew that she hadnʼt been the one to write it, but she seemed to take my comment personally anyway.

In the end, I was summoned to the Entertainment Offices one afternoon and informed by the Park Director himself that I was expected to begin overnight rehearsals for The Goosebumps Show the following week. Although Iʼd witnessed some of my cast mates using the technique, I unfortunately learned a bit too late that when “asked” by management to do something that you really didnʼt want to do, it was best to be quick on the draw with some sort of scheduling conflict. Something they couldnʼt argue with or hold against you like, “I just got a second job at Starbuckʼs so my availability is an issue.” Not surprisingly, not only did telling them that I thought the show was stupid not work, Iʼd unwittingly laid the first brick of many that would eventually build an impenetrable wall between “Me” and “Them.”

***

At the closing of the second overnight rehearsal, I was sent to the Creative Costuming building on the other side of the studio, which is where I met Natalie for the first time. Iʼd seen her before, and I knew who she was, but weʼd never spoken to one another before then.

Natalie was the manager of the costuming department and her office was in a long, low bungalow situated at the rear of the lot. Natalie was hired back when the place first opened, and ever since then she and her crew were the ones who built every single costume required for any new attraction or show that came down the pike. She had a park-wide reputation for being dependable, timely, no-nonsense and very likable. She was respected by everyone who knew her.

When Natalie was at work on a project, her M.O. was to get each cast member that she had to dress through the costuming process as quickly and efficiently as possible. She ran a tight ship and when it was sailing along as she would have it, us performers were in and out of there in minutes, like car parts zipping down a Ford assembly line. But no matter how hectic the place got, Natalie rarely, if ever, lost her cool. Even under the most pressing of deadlines, with upper management breathing impatiently down her neck, Natalie always managed to maintain an atmosphere of fun in her workplace.

I was exhausted and more than a little peeved that I was being told to report to costuming after such a long and tiresome overnight rehearsal. Admittedly, much of my frustration stemmed from my resentment at being forced to be in this torturously bad show in the first place. Throughout the rehearsal, run-through after agonizing run- through, I became increasingly upset at the position I was in. No matter what I tried, no matter how much comedic mugging I did to ham it up, the script was just so badly written that even my attempts to play it purposefully over the top didnʼt make it watchable. When I made any effort to express my concerns to the showʼs director, he simply dismissed me by tossing the responsibility back at me.

He said, “I have every confidence in you as a performer, Dewey, that youʼll find a way to make this work.” But what I heard was, “Look, the only reason Iʼm here directing this piece of shit is because I need my superiors to see that Iʼm willing to take one for the team. That way, when the big shows come along, theyʼll think of me. So shut up and stop making this harder for me.”

My scheduled time slot at Costuming was set for six-thirty in the morning. I arrived a few minutes early, signed in at the reception desk and took a seat on the small sofa against the wall to wait for someone to call me in. Luckily, I wasnʼt made to wait long. Any longer and theyʼd have found me conked out completely, drooling on their pretty furniture. The door opened and a plain-looking girl with her stringy brown hair pushed behind her ears popped her head into the lobby and said, “Dewey?”

“Thatʼs me, alright.” I said, making an effort not to sound as pissed off as I felt. It wasnʼt this girlʼs fault that I wasnʼt home in bed right now. I followed her through the door and down the hallway to the bank of dressing rooms in the back. She opened the door to dressing room number three and pointed to a small, carpeted box on the floor.

“Just step up there and Iʼll get someone to come in and help me take your measurements.” She said. A couple of minutes later, the door opened and Natalie walked in with the girl trailing behind. Iʼd never been this close to Natalie before, so it was a surprise to see how much she looked like Rosie OʼDonnell, except that Natalie was a lot prettier, and considerably more feminine than Rosie, too. I told Natalie what I was thinking, and she laughed.

“Oh my God!” She grinned. “You have no idea how many times a day I hear that. Itʼs a good thing I like her so much or else Iʼd probably take offense to it.”

