Some time later, I heard his stomach rumble. “Reality intrudes,” he said. “I’m hungry. Aren’t you?”
I was. We climbed out of bed and stretched. He offered a bear hug and shared his peppermint-flavored mouth with me again.
The air-conditioning felt chilly, and the general offered me a new bathrobe from his closet. “Got it for Christmas a few years back from my sister. But I won’t part with my old one.” His hung on a hook on the back of the bedroom door, and he shrugged into the ancient corduroy like an embrace from a close friend. Generous and long, deep brown with tan pockets and a tan collar and sash, it was well worn. The cuffs were frayed and the elbows had been patched neatly with some dark green fabric. The robe had been designed for someone as tall as himself but much broader.
“You could drown in that, sir,” I said.
“Not a chance,” he said. “My mother made it for me years ago. She always thought I’d fill out, so she made it large enough for me to grow into. Thirty years on, it’s still doing its job.” He found a pair of scuffed slippers under the bed, and we went downstairs to the kitchen.
“What can I fix you for breakfast? You like cereal?”
My shout of laughter mystified him. “Anything but cereal,” I said.
“Eggs and toast?”
I nodded.
He poured orange juice, and I watched as he whisked eggs in a skillet, adding milk and grated parmesan cheese. When it was almost finished cooking, he made toast, an exacting process that he explained to me in detail. He began with whole grain sliced bread, fresh from a local bakery. The finished product had to be well but evenly browned, spread with salted butter all the way to the edges of the crust, and then cut on the diagonal into two isosceles triangles. I nodded, solemn. Ordinarily, one should fix only a single slice at a time so it could be consumed hot, he explained, and furthermore—
He stopped in mid-discourse. “You think I’m an idiot,” he muttered. “Going on about toast.”
I would not think him an idiot. “Good toast is one of the finest pleasures in life,” I said. “You’ve figured out the secret.”
“You,” he said sternly, pointing the butter knife in my direction, “are a man after my own heart.”
I certainly was, and I was pleased he knew it.
We ate in silence. Nothing needed to be said. We washed the dishes in silence, too, though I felt sure he would speak up when I reached over and untied his bathrobe. But he did not, just nodded, and when we had put the last plate in the cupboard, we silently climbed upstairs again. So much unexplored territory remained to be discovered, and if he wanted to trailblaze, he’d found a willing partner in me.
Chapter Eleven
Our Saturday was unseasonably cool for July, overcast and gloomy, with last night’s rain continuing on and off. Decidedly an indoor day. I made several hesitant suggestions about departing, but the general would have none of it. “Do you have other plans?” he said. I did not, certainly none I would have traded in exchange for a day with him.
“Then stay. Unless you’re tired of the company.”
A rhetorical question, if ever one could be. “No, sir.” He was, after all, still a general, though such rank pulling as this amused me.
“Sometimes it’s good to spend the weekend with a like-minded companion.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Naked,” he said, his mustache aquiver.
I agreed wholeheartedly.
We found little to say, but the afternoon wasn’t uncomfortable, much to my surprise. Saturday passed into a wondrous night of thunder and rain outside and more pleasant storms in the bed we shared. Sunday morning dawned, still overcast and cool, and the general declared once again I would stay put. He left the bedroom and returned a few minutes later with the newspaper, coffee, and his pipe. Before we settled down, he sighed with some exasperation and left the room. He returned, clearly dissatisfied.
“What are you looking for?” I said.
“My glasses,” he said, glowering, daring me to say anything.
I grinned. I’d seen them and went to fetch them from the coffee table in the living room. As I handed them to him, he growled, fierce, “Well?”
If I had any comments, this would not be the time to make them. Little flaws such as the need for reading glasses make us human and endeared him to me even more. I told him so.
He stared at me.
“What now?” I said.
He cleared his throat. “Nothing.” He climbed into bed with me, and we didn’t stir from there until past noon. We even finished off the New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle, another hobby of his. On his bedside radio, the local classical station played tuneful baroque music, its brittle and luminous continuo a sparkling complement to our day.
Neither of us even mentioned the figurative rhinoceros in our military living room. What were we doing, a lieutenant and a general, and how would we ever extricate ourselves from the mire? Because we only sank deeper and deeper as the day passed.
*
After supper, he asked if I had ever listened to Puccini’s Tosca. I knew the work as well as the composer, as it happened to be one of my mother’s favorites. I’d heard the music often, though I’d never really sat down and listened to it carefully, I told him.
That simply would not do. In the living room, he pulled out a boxed set from his record library. He handed me the booklet. “Skip the history. You can look at it later if you want, but it won’t add anything to your appreciation of the music,” he said. “Read the synopsis so you’ve got an idea of what’s happening.”
I read the outline of its three acts, a tragic and utterly improbable love story—but what is opera without such stuff? The general put Side 1 on the Magnavox, settled down next to me, and wrapped a protective arm around my shoulder. We followed the libretto, English on one side of the page and Italian on the other, and I took pleasure in his interest, watching him as carefully as I followed the story.
