Simple Simon

by William Poe

  “Maybe we can find out what happened from the court records.” I tried to take Virginia into my arms, but she resisted.

  “By the time I was eleven, Harvey was drinking so much he couldn’t keep a job, even for a week. He would just sit and stare at me.” Virginia’s breathing quickened. She kept talking, but turned away from me. “Then it happened. I was thirteen. Dad came home drunk. He ran through the house calling for my mother—not Jane, but my real mother. He found me crouching beside the bed and mistook me for her. He always said I looked like my real mother.”

  Virginia carefully considered her next words. “Dad dragged me onto the bed. I couldn’t stop him.”

  “Did you tell anyone?” I asked sympathetically.

  “I didn’t dare,” Virginia cried.

  Virginia rested her head in my lap as she had done the first time we visited the blue hole. The amphibians and night insects made sounds as complex as a Bach fugue. I pulled Virginia’s hair back from her face. She had unbuttoned her blouse and now took my hand and placed it on her breast.

  When I pulled away, Virginia quickly covered herself. She stood up and ran to the car.

  “I’m sorry, Virginia,” I said when I caught up to her. “I don’t know why I reacted that way.”

  “I do,” Virginia said as she opened the passenger-side door and got into the car.

  I couldn’t find the courage to explain. I didn’t want to admit the truth.

  “You don’t want to be with someone like me,” Virginia said as I got into the driver’s seat. “I wish I’d never told you.”

  How could I let her know that the quarry reminded me of Ernie? I never should have brought her there in the first place, not to a spot so filled with troubling memories. Even after the horror of what Virginia had just told me, I could still see Ernie and me playing in our Tarzan flaps, camouflaging each other’s bodies with red clay and white bauxite chalk.

  How miserably wrong I’d been to think I could date a girl.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  Joshua, my fellow inmate in rehab, made me his special project. When I went outside, he followed me to the bench at the edge of the yard where Harris and I frequently held our counseling sessions.

  “Mind if I sit down?” Joshua asked.

  “Not if what people say doesn’t bother you.”

  Joshua glanced toward a group of men playing basketball on a court near the parking lot. “You mean, they might think I was gay, too?”

  I wanted to say, You are, kid, you just won’t admit it.

  Joshua’s blond hair fell across his face as he whipped his head in a gesture that would have seemed girlish on a less muscular young man. He sat beside me—a little too close, I thought.

  “Sure you’re not worried what they might say?” I asked.

  “Ain’t no one’s business who I talk to.” Joshua’s voice betrayed his anxiety. “Why do you write so much? Every time I see you, your head’s bent over that desk upstairs.”

  “It helps me think.”

  “Can I read it?”

  “Maybe later,” I said, but I couldn’t imagine allowing Joshua to read my personal thoughts.

  “Sometimes, you can’t help but wonder,” I said, “what if?”

  Joshua turned toward me with a quizzical look and asked, “What if, what?”

  CHAPTER 10

  Information shot around the Burger Chef that a new teacher from Little Rock was taking over the art department senior year. It was odd to hear the jocks talking about it. Why should they care anything about the art department one way or another? At the assembly on the day school started, I understood what the snickering had been about. The new teacher, Darsey Faber, was unmistakably homosexual. The man wore clear fingernail polish, penciled his eyebrows, and kept his immaculately groomed hair plastered with so much hair spray it reflected the gymnasium lighting. He seemed to go out of his way to fit the stereotypes about how a homosexual should appear.

  The jocks had been concerned about the fact that they would have him for a class. The school required each student to take band, choir, or art. Most of the jocks chose art as the least embarrassing, and hopefully easiest, of the three choices. I took every art class offered, so I knew I would be getting to know Darsey. I went into class the first day with an uneasy sense of anticipation.

  Darsey handled himself well. He may have worn showy outfits, coiffing his hair and applying a hint of makeup, but he ran a strict class. The jocks feared reports for misbehavior, possibly jeopardizing their sports careers. They knew from the look in Darsey’s eyes that a single snicker would land them in detention.

