Cyrus v. the Homosapien Agenda

11/17/21

He likes to imagine me fantasizing.

That's something I probably shouldn't have read right before bed. I lie here in the pitch-darkness, reading that particular line on my phone again and again. I'm jittery and awake and completely in knots, all from a god damned email.

It's really so confusing, in a good way. Jet's normally so careful about what he writes.

He likes to imagine me fantasizing!

I wonder what it would be like to meet him in person, after all this time. Would we even speak or would we go straight to making out? I think I can picture it. He's in my bedroom, and we're totally alone. He sits beside me on the bed and turns to look at me with his hazel eyes. Gus' eyes. And then his hands cup my face, and we're kissing all of a sudden.

My hands cup my face. I can picture it. He kisses me, and it's nothing like Natalie or Kaitlyn or Iris. There's this electric tingly feeling radiating through my whole body and my brain has gone fuzzy and I actually think I can hear my heartbeat.

And then, panic hits. Jet mentioned that he knows a guy at the school who's obsessed with taters. There's only one guy who's publicly obsessed. Me. And only one guy who jokes around about it. TJ.

Don't read too much into things, Cyrus!

On Wednesday, Buffy intercepts me as I walk into school.

"Hey," she says, "Kira, I'm stealing him."

"What's up?" I ask.

She avoids my eyes, "I made you a mix."

She hands me a CD in a clear plastic case. She doesn't do Spotify when it comes to meaningful stuff, "You can load it onto ITunes once you get home. Whatever."

I turn the case over in my hand. Instead of a track list, Buffy's composed a haiku.

Wrinkled neck, gray hair

Sorry to say this, Cyrus

But you're fucking old.

"Buff. It's so beautiful."

"Yeah, okay," she scoots backwards on the ledge we're sitting on and leans back on her hands, looking at me, "All right. Are we cool?"

I nod, "You mean about..."

"About you guys ditching me on hoco."

"I'm really sorry, Buff."

The edges of her mouth tug up, "You're so effing lucky it's your birthday."

And then she puts a cone shaped party hat on my head, having pulled it out of her bag when I was distracted, and straps it on.

"Sorry if I overreacted," she adds. And then, when no ones there, kissing my cheek super platonically. Buffy only ever does that with family and the GHC.

There's a massive sheet cake with my face on it at lunch. When I get to the table, everyone's wearing hats. As per tradition, no one gets cake without it. Marty's wearing two, seemingly desiring two pieces.

"Cyyrus," Andi sings, "Hands out, eyes closed."

I feel something drop into my palm. I open my eyes, and it's a papier-mâché baby tater with a big spoon, fashioned into a clip. I grin at her in thanks.

A couple of people from other tables look at us, and I grin and blush at the attention, "Should I wear it?"

"Uh, yeah. You have to. Especially when we got you this."

She props up a gigantic bag from the Spoon, with a literal bucket of baby taters, a whole bunch of burgers, and milkshakes, "Our gift to you. It's all yours."

"I will wear this with pride and eat it remembering you all," I promise, clipping it on.

"If you notice, there are 11 burgers and enough baby taters to fill 17 small containers of baby taters. November 17th kid, turning 17 on the 17th. If only you could dance, then you'd be the dancing queen," TJ says. He then looks at Jonah, "Beck, if you start to sing Dancing Queen, you won't get anything for your birthday."

"But it's the best song!" Jonah protests.

"Not in public, dude," the GHC says and we high five without looking at each other. Because that's how badass we are.

"So, whenever you're ready," Buffy says. She's holding a plastic knife she must've gotten from the lunch ladies and a stack of plates. She's chummier than usual with Marty, which is weird.

"So ready."

Buff slices it into perfect little squares, sending waves of magical deliciousness into the cafeteria sky. Guess which table of A.P. nerds are now the most popular kids in school?

"No hat, no cake," Natalie and Kaitlynn lay down the law from the other end of the table.

A couple of kids tape pieces of binder paper into cone hats, and at least five dudes wedge brown bags onto their heads as chef hats. People are shameless when it comes to cake. It's beautiful to see.

The cake is literally perfect, a standard expectation from Buffy. It's what I like to call Neopolitan cake, equal parts vanilla, chocolate, and strawberry, and is covered with the weirdly delicious Publix whipped cream.

Buffy is the best at birthdays.

Later, I bring leftovers to rehearsal. When we're all tuckered out after two hours of dance choreo and practice, Albright lets us have a cake picnic on stage (read: drama kids shoveling cake into their mouths like vultures).

"Oh my god, I think I just gained like five pounds," Amy Everett, one of the ensemble members, says.

"Aww," says Taylor, "I guess I'm lucky I've got a really fast metabolism."

Seriously, that's Taylor. I mean, I even know people can justifiably kill you for saying stuff like that.

Reed, a cake casualty, is sprawled out with his face in the box. He isn't so bad now that he isn't blackmailing me.

"Alright guys, hop to it. Pencils out. It's script notes time," Albright says, hopping over him.

I don't mind the writing. The scene we're choreographing takes place in a tavern. All I gotta write is "act drunk, dude". It's too bad these aren't the notes we get tested on for finals, because some people's (not mine, I'm a straight A student) grades would vastly improve. When I'm bored, though, I'll scribble down notes for people who're also in the scene, just in case they need any.

We push through without a break other than the cake. I'm not in every scene so I chill in the greenroom with the other people not doing anything. There's a TV in the room with live feed from the stage, so we all watch. I forget sometimes what it's like to sit back and watch.

Reed's standing with Andi, telling a story with wild gestures. She's laughing hard, which doesn't look fake. Andi never fake laughs.

Suddenly Gus comes in when no one's there but me, nudging my foot which I propped up on the table, "Hey. Happy birthday."

This is a happy birthday.

He collapses on the other side of the sofa, "Doing anything to celebrate?"

Oh. Okay, I don't want to lie, but my entire plans consist of hanging out with my family and Facebook message reading. Maybe dinner out. It's a Wednesday, I don't have to do anything. I believe Bram's coming over this weekend and Amber finished her midterms early so she's coming for Thanksgiving early, so we'll celebrate then.

"Yeah, I guess so," I say finally, "We're having ice cream cake and taters."

I just have to put the tater thing out there.

"That's cool," he says, "Hope you saved room for it."

No discernible reaction to the taters. But I guess that doesn't need to mean anything.

"Okay, well, enjoy it," Gus says, standing up, "I've got to get back to the stage. I'd rather Albright not scream at me for a missing prop this time."

But then he puts his hand on my shoulder, but it's off in a jiffy. I almost don't believe it happened.

Birthdays are fucking amazing.