Remembering Christmas (12 page)

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Authors: Drew Ferguson

BOOK: Remembering Christmas
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A Christmas to Remember
Frank Anthony Polito
In memory of Patrick Liddy, aka “Miss Peter”
DECEMBER 1991
All I Want
And it feels so close
Let it take me in . . .
—Toad the Wet Sprocket
 
 
 
 
 
B
ack when I used to be a Band Fag, all I ever wanted was to be
normal
.
O' the tears I shed, the years I squandered, trying to belong and be like everybody else. Now that I've come to accept—and appreciate—who I truly am, there's just one thing I'm asking Santa Claus to bring me this Christmas. . . .
My own boyfriend.
Imagine how the old man playing St. Nick at the Oakland Mall would feel if a twenty-one-year-old
guy
sat down on his lap and greeted him with this request. Not, “I'd like a Discman and the new De La Soul CD.” Or “I'll take a gift certificate to the Gap, please.” Or, in the immortal words of Charlie Brown's materialistic little sister, Sally: “Just send money. . . . How about tens and twenties?”
Nope. What I
really
desire more than anything, after spending the last five-plus years utterly and completely single, is to finally find the thing that I first heard Lionel Richie and Diana Ross singing about a decade ago....
My
Endless Love.
“Yo, Jack!”
The sound of someone shouting my name draws me out of my daydream.
“Sorry . . .”
Boiling water bubbles up and spills over onto the stovetop. Quickly, I pull the pot away and lower the blue flame on the burner. No harm done.
Time to add the angel hair!
He asks me, “What's-a-matter? . . . You wasted?”
To which I respond, “I didn't think so.”
He grins, refilling my wineglass with white zinfandel. “Then drink up.”
Damn that Kirk Bailey!
If I didn't know better, I'd say he's deliberately trying to get me drunk. But we're both aware that can't possibly be the case....
Can it?
Using the handy-dandy circle on the side of the box, I measure out two precise portions of pasta. Doesn't seem like nearly enough for the two growing college boys that we are, so I break off a few additional strands, submerging them into the steamy depths.
At the sound of the cracking semolina, Kirk gasps. “What are you doing?!”
Hesitating momentarily, I shoot him a look. “This is how my mom always does it.”
“Yeah,” he says, “but you're from Hazeltucky.”
Har-dee har-har.
As if I haven't heard it all before. Hailing from the Detroit suburb situated between mile roads Eight and Ten, bordered by the newly “Fashionable Ferndale” on the west and “White Trash Warren” to the east, my hometown has been the butt of jokes for most of my new friends since they discovered I'm a hillbilly from Hazel Park. (Truthfully, I'm part Italian / Irish / German, part English / German / Canadian. Nobody in my family comes from Down South.) I don't know why. Lots of losers from HPHS end up here in East Lansing. It's not like we're at Harvard; this is Michigan State.
“How do they cook spaghetti in Center Line?”
This I ask still amazed at the fact that Kirk and I grew up a mere four miles apart, our paths never crossing until this past September 23rd on the first day of our senior year as Spartans....
Deciding I'd try my hand at playwriting, I signed up for a course called Theatre Lab, being offered by (whom else?) the Department of Theatre. I'd attended a few plays during my days at Michigan State, most notably a production of
A Tale of Two Cities
, adapted from Dickens by the director, and
The Pirates of Penzance.
This one I especially wanted to take in as I grew up quite fond of the Kristy McNichol / Christopher Atkins parody,
The Pirate Movie
. But these shows, and the few others I'd seen, had all taken place over at the Wharton Center. I'd only set foot inside the Auditorium Building once before, freshman year, to attend a Sam Kinison concert (“Wild thing, I think I love you!”), despite its being located across the Red Cedar River directly behind my dorm.
The class itself consisted of actors, directors, and writers, all collaborating on different projects. Upon entering the room, I remember taking a good look around, asking myself,
Who's the cutest boy here?,
and then sitting down directly beside Mr. Bailey. Particularly was I smitten when Kirk got up in front of the class to present his audition monologue. The simple yet confident way he introduced himself—“Hello, my name is Kirk Bailey. My selection is from
Burn This
, by Lanford Wilson”—and the fact that, in the first line of the piece his character asks if we've ever been to a
gay
New Year's Eve party . . . like Calgon, it took me away.
Over the next six weeks we got acquainted working together weekly. But even more so when Bobbie, a Directing major and Kirk's gal pal, invited me to join the pair one afternoon for lunch at the Student, aka
Stupid
, Center. This soon became a recurring occurrence. And we've been buds ever since.... The rest, as they say, is H-I-S-T-O-R-Y.
“Not like that . . .” Kirk replies to my query regarding proper pasta preparation as if I'm the stupidest person born since my same-birthday buddy, Helen Keller. “And it's
vermicelli
, not spaghetti.”
So now he's a culinary expert!
Just because his father owns his own sporting goods store while mine works as a produce manager at a major supermarket chain doesn't make the Baileys any fancier than the Paternos. Both our mothers are stay-at-home housekeeper / child-rearing types.
“Whatever.” I give the remaining sticks a snap and drop them into the pot. “What do you know about Italian food? Ya dumb Pollack!”
Of course I'm just teasing. One might even call it flirting. This is when I realize that maybe I
have
had a bit more alcohol than I initially estimated. Never am I this blatantly obvious about my attraction to the man I've come to call my new best friend.
But I can't help it.
