3-way

Set in modern day New York, the year is 2021, and an aging Jewish comedian is in his apartment. The dewy dawn has arrived and it is 6:21 in the morning. He had a very strange dream last night. He makes fresh coffee and adds too much cream, spilling some on his counter. He cleans it up, and sighs.

The dream was about his two oldest, dearest friends in the world.

One was his ex. One, a very good friend.

And in it…

He almost spills his hot coffee on his lap thinking about it. His cheeks are so warm. His chest oddly feels warm, too.

It was a dream wherein he was in bed with his two friends…

And they were cuddling.

Just that, and nothing else.

Jerry feels so embarrassed he couldn’t even imagine talking about it.

He realizes something after all these years as well that makes his stomach twist and his heart beat quicken.

All of them are still single.

Of course, he’s had many opportunities to have long term relationships with women over the last several decades. So has Elaine with many different men.

But, somehow, one way or another…

They both find a real good way to screw it up.

And…

Jerry puts his hand over his face and sighs so deeply, he feels like he will come undone.

He then says the other name of who he had cuddled with in his dream out loud.

“George..” And his whole body heats up. He slaps his face a little, trying to find a way to stop the bodily impulses his body feels, and betray his humanity by telling himself that he doesn’t have a delayed response to human affection after all.

He takes a shower after breakfast and gets dressed. He reads an article from February online (it was now early December of the same year)about how traditional stand up comedy has gone away from his new iPhone, which Elaine had helped him purchase and set up. It makes him more depressed than ever.

The COVID Pandemic has not been kind to comedy or it’s respective comedians, however, he still has managed to win over audiences in recorded shows (limited seating and masks)and make his income just barely work even as his apartment rates and everything else in the whole of New York steadily rising to exorbitant rates, and through it all—-

Through break ups, heartaches, happy times, bad times, pitching pilots and dreaming of big things together, new jobs, losing jobs—-everything, his main constants have always been his friends.

Their jeering, their honesty, their sarcasm… all of it, it keeps him feeling safe and grounded.

And he can’t forget it. How the dream made his heart ache yet feel so warm and protected, how his whole body felt free yet a bit out of control, and how being there with both of them in his bed felt like the most important thing ever.

He gets out a notebook and a pen and writes a list.

He smiles wryly to himself, “I must be the only guy in New York that still writes out lists with a pen and piece of paper! Most people will just use their phones or iPods!” He says to himself, chuckling. He thinks of that as a possible joke as well, and as he does, he frowns a bit, not jotting it down as he usually does. It seems a bit stale, and he wants new material anyway. He realizes an iPod isn’t even the right term anyway, as that device plays music. He then realizes that iPods may not not even have the capability of having a notepad to write notes!

He scraps the whole idea and divides the paper in half with a straight line down the middle.

He writes Elaine on one side—-George on the other.

He writes for Elaine: used to date, great body, cute face, funny, can dance, great taste in film, a bit rude.

For George: best friends since high school, insecure, up for anything, cheap.

He cringes at what he had written for George, crossing it out a bit angrily at himself.

Georgie: (he amends) best friends since high school, loyal, can dance, up for anything, weirdly funny, kind of cuddly.

He faces heats up again. “Cuddly? I wrote down that he’s cuddly! Oh my God!” He says in exasperation to himself.

But he doesn’t cross it out.

He boldens the words, “cuddly,” and “Georgie,” with the pen, in fact. So dark and deeply, the paper rips a bit. He bits his lower lip in anxiety.

‘Hey, people used to believe we were gay, and in a relationship—-so, it’s not such a stretch!’ He thinks. But then, he wonders about Elaine. What would she think of all of this?

She’d think this was, that he was … Meshuggah! Crazy! Wild! Weird! Just…. not normal. But maybe not?

He gets out another piece of paper, turning on the radio.

Yes, a radio—- another outdated piece of the old days he liked to keep around, knowing he wasn’t a hipster or a jerk teenager that wanted to have a vinyl collection wrapped in plastic and a vintage record player just to show off to women, he felt like at the very least by keeping his old ways,(writing letters by hand, listening to the radio, watching DVDs and so on…) he could retain his sanity amongst this new and horribly stressful situation that was his life. He felt like a radio sometimes, staticky, old, not good at reception at times, just—-old.

A song came on, and it instantly reminds him of Elaine.

