Ironman

by Chris Crutcher

  There were grunts.

  “How ’bout you, Shu?” he asked. “Seems like you’re a key cowpoke in this one.”

  “I’m solid, Mr. Nak. He bes’ don’t be callin’ me nigger no more, though.”

  “Yeah,” Mr. Nak said. “I think it’s a real bad idea to call you that. But I think maybe Elvis is gettin’ a little better idea where his attitude comes from.”

  Mr. Nak let the group go early, but he said, “Mr. Brewster, you wanna hang around a second?”

  My stomach jumped a bit, but I said okay.

  When the room had cleared out, he asked me to sit down, and I did. “When I was listin’ the names, Mr. Brewster, I left one out.”

  I asked which one.

  He said, “Faggot.”

  I was stunned, Lar. I couldn’t remember calling anybody that, and I said so.

  He said, “Maybe I heard it because it’s so loud inside your head.”

  I just stared. I really didn’t know what he was talking about.

  He said, “I’m talking about Mr. Serbousek.”

  Blood flushed into my head like the septic tank below the World Trade Center.

  Mr. Nak said, “Looks like you do know what I’m talkin’ about. Why would you turn on a man stickin’ hisself out that far for you?”

  I couldn’t speak.

  “He let you work out with his team, he took you under his wing at school—hell, he’s half the reason Redmond can’t get his hands on you the way he wants—he’s there to walk through any particular hell you wanna walk through, an’ you turn your back on him ’cause he tells you the truth. You know, young Brewster, maybe I oughta go on an’ graduate you out of this group. I don’t mind workin’ with a man’s anger, but I have a hard time workin’ with a man who turns his back on his friends. I think it’s time for you to step up, or I’m through wasting my time.”

  I hung my head; I couldn’t bear having Mr. Nak mad at me.

  He said, “Yeah. Shame on you.”

  “How’d you know?” I said finally.

  “He told me. Hell, boy, his feelins is hurt.”

  I was quiet a few seconds more, and Mr. Nak got up to leave. I said, “Wait,” and he turned. “If I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna need some help.”

  “What kind of hep you need?” He still felt real cold.

  “Well, I just can’t make him being homo…gay…okay with me.”

  “It don’t need to be okay with you,” Mr. Nak said. “It needs to be okay with him.”

  “Yeah, okay,” I said. “But I still need a way to act. Now that I know it, I can’t pretend I don’t.”

  “What’s your problem with it?”

  “I don’t know. It’s just that I’ve always been told to be careful—”

  “You think it means something about you?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Well, let me give you a little schoolin’,” he said. “Heterosexuals wreak a heap more havoc in this world than homosexuals do. Hell, you got nothin’ to be careful of. Teachers ain’t allowed to mess with kids under any circumstances. It’s got nothin’ to do with sexual preference, it’s got to do with age an’ position. Lionel Serbousek walks with as much integrity as any man I know. What he does in the privacy of his own home is totally apart from his professional life. You have to know that, Brewster. If you’ve got a brain in your head, you have to know that. Hell, you bitch about your daddy—all set in his ways—an’ here you are, doin’ the very thing you bitch about most. Maybe I oughta take you in the office an’ let you compare notes with Elvis.”

  He was right, Lar. Completely right. But I still couldn’t just let it go. I could lie and say I would, but I knew I’d have to face Mr. S and he’d know if something was still wrong. Finally I said, “I think it has something to do with the picture in my head. I don’t know.”

  Mr. Nak smiled then, and I was really glad, because I didn’t think I’d ever see him smile at me again. He shook his head like I was some kind of pitiful puppy somebody left out in the rain, and he said, “Brewster, do you sit around thinkin’ about what it looked like when your momma and daddy conceived you? You know, like right when they were doin’ it?”

  Well, shit, Lar, what kid in his right mind would do that? I said, “Hey, I’m not some kind of pervert.”

  “That’s not what I asked. I asked if you picture your momma and daddy doin’ the nasty thing.”

  I said of course not.

  “Why not?”

  “They’re my mom and dad, for chrissake.”

  He said, “Well, you seem to pass judgment on somebody’s sexuality by what it looks like inside your head. I thought you might have included them on that, too. What about your grandparents?”

