by M. E. Kerr
“My favorite,” she said. “Do you know the words?”
“I just said I didn’t.”
“Don’t! Please! Don’t get that tone, Lang!”
“I’m sorry.”
“You seem to be always right on the edge with me.”
“I’m not on the edge!”
“You should hear yourself. What is it with you?”
“It isn’t anything…. How does ‘Heart in My Mouth’ go?”
I thought she’d probably recite the words, but she just sat up straight and began singing.
I’d never heard her voice, never knew anyone that good who didn’t want to be a singer.
“You in my eyes bring my heart
To my mouth, bring the words
To my lips, feel my blood start
To race, singing of birds,
With the lifting of wings,
Heart in my mouth, spilling out things.”
I clapped.
“You have to like Nevada,” she said. “Someone who can write a song like that.”
“How about someone who can sing a song like that?”
“Thanks, Lang.”
I noticed some people on nearby blankets watching us. They were smiling. One boy put his hand up with the thumb and first finger making a circle.
“I guess they think I was singing you a love song,” Brittany said. “I would if you could get me in to see Cog Wheeler. Aren’t they playing at Sob Story in July?”
“I work in the kitchen, Brittany.”
I was thinking, What if it had been Alex singing to me? And I was remembering the night at Adieu, Adieu.
Coming toward us on the beach, arms wrapped around each other, Nick and Allie stopped to kiss.
“Do you miss me at all, Lang?” Brittany asked me.
“It’s just easier without you.”
“What is?” She sounded really angry.
“My peace of mind. My goddamn life!” I snapped.
Allie had come back to the blanket with Nick.
“Oh, I hate couples who argue, don’t you, Nick?”
“I hate it!” Nick said. “It’s such a bore!”
That night at Sob Story I had a sunburn and a new duty. All the wine they sold arrived in the kind of waxed-cardboard containers milk comes in. I had to funnel it into empty bottles with fancy French labels and lug them out to the bar. That was what customers got when they ordered Merlot or Chablis for seven dollars a glass.
SIX
I’D FIRST MET ALEX on a cold January day in Barnes & Noble, at 22nd and Sixth Avenue. I’d never been in that bookstore before, but Alex spent many hours a week there. It wasn’t like any bookstore I’d ever seen. There were easy chairs all over, desks you could work at, even an upstairs espresso bar.
I’d gone there to listen to a new George Michael CD. Alex usually sat in the music section. We struck up a conversation, and he handed me a headset and told me to listen. It was an Elvis Costello song—“Almost Blue”—sung in this strange, husky voice Alex said was an old jazz singer named Chet Baker.
After that we sat there talking and drinking espresso. When I got to know him, I got to know places in New York I’d never heard of. Even though Alex’s apartment on Avenue A was a dump, he made up for it by finding great places to hang out all over the city—Roosevelt Island, for one.
We headed there that Sunday I was in from East Hampton.
It is smack in the middle of the East River. We caught a tram on Second Avenue between East 59th and 60th. Then we took one of the old red buses out to Lighthouse Park.
We had a picnic there, thumbed through the Sunday Times, and played chess. I think chess was the only thing I ever taught Alex.
Before we headed back, we took a walk on the island’s west side, to get a view of the Manhattan skyline.
That was when we ran into Scott Lund.
He was walking ahead of us. I’d noticed him before Alex called his name. He had a white shirt on, buttoned at the wrists, with a polka-dot silk scarf under it. Something about him—everything about him, from his walk to his tight, tight pants—made me know he was gay. But he had his arm around a woman in a red dress, and he was bending down to kiss her, while she gave him this adoring look.
I was just about to whisper to Alex, “Get her!”—and I wouldn’t have meant the lady in red.
“Scotty!” Alex called out to him.
“Alex! Alex Southgate! Come say hello to Maggie!”
He waited for us to catch up.
Alex introduced me, and we stood there chatting for a while.
He was an actor too, a lot older than Alex, starring in a Pinter revival that summer.
“Of all places to run into each other!” Scott gave Alex a friendly slap on the arm. “I’ll tell Zack I saw you, Alex. Delighted to meet you, Lang!”
After we left them, Alex said, “That’s his beard. He never goes anyplace without her.”
“What’s a beard?”
“She’s his disguise. With her, he passes as straight.”
“Oh, sure. And I’m Dolly Parton.”
“He tries, poor old Scotty. She lives across the hall from Zack and him. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Scotty with Zack in public.”
“What’s in it for her?”
“Oh, she gets to be seen with a famous actor. I don’t know, Lang. She’s crazy about him.”
“A fag hag.” I’d heard there were females who glommed onto gay guys.
“I think Scotty adores her, too, in his way.”
“I think Scotty adores looking straight…only he can’t pull it off.”
“Some old fairies cope that way. The theater used to be filled with them. Some even marry.”
“In name only.”
“Some. Some not. Some have children.”
“But they’re not really bisexual. I think people who claim to be bisexual just can’t admit they’re queer. It’s easier to say you’re bi. That makes you halfway straight.”
