by Roan Parrish
After a year and a half or so of dinners and fucking that I thought of as dating, though I guess I never used the word to Richard, I stopped by Richard’s apartment on my way to work because I’d left a book there the night before. I stepped out of the elevator—Richard lived in one of those posh buildings in Center City with a doorman and everything—and jogged down the hallway. I don’t remember why I didn’t call first. As I turned the corner to knock on Richard’s door, I saw him standing in front of it. At first, I thought I was catching him just getting home and had a moment of being thankful for my good timing. Then I saw the arms wrapped around his neck.
Richard was making out with another guy right in his doorway. I must’ve made a sound—coughed, or gasped, or said his name—because Richard turned around. What I remember most about the moment his eyes met mine is that there wasn’t any surprise in them. Not even a microsecond of shock, or guilt, or shame. His hair was mussed and the collar of his shirt askew, and he just smiled at me.
“Hey, Dan,” he said. “Not a great time.”
The man he was with was the opposite of me in every way: a gorgeous little twink, thin and blond, with big blue eyes and apple cheeks and an arm slung around Richard’s waist with the casualness of long habit.
I had no idea what to say or do and, suddenly, what seemed like the absolute most important thing was that Richard not have the slightest inkling that I cared at all.
“I need my book,” I said, and my voice came out scratchy and high. The twink shifted a few inches to the left, so I could squeeze through the doorway.
At work that night, as I mechanically poured drinks and stared at the lights strobing over the crowd, I played the conversation Richard and I had over and over in my mind, trying to make sense of the pieces.
Things Richard said:
“Well, it isn’t as if we’re exclusive,” and, at my shocked expression, “I’m sorry if you thought that, Daniel, but we never had that conversation.”
“Don’t look at me like I’ve betrayed you. I would never cheat on a boyfriend, but when did we ever decide that’s what we were?”
Socking me softly in the shoulder, “Come now, if you were my boyfriend you would’ve had to spring for a real birthday present.” In fact, I’d spent more money on Richard’s gift, a first American edition of John Dalton’s A New System of Chemical Philosophy, than on any other gift I’d ever given.
Months later, I learned that I was about the only one at Penn who didn’t know Richard and I hadn’t been exclusive. Months later, I learned that Richard had been fucking his way through the entire city of Philadelphia and everyone had known.
Months later, too, I realized that I hadn’t ever even liked Richard that much, that the reason I’d never noticed that he saw other people or cared that we spent so little time together was because I was fairly indifferent to his company. Months later, I mostly felt incredibly stupid to have it pointed out so clearly that I had no idea what it was to be in a relationship, and quite ridiculous to realize how easy it was to be living a life completely different than the one of the person in bed beside you. But that night, I just felt shocked.
And it was probably because I felt shocked that I didn’t pay better attention as I was leaving work and walking to the subway. The bar paid us in cash—one of many reasons I liked working there—and I had years of experience being careful walking around with it late at night. It usually helped that I didn’t look like I had anything to steal: shitty old iPod, disposable pay-as-you-go phone, and my keys.
They might have seen me move the cash from my wallet to my front pocket outside the bar, they might have seen a bulge in my pocket and hoped it was a nice phone, or they might have just jumped me randomly. I don’t know. But when I was a block away from the subway entrance, its awning awash in friendly light, two guys grabbed me and dragged me into an alley where a third man waited with a knife.
They punched me in the face so I knew they were serious, and threw me against the wall where the guy with the knife leaned, looking on dispassionately. Gang initiation? Debt paid? I don’t know. They found the money in seconds and broke a few ribs anyway. They shoved my face against the dirty wall and even took the time to rifle through my wallet, dropping it when they found nothing worth taking. Took one look at my ancient iPod and shitty phone and didn’t even bother once they had the cash in hand.
I called Ginger and she came and picked me up, silent tears running down her face as she drove me back to her place and put me to bed under her covers.