  I was the only student who aspired to a career as an artist, but Darsey treated me no differently because of it. Weeks went by without him saying much to me directly. Then, one afternoon, he unexpectedly asked if I could stop by his apartment after school. He needed someone to help him put a heavy mirror on his wall. I agreed, and after first going home to take care of the horses and our other animals, I went to the apartment complex, parking well down the street and approaching his door with trepidation. The man who greeted me was a transformed Darsey.

  “Simon, girl!” Darsey squealed. “Come in! And, well, honey, you have to have some of the delicious lemonade I just made. Oh, well, dear, not that I’m any kind of a molester or anything, but you are—how old are you? Oh, it doesn’t matter. It’s not like I’m luring a neighborhood boy into the apartment with lemonade!” Darsey paused, suspending his hands in midair and fixing his gaze on me.

  “Did you say girl?” I asked.

  “No, sweetie, lemonade. I’ll never have a girl in this apartment. You can count on that. But then, maybe we could find one to serve the lemonade!”

  “You are terrible,” I said, falling into the banter as if I had practiced campy speech my entire life.

  Darsey didn’t, in fact, have a mirror to hang, but there were boxes he had yet to unpack. I helped him arrange knickknacks and set fine china in a cabinet before we took a break and ordered pizza.

  I was impressed with how Darsey had managed to carve out an identity for himself. He was an “eccentric” in a grand Southern tradition. I compared it to how Aunt Opal had fostered an air of eccentricity in order to deflect Sibley’s archconservatism.

  Darsey got me talking about myself, and it wasn’t long before I had told him about Ernie. I explained that we began “fooling around” at an early age. I’d never spoken to anyone about that aspect of my life. It felt good to confide in someone.

  “Wait,” Darsey said, stopping me mid-sentence. “If this young man is your age, where is he? I haven’t seen any boys as cute as this little Ernie of yours.”

  “He started sniffing glue and dropped out of school. I haven’t seen him in a long time.”

  “Now, honey, you must know where he is.”

  “Really, Darsey, I don’t know. He barely passed tenth grade and then disappeared last year before final exams. He’s not at home with his drunken mother, I know that.”

  “Hmm,” Darsey pondered. “Well, I don’t know much about glue sniffing, but it doesn’t sound good.”

  “It’s not.”

  “You’re much too young to be pining over Ernie,” Darsey advised. “We need to set you up.”

  The suggestion made me nervous. There was no telling what he had in mind.

  One afternoon, I was at Darsey’s apartment helping to evaluate proposals for an Art Club homecoming float.

  “Darsey, I don’t think I’m completely gay,” I said. “Over the summer, I dated a girl. I saw her walking arm in arm with another boy yesterday, and it made me jealous.”

  When I had spotted Virginia with her new boyfriend, I imagined Jane fixing them daiquiris. I wondered if Virginia told her dark secret to him as she had with me.

  “Oh, darling,” Darsey said with a dismissive wave of his hand. “You’re queer! Just accept it.”

  “That word is loathsome,” I shot back. “I hate being called a queer.”

  “So sensitive,�
� Darsey smirked.

  “The jock bastards taking art class called me a sissy queer when I was a young boy. I hated it then, and I still do!”

  “They’re all queers!” Darsey said.

  “Who?”

  “Why, those beefy jocks, dear. Why do you think so many took art this year?” He paused, waiting for me to say something. “In the closet, honey! In. The. Closet. They see me out here in the open, and they want to be me.”

  I nearly choked. “You’re insane! They enrolled in art class because they can’t sing or play an instrument.”

  “You’ll see. One of these days, you’ll see.” A wry smile curled Darsey’s lips.

  As a Christmas present, Darsey decided to throw me a coming-out party. “The family simply must get to know you,” he insisted. “I’ll give you the best debutante ball anyone has seen in a generation.”

  I had learned from Darsey that gay men referred to each other as family. Some of Darsey’s friends had dropped by his apartment while I was there. I didn’t much care for any of them and didn’t want to see them at a party. I hoped Darsey would change his mind, but there was no talking him out of it.