“I love Rosie,” I admitted. “I tape her show and watch it every night.” For some reason, most people either seemed to love Rosie or hate her. There was never an in between. She was a polarizing figure, but I admired her for it. Much like my grandfather, she took no shit and demanded from the world exactly what she wanted with no apologies, and it had made her famous.

Natalie grabbed a clipboard off the wall and started filling out the top part of a size- chart. Then she handed the clipboard off to the girl. Natalie asked me which show I was in.

“Well, officially Iʼm with Streetmo,” I said. “But begrudgingly? Iʼm at Goosebumps.”

“You arenʼt one to mince words, are you?” She laughed as she pulled the seamstress tape from around her neck and stretched it across my back from shoulder to shoulder. She gave her assistant the number and the girl wrote it down on the form.

“It depends upon the situation, I guess.” I said. “I mean, there are times when Iʼm a coward and keep what I really think to myself.”

“You think thatʼs cowardly, keeping things to yourself?” She asked, pulling the tape down my right leg from hip to ankle.

“You a shrink, too? Will I be charged for this?” I quipped. Natalie chuckled and kept measuring my body parts. “Iʼve just always had this weird, overpowering…I donʼt know, need I guess, to be completely honest with people. Even if the truth isnʼt pretty.”

“Remind me to never ask you if I look fat in these jeans.”

“I had this therapist tell me one time that I should learn to bend the truth a little bit. Protect peopleʼs feelings by telling them little white lies.”

“We all gotta do it sometimes.”

“But thatʼs just it. I really donʼt like doing it. If you asked me what I thought about something, Iʼd be forced to tell you.”

“Forced?”

“Thatʼs what it feels like to me, yeah. I mean, say youʼre wearing a new perfume and you ask me whether or not I like it. If I donʼt, then I feel obligated to tell you I donʼt. I feel that telling you I like it when I donʼt is lying to you, which, in my humble opinion, is one of the worst things a person can do to another person.”

“I can think of worse things.” Natalie said evenly. She knelt down now and told me to spread my legs a bit. “Iʼm gonna measure your inseam now,” she said, looking up at me with a smile. “Feel free to tell me the truth if this makes you uncomfortable in any way.” She joked.

“I can handle it,” I smiled. I liked that Natalie had such a lively sense of humor. “No womanʼs been near my crotch in years.”

It wasnʼt often that I met someone whom I felt so at ease with as I did with Natalie. She seemed to be a person who presented to the world exactly who she was instead of who she thought other people wanted her to be. No facades, no trying to impress, no over compensating. It occurred to me in that moment that someone as real as Natalie was wouldnʼt last five minutes in a greenroom filled with self-centered, egotistical, insecure Disney actors. Sheʼd drown in all our bullshit.

“Thatʼs it,” Natalie said finally. “You can come down from your perch.” W
 I sat down on the carpeted box to put my shoes back on as the assistant said good-bye and left with my size-chart. She was probably off to her station that very second to begin cutting the pattern for my Amazo cape, I thought. Natalie escorted me back to the lobby, chatting openly along the way.

“You have a big head, you know.” She said.

“What?”

“Your head is huge. Seven and a quarter! Weʼre gonna have to build you your own top hat. Your fat headʼll never fit into the one we made for the other guy.”

***

I was almost out of the front doors of the lobby when I heard Natalie call after me. She followed me out into the portico, the door hissed shut behind her.

“Iʼm going to the Cast Away tonight. You want to meet me and my friend there for a drink?” She saw my hesitation and added, “I know you donʼt have another rehearsal tonight, so you can sleep all day and then join us there this evening.” I asked her how she knew that I didnʼt have rehearsal. “Weʼre emailed the schedules, too.” She said. “But donʼt worry. Iʼm not stalking you. I just thought it would be fun to continue our conversation.”

“Weʼll see.” I said noncommittally.

“Yikes,” she mock cringed. “Did I overstep?”

“No, no. Iʼm sorry. Itʼs just that Iʼm really not into bars…” I started. She turned and opened the door to go back inside.