And when I told Ginger about Richard the next morning, she said I should go to the police.
“Nah,” I said. “I don’t want to deal with it. What’s the point anyway? They were probably just kids.”
“No,” she deadpanned. “Not about the mugging. About Richard. You should see if you can file an incident report for rampant douchebaggery,” because she is the best friend in the history of the world. We both started laughing, which killed my ribs, so I tried to push Ginger, who, in trying to dodge me, fell off her chair. A regular Three Stooges routine.
I had nightmares about it for months afterward—no surprise there—but they went away for the most part, and I hadn’t had one in two years.
So why the fuck am I having them again, especially starting on a night when I was really happy? My brain supplies a flash flood of answers, most of which are automatic analysis: you feel like Rex stole something from you, you feel like your world has been turned on its side, everything’s collapsing, etc.
Before I can settle on any one of them, I turn the volume on the TV up and click over to the food channel that Rex mentioned liking, and I fall asleep to the sound of chiffonading, creaming, emulsifying, and zesting—or so the narration tells me.
The next morning, I wake up with the television still on and am greeted by a plump, motherly looking chef making some kind of breakfast feast of challah french toast and something called shirred eggs. My stomach gives a growl and I fumble around for the tiny coffeepot. I didn’t eat much yesterday. My stomach was in knots every time I thought about my fight with Rex.
There are two sessions I should attend at the conference this morning, but I can’t do it. I’m exhausted from all my socializing yesterday, from the fight with Rex, from all of it. And I can’t help but think that I owe Rex an explanation. That, like Ginger said, I need to just tell him some shit about me and let him decide what to do with it.
And I think, maybe, I need to have the conversation with him that I never had with Richard. I’m not interested in Jay, but if Rex thinks I am then that must feel shitty. I never really thought of myself as jealous, but when I had that moment of thinking that maybe Rex used to date Jay and that’s how he knew Jay was gay, my stomach definitely felt the way people always describe jealousy feeling in books. Besides, what if he thinks I don’t care and he meets someone else?
And, with that thought, I’m back on the jealousy wagon. The idea of Rex smiling his soft smile at another man makes me want to punch through the hotel wall. The idea of him cooking dinner in his kitchen with another man or finishing another man’s food makes me want to throttle someone—anyone. And at the idea of Rex kissing someone else, black creeps into my periphery.
I fumble with my phone and call him again. Again, there’s no answer. He’s really mad. I know Ginger’s right and he might just be busy, but I can’t believe he could be so busy he missed every call and couldn’t call me back. That’s just not Rex. He has to be avoiding me on purpose. And I guess he has every right to be mad. I did yell at him when he was just trying to be nice.
So, that’s that, then. I’m going to skip the morning sessions and just get the hell out of here. Go home.
Wow, I can’t believe I just thought of Holiday as home. But, actually, the picture that flashed in my head as I made my decision wasn’t of Holiday, or of my shitty apartment. It was of Rex’s warm cabin, the windows glowing with sunlight or firelight, the full kitchen where Rex looks so hot cooking, the cozy living roo
m with Marilyn snoozing on the hearth, and the bedroom where Rex makes me feel things I’ve never felt before.
Christ, I’m such a sap. Ginger would be grinning so hard right now if she could see this train of thought; my brothers would beat the shit out of me.
I throw my stuff into my duffel, not bothering about my wrinkled jacket, pull on some jeans, and splash the weak, hotel-room coffee into one of their to-go cups. And then I do exactly that. I need to talk to Rex as soon as possible.
9
Chapter 9
October
I’ve been psyching myself up the whole drive home, singing along to a tape that was in a John Hiatt case but turned out to be the Pet Shop Boys—score!—and I’ve played the whole apology over and over in my head like it’s a conference paper: introduction, claims, supporting evidence, conclusion, questions.
