Fag Hag (Robert Rodi Essentials) (11 page)

He grimaced. “Oh, come on. It’s just a haircut.”

She shook her head. “It’s more than that. You’re gone, totally gone. Everything I once—” Her voice was in danger of breaking; she forced herself to stop. “Peter, you have to excuse me. I can’t talk right now. I’m too upset.”

“I don’t understand you,” he said, annoyed. “Why does everything have to be so fucking dramatic?”

She felt like the earth was moving under her feet. “Excuse me,” she said, afraid she might lose her balance and fall. She left her cartful of groceries on the floor and walked out of the store. She went directly home and slipped into bed, pulling the covers up to her eyes; then she balled up, went fetal. A few minutes later her doorbell sounded. Peter, no doubt. She ignored the insistent ringing and eventually it ceased.

She quaked with anger. The bed shook. Her teeth gritted against each other. An hour passed. Two. Her telephone rang again, and again she ignored it. Soon the sun disappeared and she lay in darkness, clutching her pillow. She looked balefully out the window at the starless sky. The bed shook.

W
HEN SHE AWAKENED
the next morning, the anger that had been so hot the night before had become a cold, deadly thing. Now she could set about subverting Peter’s romance with Lloyd in earnest. But so much time had been lost, and they had gotten so far. And worst of all, she had no plan.

She knew what she had to do first. She called Peter at the office and said, “Honey, I’m so sorry about last night. Do me a favor and pretend it never happened.”

“What never happened?” he said happily, glad to put it behind them.

“Thanks so much, sweetie. See you tonight. What’s Lloyd’s address?”

Lloyd, it turned out, owned his own house in a North Side neighborhood called Ravenswood Manor. Natalie had a second cousin who’d once lived there; it was the most domestic, and one of the most charming, city neighborhoods she’d ever seen. It seemed not to have changed since the forties.

Perfect place for two gay men to settle down,
she thought. They could be urban pioneers without too great a risk to life and limb. Change the complexion of the neighborhood without making too man waves. Get a dog, maybe two—Peter had always wanted an Irish setter.

Well, she knew better than to try to spook Lloyd by implying that Peter wanted to move in with him. Maybe that worked with Morris and his ilk, but Lloyd would probably pick up the phone and call a moving van.

Her stomach fluttered all day; on the job, at lunch, on the way home. So much depended on her performance tonight. If only she had any idea of what to do!

Finally, her nerves were so bad she thought they might debilitate her.

Time to get plowed,
she decided.

She got off the bus and went straight to Bulldog Road, where she ordered a Bacardi on the rocks. There were a few men in the bar already, the hard-core, after-work crowd that drank like there was no tomorrow.

She took a swallow of her drink and looked around, hoping to see no one she knew.

Oh, my God. There was someone. Will Hammond. The man she’d stolen Peter from more than two years before. He’d never forgiven her for that.

He spotted her, and a positively evil leer stretched across his face. He got up from his stool and made his way over to her.

“Natalie, you horrible thing, haven’t seen you in
ages,”
he said, kissing her cheek.

“Will, you pig, you’re as handsome as ever,” she said, smiling brilliantly. “How do you manage it, with all the naughty things I hear you’ve been up to? There must be a really scary portrait of you up in your attic or something.”

“Bitch,” he said, and he took the stool next to hers. She wished she were anywhere on earth but here. An Indian leper colony, a Soviet gulag—
anywhere.

“So,” Will said, folding his hands over one knee. “Where’s your playmate, Peter?”

She knew instinctively not to lie to him; he might already know the truth, and he’d leap on her like a lioness on a wounded gazelle. “Oh,” she said, “Peter’s got himself a new man.”

“A serious man?”

“A
very
serious man.”

“As in capital L?”

“As in capital L.”

He raised an eyebrow. “That’s what I’ve been hearing. But I haven’t seen them out together.”

“It’s a pretty new thing. Just one week.”

“One week and it’s capital L?” he said, pretending shock. “Well, I confess myself appalled! The crisis of our age, Natalie, is that people have no moderation. They spend years avoiding commitment, then once they weary of that they get married over a handshake. It shows a want of sense.”