She is a fire cracker!, he thought with a smile.

And then, he started doodling as the song went on.

He drew some stars, a poorly drawn(in his opinion) poodle dog barking with largely written words: BARK BARK I’m a dog I’m a dog love me love me!

Then, he drew three stick figures. Hair styles: unmistakably like Elaine’s large curly do, and his own wavy longish strands—and for George, the glasses he wore.

He didn’t draw hair for him, even though he had hair.

Another song came on after, “Elaine’s song,” was over.

He’d be lying if he would say this was the first weird dream he had had about his friends. He once had a dream of having a steamy lovemaking session with Elaine, and another unrelated dream about George and him going about town having the best time ever, just having a blast—-then hugging each other and feeling so hot against him—-something sweet and perfect and just….

He bit his lip so hard it started to bleed.

The song that crept into his ears made him feel so hopeful and a bit sad. Now, in a tired old cliche type of manner, he was thinking of George.

He then suddenly drew an impulsive heart around the trio of stick figures that represented him and his two friends.

He shrugs and frowns sadly, crumbling it up and tossing it in the bin. He feels like he’s losing it.

Suddenly, he heard a buzz at the door and went over.

“Yeah? Who is it?” He asks.

“George!”

Jerry cursed under his breath, his face heating up again.

“Ah, it’s not a good time! I’m about to go out!”

“I need to go out too! Let’s go out together!” George answers, making Jerry blink in a bit of ironic embarrassment.

Jerry makes a face of utter frustration and then says, “Whatever!”

“Get your coat, Jer! It’s getting chilly!”

“Yea, yea, sure dear…” Jerry mumbles, but realizes in fear that he had said it while still holding the speaker on, and his eyes widened.

With his face brighter than a tomato, he slowly walked away from the door and got his coat and his wallet, and closed up behind him, but not before seeing Kramer.

“Hey Bud!” Kramer says, “Ya got any—”

Jerry nods, “Yeah, sure, go ahead,” he says in a distracted voice.

Kramer nods and shrugs, going into Jerry’s apartment with the spare key.

Once he gets downstairs and sees George, he avoids looking at him.

George notices, but doesn’t say anything.

He’s got his own problems at the moment, but told himself to ask Jerry about that weird situation that just occurred a moment ago.

“So, why—I mean, what’s up? I have got a lot of business to run today,” Jerry says offhandedly, making George wince at the passive aggressive manner in Jerry’s voice.

“My mother, well, she…” George starts, looking down and then at his friend. They stop walking for a moment.

“Huh? What’s that about your mother?” Jerry asks, looking a bit concerned.

“Crap,” George puts his head in his hands. “She fell a few days ago, and I had to take her into the hospital. She broke her hip. Hit her head. I don’t even know why she still tries to live alone, ever since my father passed! I can’t even talk to her, she won’t listen.”

Jerry gasps a bit, putting his hand on the other’s shoulder.

“Is she okay?”

“No. Not at all. Just getting progressively worse and worse, they did some tests at the hospital too.” George says in a strained voice. “And it looks like she might have cancer.”

“Oh, my God, George. I can’t believe it… are the doctors still unsure?”

George nods. “They found a mass in her thyroid, and they have to test it. So, I don’t know.” He sighs, and they are walking side by side. Jerry swears that their hands touch for a moment, and he feels a cold sweat on his brow.

“I’m so sorry, George. I mean, cancer? That’s horrible. That.. I hope it isn’t that. Isn’t she past ninety now?” Jerry says softly, and he sees George’s eyes. They are close to tears, but he can that his friend is trying very hard to cover up that fact.

George continues with a serious nod, “Thanks, I appreciate that. And, yes, she is. Ninety three. I think…She’s losing it, forgetting when to take her medications and.. I don’t know how I am going to handle it. All the appointments, taking care of her. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I want to do everything for her. I don’t want some stranger or a nurse to do it. It’s just… I’m so stressed.”

Jerry nods in affirmation to George. “Don’t even worry about it, buddy. I’ll help out. Anything you need. I’ll help with appointments whenever I’m free. Okay?”

“Really, Jer?”

Their eyes meet and George is smiling at him in this incredibly wonderful way, and Jerry just feels like melting right there on the sidewalk. Like ice cream on the Fourth of July. He thinks about how that could be another joke, a corny joke, but something possibly good —-but then mentally crosses it out in his mind, and thinks about just kissing him.

