It's All Relative by Wade Rouse Read Free Book Online Page B

included an all-out home overhaul.
    For example, when late September rolled around, fall took full hold, with dinnerware in bright summer colors changed out for a more autumnal palette; mums were installed, pumpkins and gourds were artfully arranged on the front porch, and cotton sheets with beach umbrellas were switched out for flannel featuring oak trees and brightly colored sugar maples.
    A Valentine’s switch-out came complete with heart-shaped candles, red lamp shades and heart night-lights, glasses featuring Sweethearts candy, dish towels decorated with chocolate candies, and pottery that resembled open candy boxes.
    Gary baked heart-shaped cookies, dyeing the dough red withfood coloring and then icing them pink. He made red velvet cake. He wore red sweaters and turtlenecks and socks.
    Basically, I was banging Cupid.
    And yet I knew nada about the most romantic of all holidays.
    My Capone-esque massacres of the past made me flinch whenever I thought of Valentine’s, and so as I approached my very first Valentine’s Day in love, I made the tragic error of turning to my married, straight fraternity brothers from college for romantic gift advice.
    â€œOkay, dude, here’s the inside scoop,” one my best friends, who was recently married, explained to me over beers. “I never buy my wife chocolates, because she will eat them and then accuse me of making her fat. I never buy her perfume, because it won’t be the right scent for winter, or it will conflict with her pheromones, or she’ll be allergic to the floral undertones, or something stupid like that. I never buy her clothes, because I’ll get her an eight, and she’ll be all, ‘What makes you think I wear an eight? Do you think I’m that big? Are you even attracted to me?’
    â€œSo what I always do is take her to her favorite restaurant, and I always give her a sexy gift, like panties or lingerie. In a small. And she loves it. And I love it. It’s a win-win.”
    I left our brotherly beer bash buzzed but emboldened, not realizing that I had just been given quality advice, actually shown something great, yet something that I would completely misinterpret, which I always do, much like when I see a Coen brothers movie.
    I immediately made reservations at Gary’s favorite restaurant in the city, a very romantic spot in a historic brick building that served just a few nightly chef specials. I wrapped Gary’s gift in shiny, expensive paper, topped it with a giant red velvet bow, and dropped it off before our dinner at the restaurant so it could be “specially delivered.”
    I did, however, due to Gary’s love of chocolate, go against my friend’s advice and buy him a two-pound milk-chocolate rabbit in afoil suit and bow tie, sporting a rather mischievous grin, which I hid under the bed as a surprise after we got home and got busy.
    The evening unfolded beautifully. The restaurant was romantic, the food was fabulous, and when the waiter brought over the dessert cart, he had already positioned my gift, as instructed, in the middle of the tarts and brulées.
    Gary gasped.
    â€œYou are
soooo
romantic!” he gushed. “You are … 
perfect
!”
    â€œCan I stay and watch?” the cute, gay, very young waiter asked, impressed, wondering, I’m sure, if I might have a clone.
    Or, at the very least, be interested in a three-way.
    I looked around the restaurant. People had stopped eating and were staring, transfixed, women nudging their husbands in that irritated manner that seemed to imply, “Thanks for the wrist corsage, you jackass. Leave it to the gays to always do it right!”
    Everyone was watching, wondering what amazing gift this amazing man had purchased for his sweetheart.
    A ring?
    An island getaway?
    A vacation home?
    Suddenly I felt this overwhelming pressure—like the emergency door on a plane had suddenly been thrown open midflight over the