  “Nope,” I said. “I don’t picture my grandparents making love.”

  “So how come your family gets to operate on a different standard than Mr. Serbousek?”

  I said, “Okay, I get it. Actually, it helps. It helps a lot.”

  He said, “What is it you get?”

  “You’re saying, don’t think about it if it bothers me.”

  “Thank you, young feller. You just bought yourself another day in Anger Management. Woulda been cheap at twice the price,” and he turned toward his office.

  I probably don’t need to tell you I was so goddamn relieved I couldn’t believe it. Losing Mr. S was one of the worst things that ever happened to me, and I didn’t even know it because I was stuck in my own stupid head.

  And when I go back, I’m not just going to walk into the pool like nothing happened. I’m going to tell him what I did and what I was thinking. He told me some important things about fathers and sons that night, and I trashed them when he told me the truth about himself. Mr. Nak is right: shame on me. But I’m going back to him like a Stotan. He’d be proud of me for that. Gotta go, Lar. I’m going to have to cook this crow for a long time so it’ll slide down a little easier.

  Ever so humbly yours,

  The Ex Gay Basher

  CHAPTER 11

  “Mom, would you tell me something?” Bo sits on the counter next to the kitchen sink, eating watermelon balls from the fruit salad nearly as fast as Ellen Brewster can scoop them out of the heart of the melon.

  “Yes, dear, I will tell you something: If you eat one more of those melon balls before dinner I will weld your Ironman’s hands together.”

  Bo plunks the melon ball destined for his mouth back into the bowl. “Jeez,” he says, “what ever happened to “Wait till your dad gets home’?”

  “It’d be a long wait,” she says. “What do you want me to tell you, honey?”

  “Why didn’t you and Dad make it?”

  Ellen’s eyes narrow as she wipes her hands slowly on her apron. “Are you and your girlfriend having trouble?”

  Bo shakes his head. “No, no trouble. It’s just…I just wondered….”

  “If it will last?”

  Bo smiles. “Yeah, I guess so.”

  “You’re pretty excited about her, aren’t you?”

  Blood flows into his cheeks. “Jeez, Mom. I’ll ask the questions, okay?”

  “Okay. You want to know why your father and I didn’t make it.” She slowly scoops out more melon balls, moving the salad bowl out of Bo’s reach and thinking. “We didn’t make it because I was weak.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean when I first met your father in high school, I was so much in love I’d have done anything to keep him. I simply adored him, and that didn’t change. He was handsome and athletic and all the girls in my class envied me. When I think back, I wonder if I didn’t stay with him through his moods just so one of those other girls wouldn’t get him.”

  “He had those moods back then?”

  “He certainly did, but I ignored them or, worse, I attributed them to his masculinity; I was actually attracted to them.”

  “God, Mom, isn’t that sick?”

  “Probably. But if so, I’m afraid it’s epidemic.” Ellen begins to set di
shes on the table. “Look, Bo, it’s really easy to turn up your nose at men like your father, men who think that being in control means controlling everyone else, but most of them come by it honestly. Your dad couldn’t have occupied that spot in our family if I hadn’t allowed it, if I hadn’t occupied mine.”

  “You sound like it’s your fault that Dad was an—”

  Ellen raises a carrot peeler. “Hold out your tongue and let me whittle it to a point. I’m not saying that at all. I’m saying I have responsibility for what I allow in my life and the lives of my children. Sometimes people behave the way they do just because they can. If I hadn’t allowed your father’s behavior in my life from the beginning, he would have changed it, or we’d have parted ways earlier.”

  Bo leans back. “Do you ever wish that?”

  “Every day of my life.” She sets a handful of silverware on the edge of the table and sits. “Bo, do you remember those months, back in grade school, when your father banished you to your room?”

  Bo snorts. “Do you remember where you were when President Kennedy was shot?”

  “That’s what I thought. Why is it you and I have never talked about that? Why haven’t you ever brought it up?”

  “You slapped my face, remember?”