“I know gays of both sexes who’ve had heterosexual affairs.”
“Actors. Acting.”
Alex said, “People. Loving. Everything isn’t as black and white as you make it. You’re gay and I’m gay, but look at someone like Madonna.”
“She’s omnisexual,” I said.
Alex laughed.
I watched Scotty mince along in the distance. I knew that walk. I’d seen comedians imitate it, for laughs.
I said, “Scotty’s the kind of fairy that ruins it for the rest of us.”
“No, Lang. Guys like Scotty got ruined. They didn’t do the ruining. People are the way they are because of the way things were in their day…. Look at your friend Nevada.”
“What about him?”
“The druggy seventies did him in. All those young rock stars were on some kind of dope.”
“Some of them still are.”
“And some of us still swish around. Don’t try to make everyone fit a mold. Wasn’t that the gist of one of Nevada’s songs?”
I shook my head. “Everybody knows his songs but me.”
Alex said, “It goes:
“If you make yourself me
Then I might set you free
Then I might let you be
Then you might let me see
That you’ve turned into me.
It’s called ‘Dad’s Advice.’”
“I remember. ‘If my lies you believe, Then I might let you breathe.’”
“His songs are filled with Daddy, when they’re not about Cali.”
“What else do you know about him?”
“Hey, I thought you didn’t like my star gossip. It’s too faggy, isn’t it? Isn’t that what you tell me?”
“This is different. I’m right there at his place.”
Alex said, “Don’t get blown away by the winds of Roundelay.” He laughed. “Sounds like a song.”
SEVEN
THAT NIGHT WHEN I got in, my mother handed me a sealed envelope.
Printed up in the s
pace for the return address, in gold letters, was:
B. L. N.
Roundelay
Ocean Road
East Hampton, New York 11937
My name was written across the front.
“Hurry up and open it!” my mother said.
B. L. N., again, in gold, at the top of thick cream-colored paper.
I read it aloud:
Lang,
Please come up to Roundelay tomorrow at noon.
I’ll give you lunch.
Use the back walk leading to
the terrace.
I’ll meet you out there.
Ben Nevada
“I wonder what he wants,” Mom said.
“We know what he doesn’t want. He doesn’t want me in the house.”
Mom shrugged. “Why should he? I’m not in Roundelay that much myself. You had a phone call, too. Brittany’s in Sag Harbor. She said she’d be up late tonight, to call her. The number’s written down on the pad by the phone.”
“She was just here a few days ago.”
“So? It’s a free country.” Then my mother asked, “Does Nick know about you, honey?”
“I never told him, or Brittany.”
“No need to broadcast it,” she said. “How do you handle it at Sob Story?”
“I don’t. That place isn’t about truth. When anyone orders a sizzling steak, right before it leaves the kitchen I toss a piece of lard between the cold serving tray and the hot aluminum plate under the dish with the steak. Then the waiter hoists it up to his shoulder and delivers it sizzling!”
My mother laughed. “But your boss observes the Sabbath, give him that. How many places out here close on Sunday in season?”
“Right!” I said. “Cheat the customer but keep the Sabbath.”
Then she said, “Who’re Cog Wheeler and The Failures? Today Liz Smith’s column said they were appearing at Sob Story July fifth.”
“They’re this rock group.”
I remembered Brittany mentioning it; I remembered her habit of reading all the gossip columnists. I figured she was still trying to get tickets.
EIGHT
“BRITTANY? COG WHEELER AND The Failures are sold out.”
“Oh, hi, Lang!”
I could tell by her voice she’d been asleep.
I said, “Mom said you’d be up late.”
“I’m up. What time is it?”
“Ten thirty. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“No, wait! This isn’t about Cog Wheeler. Did you ever make sand casts?”
“Sand castles?”
“Sand casts. You use plaster of Paris and salt water. And sand too, of course.” She laughed.
“I never have.”
“You know, I’m taking a summer course at Arts and Crafts. I have to make an ob-jay, ob-jet—”
“Objet d’art,” I said, to help her out. Brittany wanted to be an artist.
“That’s it! I have to make one with sand in it that I can bring to class next week…. So this isn’t a date or anything evil like that. I’d just like some input…and I don’t know anyone out here.”
“Where’s Allie?”
“She’s got a job. I’m alone all day and I have Mom’s car this week. There’s no real beach in Sag Harbor.”
Before I could say anything, she jumped in with “I promise not to sing.”
“If you sang, that would be a plus. I like the way you sing.”
“I feel awful about singing on the beach that way! I don’t know how I could have done that!”
“It was fine. Maybe if you’d sing everything you have to say, we’d get along.”
“It’s not me, Lang.”
“So if it’s me, why call me?”
“You want the truth?”
“Yes.”
“I hate to go to the beach alone.”
I had to laugh.
She said, “I feel conspicuous.”
“I see.”
“I could pick you up tomorrow.”
“Not tomorrow.”
“Tuesday? Same time? Same place?”
“Go a little past the driveway.”
