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“Lemme tell you, the first time Starla and I did it, it involved a rented 1967 Camaro, a broken AC, and a bucketful of hot wings!”
Groans chorused from the table. “Dude, nobody wants to hear about that,” Mordecai complained.
Pops looked sadly at his plate of wings. “I think I’ve lost my appetite.”
“Oh, come on!” Muscle Man shoveled another handful into his mouth, droplets of orange sauce spraying through the air. “It’s Guys Night. We’re guys. This is what guys talk about.”
“I guess. But you don’t have to be so…detailed,” Mordecai pointed out.
“Well, it’s almost Valentine’s Day,” Muscle Man slurred his words, but he grinned. “And since Starla and I are getting married soon, this is gonna be the best one yet!” He swigged his soda; when he lowered the can, seriousness had replaced his drunken bravado. “I wanna take her somewhere special. No more trailer beds or backseats of dirty cars.”
“What about Lookout Mountain?” Fives suggested.
“No, he’s been there a million times,” Mordecai said. “A seaside resort is the way to go. Those beds are pure luxury.”
Muscle Man scoffed. “Yeah, and so is the price. How the hell am I gonna afford a fancy hotel?”
“Well, you’re always bragging about how good you are at saving money,” Mordecai retorted.
“Weddings aren’t cheap, smart guy. I’m on a budget here.”
Pops sipped his soda. “What if we dressed up the house and made it look fancy? All you need is a little imagination!”
“Uh, no. They are not having sex in our room.” Mordecai scrunched his face, shooting Rigby a glance.
“Yeah. Not happening.” Rigby fiddled with one of his chicken wings, drowning it in sauce on his plate. The four guys’ gazes landed on him.
“You’ve been quiet. What do you think?” Fives asked.
“Oh, come on.” Muscle Man rolled his eyes, giving Rigby a good-natured jab in the ribs. “Like he knows anything.”
Rigby shrugged. “Why don’t you just take her out? You’re going out for dinner anyway, right? Why spend money on that plus a fancy hotel?”
The room exploded into laughter. “Yeah, right!” Muscle Man said, wiping his eyes and smearing sauce across his face in the process. “Like Starla and I aren’t gonna do it on the most romantic day of the year!”
“Well, you don’t have to,” Rigby said. “A nice dinner, a bottle of wine, and some killer tunes? Sometimes that’s all a girl needs.”
He smirked, thinking of his earlier phone conversation with Eileen. “You’d better be prepared, because I’m gonna blow all the other chumps you’ve dated out of the water. Best Valentine’s Day ever, baby!”
“Aw, Rigby.” He could tell she was blushing over the phone. “I’m so excited!”
He had everything planned; first, he’d take her to a contemporary dance show in the cities, a real fancy one, in like, a theater. Then he’d surprise her with a bottle of Moscato (very romantic), and gift her a mixtape of all her favorite songs. He imagined them dancing in a parking lot overlooking the city lights, music blasting from the car stereo. Kind of like when Mordecai tried to be smooth with Margaret on that camping trip–except he wouldn’t lock the keys in the car like a total loser.
Mocking laughter snapped him back to the present. “Maybe let the adults talk about this stuff.” Mordecai smiled and shook his head, like he found Rigby’s idea ludicrous and not totally awesome.
“Yeah, dude. You gotta think like a romantic,” Fives agreed.
Pops met Rigby’s gaze and smiled. “I find nothing wrong with Rigby’s suggestion.”
“Pops, no offense, but you’re old,” Muscle Man said. “And you’re single. Chicks these days don’t just want food and wine, they want to get down! Go wild!”
“Rigby’s also single,” Mordecai said. “Like, chronically single. Maybe you shouldn’t take romantic advice from him.”
Rigby bit his tongue, indignation flooding through him. I am not! But he’d promised Eileen he wouldn’t tell Mordecai just yet. She didn’t want to “rub their happiness in his and CJ’s faces”, since that relationship was rockier than ever. As much as Rigby wanted to brag about his romantic success, he begrudgingly agreed. He rolled his eyes. “Well, maybe you guys just don’t know how to make a girl happy without tearing off her clothes. That’s not my problem.”
“Dude, that line of thinking is totally gonna bite you in the ass,” Mordecai warned.
“What? Why?”
Fives chimed in. “Girls have expectations. You can’t just pretend those don’t exist.”
“What, so even if I was dating someone for, let’s say, a month, she’d expect me to make a move on her?”
They all stared at him. From the kitchen, the clock ticked, each second dragging by. Finally, Mordecai spoke. “Dude…yes.”
