Message of Love (25 page)

“Well then, don’t worry. If you’re not screwing around, it’s not contagious other ways, at least not… in the air, or the dishes or anything. If you wanna leave, I’ll understand. Everybody else has.”

“We’re staying, okay?” Everett looked at me, his eyes on the verge of tearing. I noticed the slightest shake of his head, which I thought meant he wanted me to leave. That brief pleading sent a surge of emotion through me; his need for my support made me almost tremble.

“Wes, can I have a word with Reid?”

“Sure. I’m gonna go… do something in my room. I got some other stuff I wanted to show you.”

As he left, I could only offer Everett a silent, almost panicked look.

“Can you… leave us for a bit?”

“But you said not to let you–”

His hand pressed against my shoulder. “I’m pretty sure his hypnotic charms are gone. Just for a little while.”

“But–”

“It’ll be okay. I just want to talk with him.”

I nodded.

Wesley returned, shyly, almost, carrying a cardboard box. “All clear?”

“Sure,” Everett said.

“Hey, um, anyone hungry?” I asked.

“I don’t really have much,” Wesley looked toward his kitchen.

“Can we get Chinese food?” I blurted out.

Everett grinned, wiped his face. Wesley’s eyes sort of brightened.

“Sure. There’s a great place down the block that’s pretty good.”

“Great,” Everett added, through a brief sniffle. “Let me get my wallet,” Everett reached into his backpack.

“No, this is on me,” Wesley protested as he slowly stood, then handed me some bills, and suggested a few items he knew were good. “Thanks,” he said.

But I knew it wasn’t about the food.

Outside, a window I found myself staring into displayed a trio of black dresses, shrouds almost, adorning headless suspended mannequins. I couldn’t tell if it was a clothing store or an art gallery.

How much time should I give them? What would they discuss? Was I any part of that private talk? Would Wesley beg for one last embrace, or more? What was and wasn’t contagious? But what daunted me more was to simply do as Everett asked, to trust him.

After deliberately wandering around the neighborhood, I found the restaurant and waited for the food to arrive in bags.

When I returned, I didn’t mention the way they looked, eyes a bit red from what had been some painful heart-to-heart talk. Beside Everett on the sofa were a few books and framed pictures, taken from the box Wesley had brought, then put aside.

We ate quietly. Wesley didn’t seem to be eating much, but neither of us said anything about it.

Everett kept it together that day. I listened to several hours of reveries between the two of them about their private school days. It felt odd to hear two guys so young wax nostalgic, but so much had happened to them both.

Perhaps I served as a sort of buffer between them. Maybe I prevented what might have happened, a confrontation, harsh words. But long after we had finished talking, Wesley assured us twice that no, he wasn’t up for joining us the next day at the Pride march, but we should go.

“You need to see it, see all the people,” he said. “It’s not all bad; a few scary drag queens and what have you. But no, you’ll be amazed.”

As we gathered ourselves and prepared to leave, Wesley’s gifts wrapped in my duffle bag, nightfall had darkened the high windows of Wesley’s apartment.

He took me aside, offered a handshake that became a brief hug, and whispered softly, but with an almost scolding tone, “You take care of him.”

It wasn’t until after we approached the busy intersection of ‘How-stun,’ found a taxi that would actually stop for us and accommodate Everett, until after we were welcomed into the hotel by the staff, and Everett, back in our room, had hoisted himself off his chair and into the bed, out of most of his clothes and into my arms, that he broke down.

Starting with what sounded like a few chuckles, at first I thought he was laughing at some joke Wesley had told. But of course, he wasn’t. As I pressed him closer, tighter against me, almost trying to muffle his sobs into me, he really let go, until a wet stain of tears and snot spread across my T-shirt.

“I’m sorry.”

“I’m not,” he snorted back a mucusy sob. “I mean, yeah, I’m all upset and tired, but... He told me, he told me he was thinking about just…ending it before he’s too... I was thinking about when I was first in rehab, and every day I’d get these angry low points, just defying it. ‘No, this is not me. I can rise above,’ or whatever. And I’d know that wouldn’t happen, couldn’t happen.” He sniffed.

“Take it,” I yanked my shirt toward him.

He looked up at me, those near-black marble eyes red around the edges. “But your letters, and those sweet pictures of you in the woods, and your…”

“My what?”

“Your persistence. You never gave up on me. He doesn’t have that. I was so afraid of him, but now…”

I wiped his cheek, finally pulled off my soaked shirt, and just held him.

