A Dagger in My Back and an Elbow in My Side

In winter of 2013, I was in the first semester of my sophomore year of high school. I was a theater major at a boarding arts high school in Massachusetts. I lived in a dorm called New Cottage with 11 other guys, we were inseparably close by this point in the year, new and returning students. We were known around campus, quite creatively, as the "New Cottage Boys."

We made an Instagram (@cottage_chees) and had many late night bathroom photo shoots that made there way from our Snapchat stories into the hearts of the entire student body (and some of the teachers).

(Insert Album Title)

We seriously, we did these almost every night.

Too Strong

Seriously.

Pushed

The bathroom was the only place we could be other than our own rooms after curfew so we used to hang out there for an hour or so afterward.

This story is specifically about Me, Yan, and the girl we didn't know would come between us. (That's hella dramatic.)

So like I said, it's winter in 2013. Our neighboring dorm is hosting a Wes Anderson movie lock-in. It was supposed to be where we lock ourselves in the campus center and watch as many Wes Anderson movies as possible until the sun comes up; if that weren't lame enough they cut it short after 2:00 AM. They locked us in a huge room with a tv and a bunch of couches and chairs, made us watch three Wes Anderson movies (and this was before Grand BudapestHotel so we watched the two good ones and Moonrise Kingdom) and then sent us out in the freezing cold of Massachusetts with nothing but pajamas and all of our blankets and pillows.

So yeah, this would shape up to be even weirder and more of a let down than what was initially promised on the sign-up sheet.

I didn't actually want to go, but Yan Diego is a sucker for Wes Anderson and begged me to come because he thought it would be more fun with a New Cottage boy there. I obliged. I also thought that maybe I could widen my understanding of modern cinema as I had only seen parts of Fantastic Mr. Fox at that point.

We get there and there are WAY MORE PEOPLE than there had any right to be. I guess it is true that all artists, on some level, hate themselves.

ANYWAY. One of the unfortunate guests to the event was Hana. Hana was new this year and had made a quick impression as very loud and unapologetically herself. She was a curly-haired, big, cuddly Jewish girl with the powerful singing voice and an infectious laugh. Needless to say, I was incredibly taken with her. I had never voiced this to anyone.

We showed up right at curfew to be counted there for the after-hours event so there were only a couple spots left and we had already missed the first movie (Fantastic Mr. Fox). Hana spotted us from across the room and said that we should go sit by her. She had her own chair and she filled it nearly to capacity, so there was no way I could fit. Yan, however, could get through any crack he could fit his head through. So he took the coveted spot of "cuddle-buddy" while I looked for a spot on one of the couches further back.

I wasn't honestly phased at all, I hadn't planned on coming in the first place. I was a little bummed I wasn't going to sit by the person who dragged me here in the first place, but I'd cope. I'm also big, cuddly, and well liked so it didn't take long to find a spot next to a cuddly arts major willing to share their personal space.

First movie up; The Royal Tenenbaums. Quirky. I only checked my phone a couple times throughout. We took a break after the credits rolled.

I rest my eyes for a second. My pocket buzzes with a text from Yan.

"We just made out," it says. I'm confused because in fact Yan and I had NOT just made out. I caught on and said "haha."

"No, really." I look over at where Yan and Hana were sitting and they are both staring at me and nodding their heads. Her lipstick is smeared. It hurt a little, but Yan didn't mean anything by it. That was his first kiss, he must've been proud and excited, I thought.

She got up, rubbing off the lipstick before the chaperone noticed and Yan sat in the chair.

The people sitting next to me had left so when we came back to watch movie number two, I had a full couch to myself. Hana and Yan caught on to this and, trying to kill two birds with one stone, decide to sit next to me AND continue their newly established relationship.

Whatever.

Second movie; Moonrise Kingdom. Not really a fan. 12-year-old sexual exploration is a personal no-go in terms of watching material. Although I may be biased against it because a real-life exploration was happening 0 INCHES AWAY FROM ME.

Yes.

At about the climax of this film—rain storm and all—Yan and Hana decide to pick up where they left off; tossing and turning in the process.

Only a minute into their fun and Yan looks like James Franco from 127 Hours stuck in between two boulders, struggling to escape.

I'm a person in the real world so of course, this bothered the hell out of me, but I'm not a snitch intent on receiving any stitches, so I decided to keep my discomfort low key at least until I could embarrass Yan later in the dorm about it. That is until I feel Yan's skeleton arm reach up from in between Hana and I and pull my shoulder down.

I immediately yanked my whole upper body out of his reach and sit on the arm of the chair as I had no intention of turning this awkward wrestling match into a threesome. I toughed it out the rest of the film and went back to the dorm.

Yan catches me in my room and stares for a moment, standing in my doorway.

"Well?" I began to ask, "How was it?"

"Dude," he said, in a tone I didn't anticipate, "Why didn't you help me?"

"Help you? I didn't go to that even to be your hookup mattress."

"I tried to pull myself up and you moved away."

Confused, I said, "Wait-"

"I didn't want to kiss her at all, I just didn't know what to do when she started," he continued, pretty heartbroken, "I missed pretty much all of both movies."

I couldn't help but laugh. Those movies are SO long. The rest of the night was pretty much me coaching him how to "let her down easy" or more realistically "how to explain why he accidentally made out with her for 2 hours and never wanted to."

Yan, to this day, denies this as his first kiss claiming that it doesn't count. I on the end will never forget it and will never let him forget the time he got to first base while I roleplayed as a baseball field.