“I mean, not always,” Fives said, more kindly. “Sometimes you wait a few months. Or sometimes you only wait a week. It really depends.”
“Yeah, but if you don’t make a move soon enough, she’ll get bored. Or she’ll think you’re not interested.” Muscle Man, who knew about Eileen, gave Rigby a pointed look.
“Oh. Yeah, of course.” Rigby nodded, as if the gang hadn’t been speaking a foreign language all night. There were all these rules that everyone else seemed to know, so why didn’t he? Why didn’t he know he was supposed to make a move on Eileen? And that she probably thought it was weird he hadn’t already? He hadn’t even thought about sex.
The guys moved on to a less gross conversation topic, but Rigby couldn’t focus. Panic twinged in his chest. Shit. He needed to modify his Valentine’s Day plans. Not a problem. Her car was always extremely clean; maybe instead of dancing to the mixtape, they could…
A shiver ran down his spine. Was that good?
At this point, he had no idea what the hell was going on.
The next night, he cuddled with Eileen on the couch in her townhome, the TV blaring some cheesy rom-com. When they’d first started dating, Rigby opposed those things on principle. He’d seen the cheesy, brainless fluff Mordecai picked out for movie nights with girlfriends. But after sitting through a few, they weren’t actually that awful. For one, Eileen had better taste than Mordecai. Second, she harbored endless knowledge about camera angles, lighting, costuming…she constantly commented on things that Rigby would’ve never noticed in a million years. And third, he just loved hanging out with her.
He ran his fingers through her hair. She smiled up at him, the TV glow reflected in her glasses.
She didn’t look unhappy. But the conversation from the night before replayed in his mind. According to at least four people, who had all been in relationships and probably knew better, she had expectations that Rigby had not yet met. And pretty soon she was gonna take that to mean he didn’t love her. Or she’d go looking for someone who actually knew what she wanted and gave to her quicker than her stupid ex-loser.
He gazed at her under the blue TV light; even in her lounge-around red sweater and fraying sweatpants, she looked beautiful. Her eyes always lit up when she was excited, and she found so many things to be excited about. Things that Rigby would’ve never noticed or cared about until she pointed them out, like how pretty the moon looked when the clouds drifted over it, or a particularly well-performed move in a contemporary dance competition.
“Ooh! This is called a dolly zoom.” Eileen pointed to the screen, laying her head against Rigby’s shoulder. “Otherwise known as the vertigo effect. It’s usually used to communicate…”
For once, Rigby couldn’t focus on her chatter. As he continued to look at her, he imagined her without her clothes. He imagined them doing it on her fold-out couch and cringed.
Two days passed. Valentine’s Day was the next day, and for once in his life, Rigby wasn’t gonna be caught slacking. He bought two bottles of Moscato and a heart-shaped box of chocolates. Not the shitty dollar store brand that tasted like plastic but Rigby still loved; this was the good shit. He’d finished his mixtape the night prior and nestled it among a bouquet of hydrangea macrophylla, her favorite. Whoever said the Rigbone couldn’t be romantic?
But despite his awesome gifts and planning, he couldn’t help feeling cracks in his confidence. He couldn’t stop imagining the end of the night, where they’d inevitably end up having sex. Sure, it would probably be great once they got into it, but as he thought about it now, he’d be pretty content just cuddling on her couch again. But whatever. This was what people in relationships did, and if this was what it took to keep them together, he’d do it. He tried to leave it at that and focus on the current hangout with Mordecai, CJ, Muscle Man, and Fives at the movie theater.
Which was hard to do when the gang had chosen the most boring movie on the planet.
“Dude, this sucks,” Rigby whispered to Mordecai.
“What? It’s good.”
“It’s just been a bunch of chicks taking their clothes off.”
Mordecai raised his eyebrows. “Yeah. Exactly.”
Rigby sighed, resting his hand on his cheek as yet another sex scene ensued. They’d only been here for half an hour. He swung his legs. “Can’t they like, crash a car or something?”
“Shut up,” Mordecai hissed. “Haven’t you ever seen a romance movie before?”
“Yeah, they’re usually not this boring.” The rom-coms Eileen picked out at least had a story. They didn’t grind the action to a screeching halt just for the characters to rip off their clothes and moan in each other’s ears.
Mordecai rolled his eyes and turned back to the screen. Rigby slumped in his seat, counting the scattered pieces of popcorn and Skittles on the floor beneath the seat.
