Jack Devitt - Boyfriend

Boyfriend is a self-published 36-page magazine featuring both digital and 35mm photography with long-form and poetry writing. It focuses on my personal relationships to masculinity, gender and its stereotypes, and reliance on physical and intimate relationships. Short story "Spit" was published as an accompaniment piece through 2LATE Magazine.

photography, production, styling, and casting Jack Devitt

assisted by Addelaye

featuring Jack Devitt, Addelaye, Stella Sarkozy, Amarí Williams, Jorden Deleon, Angel Yoguez, Livvie James, Daphne Bon, Rose Hanish, Jezabelle Sepulveda, Wyatt Kuebler, Solar Orange, and Alexis Burdgick

"Boyfriend" was published on Substack and is the first writing piece featured in the magazine.

I have a habit when it comes to listening to music. It’s not enough to hear the same song once every day. No, I must stream it on repeat for days, weeks sometimes, until I can suck its energy completely. Until it becomes a part of me. My phone is super broken so I have to hold the earbuds at the charger port JUST right or the music becomes a knife. It reminded me of my friend’s t-shirt left on the banister. It was there for weeks and their perfume became an eternal incense. Every time someone passed by, they said “Are they here?” As if their pheromones were replaced by perfume, permanently altering the scent of their own odor. Their sweat became flowers.

It reminded me of when I was waiting for the bathroom off the dance floor in Brooklyn. My hair was blond and long, as it usually is, and my eyes were red and glittered. A boy left the bathroom and came up to me, and I recognized him. I saw him there the weekend before and I caught his eye as he traversed the dark. I felt like I knew him from somewhere else but I couldn’t place it.

“I like your hair.”

“Thank you, what’s your name?” He told me his name and I admitted my own, and stuck out my hand. We shook, and I left my hand in his for a second longer.

“I feel like I know you from somewhere.”

“Oh yeah, from where?”

“Were you here last weekend?”

“Probably.” I asked him if he was a model or something and he smiled and shrugged and pulled away, walking back into the fog like he was a rollercoaster stuck on a track, and the only destinations were bathroom, bar, dance floor. After I pissed I went back to dance and the guy who I’d been texting but never met had found me again. We met earlier in the night and small-talked while the lights flickered and the music vibrated my boots that I’ve worn for 5 years. My brain was filled with Mules and amyl nitrate and probably a bit of weed. I relaxed into him and he had his hands on my waist and rocked with me.

“I love your hair.”

He was a lot taller than me, and, admittedly, older than me. I didn’t care about the latter but the fact he stood multiple inches above me was refreshing. I felt small and kept by him, and it soothed my drunk brain. He said something but I couldn’t figure it out. I kept saying, “What? What?” until I heard him. “We were both Jesus for Halloween.” And I laughed.

It reminds me of my friend’s studio on 105th. It smells of coffee and her house. And I always tell her that she has a specific smell. A smell that accompanies someone’s space. It was always pleasant and I found it interesting thinking of scent as a signifying factor of her identity. I feared that my scent was that of cigarettes, sweat, and a faint lick of deodorant or perfume my roommate sprayed. I watched her peel her oranges in a spiral and we all sat, peeling our oranges to varying degrees of success, hopeful to replicate that infinite spiral. The citrus filled the room and mixed with our own signifying scents and I couldn’t tell who was who.