by Stella Duffy
Max went upstairs to find Anita had let herself into Michael’s room.
“Where’s Jasmine?”
“Sleeping. They’re here?”
“Downstairs in the hall. Are you ready for them to come in and get him?”
“Almost. Won’t they want to see a death certificate or something?”
“No. It’s all organized. They take him into the school over on Parnassus and Jerry will just give the body the papers of some other guy who came in last week or something like that. They go through about ten corpses a week in his classes. Usually they get the unclaimed ones from the city morgue, but you have to wait months for them to be turned in. Or occasionally people allow their dead relatives to be ‘used in the interests of science’. But they’re not exactly ideal for study.”
“Not usually quite as fresh as this one, huh?”
“No.”
“So, Max. You’re doing a good deed after all, aren’t you? You’re the good guy yet again.”
“I can’t talk about this now, Anita. They’re waiting to take the body.”
“Michael.”
“Yes. Him. Now come on.”
“I still think you should call his family.”
“I really don’t think they’d care.”
“It’s not that. I know you, you just don’t want the cops to find out. You don’t want them to know what you’ve been doing here.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Right Max. So you keep saying. That’s why you sent everyone out today and that’s why you aren’t reporting this death and that’s why we both feel like shit.”
Max sat on the bed beside her and gently put his arms around her, drawing her to him.
“Anita – our friend has died. That’s why we both feel so bad. But we’re going to sort it out and then we’re going to get on with it. This is one setback. Our first problem. I will not let this ruin my work and I won’t let you ruin it either.”
He grabbed a fistful of her hair, no gentle calmness now, and turned her to look at him, pulling her close to his face.
“I’ve had enough of your accusations, Anita and your self-pity and your guilt. If you want to run and hide, feel free to do so, but Michael is dead. This is just another corpse. He’s gone. His spirit is gone and no amount of you sitting there and stroking his hair is going to change that. This is just a cold piece of dead meat. So let’s get on with it. Yes?” Max stood Anita up and half dragged, half carried her into their bedroom where he left her.
The two guys from the university came upstairs, wrapped Michael in a body bag and carried him away. Anita took her sleepy child and sat with her, looking down at their tiny garden, eyes blinded and swollen from an overwash of tears. By the time everyone else got home that night Max had cleared Michael’s room completely. He’d contacted the family to tell them Michael had left with no forwarding address – they didn’t want one anyway – and then he set up the central room for a House Meeting. When he heard the two cars drive up he ran upstairs to Anita.
“Come on, they’re here. We’re going to do this together. You and me. And we’re going to be happy about it and it will all be fine.”
“I don’t think I can face them. I can’t do this lie. You’ll have to go down by yourself.”
“You don’t have any choice Anita. You’re complicit already.”
“But it wasn’t my idea to lie about Michael. You wouldn’t let me call the cops.”
“It doesn’t matter. By their standards you’re just as guilty as me. Only I don’t feel guilty and you do. That’s why you can’t cope and I can.”
“You should feel guilty.”
“No. There is no ‘should’ about it. As you’ve said so many times yourself, ‘guilt is a useless emotion’. That is what we all believe isn’t it? Haven’t you told me time and again that all my guilt is merely a result of my middle-class repressed upbringing? Guess I learnt the lesson real well?”
“It doesn’t count as middle-class guilt when you’ve just killed someone.”
Max whirled around, grabbed Anita’s shoulders and pulled her to her feet.
“I didn’t kill him. He killed himself. He set himself free. I have no guilt.”
“Yeah, yeah…”
“Come on Anita, you can’t change the story now. What is it you always say? What’s your mantra? Let me see … oh yeah – ‘I choose not to involve myself in the patriarchal conspiracy of blame and regret that prevents me from attaining my true nature’. That’s the one!”
“You’re a bastard.”
“Why? For quoting your own words back at you? Oh, I think not. Michael had a choice and he chose to run away. To attain his ‘true nature’, no doubt. I choose to keep going – and if you know what’s good for you, so will you.”
“Are you threatening me, Max?”
“Probably.”
Max let her go and she fell away from him back against the bed.
“Now, get yourself together Anita and come downstairs – and make sure you wash your face first, you look like crap.”
CHAPTER 12
By the time Anita came downstairs half an hour later, the House had already convened. Her seat beside Max was empty and Michael’s seat on the other side of Max was now taken by Paul. The ten of them sat around the big oak table. Max at the head, with the huge arched windows behind him, the setting sunlight flooding in from behind making it hard to see his face properly, while clearly illuminating all the others, something he’d often used to his advantage in the past. Anita to his left, Paul masking Michael’s absence to his right.
Anita sat down and they began. Max welcomed each one in turn and then, as always, they sat silently, eyes closed, hands on the table before them, little fingertips touching until Max told them they were “one” and could now begin the Group Process.
