Welp, Thanksgiving 2020 Was Not the Time to Bring Home my First Silly Boyfriend.
By: John J King
Tags: Thanksgiving, Boyfriend, Humor, Romance, Home For The Holidays

It’s not the first time I’ve brought a boy home for the holidays, but it might be the last. Freshman year, I brought Aidan home for a long weekend. Aidan grew up in Providence, majored in political science, and only read non-fiction. My first serious boyfriend.

Kyle is not serious. Kyle went to clown college. Technically the L’Ecole Internationale de Theatre Jacques LeCoq, but what sounds important in French actually just adds up to mime class, clown class, and balloonistry lab.

We met in February in my bookstore. I was organizing “Religion” and he chatted me up. I’d agreed to dinner before I realized he’d been browsing the “Magic” shelf. We had a few dates, and when the pandemic hit, we dove in. I’d fallen for his quaint vocabulary, his love for Keaton and the Marx Brothers, his ability to make light of the darkest moments — even in the pandemic. So, when we found ourselves quarantined together for six months, I went with it. I just never should have invited him to Thanksgiving Dinner.

The trouble began on the train, where seats were kept deliberately empty to ensure social distancing. Kyle — an ever-growing line of holiday travelers behind him — insisted on asking each seated rider “Is this seat taken?” before cackling and moving on.

Upon meeting my parents at the station in Waterbury, he seemed normal, but in retrospect he was perhaps setting them up for the surprises to come. At home, my brother Todd reached out a firm hand to shake, Kyle “stole his nose” and giggled around the kitchen, refusing to give it back. He spent the rest of the weekend egging Todd on with increasingly childish challenges to earn it back, such as singing Amy Winehouse’s REHAB but “take out the ‘no’s’, like I took out yours.” Todd is twenty-seven.

Kyle was assigned dessert. My mom asked if he needed any ingredients to make the pie. He wiggled his eyes: “Worry not! The opposite of ‘desserts’ is ‘stressed.’” That kind of quip is fine in a two-person kitchen when going outside would be a serious health risk, but in Litchfield? With my mother?

That night we slept in my childhood bedroom with its creaky old bed frame. Kyle smirked at me with his “zany mime eyes,” and rocked the headboard back and forth in what he described as a “a comical sex rhythm” and which I describe as “the end of our relationship if I had sense.”

On Thursday, extended family from Pennsylvania came for dinner: my grandmother, conservative uncles, and cousins. Kyle decided it would be “cute” to take everyone’s temperature with a meat thermometer.

He disappeared as the table was being set. Moments later, the table sumptuous and the rest of us patiently waiting, Kyle emerged in a blazer, a tie I’d bought for him, and no pants.

“I thought we were doing this on Zoom,” he said.

My mother — living either a blind fantasy or eternal patience — asked Kyle to say grace.

“Grace,” said Kyle.

Uncle Calvin — who communes with the lord twice daily, said “I’d hoped that would be longer.”

Kyle smiled. I tensed with a terrified fury, knowing what was coming — that everything had been a set-up to this very moment. Kyle took a deep breath, and sighed out:

“Graaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaace.”

Dinner was a nightmare. Kyle told the kid’s table that the green beans were Rapid Test COVID Swabs, and none of the adults noticed until Noah let out a squeal, a bean up there far enough to tickle his brain.

He refused to admit he snuck the whoopee cushion under grandma’s seat, but I know it was him.

After long digestive naps, we gathered outside for pre-Pie football. My Pennsylvania uncles take only two things seriously: God and Football. Kyle takes nothing seriously. He ran the wrong way, kicked the ball over the fence. My uncles decided to teach him a lesson, not realizing that two years of LeCoq training can make an athlete of anyone. When they charged him from opposite sides and leapt, it was too late — mid-jump — that Kyle deftly stepped out from between them and their faces dropped in horror as they crashed into one another.

Apparently, you can underestimate a mime.

The whole family was quiet as we sat down for dessert. “Kyle’s made a lovely surprise,” my mom assured. “I’m certain it’s delicious.”

“I don’t want to brag,” he said, carrying in a foil-wrapped pan, “but my desserts are known to disappear.” He pulled the tin foil off to reveal: an empty dish. Uncle Calvin said nothing; he just grabbed the kids and left. Cousin Valerie sobbed.

“Wow! It disappeared before anyone could eat it!” said Kyle, chuckling to himself. Todd punched him squarely in the face. “That’s ‘nose’ way to treat a guest!” We couldn’t pull Todd off of Kyle — nothing would stop the fury, not until Kyle reached up — his jaw swelling — and put Todd’s nose back in place.

On the way home from the train station, I bought ice cream. At least we’ll have something for dessert.

Kyle won’t be joining us. When I last saw him, alone on the platform, he was trapped inside an invisible box, and I don’t think he’ll get out.

I stole the door knob, and threw it under an oncoming train.