It’s Supermodel Documentary Hour!

“Can we do this in purple?” Manuel points to a spot on Chrissy’s laptop screen.

“Yeah, let’s try dark aubergine, and I’ll change the text to white so it’s still legible,” Chrissy clicks his mouse to make the edits.

They’re at Takeshi’s Lick It! Ice Cream store, designing a handbook for Manuel’s new class at the Downtown Library. At first, Chrissy wanted to just do it remotely, but he and Matt just had a horrible fight and Chrissy thought it’d be nice to just go out in the sun. Plus, there’s nothing a bowl of ice cream couldn’t solve, at least temporarily.

“That looks nice,” Manuel smiles. “I love it.”

“It’s really great you’re doing all these classes,” Chrissy says.

“Every little thing helps in this political climate.”

“I suppose.”

“I wish we’d done Pride prep at your place again this year,” Manuel says. “It was super fun last time.”

Chrissy sighs. “Yeah, sorry about that. I wasn’t really feeling it.”

“What? Oh, girl. We need Pride this year more than ever.”

“No, it’s not that,” Chrissy says. “I mean, you know I’ve always kinda hated Pride, but… Matt’s been super busy and I just want to give him some peace and quiet when he gets home.”

“OK, I guess that makes sense. How’s he?”

Chrissy looks back on the screen, clicking away at his mouse, adjusting the margins. But he feels like he’s about to burst. If he tells Manu about the big fight that just happened earlier, would that be an invasion of privacy?

“Hey, what is it?” Manuel rubs Chrissy’s back.

Chrissy can’t hold it in any longer. “I haven’t seen much of him since the fires back in February. His business is growing so much, but they’re so slow in hiring that he’s started spending time at sites to supervise.”

“But, isn’t that a good thing?” Manu sips his lemonade.

“Manu,” Chrissy takes a deep breath. He knows his best friend is staring at him, but he can’t look back at them. “Matt and I haven’t fucked in months.”

Manuel laughs so hard that it irritates and offends Chrissy.

“Oh, bitch.” Manuel wipes their tears. “Is that all?”

“Sex is important to me.”

“I know that,” Manuel says. “Sorry, I didn’t mean… I laughed mostly because I was relieved it wasn’t, you know, something more dire like cancer.”

“Okay?”

“But are you still intimate with him?”

“Not as much as we used to,” Chrissy says as he multitasks on his laptop.

“What does that mean?”

“He comes home so late at night and leaves super early in the morning. And he’s always on his phone. Always, always on his phone. Actually, come to think of it, he always holds his phone, except this morning.”

“And this has been going on for months?” Manuel says.

Chrissy nods. “A few weeks ago, we had a fight. Our first one in years. I asked if it was him in that article with Sauron, you know, ‘loves red and Bob’s Burgers.'”

“Oh, fuck…”

“He said it wasn’t him.”

“You believed him?” Manuel says.

“You know, he didn’t say it wasn’t him. He said there were lots of people who also loved red and Bob’s Burgers.”

“I mean… Yes, but still…”

“But that’s not the worst thing,” Chrissy says. He can feel his hands tremble. “He came home early-ish, and wanted to take me out.“

“Aw, that’s sweet.”

“But I already had to go meet a client. And Matt was… He kind of… He asked if I could cancel. He kind of said it wasn’t as important as going out with him.”

“Umm… Okay?”

“I told him that was such a shitty thing to say, that we couldn’t all have our own businesses and make good money.”

“Good,” Manuel smiles and rubs Chrissy’s shoulders. “That’s good. I love that you stood up for yourself.”

“Thank you,” Chrissy says. “But anyway, I came home, he apologized, and I thought everything was well and good and…”

“And what, sweetie?”

“Things went back to normal for a while, and it looked like he had more energy, less mellow. A few weeks ago, he finally got back to the gym. They hired a new supervisor to lighten his workload. I thought finally he had his life back together again, that, you know, his libido’s back. But still no sex. And then this morning, he just… Blew up. We had a huge fight about privacy issues when I wanted to do porn, and that he didn’t appreciate the comments people left on a video I did.”

Chrissy stops himself. Could talking to his best friend about his and Matt’s issue be considered a breach of privacy? He doesn’t know anymore. And this unknowing, this uncertainty in his and Matt’s relationship, is an uncharted territory. And it frightens Chrissy.