  Tears rim Ellen’s eyes and a slight, involuntary moan escapes her. “Yes. I remember.” She moves the short distance to where Bo is seated, sliding her arms around his neck. “Oh, Bo, we…” but she chokes.

  “Aw, come on, Mom. It’s all right. I forgot about it till you brought it up. I don’t need to talk about it. It’s over, a long time ago. Come on, Mom.”

  She shakes her head. “I need to talk about it, even if you don’t. Bo, that incident, along with some others like it, is the shame of my life. I can forgive myself for almost everything, but those times when I just stood by and let him take you apart just bring me to my knees.”

  “Mom, I survived, okay? It wasn’t your fault.”

  “What did you think of me, Bo?”

  “I didn’t think anything. I just thought Dad was an asshole and I wasn’t going to let him win.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “Well, it’s true,” Bo says. “I never thought you were responsible for what Dad did to me.”

  “I wasn’t responsible for what he did to you. I was responsible for what I didn’t do. Look, honey, if you’re not mad at me for that, then it’s real possible you have a dangerously distorted view of any woman’s capabilities. If that’s true, you’d best re-examine it, or you’ll run into problems with your girlfriend—or any girlfriend, for that matter. Problems that you can’t imagine.”

  “What does this have to do with Shelly?”

  “It doesn’t have anything to do with Shelly. It has to do with you and how you react to the world. I’m your mother. You had better deal with your anger at me.”

  Bo’s mind flashes to himself as a little boy, sitting on the edge of his bed, hating her guts for slapping his face and for defending his father, and a cold whirlwind runs up his spine.

  Ellen catches his look. She says, “That’s what I’m talking about.”

  “Jesus, I did…I mean, I was mad. Really mad. I felt like you left me. I remember thinking you of all people should know…”

  Ellen lowers her eyes.

  “But it’s okay, Mom. I mean, I forgave you a long time ago. It wasn’t your fault. There was nothing you could—”

  “Stop it,” she says softly. “Don’t ever say there’s nothing I could have done. That diminishes me.” She looks up and smiles through the tears. “And don’t worry about me crying. It’s okay for me to cry about this. It’s something to be cried about. You may have forgiven me, Bo, but you can’t erase the experience, and neither can I.”

  FEBRUARY 14

  Dear Larry,

  It’s Valentine’s Day, Lar, and I think ol’ Cupid got slapped around a little at my house today. I had a little blip in the back of my mind that said I should check out with Mom why her and Dad’s marriage got derailed. I ended up getting a five-credit graduate course in marital and family dysfunction.

  The scary part was that after she finished beating herself to death for not standing up to my father during his Neo-Pleistocene Hitler period, she described all the feelings that got her hooked up with him, and they were exactly the same feelings I have for Shelly. Aaagghh! (Don’t get me wrong. Shelly is nothing like my dad, but I have the same blind, deaf, and dumb, brain-numbing feelings my mother had for my dad. I see her pumping iron or in her aerobics class, so powerful, yet so soft, and I’d do anything for her. Anything, Lar, do you hear me?) Mom told me that if I didn’t do anything else before I get out of high school, I’d better discover the difference between falling in love and loving somebody. It wasn’t my dad who was a lie; her feelings were the lie, and what she did because of them. And I have them, too. I thought I’d save myself some research and just ask her how she figured it out, but she said, “If I had figured it out, Bo, would I be spending my life alone?”

  Shit, Lar. Think I should talk to Shelly about this?

  Outta here for a long run,

  Tinman

  “I guess I’ve been pretty much of an asshole,” Bo says as Lion drops a stack of Journalism assignments into his backpack.

  “We’ve missed you at the morning workouts,” Lion says back.

  Bo runs his thumbnail along the edge of Lion’s desk. “I couldn’t face you.”

  “Couldn’t stand to think of me as a queer, huh?”

  “It’s not that,” Bo says, “it’s just that…Yeah, it is that. Or was.”

  “So what changed your mind?”

  “Talking with Mr. Nak, mostly. He made it pretty clear whose problem this is.”

  Lion says, “Nak’s good that way.”

  Bo nods. “So do you think I could start working out with you guys again? In the mornings, I mean?”

  “Far as I’m concerned, you never stopped. Wrote it off as a midtraining breather.”