“You donʼt have to say yes right now,” she said, holding the door ajar. “You can say yes after youʼve gotten a good eight hours of sleep. See you there at ten.”

Natalie let the door close behind her, strut her way back across the lobby floor, and disappeared through the other door.

***

I wasnʼt kidding when I told Natalie that I didnʼt like bars. I preferred intimate gatherings with two, maybe three other people at the most, ideally at a table in some private corner of an unknown restaurant. Thoughtful conversations without any distractions were more to my liking. I shied away from bars and nightclubs mainly because I didnʼt drink. But, the real truth was that the social aspect of those places terrified me. I had always despised small talk and, frankly, I was bad at it. All these things taken into consideration, there really was no point in my going out at all. So, I rarely did.

Part of my disdain for what I considered the dubious night life stemmed from the many unpleasant experiences Iʼd had with the men that my mother often brought home from those dark and seedy places. It wasnʼt uncommon when I was a kid to be awakened at night by the rowdy commotion of some drunk asshole slobbering over my mother out on

the living room sofa. Iʼd wander out to investigate, rubbing the sleep from my eyes, and find that Iʼd interrupted something that was happening on the couch that I didnʼt quite understand, but to my young eyes appeared to be rather violent. The strange man was on top of my mother and she was making weird sounds. “Get off of her!” Iʼd scream. “Get off of my mom! Youʼre hurting her!” But even though I was trying to save her, my mom always got mad at me. Sheʼd yell at me and tell me to get the hell back into my room.

But I actually liked Natalie, which caused me to feel a bit guilty that I really had no intention at all of meeting her and her friend at the Cast Away. I knew that the place would be filled with people that I didnʼt know, and I feared that, as usual, Iʼd ultimately leave feeling like an idiot because of something stupid Iʼd said, or because I could never shake the awful feeling that I was somehow unwelcome. Nobody had to actually do anything to make me feel that way, but it didnʼt matter. Iʼd sabotage the evening anyway by convincing myself that people were staring at me balefully, wondering why the hell Iʼd been allowed to come into the joint in the first place.

I tried to give myself a pep talk. What was the worst thing that could happen, really? Sure, I might feel awkward and I might say something really stupid that caused everyone to slowly pull away from me, but Iʼd experienced all that before, right? Iʼd survived. If I did go, I reminded myself, I had all the power. I could turn around and walk out of there any time that I wanted to. It wasnʼt as if they locked the doors once Iʼd gone in, trapping me inside.

Then why did social situations always feel like a trap to me?

If I took any time to think about it, I guessed I understood, in part, anyway, why that was. For some reason, large groups of people were difficult for me to endure because, well, I felt lost within such a big crowd. No, not lost. Insignificant. Unnoticed. And even though nobody in particular had done anything to cause me to feel that way, it happened regardless, and I would become angry at everyone in the room. It was stupid and irrational, I knew. But that never stopped it from happening.

But, goddammit, itʼs getting old. Get off your ass and go meet Natalie. Sheʼs made it clear that she wants to be a friend.

I forced myself to put on my sneakers and grab my car keys. If things got weird, I would just stick close to Natalie, the one face that I would know.

***

The Cast Away was the after work hangout for most cast members who liked that sort of place. I pulled into the sandy parking lot and located a parking space around the back side of the building. The place had been a home years ago, one of those ugly cinderblock structures with only one floor and an open carport. The three windows across the front of the place were blacked out, but signs advertising brands of beer glowed behind the glass. A sign that read “OPEN” and flashed letter by letter above the Miller Lite sign. The building was so small it appeared as if it couldnʼt hold more than thirty people at one time. When I walked inside, though, I realized that if the maximum capacity allowed was thirty, the local fire marshall would have a hey-day citing the place. But, in spite of how packed it was, Natalie spotted me as soon as I came in. She waved at me from the bar.

I made my way over to her, squeezing between high-tops and skirting the pool table that took up most of the center of the room. I took note of how low the ceiling was. More noticeable, however, was the fact that almost every inch of the ceiling was covered with old cast member name tags. Hundreds of them were stuck into the styrofoam panels like one giant, upside down bulletin board.