“I know, I know.”

“What’s she like? The new Mrs. Leland, I mean.”

Natalie flinched. Among the things she hated worst about Will was his insistent use of the feminine mode when discussing his gay brethren. “A bit of an intellectual,” she said, “though not like any intellectual you’ve ever met before. Not a socialist or anything. Just the opposite. He’s a—what do you call them?—a libertarian. It’s pretty much all he talks about. Government and philosophy, stuff like that. Free enterprise.”

He put a hand on her shoulder. “Thank
God
you’ve warned me! What if I’d gotten curious and invited them to a dinner party? Can you
imagine?
My intimates gathered to frolic and play, and the new Mrs. Leland wanting to discuss the Consumer Price Index and the Joint Chiefs of Staff? I’ll be sure to steer clear of
that
one. Tell me more!” He wriggled in his seat, enjoying this.

“Well—he’s not much to look at. Balding. Doesn’t know how to dress.”

“Good heavens! What does Peter
see
in her?”

She twirled the ice in her glass, not wanting to meet his eyes. “To be honest with you, I don’t know. I suspect he’s flattered Lloyd treats him as an equal. An equal
mind,
I mean. Almost everyone else has always treated him like a hunk of meat.”

“But darling, that’s the way we
all
treat each other—and Peter was never any different, I can tell you that from firsthand experience!”

She shrugged. “Then I don’t know what the appeal is.”

Will sighed and lowered his head. “And how is poor Natalie taking all of this?”

“It’s a little sobering. Peter and I were just talking about it the other day. Growing older and becoming more responsible, all that. Settling down. He’s got a full-time job now, too. We still love each other dearly, but I think our future’s going to be less dazzling than our past.”

“So you don’t feel left out in the cold at all?”

“What? Oh, no. Matter of fact, I’m having dinner with them tonight.”

“How kind of them! I just hope they didn’t invite you out of pity.”

Her faced flushed with anger.
Don’t get defensive,
she warned herself;
that’s exactly what he wants.
“I don’t
think
I’m an object of pity, Will,” she said in carefully modulated tones. She finished her drink in one gulp.

“But my dear, of
course
you are! There’s that old song, isn’t there?”

She faked a smile. “Whatever you say. Must run. Love to all the boys.”

She picked up her purse and started to leave, but from behind her she heard him begin to sing. She recognized it as an old Judy Garland tune, but he had changed the words:

Ever since this world began

There is nothing sadder than

A one-fag fag hag

Looking for the fag that got away

She stopped in her tracks. The world seemed to eddy about her head. She thought she might faint from fury.

Don’t turn around!
She warned herself.
Just keep going! Keep walking out the door! He’s dying for you to turn and fight! It’s what he wants more than anything!

She wouldn’t fight, then; but she couldn’t just leave, she couldn’t let him insult her with impunity.

She turned and faced him. She let the tears in her eyes flow freely.

“Well, you’ve done it,” she said. “You set out to hurt me, and you’ve done it.”

He was visibly taken aback by this response; it was clearly the last thing he’d expected from her. He tried to cover his embarrassment with bravado. He clapped his hands and said, “Magnificent performance! Give that woman an Oscar!” Other patrons in the bar were watching them now.

“You’re an intelligent man, Will,” she said. “You’re good-looking, you’re successful. Surely you can find something to make you happy besides humiliating people who have less than you. People who have nothing left at all.” Tears were streaming down her cheeks now.

He seemed about to reply, but she’d taken the wind out of his sails. He turned away from her and ordered another drink. He looked positively sheepish.

She left the bar weeping.

Fag hag.
Fag hag.
It rang in her ears as she walked home; it was the only refrain she heard on the street—she imagined everyone whispering it as she passed.

Fag hag.
She’d heard that label applied, derisively, to other women; not to her. Yet what else could she be? Her entire life was devoted to the company of gay men who didn’t care a damn for her—who found her an amusing diversion, a sparkle of color in their monochromatic, all-male realm. Was she as pathetic as that? An anomaly? A figure of fun? A silly indulgence, of no importance—not beneath notice, but not much above it, either?