Before long, he was so caught up in the score that I doubt he even remembered my presence. He listened with his eyes closed, his head bobbing with the music. Now and then he hummed along, his voice rumbling deep, and any time I tried to speak, he shushed me until I just gave up and surrendered to the sound. To my surprise, the music proved more familiar than I expected, and at last I had some context for it.
When it was all done—six sides and two and a half hours later—I could certainly see why anyone might be attracted to the sweep, the spectacle, the obvious emotion. I didn’t need to be fluent in Italian. I could translate the characters’ joy, anger, and pain through the music. But the highlight for me was sitting next to General O’Neill and sharing his pleasure. We could have been listening to radio static, and I would have been satisfied.
“Good Lord,” the general said when the needle lifted off the record at the end of the last side. “It’s already dark outside.”
My spirit sank as I realized our weekend was over. Monday was coming, and what would it bring?
“You want a snack or anything?”
“I’m not really very hungry, sir.”
“Hmm. Neither am I,” he said. We sat on the couch for a moment, looking at each other, and if I expected his grin to crack the tension, I was disappointed. “Back to work tomorrow,” he said.
Yes. Work tomorrow. And Tuesday, and the rest of the week and month and year. I pondered these things as we dressed in an awkward hurry. I had nothing else to put on but my rumpled suit from Friday’s event. The general offered me an apology, a promise for a new shirt, and a couple of safety pins for the old one. He climbed into blue jeans and a sweatshirt himself, and we went out through the back door into the garage and drove to the club in silence. The building was closed on Sunday nights, so we had the grounds to ourselves. He pulled his car next to mine in the parking lot and switched the engine off.
Cold drizzle continued to fall, as we sat in the dark for a few moments. I suspect he was as much at a loss for words as I. He could not see my
face in the dark, nor could I see his, but I heard his breathing, and I knew he had something to say. He cleared his throat. At last, half to himself, he muttered, “Damn it.” And then, “Stovepipe, I’m at a loss for words.”
“I understand, sir.”
He sighed and cleared his throat. “Stovepipe?” He cleared his throat again. “You have every right to throw the book at me. What happened is indefensible and unprofessional. What I’m trying to say…” He breathed in and out, heavy, and I reached for his hand. He took hold as if it were a life preserver for a drowning man.
“Oh, hell,” he said. “I don’t know what I’m trying to say. The professional officer in me is ashamed I took advantage of another professional officer who has always had reason to trust me. Embarrassed that this officer may have felt he was doing my bidding because he might have perceived it as some kind of order, or that he—er, you—didn’t have a choice. I would never use rank to reach such an end, and I hope he—you—didn’t think…” He paused again and took another deep breath. “I knew better. I knew better. I should never—”
“Oh, be quiet,” I said. “Please. You’re talking nonsense.”
“Am I?” He sighed and pulled his pipe and a crumpled tobacco pouch out of his jeans. In spite of the drizzle outside, he opened the window halfway to let out the smoke.
“This whole next week is going to be hell for me, and you, too, I reckon,” he said. “I have to trust you to continue doing your job as if this weekend never happened. It’s a big responsibility, one I have no right to place on your shoulders. I’ll have to do the same, but I’m older. More experienced. I’d carry it myself if I could. But you—”
I had to ask one question. “Sir? This weekend—do you want it to happen again?” I dreaded the answer, but if we were at an end, I needed to know before I got out of the car.
“Do you?” he said, after a pause.
“I asked first,” I said.
A longer pause, eternal, but this was at the end of it, and my heart leaped. “Yes,” he muttered. “Yes, damn it.”
“Thank you,” I said. “I was afraid for a minute you were telling me it was over.”
“You don’t know what you’re getting into,” he said.
“I can take care of myself, sir. Nobody puts his hands on me if I don’t want him to. And I can’t remember ever telling you ‘no.’”
“I didn’t give you a chance.”
“I was afraid that you wouldn’t, not that you would.”
“That’s kind,” he said.
“It’s not kind. It’s true.”
“I wish you’d quit making this so easy,” he said. “Even to suggest that we might have some kind of future is unfair, because I can’t promise anything.”
It dawned on me that if we were to continue, the attraction we shared would be the only uncomplicated part. We would have to be on guard every second. In no way could he change the relationship we had already firmly established at work. If anything, I’d probably feel as if he were coming down on me even harder, overcompensating like mad. Except for the nominal fact that two gay airmen could now share a public relationship, according to the Air Force, everything else about us was wrong, from fraternization to the impropriety of being personally involved with someone in your direct chain of command.
“I have no right to ask,” he said. “But I’m such a selfish son of a bitch and a goddamned old fool that I’m going to ask anyway. Because I may never get another chance. It’s easy for me to say it’s worth the risk. I have nothing to lose. I could retire tomorrow and be comfortable for the rest of my life, and they can’t take that away from me. But you’re just beginning your career, and you’re still young. Asking you to gamble your future against—”
“Are you asking?”
“I won’t bother you again if you tell me to keep the hell out of your private life.”
“Are you asking?”