  Bo takes a deep breath and the words fall out in a gravity dump. “Coach, I’m sorry, I really am. I mean really sorry. I don’t know what…if I ever…I should have known…. I mean we can still have pizza and everything. I just…”

  Lion raises his hand in protest and says, “Stop. Tell you what, buddy. If you learned anything about prejudice—about bigotry—and you pass it on, it was worth a few weeks of losing you, okay? I won’t lie; those weeks weren’t easy. It really hurts”—and he pounds his chest with a flat hand—“it crushes, to have someone as special as you turn away from me because of something that’s just a part of me. But if you learned a truth from it, and if you’re stronger or smarter—well, that’s what I got into the teaching business for, and I got my money’s worth.” He slaps Bo on the shoulder. “So we don’t need to talk about it anymore. We’re even up, and you’ve got big-time Stotan work to do.”

  VALENTINE’S AFTERNOON

  Whooee Larry,

  I feel good! The world’s tilted right on its axis again. I’m cool with Mr. S and I’m cool with Mr. Nak, and I’m the hottest number since Johnny Depp as far as Shelly’s concerned.

  I need to tell you something about working out, Lar, about being a triathlete. Lately I’ve been thinking maybe God was behind my self-imposed banishment from team sports, rather than Redmond, because this kind of training feels almost spiritual. There were times in the fall as I hammered over the rolling hills outside town on my bike, pushing my body past the wind chill, and the agony of being fileted on that razor blade of a seat, and the searing burn in my thighs and calves, and the unrelenting ache across the back of my shoulders, to a place where pain simply didn’t matter and I could feel the mechanics of my body: feel muscle move bone and air swirl through my lungs into my bloodstream. It sounds hokey, but it’s true. I feel the same way swimming. When I flip into the third turn on the fifteenth of a set of twenty one-hundreds, neck and neck with Wyrack, and my lungs want to burst and my triceps and deltoids threaten to
melt and I know it’s never going to end, somehow I call up this power, and it feels like hate, and it feels like love, and I simply pull ahead.

  It’s a dance, Lar. The rhythm of my feet pounding the pavement or the hard snow, the steely repetitions forcing the weights to the beat of Seger or Springsteen, the hum of the tires as I hammer out another mile, the slapping of my hands on the water in perfect drum cadence—it’s a dance. And I want to tell people, but only a few can hear because if you haven’t taken your body or your brain or your spirit down that road, you are deaf to it. So I’m telling you, Lar, because even though it’s hard to picture you in serious workout gear, you listen to everything.

  Shelly can hear it; that’s one reason I love her. When she’s lifting or running or dancing, there’s nothing and no one else in the world—it all belongs to her. Seeing the way she loves her body makes me have to love it, too. I feel bad for people who can’t find that rhythm; for guys like Elvis, who’ll never be jocks because they have the same picture of athletics as Redmond has, only Redmond loves them and Elvis hates them; for guys like Hudge, who are unaware they even have a body.

  Speaking of Hudge, there’s true tragedy there, Lar. Rumors flew all over school today about him. I’ll tell you about it when I’m not drop-dead tired. I gotta catch a nap, then put in an hour or so cleaning up down at the newspaper before the Anger Management Valentine’s Day party. (Can you believe that?) We were supposed to have it this morning, but Don the janitor came in to tell us Mr. Nak was taking care of an emergency and that we’d have to come back this evening. Turned out the emergency was out at Hudge’s place. Tell you more when I know more. Hey, I’m a drooling-all-over-the-page goner.

  ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ,

  BO

  Don the janitor bangs down the panic bar with his broomstick and kicks the side entrance to the school open, allowing Bo and Shelly in from the bitter cold. Don bends at the waist in an exaggerated bow and says, “Happy Valentine’s Day, you angry young lovers.” The angry young lovers carry brightly decorated boxes filled with valentine cards for each of the other members of the group, to be distributed among similar boxes once the party begins. Neither has participated in this ritual since sixth grade, but Nak’s “Mandatory Love Fest” is exactly that, and even though the group meeting was canceled this morning due to an emergency, everyone is present for the new meeting time.