Driving through Detroit this morning made me homesick for Philly. I almost called Ginger just to hear a familiar accent, but it seems like every time I’ve talked to her lately she’s ended up listening to me whine, so I just turned up the volume and sang along, speeding as fast as my poor little car would take me. I mean, the best thing about Michigan so far is that the highway speed limit is seventy.
Around 2:00 p.m., ten miles from Rex’s house, I think practical thoughts like that I should go home and shower, or call again, or get something to eat, but I know if I stop to do any of that stuff I’ll lose my nerve, so I just drive straight to his house, hoping he’s home. My stomach flips in relief when I see his truck in the driveway. I barely register that his shades are down when they’re usually open to let in the sun.
When I get out of the car, I’m jittery from nerves and too much caffeine. I knock on the door, but he doesn’t answer. I’m pretty sure he’s home because I can hear Marilyn barking from inside and there’s nowhere he’d walk to on a Sunday without her. At least, I don’t think. But I guess I don’t really know.
I try the door and the knob turns in my hand. I’m about to just push the door open and walk in, guns blazing, yelling that I’m sorry, but pictures of Richard making out with another man flash through my mind. What if I walk in on Rex with someone else? I seriously could not stand that.
I’m not sure what to do. I knock again, noticing for the first time that Rex doesn’t have a doorbell. Then I hear Marilyn whining at the door. What if Rex is hurt? What if someone broke in and shot him or he passed out from carbon monoxide poisoning or something? That happened to the mom of a guy I worked with at the bar. They just found her sitting in her armchair like she was watching TV, only she’d been dead for three days.
I push the door open even as my logical mind tells me there’s not going to be carbon monoxide in a cabin in the woods, nor is there likely to have been an armed robbery. Still, the fear of Rex lying somewhere, hurt, is stronger than the fear of finding him with someone else.
As the door swings open, Marilyn darts through it. I’ve never seen her do that before; she’s so well trained. I swing around to run after her, not wanting to have to tell Rex I lost his dog on top of everything else, but she just pees on a bush by Rex’s garage and trots right back to me.
I walk inside tentatively, feeling like I’m about to find blood-streaked bodies lying all over the house like in a slasher movie or In Cold Blood.
“Rex,” I call. “It’s Daniel. Are you here?”
Marilyn runs toward the bedroom, where the door is closed. Maybe he’s sick?
“Rex?” I say at the door.
“Daniel?” a weak voice says from inside. I open the door and the bedroom is dark, the curtains pulled shut and taped together. There’s a lump on the bed and I walk over to it.
“Rex,” I say again, “are you okay?” I know it’s Rex under there, but for some reason, all I can think of is how my brothers used to hide under the covers and jump out and scare me.
I reach for the bedside lamp, but Rex grabs my hand. He pulls the covers down slowly and I can see that he looks tense.
“Hi,” he says. “I thought you were in Detroit.” His voice sounds strained.
“Oh, yeah, well, I came back early. I wanted to talk to you. Are you sick? What’s wrong?”
He smiles a little shakily.
“Sorry I didn’t answer when you called. I just get these headaches.” He makes a motion like he’s waving it away and pats the bed next to him. I sink down and run my hand over his back.
“Well, I hear orgasms are good for headaches,” I tease, leaning down to kiss him.
He winces.
“Mmm, I don’t think so just now.”
Now that I’m close to him I can see that the sexy wrinkle between his brows is deeper than I’ve ever seen it, and that his face is tight with pain. The bed smells warm, like he’s been lying here a long time. Oh shit.
“Do you get migraines?” I ask him, keeping my voice very low and even.
“Yeah,” he scrapes out.
God, that sucks. When Ginger gets them she’s in so much pain she can barely even cry because it makes it hurt more.
“Shit,” I say. “What can I do? Do you have medicine? Can I get you anything?”
“Can you take Marilyn for a walk?” he asks. “I let her out to pee this morning, but—”
“Yeah, of course. But what can I do for you? Do you have medicine?”
He mmhmms softly. “In the bathroom. But I can’t keep it down.”