  Most gay men in Arkansas lived double lives during the era of the early 1970s. Many were married, more of them divorced. Quite a few had children. The most usual way to socialize was to throw parties. Other than that, men rendezvoused after hours at the Drummers Club in the Manning Hotel, which was located in downtown Little Rock on the river before its demolition to make way for a convention center and hotel complex. Darsey’s friends covered the spectrum of possibilities, from straight-acting married men with children to men so flamboyant it was a wonder they found jobs in the straight world. Only one was a habitual cross-dresser. Several others occasionally camped it up, going to parties in drag.

  For my debutante ball, Darsey hired a caterer, purchased party favors, and draped his apartment in pink crepe paper. Black helium balloons floated against the ceiling. Deft at papier-mâché, Darsey molded a Santa Claus, complete with customary red suit and white fur trim. He augmented Santa’s outfit with a black leather vest. Instead of holding reins to guide his sleigh, this Santa wielded a bullwhip. Darsey had crossed out the word Satan on a plaque below the figure as if there had been a spelling error and replaced it with Santa.

  By eight o’clock, only two people had arrived. Darsey paced nervously, convinced that he must have forgotten to mail the invitations.

  “They went out,” I said, reminding him that I personally deposited the invitations in the mailbox at the apartment office. “You shouldn’t have told people to arrive ‘precisely at eight,’” I cajoled. “People will show up, don’t worry.”

  I hoped I was wrong. The night had not yet begun, and I already wanted it to be over. Soon enough, a cadre of Darsey’s friends arrived at the door and entered the room like a gaggle of clucking hens. One of the men stumbled, dead drunk, almost crashing into the table of hors d’oeuvres. The others weren’t in much better shape.

  Noticing my concern, Darsey sashayed over and touched my arm. “They’re just being festive, dear.”

  Being festive was Darsey’s explanation for all bad behavior.

  Each arriving guest seemed to be more intoxicated than the last. Darsey busied himself securing his collection of porcelain figurines against the festive crowd. He stashed his heirloom silverware in the bedroom closet after realizing that some of the guests had brought young men they had met in Boyle Park, notorious as a place where older men picked up teenagers in the evenings. Darsey had explained it to me. I only knew Boyle Park during the day when it was a place for family cookouts and Boy Scout meetings.

  Tired of fending off roaming hands, I retreated to the Duncan Phyfe chair that Darsey had designated as my throne. The chair, centrally positioned on a Persian rug, rested between arrangements of eucalyptus limbs, baby’s breath, and budding hydrangeas. I was beginning to wish I had stood firm against allowing the party and was about to insist on leaving when I heard a squeal of delight as Darsey greeted some late-arriving guests.

  Darsey stepped outside into the cold and partially closed the door behind him. When he came back inside, a distinguished older man accompanied him. Seconds later, a young man entered who was so handsome he instantly riveted everyone’s attention, including mine.

  “Let me introduce you to Tony Bishop,” Darsey said, walking arm in arm with the brown-eyed Ganymede.

  “Hello, Simon,” Tony said, speaking in a deep baritone that belied his boyish appearance. “Welcome to the family.”

  My heart lodged somewhere between my larynx and the pit of my stomach. I took Tony’s hand, surely blushing as pink as the crimped decorations surrounding me. After our initial introduction, Darsey whisked Tony away to mingle with the other guests. I marveled at what a master Tony was at dodging the advances, moving like a ballet dancer as he avoided arms that tried to wrap around his waist and swatting away hands that groped toward his pants. When Tony landed in a safe spot between the man who had entered the apartment with him and someone else whom he seemed to know, Darsey came over to talk to me.

  “Dear soul!” he exclaimed. “You’re as red as that Santa’s coat. Go on now and splash some water on your face.”

  I had become lost in smitten fantasies about Tony, imagining how it would be to place my hands on either side of his face and kiss his sweet ruby lips.

  “Faint?” I said, responding to something Darsey had said. “No, I’m not going to faint.”