The way Kirk stands here in the kitchen of his off-campus apartment, aka “The Duplex,” looking ever so handsome in his olive green and black-sleeved Oaktree jacket worn with dark mock turtleneck, matching slacks, and black leather shoes with silver buckles. (I couldn't feel more underdressed wearing the navy and gray snowflake sweater I've had since high school with my Girbaud jeans.) The way his blond bangs cascade ever so casually across his high forehead . . . The stubble on his cheeks and his crooked, dimpled chin . . . His straight, white teeth and bright blue eyes staring back at me.
It takes every bit of restraint in my being not to shove him up against the refrigerator and ram my tongue down his throat. But we're both aware he wouldn't like that....
Would he?
Once we get the cooking of the main course under control, we start in on the salads. Kirk takes care of cutting and washing the romaine, while I commence with chopping up the toppings: cherry tomatoes, red pepper, and . . .
“Where's the cucumber?” I know we bought one at Country Market, aka “Country
Markup
,” when we did the shopping for this evening.
“Right here,” I hear Kirk reply. When I look over at him, he's got the eight-inch gherkin in the palm of his hand, extending out from the crotch of his pants. “Come on, grab it!” He wags the fruit back and forth at me like he's taking a whiz.
“You wish you were that big,” I say, totally busting on him. Of course I can't help but wonder how Kirk would actually measure up, once he's succeeded in making the thought cross my mind. “Now who's wasted?”
God, I hope I'm not blushing too badly!
“You ain't seen nothing yet.”
Kirk finishes off his beverage, pours another. He reaches into the freezer, removes a plastic Tupperware tub filled with something red and frozen.
“What's that?”
“This would be the sauce.”
He pops the top off and places the contents in the microwave at the far end of the counter next to the Mr. Coffee coffeemaker.
“At my house,” I reveal, “we just open up a jar of Ragu and consider it jake.”
“Not my mother,” he says, rolling his eyes. “She makes everything from scratch. Cakes, pies,
golumpki . . .
I shake my head at his sudden Eastern European accent. “Okay, you lost me.”
“Stuffed cabbage,” Kirk clarifies.
“Gross,” I grumble, despite having never sampled anything remotely close to the dish he's describing. Growing up, if it couldn't come with mashed potatoes and canned corn on the side, my mother wouldn't cook it. “You really
are
Polish.”
“I told you,” he tells me. “Bailey isn't my real last name.”
Apparently, back in the 1950s, Kirk's grandfather got fired from his job at Hudson Motors, so he went and reapplied—and got rehired—under a pseudonym. How the man milked Bailey from Szlachta, I have no idea. (Kirk seems to think it had something to do with his grandpa's liking Irish cream.) Regardless, Kirk's dad, who was already grown and married at the time of the surname switch, decided to follow suit, thus allowing Kirk all his life to pass as something other than
Polski.
Or is it
Polska?
As in
kielbasa.
Beep!
The timer goes off, and Kirk extracts the container. He dips a wooden spoon into the not-yet-defrosted sauce, stirs, returns it for another two minutes.
“What are you doing?”
He holds the tomato-stained object mere inches from my mouth. “Have a taste.” I let my lips part, sense the savory sweetness on my tongue. Kirk takes a try himself, not bothering to wash off the utensil beforehand. “Oh, no.... Now I've got your cooties.”
“Shut up!” Giving him a gentle push, my hand lingers a moment, copping a feel of his bulging bicep.
“You like?” he inquires, eyebrow raised.
For a moment, I assume Kirk's referring to the mass of muscle beneath his sweater. Then I realize he must be talking about his mother's recipe.
“It's nice,” I say, double entendre intended.
Our eyes meet.
He steps toward me.
Reaching out a hand, he brushes my lower lip with his thick thumb.
Not since the first love of my life, Joey Palladino, have I been so turned on by someone's digits. If I didn't know better, I'd think Kirk Bailey was going to kiss me right here and now. But we're both aware that can't possibly be the case....
Can it?
“You got some sauce,” he says, wiping it away. Then he licks his own fat finger as if it's a lollipop, calling to mind thoughts of—
Beep!
Like that ridiculously popular TV show that I refuse to watch (despite how incredibly hot that Slater stud might be), I'm
Saved by the Bell.
Ten minutes later, we're ready to sit down and dine....
“We need some music,” I decide before diving in.
“What do you wanna hear?” Kirk asks en route to the stereo system.
He's got one of those record/CD player/dual cassette deck combo deals, all stacked one on top of the other, inside a protective glass cabinet. On opposite sides of the room, two ginormous speakers sit propped up in the corners.
“I don't know,” I say, contemplating his question. “Something Christmas-y.”
Kirk peruses a tower of CDs almost as tall as I am. Or in my case, as
short
. At five-foot-seven, I've always been somewhat vertically challenged.
“You're in luck,” he tells me, opening a jewel case and sliding a silver disc into the slot. A moment later, the room fills with the sound of somber piano playing.
“That's pretty. . . . What is it?”
My companion sits opposite me. “George Winston,
December
.”
My face lights up. “I love George Winston!”
My friends and I used to listen to him back in high school (on cassette, of course). But this particular track doesn't sound familiar. There's a mellow, haunting quality to the tune that immediately brings a tear to my eye. I don't know why.
Maybe it's because I am indeed inebriated. Or maybe it's because it's the final day of class with only five more months to go until graduation. Soon I'll be surrounded by a bunch of people who barely know me, meaning my mom and dad, and my sister and brother, and the folks I work with at Farmer Jack's. Up here at MSU, for the most part, I'm finally able to be myself. Whenever I'm around my family, I can't talk freely about certain important facts: like how I've totally fallen in love with the
guy
sitting across the table from me.

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