After a litany of awkward “excuse meʼs” and a nasty look from a girl whose beer spilled when I knocked into her, I finally reached the bar. Natalie turned to greet me with a hug, as if weʼd know one another for years. Her forwardness caught me off guard, but I worked through it, trying not to stiffen up for the hug. I made an effort to let her be the first one to release the hug, but it was taking way too long. I pulled away and said, “Wow, this place is crowded.”

“Isnʼt it great, though?” Natalie said. “I love coming here.” Then she turned and placed her arm upon the arm of the guy standing next to her. “This here is Greg. Greg, this is Dewey. Heʼs the Streetmo guy I was telling you about.” She glanced at me playfully and said, “The one with the huge head.” I shook Gregʼs hand. It was as soft as a babyʼs butt. That didnʼt surprise me, though. A guy as gorgeous as Greg certainly didnʼt have to worry about hardening up his hands with manual labor.

As though sheʼd read my mind, Natalie said, “Isnʼt he cute? Heʼs a Prince Charming at the Magic Kingdom.”

I deliberately restrained myself from reacting. I supposed that olʼ Greg was used to people being impressed whenever they learned that he was a “Prince,” but not me. Whenever I felt that social etiquette required a particular “correct” response, I usually found myself responding in a manner exactly the opposite of whatʼs expected. I feigned disinterest and purposefully downplayed the moment.

“Oh,” I said. “Cool.”

There was a little girl sitting next to me in the third grade once. Her name was Paula. We were coloring in a ditto that our teacher had handed out to each of us. Paula kept saying over and over again, “Mine looks stupid.” I ignored her. I knew what she wanted,

expected, me to say: “Aw, no it doesnʼt, Paula. It looks great.” But, no matter how many times she repeated herself, I refused to take the bait. Paula was really annoying me. Eventually, when she couldnʼt stand it any longer, she turned to me and asked me directly, “My picture looks stupid, doesnʼt it?”

Resentful of such unfair expectation, I replied curtly, “It sure does, Paula.”

Well, I wasnʼt in the third grade anymore, but my response to Greg wasnʼt much different. The truth was, his good looks intimidated me. Handsome people always did. For me, looking at a gorgeous person was like being forced to look at all of my own physical flaws. And anyway, pretty people expected to be fawned over, and I wasnʼt going to give him that.

“I was about to order another drink,” Natalie told me. “Your first oneʼs on me.”

“No thanks,” I said probably a little too emphatically. The inevitable next question came.

“You donʼt drink?” Natalie said. I tried to appear at ease as I replied that, no, I didnʼt drink.

“Iʼve just never found anything that I like.” I lied. You canʼt find something if youʼve never looked for it. Natalie smirked at me and raised her glass in the air. Just before the glass touched her lips, she said, winking at me, “Bullshit.”

“Well, I certainly donʼt have that problem.” Greg chimed in. He was already feeling merry. He took his drink (Third? Fourth?) from the bartender and said, “Mama likes to party!” He, too, raised his glass in the air. “To The Rat.” He said, and the two of them clinked glasses. Greg looked at me and said, “You see? Youʼre missing out on all of the fun, Dougie.” He took another, longer sip and I decided not to correct him. That would have been rude. He was royalty, after all.

***

By midnight, the bar staff had rolled the pool table against a wall and a dee-jay began pumping dance music from a tiny set-up in the corner. A small disco ball that I hadnʼt noticed before wobbled and glittered as people reached up to spin it manually. It was

like a sad, low-budget Studio 54 in there. Natalie grabbed me by the arm and yanked me playfully. “Letʼs dance!” She said. She was already gyrating where we stood.

“I donʼt dance,” I heard myself say. God, how many things did I not do? “Iʼm not really that good at…” I tried to make an excuse but I wasnʼt quick enough. Natalie was forcefully dragging me out into the center of the room.

