wesley dawkins

“You came because I invited you.” She reminded him, reaching out and nudging him on the side. “There’s cold water if you think that’ll help your boner. I really don’t think that’ll get any better if we do manage to go on with the contest, though.”

Wes’ hand reflexively went to his side when Lina nudged him. He was really ticklish. “Right,” he said. Because ‘straight’ guys couldn’t go to LGBTQ+ events without being invited by someone––and as of now, he was in closeted mode. “Yes, please say boner a little bit louder,” he said through gritted teeth, glancing around. “This is so weird, I shouldn’t have come. I’m not gay enough for this.”

“jazz? oh dear god, my dad used to love jazz music. he’d play it all ‘round the house, and…it was honestly atrocious. like, who wants to live with jazz music playing in the background? surely not me. i mean i also have terrible taste in music, that being like top fifties pop, so i must get that from him. do you play, like, guitar or something? people who sing usually do that, i think.”

“Oh, tell me about it. I know way too much about jazz now and every time I hear anything with jazz influences I wanna barf,” Wes said. “Top fifties isn’t that bad, though. I like that stuff.” Lately he felt like the popular songs were getting better, or maybe they were just getting catchier. “I play guitar and piano. Probably better at piano,” he added, thinking out loud. “So, like, what’re you doing in Toronto? You’re obviously not from here.”

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“It involves good-looking people and getting them wet, that’s basically it. I’m the only one who’s in so far but hopefully we can get some people to join. How’s that hella built guy over there? I’d throw water at his shorts to see what’s up but that’s probably just me.”

“Lina,” Wes said, sort of scolding her for being so brash, but he was laughing at the same time. He glanced over at the guy she’d pointed out and found himself turning slightly pink, and not just from the sun over their heads. “I don’t even know why I came to this thing, it’s way too hot out, and the view isn’t helping.”

“Seriously though, where’s my wet t-shirt contest? We could raise a couple of bucks if we got people to pay for it, like… imagine getting better wifi connection at the café. That’d be freaking wonderful.”

“Wet t-shirt contest?” Wes echoed, trying to suppress a small smile. “I don’t know what that is, but I’d watch. Depending on who was playing.”

“I could see that,” Wes laughed, thinking that Faith definitely resembled more of a kitten or koala than a giraffe. Himself, on the other hand, was practically part-giraffe. “Yeah, I haven’t been that bendy since I was like, five years old, or something. Maybe all of the athletes are just children in disguise as adults, and that’s how they’re so bendy.”

alex smiled. “oh, that’s lovely! i think everyone had a ‘i want to be a musician’ phase when they were a kid, and i’m glad you got to live it,” they said, gesculiating a bit. “i bet your great too. what kind of music do you play?”

Wes couldn’t say he was really ‘living’ his dream, because he’d got very little attention so far and he couldn’t stop his mother from breathing down his neck about getting a ‘real job’, but he liked the Alex thought so. “I’m alright. I kind of just play whatever comes out when I write, but I think I’m leaning more towards alt rock or alt pop, whatever that means. All I know is that I took jazz in college and I’m definitely not going into that genre.” 

“okay, so, like, i’m a comic book artist. that’s the actual name of my profession, as childish as it sounds. and i had this big deadline coming up. so i get to the day before it, and i’m scrounging around to finish. i wasn’t exactly not close to being done but still i wasn’t wrapped up. and it’s like five am and i still have two strips left to color and it’ll be a waste of time to go get coffee, not to mention the closest place to get coffee from my house at five am is seven eleven, so i’m like, you know what? fuck it. because the deadline is seven am. anyways, i finished. i’d honestly count that as one of my wrose moments, though. what do you do for a living?”

Wes listened to Alex as they spoke, finding it interesting what they did. They looked pretty young, so he was impressed that they already got to do cool stuff like comic books. “Jeez. I’m glad it ended well, even if you had to drink black coffee,” he said, laughing. “Uh, me? I’m a musician. Sometimes I do gigs around the city and I’m working on an album right now... I have a couple of tunes on bandcamp but I don’t really have my foot in the door yet. It’s a work in progress,” he explained.