Too long later, they walked out of the theater. As they walked back to the park and chatted, Rigby found he held the dissenting opinion.
“That was off the hook!” Muscle Man cheered, slapping palms with Fives. “I think that dark-haired hunk looked kinda like me, ya think?”
CJ gave him a light-hearted shove. “In your dreams. The blond guy was way hotter.”
“Really?” Mordecai grinned, brushing her shoulder. “Did I ever tell you about when I was blond?”
“You? No way.”
“That girl in the red was so cute.” Fives turned to Rigby. “That couple behind us kept making out whenever she took her shirt off.”
“Yeah, I know,” Rigby scoffed. “Why do people do that? Yeah, this naked stranger really puts us in the kissing mood.”
“It puts you in some kind of mood, that’s for sure.” Muscle Man smirked. “Man, I gotta come back here with Starla!”
“You wanna see it again? I could barely stay awake for it once.”
Muscle Man shot him a look. “No way you were bored.”
“Yeah, he wouldn’t shut up about it.” Mordecai turned away from his conversation with CJ.
Fives tilted his head. “Really? Maybe none of those girls were your type.”
“They were hot, yeah. But who wants to watch a bunch of people fucking for two hours? We get it, you’re hot and you’re naked.”
CJ punched him in the shoulder. “Maybe you’re not grown up enough for this stuff, little dude.”
Though her tone was teasing, Rigby recoiled. “Nuh uh. I’m just as grown up as you guys!”
That earned him another burst of laughter.
Later that night, Rigby couldn’t sleep.
He stared at the ceiling, trying not to count the hours until the sun came up and it was Valentine’s Day. Between the conversation at Guys Night, his weird reaction to thinking about having sex with Eileen, and his utter boredom at a movie that was clearly supposed to make him feel some type of way…what the fuck was his problem?
He’d looked up some stuff once they’d gotten home; apparently, romance movies made people horny. Okay? Why? That part he couldn’t figure out. It wasn’t that he didn’t find the women attractive. He just didn’t feel…right.
Even with Eileen, who was the most beautiful woman in the world, he didn’t feel the urge to rip her clothes off. He wanted to kiss her and cuddle with her. But nothing else had even registered as a thought in his mind.
They had to do it tomorrow. He’d like it once they got started, right? But what if he didn’t? What if she could tell? Then he’d ruin Valentine’s Day anyway, and she’d probably break up with him. Rigby couldn’t blame her. Who wanted to be with a loser who didn’t wanna bang?
They’d only been dating for a month. But he couldn’t imagine life without her. He saw her in everything, from every rock on the ground (she loved geology and explaining rock types to him) to street dancers to the constellations she’d effortlessly pointed out during their camping trip. She saw the beauty in everything and everyone, even someone as fundamentally shitty and destructive as Rigby. In just a month, she’d given him the world. He couldn’t even give her a fraction of that.
What was wrong with him? That part he still didn’t get. Maybe his dad had tried to warn him. You screw things up. That’s who you are. Maybe he’d known Rigby was missing something, some core part of being human that everyone else was born with. Maybe he couldn’t feel love at all. Maybe that was why he was always ruining people’s lives.
He leaped off the trampoline, pacing the room. Anxiety bubbled inside him. What was he supposed to tell Eileen? How could he begin to explain any of this?
His eyes fell upon Mordecai. Maybe he’d understand. Well, not understand, but maybe he’d know how to fix this. Maybe there was some key solution Rigby needed, something that would prove he wasn’t broken.
He crept over to the bed, shaking Mordecai’s arm. “Mordecai? Mordecai!”
“Dude. What time is it?” Mordecai mumbled, throwing a pillow over his head.
“Wake up. I need to talk to you.”
Mordecai sat up, rubbing sleep from his eyes. “I’m going to kill you.”
“I don’t know what to do.”
“About what?”
Rigby paced the room, wringing his hands. “I just realized something, and it’s kind of terrible.”
“Dude, spit it out.”
“I don’t want to have sex.”
The words hung in the air. Rigby continued pacing, the floorboards creaking beneath his feet. “I don’t. Like, ever.”
“What?” Mordecai furrowed his brow. He glanced at the clock. “You need to go to sleep. You’re always spiraling in the middle of the night.”
“No! I’m not spiraling. I get it now.” He kicked a pile of dirty clothes. “At first I didn’t understand, you know, with the movie and everything. But that…feeling you’re supposed to have when you see a cute girl…I don’t have it. I don’t think I’ve ever felt it.”
