TRAY BUTLER

Illustration by Mark Julien

The boy was tall, with an untamed black mop and a street-smart snarl that didn’t say “gay bar.” Except that’s where we were­—this college kid out with a clique of giggling fag hags, while I was up past my bedtime on a Sunday night trying to show an out-of-town friend one last good time.

“Bangs boy“ and his crew were obviously regulars. The girls kept dancing too close to us, while their token homo fed them well drinks. My houseguest, Raymond, was too distracted by the unfamiliar faces to pay the tall guy much mind, but I was oddly captivated. Not that the guy was hot—the shaggy hair and slacker posture reminded me of a Gorillaz album cover—but I kept trying to read the words on his T-shirt. I’d guessed it was just another smart-ass Urban Outfitters product until I saw the message. It said, simply, “You are what you want.”

I called it a night not long after that, wishing Ray good luck and leaving him to the wolves. On the walk home, all I could think about was the shirt. What if that’s true: Maybe we are what we want? It seemed too silly to be so profound. But I also thought it cut to the quick of one particular truth about gay men, and one we don’t particularly like to face. Too many times when a dude turns out to be a dud, it’s not because of who he is. It’s because of who he isn’t. He’s not the person you thought he was when your eyes met across the bar, or he’s not the smokin’ hot papi his online profile and pics made him out to be. But worst of all: He’s not you.

It reminds me of a conversation I had in college, when I was the one sucking down shooters on a Sunday night. My friend Arthur confessed to me then that he wasn’t sure he could ever find his soul mate, and he knew why. He had an all-too-clear image of the person he wanted to be with: Someone of about the same build as him, with the same interests and a similar childhood. In short, Arthur wanted to date Arthur. It wasn’t vanity talking, it was a cry for companionship.

Of course, we’ve all heard the old gays-as-narcissists argument, which is one well-worn stick the religious zealots like to beat us with, even today. But this goes deeper than that, I think. I realize now that narcissism is a red herring. As a certain ex of mine likes to put it, it’s really about security. Dating, he says, is a zero sum game. We go for the guy who’s on the same level as us because we don’t like to consider the prospect of our hot new boyfriend realizing he’s trading down. That’s why the 7’s date 7’s, and the 3’s date 3’s.

Which brings me back to my houseguest, Raymond. On the last night of his (very long) visit, he plopped down next to me on the couch. I was flipping through the pages of some gay glossy, when I came to a spread about gay couples who’d been partnered for years. In photo after photo, all the couples looked the same. Here’s Bob, who is balding with goatee, and his partner Dan, also balding with goatee. Second verse, same as the first.

“How sad,” I said. “Is this what happens when you stay with someone too long? You just turn into clones of each other.”

Ray grabbed the glossy from my hands and inspected the picture closely. He’s childish that way. “I don’t think it’s sad,” he said. “In fact, I think it’s sort of sweet.”

Maybe so.

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