I drop my head down between my shoulders, but I can feel Rex’s heat at my side. I’m so furious with myself for this lame date that I want to punch myself in the face. Or punch a wall hard enough that my knuckles will be swollen tomorrow in reminder. And I’m fucking embarrassed. I guess Leo was right not to look convinced.
“Fuck, Rex, I suck at this! I’m shit at romance, or whatever the hell a date’s supposed to be. I don’t know how I’m supposed to act. I don’t know what I’m supposed to say or do! I don’t know how it’s supposed to go, and don’t tell me there is no supposed to because I know there is. I know there is because if I were doing it right you wouldn’t be looking at me like that right now. I wouldn’t have pissed you off and…. Dammit!” I yell.
I hit the counter with my fist, since I’m relatively sure I won’t break it. The counter, I mean.
“I can’t even take you out on a date without fucking the whole thing up. I should never have taken you to that stupid movie. You’re right, it was fucking pretentious of me and of course you hated it!”
“I didn’t hate it!” Rex yells. “Would you stop? I didn’t hate the movie, Daniel. I didn’t… I didn’t fucking understand it, okay?”
He puts his hands over his mouth, like he’s just said something he can’t take back.
“Oh, well, I mean, Surrealism’s pretty disjointed, so—”
“No. I mean—shit,” he breaks off shaking his head. “I couldn’t read the subtitles. I can’t… I don’t read very well.” He shakes his head again, like he’s frustrated with what he said. He looks up at me as if it takes a lot of effort. “I’m dyslexic,” he says. “Severely.”
It takes me a minute to process this, since Rex seems so completely competent at everything, but once it sinks in, the pieces fall into place like the reveal at the end of a mystery novel.
Rex taking my phone number rather than writing his own, Rex not texting, Rex having no use for the Internet, Rex cooking without recipes. Jesus, of course. And that night with Will and Leo, when Leo wanted to place that game where you had to read things off scraps of paper, Will made excuses because he knew Rex wouldn’t be able to do it. Because he knows. And Rex never told me. Fuck, that can’t be good.
I realize that I haven’t said anything and Rex is now looking back down at his hands. I’m not sure what to say. I can tell this is a big deal to Rex, and I don’t want to say the wrong thing.
Absent anything helpful to say, I decide to take a page out of Rex’s book and I put a hand on his shoulder. He’s shaking. He looks so tired all of a sudden; his forehead is wrinkled and his mouth is tight.
“I’m not—” He shakes his head in frustration. “I’m not stupid.” He spits out the word. “It’s just that things get all jumbled up. Especially if I’m nervous. I mean, I can read. Subtitles go too fast, though.” Every word is tight, bitten off. It’s clearly killing him to tell me this.
He walks into the living room and starts to build a fire. I follow, sitting on the couch and just watching the strong line of his back, his clever hands kindling the fire quickly. Marilyn trots over and licks my hand, then settles into her favorite spot in front of the fire. God, it must be amazing to be Marilyn. Warm, taken care of, pet all the time, nothing to do except eat and shit and cuddle and sleep by the fire. Never having to worry about whether you’re acting right or if someone’s going to misinterpret what you said. Never trying to figure out what you want.
Rex sinks down onto the couch next to me, looking at me intently.
“Sometimes I can hardly think when I look at you,” he says, almost like he’s talking to himself.
“Wha?” I garble out stupidly. He traces my eyebrows with his thumbs and then lets his hands fall away as he leans his head back onto the couch and sighs. He looks lost for the first time since I’ve known him.
I straddle Rex’s lap and put my hands on his shoulders, so I’m looking into his eyes.
“I know you’re not stupid,” I tell him calmly. “I think you’re incredibly smart. You have an insane memory. Amazing spatial skills. You can fix everything and you know how things work just by looking at them. You are anything but stupid.”
Rex lets out a breath. He seems… relieved, maybe? That he told me. His hands come up to settle on my hips. He nods, though barely.