“No, I’m a total Hamil-head.”
“We’re called Hamilfans, actually.”
I tell him how I want to write Hamilton and Harry Potter crossover fanfiction and call it The Great American Fantasy Novel and stage all those duels in the dueling club and what houses I would sort everyone in. I take a deep breath. “All history should be taught through rap by Lin-Manuel Miranda.”
“Maybe The Wicked Wizard War will become the next Broadway hit!”
Arthur tells me everything he loves about TWWW, and all I can think about is how I wish he was actually by my side right now, so I could feel him laughing against me and kiss him for making me feel smarter than I actually am.
“. . . and when Ben-Jamin cracked the enchantress’s wand, I yelled and my dad came into the room to ask me if everything was okay and then told me to shut up.”
It’s almost two a.m., and I could talk to him until my body forces a shutdown on me like an overheated laptop.
“Arthur?”
“Ben?”
“Thanks for reading. And for Hamilton.”
“Thanks for listening. And for The Wicked Wizard War.”
“I want to see you again tomorrow.”
“Date?”
“Why not.”
“So is this a fifth first date?”
“Second date, Arthur.”
“Wow. Second date. We finally got there.”
“How lucky we are to be alive right now, right?”
“Oh my god, you’re speaking Hamilton—I’m just so into you. I’m helpless.”
I’m so into him too.
Saturday, July 21
Dylan calls me on FaceTime as I’m getting ready to meet up with Arthur.
“Hey,” I say. I’m naked from the top up because I’m not sure which shirt I want to wear yet.
“Morning strip show,” he says. “Dylan like.”
I hold up a solid white T-shirt and a solid green T-shirt. “Which one?”
“Green. What are you doing? Let’s hang out. I’m bored. Samantha has to work until six.”
I put on the green shirt. “I’m meeting up with Arthur.”
“Cool. Let’s all go chill.”
“I think I need some one-on-one time with Arthur.”
“Whoa. Knife to the heart, Big Ben.”
“You’re kidding.” He’s not playing this card on me.
“You were going to hang with just me and Samantha last night before Arthur was going to come around.”
“Yeah, but you guys needed me too after your future-wife comment. It took away the pressure. Same with me and Arthur.”
“I love you, man, but we didn’t need you there. I said something stupid, but Samantha and I would’ve hung out with or without you.”
“Okay. But you only want to see me right now because Samantha is busy and you’re bored.” It was the same deal with Harriett.
“I’m not seeing what’s wrong with that. You’re my best friend.”
I don’t know what a fight between me and Dylan would look like because arguing has never been our thing. But it’s hard to just joke my way through this one. “Right, and Arthur is becoming more than a guy I just like. I got to give that some time and attention. I want to hang with you too, but this thing with Arthur is just so new and limited. I got to see how this plays out.”
Dylan nods. “What’s the winning scenario for you here, Bennison? Long-distance relationship? Friends on Instagram who like each other’s pictures?”
I shrug. “I’m just going to live in the moment. That’s the only way to see where we end up.”
“I will let you live in the moment because it sounds serious and awesome,” Dylan says. “But be careful, okay? I like Arthur and don’t want to have to kick his ass if he breaks your heart.”
“No ass kicking needed,” I say, hoping pretty damn hard that Arthur won’t turn out to be Hudson 2.0.
Arthur and I leave the High Line holding hands.
After that conversation with Dylan, I really needed Arthur telling me how Ms. Angelica “Looking for a mind at work” Schuyler is a Ravenclaw, or how screwed the wizarding world would’ve been if Hamilton was not only a Death Eater but Voldemort’s right-hand man. But with every good thing, like kisses while we wait to cross the street or our hands finding each other again after crowds split us up, I’m still rocked by this idea of everything ending.
Maybe this won’t work out and I won’t care about it ending. But I can’t get from A to B without us being A and B first. Live in the moment.
Except it’s hard to think about living in the moment when Arthur brings up time travel. “If you could time travel,” he says, “would you go to the past or the future?”
“I can only choose one, right?”
Arthur nods as we cross through Union Square to make our way to the Strand Bookstore since he hasn’t been there yet. The Union Square area is the place to be for the bookish crowds. There’s a four-story Barnes & Noble, where I attended a midnight release party for Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and a few blocks over is Books of Wonder, where I’ve met some authors and gotten graphic novels signed.
It would be really helpful to jump into the future to see how everything with Arthur plays out. But I wouldn’t even want to do it hypothetically. I want to trust that everything runs its course for some reason. Maybe meeting Arthur is supposed to teach me to be open to another dude in the future, to be bold and get his name and number if we meet somewhere out in the world.
“If I go to the past, can I change things?”
“Sure.”
Part of me wishes Hudson and I never dated. We were better friends than boyfriends. The good times were good, but I don’t think it was worth losing a friend over. “I would go back to the past, like a couple years ago, with the winning lottery numbers for my mom. Change the game up for us.”
“You’re nobler than I am.”
“What would you do?”
“I’m Team Future.”
“Because of school?”
“Other reasons too,” Arthur says. He squeezes my hand. “Probably better I go to the future. If I go anywhere near the past, I’m just going to write Hamilton before Lin-Manuel Miranda can.”
“You would dick him over?”
“Fine. Cowrite with him.”
I spot a churros food truck parked by the Best Buy and across the street from the park. “Have you ever had a churro before?”
“Not sure I know what that is.”
“It’s just fried dough. I like them best with cinnamon, but sugar is cool too. Come on, my treat.”
We rush to the cart. The guy asks me what we would like in Spanish and I answer in English. One cinnamon, one sugar, one chocolate, one raspberry. We go to the park to eat the churros so we don’t get powder and crumbs all over the books at the Strand.
“Do you speak Spanish?”
“Not really. I picked up some stuff from just listening to my parents speak to my aunts and uncles, but I understand more than I can speak.” Fourth-Grade Ben got really tired of not knowing what the other Puerto Rican kids were saying about him behind his back. I take a bite out of the cinnamon churro, which has that freshly baked warmness to it. “Which one you trying first?”
Arthur grabs the chocolate churro. “This is crack,” he says, taking another bite. “Where have these been? Is this a New York thing?”
“I don’t think so? Some Mexican restaurants might have them as dessert.”
“I’m a cookie guy, but I can be converted to a churro guy.” He takes another bite. “I feel like a whole new world has opened up to me. Between you being so white and not speaking Spanish I keep forgetting you’re even Puerto Rican. Your last name always reminds me though.”
I freeze with the churro between my teeth. Arthur continues chomping away at his chocolate churro, completely unaware that he’s just nudged me really hard in one of my sore spots. It’s 2018. How are people—even good people—still saying shit like this? I mean, I’m an idiot too—I learned that with Kent at the Yale meetup. I swallow what I can and drop the rest of the churro in the cardboard tray.