This Process had been invented by Max and Anita within the first few months they’d been in the House – though it hadn’t been called a Process at the time. It was designed to allow everyone a chance to speak, while not letting those to whom speaking came naturally overtake the others. Each person was given three minutes, the others were not allowed to interrupt, having to listen silently while whoever was speaking said their piece. Everyone had to take a turn whether they had anything to say or not, either talking for their three minutes or staying silent under group scrutiny. Anita timed the minutes strictly, calling out when one, two and then three minutes had passed. Max believed the three-minute limit meant that people chose to speak about what really mattered to them, rather than just waffling and then throwing a “hot bone of an idea” in at the last sentence, disrupting the group. The next person would then speak for the duration of their own three minutes. No one was allowed to use their time to address the speech of another, or to defend themselves. Max would then, after speaking for his own three minutes, take twenty minutes to “facilitate” – to tell the others what they were really talking about, to draw all the thoughts together and to plan the agenda for what was to become the solid basis of the rest of the meeting over the next five hours. All meetings lasted five hours with one ten-minute break at the three-hour mark. The House had been having monthly meetings ever since it first started and occasional meetings in moments of crisis, but they always followed the same pattern. This evening, Paul began.
“To tell the truth, I’m glad Michael’s gone. I hadn’t felt comfortable with him for a long time. He seemed to always want to compete with me and I have only ever wanted to serve this group, you know that, to help create our whole. I’ve felt for some time now that Mike was not happy with the group and needed to be away. Which is fine. Perhaps we weren’t working for him either. I’m glad he’s gone and I don’t expect to miss him at all. That’s all I’ve got to say.”
The group then waited in silence until Anita called the end of Paul’s three minutes and turned to Rose sitting beside him. From the midwest and just turned seventeen, Rose had come to the House four months pregnant. She was now due to have her baby with
in the month and had been very close to Michael. She cried for the first two minutes of her time and then started to speak between her sobs, holding tightly to the bump in front of her, as if the unborn child was a buffer against the pain.
“I feel I should have given Michael more, but he was just being so supportive to me and Babe that I didn’t know … I mean … that he didn’t love us. Like I thought he did. I thought he loved us. Really. He wanted to be Babe’s father, he told me that and I believed him … I thought he was so cool… I thought he’s gonna stay and do it, you know, not like them all back home? And we could, you know, maybe we would move away together and … I’m not stupid…”
She stuttered and gave up a watery smile.
“Well, not very – I know that he didn’t really want to live with me … I mean, not any girl … but he played along with my story, and it made me feel good. Made us feel good, me and Babe … and now I just … I don’t know, I think maybe I should move on too, I’m not…”
Anita looked up from the stopwatch and said sharply, “That’s enough Rose. Time. John?”
John had his arm around Rose and was staring at Max. He was a big man from Virginia who didn’t speak much and maintained that he came to the House both to “hide from the wreck” that his marriage had been and to find a new way of being with people. A way that didn’t involve families and traditions and the misery that his previous life had become. A way that didn’t yet exist, but he was hoping to force into being by the very strength of his need. He kept his eyes on Max the whole time he spoke.
“I don’t know either. Come on now, Rosie honey, dry those eyes.”
He handed his handkerchief to Rose and was reprimanded by Max.
“That’s conversation John.”
“Shut up, Max. It’s not conversation, it’s humanity. This little girl is crying and she needs some attention. She’s a child and she’s lost a friend. She’s going to get some attention from me. I don’t care that the rule is not to deal with someone else’s pain. I actually don’t care about the rules at all. I care about the people. So, Max – do you want to discuss it?”
“No John, I don’t. Because to discuss it would be to break even more of the rules than you just did. You have about two minutes more.”
“Yeah well. Somehow, I don’t think two minutes is going to do it. Perhaps we ought to be looking at these rules and maybe getting rid of some of them. I think we ought to be looking at quite a few things. You know, I don’t know that these rules have got us all that far actually, there’s a whole lot of stuff going on that maybe we should be …“
“Um, one minute John.”
“Yeah Anita. Right. One minute more to see just how far I can push – ah, don’t look so scared, it’s not that big a deal. Anyway, I think I’ve said all I really wanted to. For now. Just a little experiment and it seems to have worked. Simple really – break a rule, stand back and stare in wonder when the whole world doesn’t crumble before your very eyes. Almost satisfying. But maybe not quite satisfying enough, huh Max? We’ll see.”
John leant back in his chair holding Rose against his shoulder and smiling at Max over her head. Max just stared back at John and then waited for Anita as she timed the remaining minute. Doug and Jake then followed, each expressing dismay that Michael had left without talking to them but, both being young men who had come to the House looking for security rather than anything more challenging, they echoed Paul’s sentiments that they’d rather just get on with things than rake over the past. While neither of them was allowed to say so, they were both thrown by John’s challenge to Max’s authority and were desperate to get the meeting back on its usual, predictable course. Elspeth, a German friend of Anita’s who’d only been in the House for a month and still didn’t have a great grasp of English, merely said she expected to miss Michael and left it at that. Her Irish boyfriend Sam said pretty much the same but added that he thought numerically speaking, ten was more stable than eleven. Another two minutes of silence followed his short speech.