The next morning, we packed for the day, and I carried our small duffel bag hoisted over my shoulder. Everett rolled ahead of me along the crowded streets, until we came upon a loose line of people standing, watching as a stream of marching people, floats, balloons, banners and smiling men, women, even some kids hoisted on parents’ shoulders, poured along Fifth Avenue.

We managed to appreciate this shared joy, this buoyant display of openness. Wasn’t this what we wanted, what we tried to emulate in our small way? At some point, standing beside Everett, I had taken his hand, finally comfortable enough to do that on the street. Then I just leaned behind him, my arms draped over his shoulders like a sweater.

Some cute guy in shorts and a cut-off T-shirt that showed off his thin waist and belly button called out for us to join him.

I didn’t need to ask Everett. His look up to me, those eager dark eyes sparkling in the sunlight, pleaded for a day of desperately needed joy.

“I don’t know if we’ll get a cab back uptown,” I said. “And I want to see Central Park.”

“Okay, but I want to try the subway again. Here. Get out my map,” he leaned his shoulder around as I unzipped his backpack.

“There’s gotta be a station with an elevator downtown that doesn’t stink of pee. We could just take the sidewalk. Besides, I want to see it. Christopher Street, homo central.”

“Lead on.”

And, after a minute of perusing the map, he handed it to me and I stuffed it into his backpack. We joined the slow-moving parade on the street. In between the banners and balloons, the strolling men in shorts, the women with signs who chanted slogans, I felt a growing elation and was able to put aside our concerns for Wesley.

At one point, the parade slowed to a halt as a distant siren echoed a few blocks south. Mustached men casually draped their arms over each others’ shoulders, until someone called out a spontaneous, “Kiss In!”

All around us, people embraced, smooched, and I felt a rush of emotion as I leaned down, took in Everett’s smiling face as he squinted under the sun, and kissed him, there, in the middle of a New York City street, surrounded by others.

Then, the parade continued to scattered cheers and applause.

“Take my hand,” he said.

“But you can’t–”

“I’ll manage.”

With his left hand in mine, he began a sort of cross-stitch push on his wheels, his path veering a bit from side to side. It became a sort of wavering dance, a bit awkward but worth the effort. We continued on our path, and for me, as usual, Everett led the way.

Chapter 31

July 1982

We stayed in Philadelphia that summer, endured the heat, the noise, as if building up our reserves before escaping for our camping trip with Jacob and his girlfriend.

As much as I wanted to distract and cheer Everett, I also hoped for an ultimate outdoorsy spot for just the two of us, with friends nearby.

All of it, the time apart, then together, meeting Nick in Florida, the fight afterwards, the van incident, even meeting Wesley, bonded us more than any of those initial furtive couplings before college.

We shopped for a shower hose, mini tables, a toilet seat and bucket, somebody borrowed a shovel; then groceries were collected at open markets. 

When we weren’t working, we perused museums like tourists, saw rock bands like Elvis Costello and the Attractions at JFK Stadium with Gerard when he wasn’t couch-surfing at the apartments of his friends in New York City. It was as if we dove into having fun, simply to forget discussing Wesley.

But that didn’t stop his concern. Free of coursework during classes, Everett continued his obsessive study habits, but with newspapers and magazines. He returned to Giovanni’s Room on his own a few times, and bought every gay newspaper they had, then finally ordered a few subscriptions.

He spent hours poring over every article about the constantly changing theories about the ‘gay cancer’ that kept spreading. One said it was from Africa. Another supposed it was a combination of the sexually transmitted diseases common among “promiscuous” gay men. Another blamed drugs, while another discounted that, citing hemophiliacs in the death toll.

I left him to his research, knowing he would eventually summate his findings, then ask me to read one article or another. I didn’t want to think about it, but I listened, all the while growing worried.

While putting away laundry, I had found one excuse or another to look in Everett’s clothes drawer, and merely touched the thick small envelope that Wesley had given him. Perhaps it was my sense of respect for his privacy that had kept me from prying.

As if honoring my trust with a surprise, after I’d finished washing the dishes from a light dinner of cold cuts and salad
–Mrs. Kukka had stopped by to nibble a bit with us before going out for the evening– I heard Everett in the bathroom. But as I returned to the bedroom, the envelope lay on the bed. I waited until he returned and slipped into a pair of shorts.

“Well, open it,” he said.

“Are you sure?”

“I know you want to.”