I get up slowly and quietly walk to the bathroom, since light and sound are clearly not Rex’s friends right now.
I find the medicine sitting on the sink in the bathroom, and the slight sour smell makes it clear that he’s been sick in here. In the kitchen, I find a jar of applesauce and cut the pills into tiny pieces, hiding them in a spoonful of applesauce.
“Can you sit up a little?”
Rex drags himself up.
“Give me your wrist,” I tell him, sitting next to him on the bed. With one hand, I squeeze the pressure point on his wrist that should help him feel less nauseated. “Try and swallow this,” I say, holding up the spoon in the other. He makes a face, but swallows it. I put the spoon down and use my hand on the pressure point in his other wrist.
“Close your eyes,” I say softly, and I keep the pressure on his wrists and start telling him about the conference. Just rambling on to distract him.
I tell him how Detroit reminded me a little of North Philly, with the big, crumbling stone churches and the streets arcing around them instead of laid out in a grid. I tell him how cool I thought it was when this badass old professor got asked a convoluted question by a young guy trying to prove how smart he was and she paused for a second and then told him that she wasn’t really interested in that conversation because it didn’t seem to have value to anyone but academics, and how I wish that someday I could be brave enough to call someone on their bullshit like that. I tell him that I watched the Food Network for the first time and want to watch it with him so he can tell me what everything is. I don’t tell him how sorry I am for yelling the other night, though. I’ll do that later.
Little by little, I feel him relax; his jaw unclenches and the rigid set of his shoulders loosens. I lean down and kiss him on the forehead.
“I’m going to take Marilyn out. I’ll be back soon. You just rest.” I tuck the blanket back up around him and close the bedroom door.
It’s chilly, so I grab Rex’s quilted flannel coat from the hook beside the door.
“Your dad’s sick, huh?” I say to Marilyn when we get outside, and she barks in answer and bounds around me. I walk for a while, breathing in the clean-smelling air, and Marilyn runs off in front of me, scratches at something, then runs back, like she’s scouting ahead. With every breath, I smell the combination of cedar, wood smoke, and musk on Rex’s jacket and I pull it tighter around myself as if he were walking with me.
When we get back, a much happier Marilyn curls up in front of the fireplace. It feels a little cold in here, so I decide to light it. The only fires I’ve ever made have be
en by squirting gasoline in garbage cans in abandoned lots or in the alley behind my dad’s shop if we had to burn garbage, but I’ve seen Rex do it a few times. How hard can it be?
Hunh. Kind of hard. Every time I get the kindling going, it burns up before it lights the rest of the fire. Finally, with some maneuvering that almost loses me the skin on the back of my right hand, I get a pretty respectable blaze going. Then I go back to check on Rex.
I sit down next to him on the bed. I don’t want to wake him, but I want to see how bad he feels—if I should be getting him a prescription for something. I stroke his hair back and he whimpers. Poor Rex. He looks really awful.
“Rex,” I whisper softly.
“Hey,” he says.
“What can I do? Do you think you can keep any food down? I could get you something to eat?”
He laughs weakly. “I don’t need food poisoning on top of a migraine,” he says. “The pills are helping. Could you….” He trails off, like he wasn’t going to say anything.
“What?”
“Maybe just stay with me a little while?”
“Okay,” I say, “sure,” and I kick off my shoes. Rex scoots over a little and looks up at me. His eyes are uncertain behind the pain, and I realize we haven’t talked about anything yet. But it’s not the time. I slip my jeans off and slide under the covers, careful not to jostle him. I lie on my back next to him, not quite touching, like the night we were at my house, only this time it’s physical pain I want to protect him from.
I hate that I don’t know what else to do for him. That there isn’t anything I can do. There wasn’t that night at my house, either. I hate feeling helpless and for a second, I’m almost mad at Rex for making me feel that way. Then he reaches his arm out, encouraging me to rest my head on his shoulder, and my anger melts away. It isn’t really at him anyway.