Hey Now, You're an All Star

One day I was driving down 690 towards Syracuse. It was a nice summer day, mostly sunny and warm. My windows were rolled up and the AC was on. Around the Lakeland exit, there’s an older forest green sedan in the left hand lane. He’s going slower than I am. I ride his bumper for a few seconds until he moves over. I pass aggressively because at the time I actually thought it meant something. I drive past and think nothing of it.

A couple miles down the road, near the Hiawatha exit, the same car pulls up alongside me. The driver is waving his hands and gesticulating wildly, trying to get my attention. I think he’s trying to tell me there’s something wrong with my car; I have a light out or my gas cap is open. Whatever, I’ll check it out when I get where I’m going.

About a mile further is my exit, Wet Genesee Street. I pull off and the car follows me. I’m a little worried now, thinking, “Shit, I pissed off a gang member.” The driver is this big, bald black dude. There’s a red light at the bottom of th ramp. I stop and he pulls up along my right side. He motions for me to roll down my window. I figure, all right, fine, let’s see what this is all about.

I roll down my window, he looks right at me and says, “Mmm, you are gorgeous,” with the gay lisp and all.

I’m stunned. “Uh… what?”

“You are fine, sweet thang!”

I can’t even come up with words. My mouth is just hanging open.

“Do you work out?”

“I… uh… um… no,” is all I can manage to stutter. It’s a lie, but honestly, I’m so astounded I can’t even think straight.

The light turns and I book it. He follows me, screaming his number out the window and “Call me! Call me!” as I shake my head going, “No! No!”

About nine months later, I was working a temp job at an insurance company in downtown Syracuse. I’m washing my hands in the restroom and another guy walks out of one of the stalls. He’s pretty big, standing over six feet and probably close to 250 pounds. He’s in his mid 30’s, but his hair is already starting to go gray.

“Hey man, how are you?” he asks as he moves next to me to wash his hands. This is a little uncomfortable, but not technically a breach of men’s bathroom etiquette, so I respond with a simply, “Good, you?”

“You been here long? Where do you sit? I just started my customer service training.”

He seems like a nice guy, so I play along. “Just a few weeks. I’m a temp. I work over… in that general direction,” I say, pointing.

“That’s cool. I’m Mike, by the way,” he says, offering his hand. This is really pushing the boundaries, but he just washed them, so whatever. I shake his hand, “I’m Mike too.”

“Cool. Maybe I’ll see you around.”

I saw him around a lot. Well, not so much around. He came to my cubicle two or three times a week. Even when he finished his training and moved to the third floor (I was on the sixth), he’d come by on his breaks. I mostly thought nothing of it. He was just a lonely guy and for whatever reason, he’d chosen me to be his work friend.

It wasn’t until he gave me his number and said we should hang out that I began to think something was up. I just nodded my head and said, “Maybe.” I threw his number away as soon as he left. He came to my cubicle on a Monday, “Hey, how come you didn’t call me?”

“Oh. Uh… I must’ve lost your number.”

“That’s too bad. You could’ve come over, I would’ve cooked us dinner. We could’ve relaxed and had a good time.”

That totally set off alarms in my head. “Oh. Sorry.”

“Here’s my number again. Call me sometime.”

“Okay, I will.” I’m such an asshole. I wouldn’t, and I promptly lost his number in the trash again.

I got laid off a few weeks later, so I never knew for certain if he was trying to hook up with me. He apparently came out to a friend of mine that worked in the same building, so my guess is probably yes.

Finally, there was a night in Armory Square. I was out with some friends, and we were drinking, because that’s what you do. We started at Syracuse Suds. I had had two long islands, so I’m pretty much in the bag. We decide to cross the street and go to Teddy’s. When we talk in, there’s a guy sitting at the table near the door. He touches my arm. Not like a sharp, “Hey dude, what’s up?” touch I might get from someone I know, but a soft, lingering, “Heeeyyy, how you doin’” touch.

Like I said, I’m pretty trashed, so I don’t recognize it as the latter. “What’re you drinking?” he asks. I look at him. It’s dark and I’m drunk, so I’m squinting. I’m trying to figure out if I know him. Did I go to school with him? Did I work with him? Is he a friend of a friend, what?

“What are you drinking?” he repeats.

And then it hits me. It happened again. It happened again.

“I, uh… I don’t know yet,” was the best answer I could come up with as I made a beeline for my friends. As I recounted what had just happened, they laughed and called me stupid. “Dude, you could’ve gotten a free drink out of it.”

This is all sort of amusing to me. I don’t think I put off the gay vibe. Most of my straight friends do, though. It’s good to know that if I ever decide to switch teams, I’m already an all star.