He wheeled over to the bed, hoisted himself up, and I waited for him to settle in. Despite the summer heat, he liked to lay out our quilt in the daytime, the flat green triangles a mosaic at our knees. After unfastening the clasp of the yellow envelope, I sifted out a half dozen Polaroids, similar to the one he had sent me almost three years before.

Most of them were merely cute; others almost blurry or harshly glared flash shots of a shirtless younger version of him. His grin varied but remained a bit coy. In one, his side exposed with the underwear tugged down, his legs, then thicker and firm, showed his familiar fuzzy hair. The last one stunned me, Everett fully naked, his penis thickened, his eyes half-closed, an Adonis in a dorm room, one part a blur, the other defined in harsh flash.

“It’s so…”

“Pretty hot, eh?”

“Are these even legal?”

“Well, I was consenting, but underage, so no.”

“What are you going to do with them?”

He reached for my shorts, whose contents had grown. “I can tell what you want to do with them.”

“Stop! Don’t!” I giggled. “Don’t stop!” I crouched away from his tickles, nearly crushing one of the photos.

He laid them out on the bed like Tarot cards, perusing them. “You should add yours to the collection.”

“But you gave it to me.”

“You can have them all.”

“Really?”

“For a trade.”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Oh, I’ll think of a proper occasion.”

He continued to gaze at the images as if they were of someone else. And in a way, they were.

“You’re a lot hairier now,” I said as I crept my hand under his shirt.

“It’s funny,” he said. “I want to ask you something.”

“What?”

“If you met me now, would you still…”

“What?”

“Would you still want to be with me?”

It wasn’t an idea I hadn’t considered, and perhaps my hesitation hurt him a little bit. If I’d seen Everett rolling along on campus, would I have ever had the nerve to say anything to him without seeming odd? Wouldn’t he be surrounded by friends, admirers, another boyfriend, perhaps? But how could ‘we’ have ever happened?

“I’m just happy I didn’t decide to go on that walk in the woods a few minutes later, after you’d…finished.”

“My wintry ablutions?” he joked.

“No, seriously, Ev. I don’t know how we could have met. You would have gone to school somewhere else. We’re so different, but… you know I feel so comfortable with you, most of the time, when you’re not driving me nuts.”

“You’re so easy to confuse sometimes.”

“Well, you, you still… I don’t know the word.”

“Beguile you?”

“Something like that. I don’t know.” I glanced at the Polaroids before nervously assembling them together in a stack. I didn’t want to think about what could have been, what had and hadn’t happened.

He offered a hand in putting the pictures back in their envelope, then placed them on the bedside table. Coaxing me to a comfortable cuddling position, he stroked my chest, toyed with my nose, ears, with his tongue that time, and offered a waxy kiss.

“I would have been such a mess if this had happened and you hadn’t been there for me. And I can’t stand the idea some other people have about their illness or disability being some kind of ‘blessing.’ That’s crap. I hate it.”

I touched him at his cheek, content that he hadn’t shaved, that he was with me.

“But it all opened up a new world to me, people I don’t think I ever would have noticed, or cared about.”

“What would you be doing instead that you aren’t already doing?”

“Well, lacrosse, for one thing. I mean, would there ever be wheelchair lacrosse? I dunno. I’m a little busy to… But that was never important. I’d still have an interest in politics. But I was really naïve before. I had this image of myself as some indolent slutty diplomat’s assistant, bedding dignitaries’ sons in France or Monaco.”

“Really?” I chuckled.

“Well, not exactly. But I just took the world for granted. You...” He reached over, offered a caress to my cheek. “You’re doing exactly what you want to do, even with me and all this.”

“Well, not exactly. I’d probably still think I should hide out in the woods for a career. And now, it’s just a little different; you know, tree versus city. But I don’t know if I’d ever meet some guy. I’d never meet anyone like you. I wouldn’t even have met you if I hadn’t met you.”

He chuckled, but it seemed he understood.

“Speaking of the woods,” he said.

“Yes?”

“Are we all set for camping with Jacob and his girlfriend of the month?”

“Yes. And I believe it’s been a few months.”

“Okay, then, Suck-my-Hammock it is.”

“Susquehannock.”

The drive, broken up by our jokes and conversations, and sing-alongs to various songs on the radio, offered a special change of pace, since Everett had deigned to let Jacob drive the van, while his girlfriend Sarah served as navigator. Everett and I nestled together in the back, occasionally poking our heads up to catch a view or funny road sign. But mostly we sat or lay on a pile of sleeping bags, the camping equipment only occasionally wobbling precariously near us.