  Darsey escorted me to the hall bathroom, insisting that I follow his advice and freshen up. I returned to find Tony sitting in my seat of honor.

  “Oh, I’m sorry, were you still sitting here?” Tony smiled. “There’s room for us both.”

  I balanced myself on the arm of the chair.

  Darsey yelped from across the room. “Look, everyone! There they are, the queens of the ball!”

  Tony, accustomed to such fawning, offered a facetious bow. “Please, everyone, continue drinking,” he said, raising a glass of wine.

  After taking a sip, Tony handed me the glass. I whispered in his ear, chuckling as I fell into cliché. “Where have you been all my life?”

  “I was going to ask you the same thing,” Tony said with a generous smile. “Darsey’s been hiding you for himself, hasn’t he?”

  Satan-Santa stood nearby. I noticed for the first time that its features resembled Darsey’s.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said, nodding my head toward the door.

  We found our coats buried under a pile on Darsey’s bed and squeezed through the crowd. When we reached the door, Darsey called out, “Not my boys! Don’t go. You’re the maids of honor!”

  “I’m not your boy,” I said on the way out.

  Hands covered gaping mouths as the guests feigned shock and horror. Darsey shot me a drop-dead look.

  “Did you see Darsey’s face?” Tony chuckled when we were outside. “No one speaks to Her Highness that way.”

  “Guess I do,” I said uneasily.

  Our breath swirled in the crisp air as Tony held me at arm’s length and looked me over. “I think I’m going to like you,” he said.

  We sat inside Tony’s Volkswagen Beetle, urging the motor to warm up so we could turn on the heat. While we waited, I raced through an outline of my life story. Tony turned his palm to the stream of air coming from the vent. I reached out and clasped his hand in mine.

  “I was beginning to think I was the only one my age,” I said.

  “Only one, what?” Tony asked.

  “You know—a boy who likes boys.”

  “You are so wonderfully innocent,” Tony said, leaning toward me. I closed my eyes and felt his warm breath on my cheeks before our lips met.

  With the Volkswagen sufficiently warm, Tony drove us into Little Rock and took me to Boyle Park. I wondered why he considered that a romantic spot.

  After we parked, Tony explained that the boys we could see hanging around the pavilions were hustling. As we watche
d, a Cadillac slowed to a stop. One of the boys got in the car after speaking with the man who was driving.

  “You haven’t done that, have you?” I asked.

  Tony raised his eyebrows. “Well, listen to you! Are you going Mr. Morality on me?”

  “No,” I said sheepishly. “It’s just…Well, isn’t it dangerous?”

  In addition to what Darsey had told me, especially about Boyle Park, I knew something about hustling from having read John Rechy’s City of Night, which I had stumbled upon while visiting the public library in Little Rock. The book made male prostitution seem alluring and, at the same time, appalling. I was going to ask Tony what it was like—if he had done it.

  Tony realized I was in a quandary. He took me in his arms and pressed his face against mine. We kissed for what seemed like hours—glorious hours.

  “Mother’s expecting me back,” Tony said, pulling away at the sound of an approaching car. “It’s late and the police will start patrolling soon.” He put the car in gear, and we headed back to Darsey’s. Before I got out, Tony wrote his phone number on a slip of paper and put it in my hand. “Call me tomorrow?”

  “I’ll call you tonight,” I said.

  “Tomorrow’s better. I don’t have a phone in my room.”

  “In the morning, then?”

  “Before nine o’clock. That’s when I leave for church.”

  Tony kissed me on the lips. “Simon, I mean it, where have you been?”

  “Waiting for you,” I whispered.

  The next morning, I telephoned as early as I dared.

  “You called!” Tony practically shouted.

  “Of course I did. I thought about you all night.”

  “I can’t stop thinking about you, either.” Tony paused for a moment. “This usually doesn’t happen.”

  The word usually leaped out at me, but I didn’t want to pursue my question. How many boyfriends had there been? I remembered the distinguished man he had arrived with at Darsey’s party and wondered if it was someone Tony had met at Boyle Park.