by Nick Poff
So Ed Stephens’s name had finally entered the gossip mill that was Porterfield. He briefly longed for his days of invisibility, but knew to return to that time meant giving up Rick, something he’d never do. Rick and his love had given Ed’s life a meaning it had never had, and to lose that was unthinkable. Janis Ian’s song, “At Seventeen,” came to his mind, and he tried to remember that one line, something about gaping small-town eyes. Let ’em gape, he thought, his tired back straightening. Let ’em get a good, long look at what real love is.
Ed, as any good man in love should, felt the love he and Rick shared was bigger, better, and purer than any love the world had ever known. Anyone who saw fit to disparage it was automatically a fool in Ed’s eyes. A lesser man might have have poured himself another cup of tea, maybe throwing a shot of whiskey in it. Ed, however, pulled his snow boots back on and went outside to shovel his walks in plain sight of Porterfield.
* * * * *
Ed was pulling his boots off again when the phone rang. He clumped, boots unlaced, to answer it.
“Ed? It’s Effie Maude Sanders.” The voice of Mrs. Penfield’s housekeeper rolled into Ed’s ears, not unlike the sounds of the scratchy records he’d been playing for months now. “I thought you should know Mrs. P.’s had a bit of an accident. Slipped on some ice on the front porch.”
“Oh, no! Is she badly hurt?”
“Naw,” Effie Maude said. “Pshaw, she just twisted her ankle. Scared her more ’un anything. Doc Weisberg looked her over and told her to keep her weight off it for a few days. I’ve got her all set up in the study where she sleeps when that ’ritis of hers keeps her from climmin’ steps.
“Anyways,” she continued, “I’ll stay over here for a few days. No problem, since my brother can tend the stock out to the farm, but I need to be at the church social tonight. Promised I’d take care of things in the kitchen. You think you could come over and sit with her for a spell while I’m gone?”
“Of course. When do you need to leave?”
“Oh, six should be just fine, if you can make it. I want to leave a li’l early, on account of the snow. I’m much obliged to ya, Ed.”
“No problem. Rick and I will come over as soon as we’ve eaten,” Ed assured her. “We’ll be over there by six.”
Ed hung up the phone, just as Rick’s car pulled in the driveway.
“Well, this weekend sure isn’t turning out the way I had hoped,” he said.
He was sorry for Mrs. Penfield’s misfortune, but glad of an excuse for them to visit her. Thinking back on his conversation with Todd, he thought a visit with one of their biggest fans might be just what they needed.
* * * * *
Ed and Rick jumped out of Ed’s truck, their door slams sounding like rifle shots in the cold, still night. They walked from Mrs. Penfield’s driveway to her back door along the path Ed had cleared earlier that day. Rick’s face was tight and troubled. Over dinner Ed had told him of his conversation with Todd, and nothing Ed had said since would erase the look from Rick’s face. Ed hoped Mrs. Penfield might have better luck with easing Rick’s mind than he’d had himself.
Effie Maude met them at the back door, dressed for the cold and snow in a huge parka, the hood thrown back to reveal her gray hair pinned tightly into a bun. Her polka-dot, Saturday-night social dress just cleared the tall, heavy rubber boots she wore. Ed was relieved to see the ghost of a grin flit across Rick’s face at the sight of her.
“C’mon in, boys,” she rasped as usual. “Good to see you. How’re the roads out there?”
“Snow-covered,” Ed reported. “It’s too cold for the road salt to do much good. Be careful, okay?”
“Pshaw, I’ve been drivin’ in snow since before either one of you was born. Only day I didn’t make it in to Mrs. P.’s was the blizzard of ’78, ya know. I can handle this stuff easy.”
“How’s Mrs. Penfield?” Rick asked.
“Aw, just fine,” Effie Maude said, leading them into the kitchen, showing them where to leave their wet boots. “Doc Weisberg was over here first thing after I called ’im. You know those two go way back and all. Mrs. P.’s probably the only one left in town he’d do a house call for.”
“That really is something,” Ed said. He hadn’t received a house call from Dr. Weisberg since he’d been in grade school.
“Well, ya know I always thought, with Mr. P. gone and the doc’s wife gone, that those two would get together, but what with the doc bein’ a Jew, and how this town talks, I guess it’ll never happen.”
“Effie Maude,” Ed protested. “What a thing to say.”
“Now, Ed, you know well as me how this town is,” she said, heading for the door. “Talk, talk, talk. That’s all most of ’em are good for. Don’t bother me none. Never has. If you live a good life, nothin they say can hurt ya any. Mrs. P. knows that, but maybe she decided she was just too old to take on another man.” She shrugged. “Thanks, boys. I’ll be back in a few hours.” She threw the hood of her parka over her head and slammed the door behind her.
Rick actually laughed at the expression on Ed’s face.
“Dr. Weisberg and Mrs. Penfield?” Ed asked in surprise. “I think the old girl has more going on than I know.”
“Let’s go ask her,” Rick said, mischievous grin in place. Ed was glad to see it.
Mrs. Penfield was resting in a twin bed she’d had placed in her late husband’s study. She was sitting up, a book in her lap, and was very pleased to see her company.