The road became more winding after we entered the park, and I leaned up toward the front seat to point at a few roads for Sarah to seek out.

Another hundred feet higher and around several more mountains, I pointed Jacob to an almost hidden road. After slowly driving over gravel and dust for a few hundred yards, the trees parted to reveal an expansive view of rolling hills and valleys.

“Wow,” Jacob shouted, the first out of the van. He spread his arms wide, taking in the majestic view. We followed, removing equipment as Everett scooted himself to the door’s edge, then hoisted himself to his chair after I’d placed it on the ground.

“It’s a little rough, but the clearing should be okay.”

“I got it.” He had to tug a bit harder, but his wheels managed to tread over the dirt.

“Somebody else had a good idea,” Sarah said as she set a box of cooking utensils near a small circle of rocks that corralled the ashy remnants of a fire. She tied her long auburn hair into a bun with a hairclip. Despite her small frame, she hauled cartons with ease and determination.

“You seem like you know what you’re doing,” I smiled.

“Girl Scouts, five years.” She held up a few fingers as a saluting oath.

We each set about our chosen duties; Jacob the tents, Sarah the cooking, “fulfilling my gender role stereotype,” she joked. Everett decided to focus on filling up an inflatable mattress, using his hands on the foot pump. I chose a less glamorous chore of digging a hole for our communal toilet.

A while later, I returned with another bundle of sticks and kindling, to see an almost homey setting. The two tents bookended the campfire, their openings facing the view.

Uphill, my little contribution was already being enjoyed.

Everett sat like Rodan’s “Thinker” atop the plastic toilet placed above the small pit I’d dug. He dared me to take a picture. We’d set up a tarp on one side facing our campground, but Everett enjoyed just sitting there, waiting for something to happen naturally.

“You okay up here?”

“Did we bring any more books?” he asked as he broke the pose. “Damn Chaucer.”

A flat clanging noise drew our attention.

Sarah held up an empty pot and a fork, and announced, “Dinner’s ready, menfolk!”

“Sinnema…”

“Sinnemahoning?”

“Honig or honing?”

“I forget.”

Something about the fresh air made the wine go to our heads. Everett and Sarah sputtered over the name of the river byway village we’d visited on our way up. We’d each bought postcards at the shop and then sent them to each other across the road at the post office.

After a few rounds of jokey Indian-naming, the talk shifted to a more wistful contemplative tone as Sarah asked if any of us knew which Native American tribes had originally roamed the Pennsylvania hills. No one could.

“They probably died off more from the diseases we evil white men brought them,” I said.

“Don’t look at me,” Jacob held up his hands. “My people were busy being slaughtered in Europe.”

“It’s so strange,” Sarah pondered.

“What is?”

“Diseases, plagues, then and now. One of my fellow med students got into this argument over, you know, the gay cancer or whatever it’s called, and said that exponentially, it could get so much worse. And then he brought up quarantines and it turned into this nasty argument that–”

“Do we have to talk about this?” I cut in.

“What’s the problem?” Sarah said.

“We’re here in the mountains, away from all that.”

“I’m sorry, I was just trying–”

“We’re on vacation. Can’t we just…?”

“Vacate?” Everett snipped.

“Yes,” I defended.

“Fine,” Everett said. “We shall only discuss all things botanical.”

“That’d be nice,” I replied.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah muttered.

“No, I’m sorry. I just–”

“No, it’s fine.” She shook it off.

Had Everett told them about Wesley? I didn’t ask. He wasn’t my friend, or whatever Wesley was.

A silence ensued, the crackling of kindling, until Everett struck up a winsome version of one of his Cole Porter favorites.

As we settled into our tents, I waited for Everett to scoot off his chair, then crawl inside.

“Cozy,” I said.

“You horny?”

“It wouldn’t matter. I’m exhausted.”

“I’ll bet our compadres are having fun.”

Their nighttime intimacies across the campsite were kept to a few quiet giggles.

I felt the long day’s effect as well. While it was an ideal situation, Everett and I cuddled in a pair of zipped-together sleeping bags, the air mattress squeaked under our every move. We settled on a sideways position in the darkness.

Running my fingers through his short curls, I smiled.

“You like my summer look?”

“Yes.”

“So you did hate the New Wave style.”

“I didn’t hate it. I just… you’re beyond style.”

“Easy dodge.”