Mordecai yawned. “Dude, in high school you were obsessed with like, three different girls on the dance team.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t wanna…you know. I didn’t even know that was a real feeling.”
“What?” Mordecai sounded more awake now. “How? You know people have sex.”
“I thought people just did it because they were supposed to. Not because they like, wanted to.”
Mordecai stared at him. Under his baffled gaze, Rigby squirmed. His face flushed with embarrassment. Maybe he was too immature. Was that it?
After an uncomfortable silence, Mordecai spoke in a low voice. “Do you think you might be, you know…gay or something?”
“What? No. I mean, I don’t think so.”
“It’s cool if you are. I don’t care.”
“Wait, really?”
“I know we talked a lot of shit in high school. But I don’t care. Seriously. As long as you’re not checking me out. I do have a girlfriend, you know.”
Rigby snickered. “Please. Like I’d find you hot even if I was gay.”
Mordecai shoved him. “Be quiet.”
“Seriously, though, I don’t think I’m gay. But I don’t think I like girls, either.” Rigby struggled to find the words for his complete lack of feeling. “I think I might just be nothing.”
“Is that even possible?”
“It is for me,” Rigby sighed. “This is so stupid. How do I fix it?”
“Dude, I don’t know. Maybe you gotta ask Skips.”
Rigby perked up, but his hopefulness immediately deflated. “Even he was in love with Mona. He wouldn’t understand.”
“I don’t understand. Maybe you haven’t found the right person yet.”
That’s not it. Rigby bit back the words. Eileen was the right person. He didn’t know much, but he knew that. But how could he know that, if he was incapable of feeling love? “This sucks, Mordecai. I don’t know what to do.” He curled his tail, twisting it until fur came loose and fluttered to the floor. “How am I supposed to date, huh?”
“Hm.” Mordecai studied the floor, lost in thought. He looked up after a few moments. “Maybe you don’t.”
“What? Like, ever?”
“Well, it’d be unfair to the girl, right? Or…guy, or whatever. If someone liked you, but you didn’t like them back and dated them anyway.”
Rigby’s breath caught in his throat. Was that true? Was he being unfair to Eileen just by being with her?
“What if…hypothetically,” he added quickly, “I was dating someone? I’d probably need to break up with them, right?” He squeezed his eyes shut.
“Uh, yeah. You can’t be in a loveless relationship. That’s how people get divorced and shit. Maybe that’s your dad’s problem. He could’ve passed it down to you.”
Rigby’s heart dropped. His dad’s voice always annoyingly echoed in the back of his mind, but now it barged to the forefront. All you do is hurt the people around you. But you’ll never stop, will ya? You can’t stop.
Even his dad, his complete drunken asshole of a dad, knew how to love. Rigby had heard the bed creaking down the hall more times than he liked to remember. He didn’t doubt his dad loved his mom. It was him where things got iffy. And rightfully so, yeah? He’d need to break up with Eileen. What kind of asshole boyfriend breaks up with his girlfriend on Valentine’s Day? He never would stop hurting the people around him, just by existing.
He flattened his ears against his skull. As he retreated, tears burned his eyes. He couldn’t help his fur spiking out as he thought about breaking Eileen’s heart. Or was even that an asshole thing to think? Like she couldn’t find someone better in five seconds on the street.
“Dude, hey.” Mordecai stood. “I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not saying you’re like your dad, I’m just saying it could be an explanation, you know?”
Rigby couldn’t answer because he’d burst into tears.
“Hey, hey. Chill out,” Mordecai said softly. “You’re not dating anyone, so you don’t have to worry about it, okay?”
“Yes, I do!” Rigby grabbed Mordecai’s arm, staring at him through blurry vision. “Am I just supposed to be single for the rest of my life? Am I just gonna die alone?”
“No, dude, I’m sure you won’t,” Mordecai said. “Like I said, maybe you haven’t met the right person yet.”
Rigby dried his tears on Mordecai’s hand. From the way Mordecai didn’t complain or push him away, he could tell Mordecai didn’t really believe that.
The next morning, after a fitful night of bad thoughts eating him alive and virtually no sleep, he called Eileen and asked her over. He wasn’t shitty enough to break up with her over the phone. He’d do it in person, which almost made him feel shittier. She’d knock on the door expecting a fun Valentine’s Day hangout and receive a breakup.
Whatever. This was better for her, even if she didn’t know it.
Waiting for her to arrive felt like waiting for death. He sat on his trampoline, each clock tick drawing out as if to taunt him. Only so many minutes before you lose her forever.