Brittany always got her way. I didn’t know how to tell her no. Not that Brittany Ball ever took no for an answer, anyway.
NINE
WE ATE CHICKEN SALAD on the 100-foot terrace overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.
Besides Plato, there were the other two chows: Aristotle and Socrates.
Before he played other rock groups, we listened to The Failures for a while. Nevada remarked that he’d read an interview with Cog Wheeler in Rolling Stone, and he liked the sound of him.
It was a hot, gray, windy day with big waves pounding the beach.
Nevada seemed to like to dress all in black: same jeans I’d seen on him before, same thong sandals, a black silk shirt billowing out in the breeze.
He didn’t talk a lot, except to say what music he was playing sounded like what sixties music. The Orb sounded like Pink Floyd. Sonic Youth sounded like Velvet Underground. That sort of thing.
I didn’t know that much about sixties music. I didn’t have much to say.
Franklin came out with a pitcher of iced tea and refilled our glasses. He took away our empty dishes and put down a plate of chocolate chip cookies.
“These are from Barefoot Contessa,” Nevada said. “They’re hard. I don’t like them soft.”
“They’re good,” I said.
He smoked French cigarettes called Gitanes. He took one from a pack, lit it, and exhaled a stream of smoke.
“Have you got a girlfriend out here?” he asked me.
“No.”
“In New York City?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I said nothing.
“Do you play tennis?” he said.
“Yes, I do.”
“Good!”
“Why is that good?”
“All right,” he said, looking full at me for the first time, his dark-blue eyes fixed on mine. “I’ll tell you what this is all about.”
He took another long drag from his cigarette. The chows were asleep under the table.
He said, “Old friends of mine—both artists—have asked a favor of me. They live in France, in a little town called Aniane. It’s in the Languedoc region, a part they call Deep France. In other words, the sticks!”
He looked down at his cigarette a moment.
I looked out at the ocean, remembering the first weekend at Roundelay, when Alex and I walked along the beach. Besides chess, I’d never had anything to show him; he was always showing me things. Then I had East Hampton, a place that would be new to both of us. He loved the looks of it. I remember that first morning he just ran into the ocean and threw himself into these giant waves, then came out soaking wet with his hair down in his eyes, hugging me, no sunglasses. He’d lost them in the water.
Nevada continued. “They have this daughter. Huguette. That’s what they call her. They got this damn fool idea to bring her up over there! They’re Americans, but they didn’t want to raise the child here. Thought she’d be safer there, better educated, all that expatriate rot about Europeans being superior to us!”
He paused to sip his tea.
Toni Braxton began singing over the speakers. I wondered if he’d say who she sounded like.
But he went on. “This child, this girl, is about your age. Seventeen.” He looked across at me as if to confirm the fact.
I said, “I’ll be eighteen in July.”
“Huguette was brought up in this dinky little French town filled with grape growers and farmers. She went to school in the place. No more than fourteen hundred people, peasants, in the place. Most of them are hicks! Ordinary working people…Huguette’s a young, smart, healthy, very attractive girl, and what was she supposed to do in a little fly-speck town for amusement? She fell in love. She has fallen madly in love. Who do you suppose she fell in love with?”
I shrugged. “A grape grower?”
“A grape picker,” he said. “A local yokel who picks grapes. She is besotted with him!”
His shouting woke up Plato. The chow raised his head and peered up at me with worried eyes.
Nevada raved on. “Obsessed, besotted, head-over-heels in love! Surprise, surprise. What did they expect?” He didn’t want an answer. “So what this child needs now is some exposure to the real world, to peers! They want to get her out of there, away from him! They’re sending her here for the summer. She arrives tomorrow.”
He looked into my eyes once again and said, “That’s where you come in.”
I sat there waiting for the other shoe to drop, while Toni Braxton sang, and Nevada interjected, “This singer is very much like Roberta Flack.”
“I never heard of Roberta Flack,” I told him.
“You two would probably get along,” he said.
I knew he didn’t mean Roberta Flack and me.
“Now, here’s what I have in mind,” he said, finally getting to the point. “I’d like you to help me out. Take her to a movie now and then. Play some tennis with her. Show her around the Hamptons. Give her a taste of real life. Introduce her to some intelligent young people! Of course, I’ll reimburse you for any amount you spend.”
He looked at me and I looked at him.
“Well?” he said.
“It’s not a very good idea,” I said. “I don’t know anyone out here.”
“You were with a group the other day. I saw you.”
“They’re from New York, Mr. Nevada.”
“Then you and Huguette would be good company for each other. You’d like a tennis partner, wouldn’t you? Someone to spend time with? And it’s easier to meet people when you’re with someone.”
I could see myself getting into another situation where I’d have to lie and pretend I was someone I wasn’t, so I just sat there shaking my head.
“She wouldn’t be interested in you,” he said, “if that’s what’s bothering you, Lane.”
“Lang,” I said.
“She’s in love with this French field boy!”
“I have other commitments.”
“You mean your work at Sob Story?”
“Things I do on weekends.”
“Do them. You don’t have to give up your weekends.”