Chris however, elected to follow John in rebellion. Chris was from Chicago, gay, and living in San Francisco under an assumed name in order to hide from the authorities in Illinois where he was wanted for questioning about a few minor drug offences, some outstanding debts and a certain matter of draft-dodging. Anita had met him at an underground house and begged Max to take him in a year earlier. Chris had always been well aware that any time he overstepped the mark he ran the risk of Max turning him in, which meant he was usually content to go along with the group. He had found that, contrary to his expectations, he quite liked living in community and could almost overcome his innate distrust of Max, but this time he felt buoyed up enough by John’s attitude to bring some of his own feelings into the equation. He was also heartbroken.
“John’s got it. There’s some stuff going on here that isn’t right. Just look around – Paul’s really happy for Michael to have gone. Of course he is, he’s got what he’s wanted all along – now he’s sitting there at the right hand of God. Father and Son, yeah Max? Isn’t that how you see yourself? Only of course, now Michael’s gone we’ll have to think of him as the Holy Ghost, am I right?”
“No conversation, Chris.”
“Fuck your rules Max. We’ve lost a friend, a brother…”
Paul looked across the table to Chris.
“Don’t you mean lover?”
There was a pause while Chris looked at Paul, sizing him up and everyone else stared at Chris.
“Yeah, OK Paul. Lover. Michael was my lover. Do you have a problem with that?”
Max stood up at the head of the table, his voice trembling with the effort of affecting a calm exterior.
“This is a conversation. This is against House rules. You cannot do this.”
“One minute, Chris.”
Chris turned and snarled at Anita.
“Put your fucking watch away Anita, I know what’s been going on.”
Max and Anita both looked at each other and John noticed Anita’s hands begin to shake. Max put his left hand over hers and pulled her slightly closer to him as he sat down again.
“Fine Chris. If you’re so determined to bring it all up, perhaps you should say this in front of the whole group. If, that is, you really feel it’s what Michael wants everyone to know?”
“Fuck you, Max.”
“No. Not me. Go ahead. Here, let’s get rid of this.”
He took the stopwatch from Anita’s hands and flung it against the wall.
“Now you have all the time in the world. But I warn you. You started this. If you can’t handle what comes of it, you had better be prepared to leave the House yourself.”
“I’m ready.”
“Go ahead then. The floor is yours.”
Max sat back in the chair, waiting for Chris. Only John noticed that his grasp on Anita’s hand was so tight that the tips of her fingers were starting to turn blue.
Chris looked at Max, then around at the whole table and began to speak.
“OK. Michael and I have been lovers for about three months. We were planning to leave together and Michael believed Max wouldn’t let him go. That’s why he started to do all these Processes. He thought that if Max saw how committed he was to the Group and to the Process, then when he actually said he was leaving, Max would allow him.”
“I’ve never stopped anyone leaving before now, have I?”
John looked across at Max.
“No one’s ever wanted to leave, so we have no means of comparison. But, then again, you were never in love with anyone who left before now either.”
Rose sat up from John’s shoulder and Doug and Jake shifted uncomfortably in their seats. Anita wrenched her hand away from Max’s grasp and Max burst out laughing.
“Is this what all the fuss is about? You think I was in love with Michael? Christ! That’s incredible!”
“You were. He told me you were.”
“No Chris. I expect he told you he was in love with me. Didn’t h
e?”
“I…”
“He never said I was in love with him, did he? He said he was in love with me. There’s a big difference there. That is what he said. Isn’t it?”
Chris just stared at Max, uncertain of what to say and certain that he had probably got himself in far too deep. Anita turned and took Chris’s hand.
“Well, as it’s all truth here today, I’ve got something to say too.”
She raised her hand as both John and Max started to remonstrate with her.
“Don’t worry, I’m talking to Chris, not you. You see Chris, I know Max.”
“You don’t know what…”
“Oh yes I do. It’s not that he has a problem with it, the homosexual thing, though maybe he does, but actually, I really don’t see that he would have had the time.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that as Max was screwing Rose for the first couple of months she was with us and Elspeth ever since Rose got too big for him to be comfortable with it, and me whenever he could, he hardly had time to fit Michael in as well.”
Seeing Max was about to speak, she continued.
“Don’t bother to deny it Max. I know you. Very well. How these silly little girls thought I didn’t know, I’ll never guess. But you see Chris, that’s how I know Max certainly wasn’t screwing Michael. He may have learnt the lessons of free love admirably, indeed, I think I taught him too well, but he hasn’t quite managed to outgrow his traditional fear of queers. Have you Max?”
Max smiled at Anita.
“Thank you Anita. You’re right, I still haven’t quite crossed the border to explore my ‘man loving’ side. Stop snivelling Rose, it doesn’t matter that much. It’s only sex, at least Elspeth and Sam acknowledge that. Well, there we are – those are my secrets, but it still doesn’t address Chris’s hostility towards me. Shall I tell you what it is you’re feeling Chris? Simple jealousy. Sure, you two were lovers, big deal. But Michael loved me and I rejected him. That is why he left us, that is why he’s gone and that is why you won’t ever see him again. I didn’t want him and so he didn’t want any of us. Michael is gone Chris, without you. Gone because it was me he loved, not you.”