Kissing him on the cheek.

‘That’s safe’, Jerry thinks.

‘French people do it!’, he thinks with a grimace. ‘Kiss on the cheek to say hello and goodbye, male and female! It doesn’t matter!’

He shakes his head subtly and responds, “Absolutely, no problem.”

And then, of course, Jerry thinks as his cheeks heat up, George moves in and hugs him.

Jerry is still for a moment, and can’t move, but he doesn’t want to not hug his friend back.

So he does, and it feels good. Too good.

Suddenly, he is so wrapped up in the moment, that he gets closer to George, and inhales deeply. Jerry smells something like bergamot or amberwood… something woody.

It’s the smell of George, and Jerry likes the way he smells.

But George catches on, and backs away for a moment.

“Uh, Jerry? Are… are you smelling me?” George asks gently.

Jerry shakes his head but then says, “You got a new cologne, huh?”

“Pretty good, huh? I got it when I was looking up popular men’s frangances for this year. I gotta amp up my dating game. You know.”

Jerry nods. “It’s a great one. Good research.”

George winks at him, and Jerry wants to run away and go crawl in a small hole to hide.

Awkwardly, Jerry smiles and nods again.

“So, uh, what kind of stuff you got planned for today?”

“Nothing,” Jerry answers haphazardly.

“Oh, I thought you had a lot going on today.”

“I… I do. You wanna grab some coffee and then we can diverge?”

George makes a face, thinking Jerry is acting incredibly weird today, but just smiles at him—-‘maybe he is sick, or just had a bad night,’ George thinks.

“Diverge?” George asks, his eyes squinting. “The hell does that mean?”

“Like… go our own separate way?” Jerry explains.

“Hmm, okay. Sure. Let’s go to the coffee shop,” George says.

“Okay.”

They go and get coffee and talk idly, joke around, but it all feels off. Jerry wishes he could forget the dream; George is wanting so badly to ask about the weird slip up at the door speaker, where he heard Jerry call him, ‘dear’ and then nothing.

But, they don’t. They finish their coffee and then both go separate ways after.

“I’ll call you later!” George says, waving.

Jerry waves back. “Sounds good.”

George can’t help but think about how he feels about being called, dear, by Jerry, however. As he’s walking off, he realizes just how good it made him feel, and he can’t breathe for a moment.

He lets go of his trembling breath, and goes toward the cinema, trying to get his mind off of everything with a movie. He puts on his mask, wishing that he would’ve had worn one around Jerry, not sure what his own expression had conveyed—-and it makes his chest twist up and stomach feel in knots.

————-

Jerry goes back home after the coast is clear. He knows he was lying about his day and his schedule; he feels awful about it and about what is going on with his George’s mother, a woman he had known for a long time, since he was a teenager.

He wishes he could talk to someone about all of this. Maybe Kramer? He thought possibly, Kramer was open minded and had kissed him once too!

He reminded himself that George has had terrible luck in love as well. What would he even try to propose to his friends, a real relationship? Between all of them? Did he even want that? Was he possibly gay after all?

He decided no to the last query—-he knew he was sexually and romantically attracted to women. He decided he was bi-curious. That was hip to the woke culture; he decided he would lead with that sort of terminology to get the conversation started.

He put on the radio again, turning up louder.

He closes his eyes and lays on the couch, and immediately thinks of a sensual scene between him and Elaine and George.

They were kissing each other to the music in a steamy, hot room—and he realizes after a minute that even in his fantasy they were all arguing.

“You just kissed Jerry! It’s my turn!” Elaine hisses at George, and they start shoving each other.

“Nah, you’re hogging him!” George yells.

“You two can kiss!” Jerry says in a sigh.

“No!” Elaine and George say at the same time, and he shakes his head in frustration.

“Laney, George, let’s Three way it!” Jerry suggests, pointing at them in a suggestive and direct manner.

They all agree and suddenly nod, leaning in to kiss, all of three of them at the same time…(tongues out comically and both of them dramatically winking at each other and him…)

He opens his eyes, a bit disturbed and yet slightly aroused, and he gets up, turns off the radio and takes a very cold shower.

******

Part one is complete, part two is coming soon! Inspired by a good friend of mine! Is this platonic love or possibly something more special?