“Do you want thoughts or hugs?” Manuel says. “Or both?”

“Just hugs for now, please,” Chrissy starts crying.

“Aw, come here, sweetie.”

It’s not the first time Chrissy cries in his best friend’s arms. Manuel always gives comforting mama-bear hugs. It’s one of the things he loves about Manuel. Manuel can be bitchy at times, but during situations like this they always seem to know what to do to calm Chrissy down.

“Thank you,” Chrissy says between sobs. “It’s not that I don’t value your opinion. I want hugs because I’m not ready to hear your thoughts yet. I’m still… processing all of this.”

“I’m just baffled,” Manuel says. “Matt? Blowing up? That doesn’t sound like him at all.” Manuel takes a sip of his lemonade.

“I know! But he did. I mean, I get his point of view, but his delivery… Maybe it was stress from work or something.”

“I know he loves you very much,” Manuel says as he holds Chrissy. “Everyone can see that, it’s almost obnoxious. I’m always, always open with Takeshi, and he’s always open with me. Whenever you texted me saying, oh, Matt did this and that, I’d tell Take-chan about it. It’d light a fire under his ass, and he’d step up his romance game with me.”

Chrissy laughs and wipes his tears with his hands. “That’s diabolical, I love it. But now I wonder if I overshared things about Matt and me with you.”

Manuel sighs. “Maybe? Why don’t you talk to Gar? They’ve been best friends for ages. Maybe he could make some sense of it. But there’s gotta be something else going on. Again: Matt doesn’t just ‘blow up.'”

Chrissy flinches a bit. He doesn’t want to sound like he’s snitching on Matt to Gar, but Manuel may have a point. “I’ll… consider it.”

“Good. Anyway, ‘you’re feeling sad, so you know what’s it time for?'”

Chrissy sees the big grin on Manuel’s face. “Oh, no, you don’t mean…”

“You know it, bitch! ‘Supermodel Documentary Hour!'” Manuel grabs Chrissy’s arm.

“Are my golden girls doing the Superstar thing again?” Takeshi walks in and catches Chrissy and Manuel posing in his ice cream shop.

“Hey, we’re not that old,” Manuel says.

“Yeah, but you’re wearing gold,” Takeshi says and kisses Manuel.

“Oh, yeah, I guess we are.” Manuel hugs Takeshi.

“Hey, Chrissy,” Takeshi says. “How’s Matt?”

“Hey…” Chrissy says.

“Anyway, Takeshi and I are going furniture shopping.” Manuel grabs Takeshi’s hands. “You should come with us.”

“Oh,” Chrissy says. “Umm… No, I’ll… I need to feed the cats.”

“Don’t they have an automatic feeder?” Takeshi says.

“No. It’s complicated with three cats, and Gala always wants to eat the other two’s kibbles. Anyway, lunch time is always wet food.”

“Ugh, fine,” Manuel says. “You sure you’ll be okay?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Chrissy says and grabs his things. “Manu, I…” Chrissy catches himself mid-sentence.

“Yes?”

Chrissy wants to tell Manu that everything they discussed should just between the two of them and that Takeshi shouldn’t know, but he realizes actually saying that in front of Takeshi would make it awkward. He’ll just text Manu.

“Oh, uh… I’ll email you the final design, yeah?”

“Thank you.” Manuel squeezes Chrissy’s shoulder. “Text me if you need anything.”

“Thanks so much, and have fun today!”

As Chrissy walks away, he overhears Takeshi asking Manu what that’s all about, and Manu shushing him. Chrissy grits his teeth. Has Matt been right all along about their privacy? But who else should Chrissy talk to about this if not Manuel?

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Chrissy: Romper, beaded bracelets, spike bracelet, necklace, rings, hairband, laptop bag by Dollsexposed; gold shoes and pink glasses model’s own.

Manuel: Graphic tee, gold chevron shorts, belt bag by Dollsexposed; bracelets by Fashion Royalty; sandals by Phicen/TBLeague; earrings model’s own.

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And of course, here’s that infamous “Supermodel Documentary Hour” from one of my favorite dumb movies, Superstar!