No, no—there was Peter. He had lifted her above that. Her love for him, and his for her, was not of that kind. Their love was real; it was genuine; it existed on a plane above the shallow revels of persons like Will and his shrieking “intimates.”

Peter had been her salvation from that kind of life. She saw him as her salvation still. He was her bedrock; he was her religion. She must have him back, or be lost again—have him back, or be prey to the pity and contempt of the world. Will had shown her that.

She arrived home, at long last. It had been a doleful trek.

She changed clothes for dinner. She would dress down; she would not sparkle tonight like some Roman candle; she would not be a “fag hag” for Peter and Lloyd. She would be herself, stripped down to bare wood; she would be
visible.
And somehow she would show Peter what Lloyd himself was, equally exposed. No more subterfuge. No more tricks or stratagems. Now it was head to head, Lloyd versus Natalie, in the arena of combat, with Peter in the box, his thumb at the ready. Up?—Down?

T
HE CAB LEFT
her standing on the sidewalk in front of Lloyd’s domain. It was an old prewar row house with an Art Deco door but no other discernible emblem of style. It rose to a height of two stories, and the trees around it were tall and riotous with color. She thought it looked homey and peaceful. A nest for two birds, neither of which could lay eggs.

It was getting dark, and there were lights on in the house. She carried a paper sack with a chilled Chardonnay in it. She went up the walk and rang the doorbell.

Now we meet as enemies,
she said to herself.

But in fact it was Peter who greeted her—shaven-scalped Peter. It was like a fresh wound to see him this way again.

“Hi!” he said brightly, opening the door wide to admit her. “Come on in! Good to see you, honey!” Everything he said sounded false.

The house was warm. She took off her jacket and handed it to him. She could smell something cooking.

“Lloyd’s in the kitchen,” Peter said, hanging her jacket in the tiny vestibule closet. “We’re having catfish; can you smell it? Lloyd says it’s a better buy than chicken, ‘cause it’s richer in protein. Also some brown rice and broccoli. I’ve gotten Lloyd into low-fat eating. He says he never considered that there was no mind-body dichotomy until he met me.”

I’ll just bet he said that,
thought Natalie as she handed him the Chardonnay. “Here.”

He peeked into the bag. “Oh, honey,
thanks!”
he said, a bit fulsomely. “Wonderful of you!” He kissed her. “Come on, I’ll open this right now. You can meet Lloyd again. You only met him the once, right?”

She nodded. He led her to the kitchen at the back of the house. “Funny, I’ve never seen you in blue jeans before,” he said as they walked. “Never even knew you owned a pair. You look kind of different tonight—denim, your hair down. Like a hippie or something.” He laughed.

You’ll regret that,
she thought, her anger clattering around in her brain like a wind-up toy gone berserk.

The house was sparsely furnished; the decorations were minimal. But everything was quality—an oak writing desk, a rosewood dinner table. Venetian blinds hung in every window, and a series of framed black-and-white photos adorned the hallway—all vintage portraits, some of children, some of wizened ancients, many in between. “Lloyd likes faces,” Peter explained.

In the dining room there was a threadbare Oriental rug. For a homosexual’s house, this was all disconcertingly masculine. Not a tassel or a curtain to be seen.

In the kitchen, Lloyd was squatting before the oven, checking the catfish. When she entered, he stood up and smiled, and she was astonished to find him handsome; he was kind of like a balding Charlie Sheen. Suddenly she remembered that she’d been initially attracted to him, at the wedding; her subsequent loathing of him must have rendered him daily more ugly in her memory.

He and Peter were both wearing blue jeans and sweatshirts with the sleeves rolled up. They looked more like an old lesbian couple than gay lovers. They might have been married a dozen years.

Lloyd extended his hand and said, “Welcome, Natalie. Glad you could come.” His smile was charming.

“Thanks,” she said. They stood there, nothing else to say.

“Natalie brought wine,” said Peter, making a deal of noise with the paper sack as he removed the bottle. Natalie turned and looked around the kitchen; it was clean, bright, filled with implements.

“Thanks,” Lloyd said. Then he turned to Peter. “Why don’t you open it up, hon? Keep us happy till dinner’s ready.”