“Watch my drink!” She called back to Greg. She lead us to a spot in the dead center of the dance floor. The top of my head bumped the low hanging disco ball and I watched the silver sparkles swing back and forth across Natalieʼs face. “Footloose” was playing and Natalie hollered, “I feel like Iʼm at my ninth grade dance again!” I smiled awkwardly, remembering that my ninth grade dance was probably the last time Iʼd ever stepped foot upon a dance floor. I knew that I had a problem with letting go, and dancing certainly required an amount of raw abandon that I wasnʼt comfortable exploring. Even at the ninth grade dance, my buddies and I had never actually danced at all. In an effort not to look stupid, we horsed around instead and teased the people that were dancing. My guess is that our plan didnʼt work so well and that we ended up looking even more ridiculous than we would have had we actually found the courage to dance with everyone else.

Natalie spun me wildly around the dance floor, making me feel like a sack of potatoes being dragged about. I wasnʼt resisting her. But, I wasnʼt doing anything in the way of participating either. Natalie said something to me that I couldnʼt hear over Mr. Loggins.

“What?” I said. Natalie placed her hands upon my shoulders and pulled me down to her. “I think Greg likes you.” She said into my ear. I leaned back and stared at her, not sure how to respond. Because I had no clue as to what was expected of me in that moment, I found myself at a loss for one of my usual countering responses. I couldnʼt decide if I was upset with Natalie or grateful to her. Either way, it was weird to me that she would presume to play matchmaker for me when weʼd only just met that afternoon. It rubbed me the wrong way somehow, like when someone calls you by a nickname when they donʼt know you at all. And anyway, what made her so sure that I was gay? I certainly hadnʼt told her. I mumbled, “I seriously doubt it.” But, I couldnʼt stop myself from glancing over my shoulder to where Greg stood at the bar. He was looking right at me. He raised his glass and smiled.

“Um,” Natalie nudged. “Think again, you hottie.” She waved her hand above her head, summoning Greg to come over and join us.

“What are you doing?” I panicked.

“Iʼm helping you,” she said. Then she turned and walked away, leaving me alone on the dance floor. Greg was there now and he said, “Sheʼs something else, isnʼt she?” He offered me a glass.

“Oh, I donʼt…” I said.

“Itʼs just soda, sweetheart,” Greg interrupted. I took it from him. “I donʼt want to be a bad influence on you from the very start.” Greg was making it pretty clear that there was interest. For tonight, at least. But, I was terrified. I had no experience whatsoever with that game. Marie and I had only been divorced for two years and Iʼd been so busy trying to pick up the pieces that finding myself a boyfriend had been at the very bottom of my To Do list, if on it at all. Standing close in front of me now, Greg stretched his arms out over my shoulders, his drink clasped in his hands behind my head. My body tensed and I wanted to pull away, but I was trapped. I resented Greg for that.

“How long have you been in Orlando?” He asked me, swaying both of us to the music now. I felt ridiculous and exposed. Where the fuck do I put my hands? They hung limp at my sides.

“My mom moved us here from New York when we were kids,” I said. I sensed that Iʼd been lured into small talk and I resented that as well. “But when my son was born, my ex-wife and I decided to move back there to raise him.”

“Holy shit, you were married? You have a kid?”

“Yes.”

“Ah-ha,” Greg grinned. “So thereʼs an ex-wife, a son and a desperate escape to a small town where you could hide behind a white picket fence and a nine-to-five. Boy, you flew into the closet and locked the door behind you.”

“We just felt that we needed to…” I began to explain. Greg stopped me.

“Shit, Iʼm sorry man,” he said, taking a step back from me now. “I was just making conversation. I didnʼt mean to pry. That was out of line.”

“You donʼt even know me.” I snapped, in effect batting his apology right back into his face.

“No,” he agreed, looking down at his drink. “No, I donʼt.” He took a slow sip and glanced back at the bar. “You know, Iʼve never really liked Cyndi Lauper very much. I think Iʼll sit this one out.” He pushed past me and walked away, leaving me alone again on the dance floor. This time for good. I listened to Cyndi mock me.

…caught up in circles, confusion is nothing new.