“I could see to it that you’re transferred to another unit with the highest recommendation from me. Any job you want. Immediately. Retraining into another career field, if you like.”
“Are you asking?” I didn’t mean to yell. I didn’t mean to sound so angry, either, and he was taken aback for an instant. His temper reared like a horse seeing a snake, and he roared back.
“Yes!” At last, a glimmer of light charging through his doubt.
“Okay. Then let me give you an answer.”
He put a gentle hand over my mouth. “Not yet,” he said. “You’ve got a lot on your mind right now. I want you to think long and hard before you answer. Call me in a week,” he said. “If you say yes, well, I don’t rightly know what you can expect, but you will never find a man more grateful and more willing to show you how much.”
Curiously, he never said a word about love or its possibility. Perhaps he believed men simply didn’t speak of such things. I hardly expected him to offer his heart to me in a box, at least not yet. But, as articulate as he was, why couldn’t he find the words to explain that he was brimming over? Perhaps I was being too harsh. Though we’d known each other for more than six months, in some significant ways, we had just met, and we had some first impressions to verify.
“What happened Friday night scared the hell out of me,” he said. “But not so much that I stopped it on Saturday. Or today. Great God.” He paused and shook his head. “What have I done?” He looked at me, long and searching. “Thank you for the best weekend I’ve ever had,” he said.
Hope sprang. “You’re welcome,” I said.
His voice grew hoarse. “If you’re smart, you’ll say no, Harris.”
Maybe I wasn’t smart. In the shadows, he pressed his mouth softly against mine, and I pressed back. There was none of the all-consuming urgency of yesterday and last night and this morning. The intimacy of it unsettled me, but it felt exactly right, sitting there in his car with his arms around me in the dark. I reached my hand under his sweatshirt, and he murmured his approval with no trace of doubt. When we separated, reluctantly, I knew he was grinning in the dark. I could smell it.
“I can’t promise you every weekend. We both know that’s impossible,” he said. “I will make time to share with you as often as you want. And you’ll have my undivided attention. But it won’t be easy. You know that.” He stopped and sighed. “Listen to me. You haven’t even said yes.”
I opened my mouth to speak, but he stopped me again.
“Think it over,” he said. “And be damn sure of your answer, because I’m going to hold you to it.”
He rested his mustache against my cheek again. When he finally pulled himself away, he shook his head. “This can’t be happening.” Weary. “Good night, Longjohn, and I’ll see you in the morning.”
Tomorrow morning. Oh, yes. That.
I walked to my own car and climbed in, buckled my seat belt, adjusted the rearview mirror for the dark, fired up the engine, and switched on the lights. The general followed me out of the lot, turning right and heading inward, deeper into the confines and regulation of the base, while I turned left, toward the gate and the freedom that lay beyond the perimeter fence.
*
A week later, I called his number. Nothing in his answering machine message identified him by name, but I knew the voice. At the sound of the tone, I said, “Yes. Satisfied?” and hung up.
And sometime that weekend, he returned the call and left a simple “got your message” on my voice mail in response. And a second message saying “you won’t regret it” followed by a pause. “Wait. Maybe you will. Son of a bitch,” and laughing. And then a third, with a single word of thanks. And, improbably, a fourth, with his thanks repeated a dozen times.
Chapter Twelve
At the NAF headquarters, a month followed during which I wondered repeatedly if I had dreamed a general for a lover. Apart from the phone messages he’d left on my answering machine, he gave no sign, no hint, as my morale sank lower and lower. Work became hell, with the general ranting daily for my perceived or petulantly real in
fractions. The staff was shocked at his venom, but at least I had a good idea why he raged so.
Julia and I continued our movie-and-dinner tradition. Even though she knew something was wrong, she graciously accepted my “I don’t want to talk about it” and didn’t press for details. The general’s occasional distracted compliments when I’d exceeded expectations weren’t much consolation, and my own anger matched his, even if I couldn’t express it. I planned all sorts of traps and tricks to catch him and followed through on none of them.
At a business council breakfast in mid-August, he glared at me over his rubbery omelet and unacceptable toast, clearly upset about some mistake or perceived inadequacy. I had no idea what I’d done wrong, but I was just as willing to antagonize him in return. I selected the largest banana from a bowl of fruit on the table, and as he watched, I peeled it and ate the whole thing in two bites. He could have spat bullets in my direction.
It was an immature prank, and I hoped no one else was watching. I expected him to be furious. I thought it would at least scratch open an old wound if it didn’t rekindle an old fire. I prepared myself for his fury, but to my astonishment, he said nothing about it during the drive back to the base afterward.
*
At the end of the week, as the Friday doldrums sauntered in after lunch, I had little to do and was idly shuffling papers and procrastinating. The outer offices were empty except for me. Everyone else was gone on some pretext or other. I hadn’t done anything more useful all day than track down the general’s misplaced glasses twice.
When he summoned me mid-afternoon, I stood by his desk, expectant, as he sorted through some mail, waiting for him to notice me. He’d lit his pipe, which he rarely did in the office unless something was troubling him. He finally indicated for me to take a seat.
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