And not just her. By breaking up with the woman of his dreams, he was sentencing himself to a lifetime of loneliness. Like Mordecai said, it would be unfair to date. He was fundamentally broken. But he didn’t need to make that anyone else’s problem.
The house’s silence suffocated him, and he gritted his teeth. Everyone had whisked away for Valentine’s Day plans. Benson was off with Audrey. Pops was handing out lollipops to couples in the park. Mordecai, of course, was out with CJ.
His gifts for Eileen sat on the floor, mocking him. He’d been so excited to give her these gifts just a few days ago, but now, the heart-shaped box and pretty flowers seemed cruel: look at the love you’re giving up. Look at the love you’ll never experience.
He jumped off his trampoline, angry tears threatening to spill down his cheeks. He needed to get rid of these stupid gifts. Giving them to Eileen now would be mean, anyway.
Benson would skin him alive for lighting a fire on the lawn, but Rigby couldn’t make himself care. Maybe he shouldn’t have left the only guy incapable of feeling at home alone. He flicked open the lighter he’d stolen ages ago from Skips’s garage, then paused. Yeah, he could just throw this stuff away. But then he could dig them out of the trash, convince himself to try to work things out. He couldn’t have that option.
He tossed the chocolate, flowers, and wine into a pile and lit them on fire.
The flames started slowly. After a few seconds, they shot into the sky. Rigby jumped back.
Lavender burned at the center of the orange inferno. As Rigby stared into the eye of the flame, it shifted. Before he could blink, the fire had morphed into a loose shape. A woman.
Eileen.
The wine bottles made up her glasses. The flowers trailed down her neck like hair. The heart-shaped chocolate box remained in her chest, split in two by the flame.
“Really?” she spit embers onto the grass. Rigby leaped out of the way. “You’re breaking up with me on Valentine’s Day? Who does that?”
“It’s for the best!” Rigby argued. His excuse sounded flimsy even to his ears.
“Best for me? For us?” Her wine bottle eyes glittered. “Or best for you?”
He flinched. Why did his stupid dad’s voice always worm its way into his mind? If he were here, he’d seethe over Rigby’s selfishness and tell Eileen to join the club of hearts broken, of lives ruined, by his idiot son.
But lately, for some reason Rigby couldn’t explain, everyone’s looks of irritation or hurt at his stupid actions cut deeper. Usually he shrugged off anyone’s emotions that he couldn’t benefit from in some way. But he found himself wanting to prevent people from being upset with him. For one, it sucked to have people always mad at him. Also, his usual cattiness and belligerence were starting to feel more like an act. Like he was putting on a mask every day instead of just being normal. Whatever. It was stupid and he couldn’t begin to stew over all that right now. He looked helplessly at the fire woman.
“It’s best for you,” he said. “I swear.”
“Sounds like an excuse.” She leaned in, her heat engulfing Rigby’s face. “I have half a mind to kill you right now.”
As she lashed out her arms that dripped with embers, Rigby noticed Eileen’s car approaching. He leaped out of the way. “Not before I talk to the real Eileen.”
“Rigby!” Eileen parked askew and jumped out of her car. She hurried over, eyes widening as she took in the peculiar scene in front of her. “What is this? What’s going on?”
“I can explain.” Rigby rushed to meet her. “I mean, kinda. I don’t know what that’s about.”
“Is that me?” Eileen took off her glasses to squint at her fire doppelganger.
“Sorta. Eileen, uh, I have to tell you something.”
She put on her glasses and faced him. He took in her pink sweater and red barrettes, a bit more feminine than her usual style but still cute as hell. I don’t want to do this.
But he had to.
“I…didn’t call you over to hang out. Eileen…” He swallowed. “We need to break up.”
She froze. Her tail went rigid. “What? Why?”
“It’s not you,” he said quickly. “You’re great. Like, really, really great.” He wiped his eyes. Shit. Crying already was a bad sign.
“So are you,” she said softly. The kindness in her eyes made Rigby want to leap inside the flame monster and die. How could she look at him like that? How could anyone? “That’s why I don’t get it,” she continued. “I thought things were going well. You never told me they weren’t.”
The firelight reflected in her glasses. Despite the ground beginning to burn around them, she stood still, collected, as if she wasn’t gonna move until Rigby explained everything.
He inhaled. “I love you.” The words fell out before he could stop them. “I love you so much. But this isn’t gonna work. Again, it’s not you. It’s my own fault. I just…”
“Yeah?” She closed the distance between them. The fire crackled; even the fire woman seemed to be holding her breath and waiting.
He forced the words out. “I don’t wanna have sex.”
Before she could respond, he plowed ahead. “Not just with you. With anyone. I mean, it’s not so bad watching it in a movie, it’s just super boring. But then I think about actually doing it and it’s gross, and I don’t know if it’s because I’m immature or just missing something or…” He took a breath. “I’m just busted. I’m sorry for breaking up with you on Valentine’s Day, but I literally just realized last night and now you can go find someone better, who can meet your expectations or whatever. I’m sorry.”
Tears spilled down his muzzle. At least it was over with. The fire woman snickered behind him, and Rigby couldn’t blame her. He couldn’t see Eileen super well through his blurry eyes, and he was glad for that. He didn’t want to see her disappointment, disgust, or whatever amalgamation of negative emotions was written across her face right now.
Among the fire’s crackling and snickering, another sound emerged, light and airy. Laughter.
Rigby wiped his eyes, and sure enough. Eileen was laughing.
“This isn’t funny,” he grumbled, curling his tail in embarrassment.
“It sort of is. Rigby, you don’t get it.” She grinned. “I’m asexual, too!”
“You’re a…what?”
“Asexual,” she repeated. “It means I don’t want to have sex, either.”
Rigby stared at her. The heat smothering him seemed to let up. Behind Eileen, the tiny flames shrank, vanishing into the earth.
“I should’ve told you sooner,” she said quietly. “But I didn’t know what you would think. And then it never came up, so…”
“Wait. You’re messed up, too? But how–”
“I’m not messed up,” she chuckled. “Some people just don’t want sexual intercourse. I’m not repulsed by it, I just don’t really feel the need to do it. Why do that when you can just hang out?”
“Dude, exactly!” Rigby returned her smile. “So…wait. It’s not bad? I’m not broken?”
“Of course not! Asexuality has been noted across several species. My best friend in college was also ace. I’m a part of an asexual book club, too. Every month we read books that don’t revolve around romance, and it’s great!” She took his hand. “I know you don’t like reading, but you can come sometime if you want and just hang out.”
Relief descended over him. He wiped the last of his tears, trying to make sense of this completely new jumble of information. “But…I still love you. And you love me, right? So how does that…”
“Oh, not all asexuals are aromantic.” She caught Rigby’s confused expression and giggled. “Sexual attraction isn’t the same as being in love. You can love someone and not want to have sex. Or want to have sex but not fall in love. Come to the book club sometime; we’ll give you a whole crash course.”
Behind him, the fire woman howled. Rigby and Eileen turned to look at her as she melted into the ground, leaving nothing behind but a scorched patch of earth.
He turned back to Eileen, brimming with newfound hope. “So we don’t have to break up? That’s what you’re saying, right?”
“No. In fact, this is better than I imagined,” she said. “I never even considered you were also asexual. You’re the first ace guy I’ve ever dated, and thank God for that.” She rolled her eyes, still smiling. “Now I know when you sweet-talk me you actually mean it and don’t just wanna get me in bed.”
“That stuff’s for losers.” He smirked, squeezing her hand. “Is that what it’s called? Ace? That sounds awesome.”
“It totally is.”
As they faced each other, hand in hand on the charred lawn, Rigby couldn’t stop grinning. He didn’t have to break up with her after all. He wasn’t broken or inhuman or incapable of feeling love. He was just asexual.
The word sounded odd, but he kept trying it out in his mind. Asexual. Who knew there was a single word for his confusing mess of feelings? A word that proved he wasn’t a strange, disgusting anomaly. A word Eileen seemed proud of. Maybe he could be, too.
“Well, it looks like Valentine’s Day’s back on, baby!” Rigby kissed her on the cheek. “I hope you’re ready, because I’m taking you to–”
“-The contemporary dance show downtown! You shouldn’t have!”
“What? How did you know? It was gonna be a surprise!”
Eileen smirked, taking his other hand. “One thing you’ll learn about me is that I can always guess surprises.”
“Always? Sounds like a challenge.” Rigby glanced at the pile of ash behind him. “Uh, so I kinda burned your totally awesome gifts. You mind coming with me to pick up new ones?”
She shook her head, amusement glistening in her eyes. “Never a dull moment with you, is there?”
“Oh! I have a copy of your mixtape upstairs, though. Hold on.”
Later that night, as they danced together in an empty parking lot, the white and blue city lights glittering in the distance, Rigby tucked a pink hydrangea macrophylla behind Eileen’s ear and finally felt okay.