“How nice of you to come see a foolish old woman,” she exclaimed, closing her book. “You’d think I would know better, going after the mail in this weather. I should have let Effie Maude do it, but, no, I deliberately went on that porch, slipped, and fell. I’m just glad she was here to help me back inside.”
“I’m feeling very guilty.” Ed parked himself in a wing chair by the blazing fire. “If I had done a better job of cleaning the snow and ice off the porch, this wouldn’t have happened.”
“Nonsense. With the constant snow we’ve had this week, it’s impossible to keep that porch perfectly clear.”
“Well, if I were your mailman, Mrs. Penfield,” Rick said grandly, “I would ring your bell and hand you your mail personally.” He glanced at Ed. “That’s the service I provide for my very favorite customers.”
Mrs. Penfield laughed in delight. “Oh, it’s such a joy to see you two. Perhaps I should twist my ankle more often, if it means I would receive such charming company on a Saturday night.”
Ed held his hands out to the fire. “You’ll probably throw me out after I ask this, but what’s up with you and Dr. Weisberg?”
Mrs. Penfield snorted. “Has Effie Maude been talking again? Honestly, that woman is incorrigible. She has fancied a romance between Nathan Weisberg and myself since our respective spouses passed away. While it’s true that Nate and I have been dear friends for many years, there simply is no more to the story. I think our Effie has read a few too many romance novels.”
Ed and Rick joined her in laughter.
“Oh, it feels good to laugh,” Ed said, smiling at them both.
“Is there a reason laughter has been scarce for you today, Ed?” Mrs. Penfield asked. “Are your snow chores getting you down?”
“No,” he answered. “Something else.”
“Ed, I don’t think we should bother Mrs. Penfield with that.”
“She’s exactly who we should bother, because she would be the first to understand,” Ed insisted.
“Perhaps Mrs. Penfield should be allowed to judge for herself,” she said. “What seems to be the trouble?”
Ed told her of the incident with Jim Murkland at the post office and repeated his conversation with Todd. “We’re doing our best to be strong, as you told me to be,” he said in conclusion. “Thing is, all of a sudden I feel as though I’m, we’re, living in a glass house.”
Mrs. Penfield looked from Ed’s annoyed face to Rick’s troubled one. She nodded. “I see. You’re worried, then, that some
of the less tolerant residents of Porterfield might take it upon themselves to shatter the walls you’ve so carefully built, is that it?”
Ed shrugged. Rick jumped up from his seat and began to pace.
“Here’s the thing, Mrs. Penfield,” Rick said. “I’ve got my job, my sister, her children, and Ed and me to think about. I don’t want to do anything that would jeopardize any of that. By the same token, I wouldn’t dream of leaving Ed. It wouldn’t stop the talk. The damage has already been done, hasn’t it? Small towns are new to me. I’m afraid, and I’m not sure how not to be.”
Mrs. Penfield’s eyes followed Rick’s progress around the room. “Rick, dear, do sit down. Just watching you is making me tired.”
Rick did as he was told.
“I understand your anxiety, but I’m also relieved to see you’ve made one excellent decision.”
“What’s that?”
“Why, not abandoning your relationship with Ed, of course,” she exclaimed. “I can see with my own nearsighted eyes how deeply you care for one another. When you get to be my age, you’ll understand how rare that kind of devotion really is. Why, that’s half the battle right there.”
Rick looked puzzled.
“Ed, why don’t you see about removing those ice patches from the front porch? I think Rick and I need to have a talk.”
“But I don’t have my shov—”
“You’ll find everything you need in the garage,” she interrupted. “Now, run along. Rick has never experienced Hilda Penfield the teacher, and I think it’s time he did.”
Ed grinned mischievously at the still puzzled Rick. “Her essay tests are murder,” he said, leaving the room.
Ed pulled himself back into his boots and winter coat. He located a shovel in the garage and went to work, chipping away at stubborn frozen footprints on the porch and front walk. The night was bitterly cold, no more than a few degrees above zero, but Ed was warmed by the thought of Mrs. Penfield’s ability to find comfort in an uneasy situation.
He listened to the traffic on Main Street, just a block away, the only other sound besides his shovel against the hard packed snow. He thought of an old Simon and Garfunkel song, “My Little Town.” It had been going through his mind all evening. Ed loved the song, and thought any small town guy who'd grown up feeling different and alienated probably related to its contemptuous lyrics as much as he did.
Ed supposed he had fought his own internal war with Porterfield. He had been annoyed as a teenager when the upheavals of the sixties had barely registered on Porterfield’s radar screen. He’d been scornful of the town’s obvious prejudice against anyone of color. As a gay man, he’d been both resigned and angry at the town’s potential for homophobia. However, Ed's pragmatism would not allow him to see the town from that viewpoint alone. Although the rainbows in Simon and Garfunkel's little town were black from lack of imagination, the rainbows Ed had seen arching over Porterfield had always been full of color and promise.
His thoughts of moving away had always been brief and fleeting. The siren's call of "My Little Town" told him he was a fool to stay, but it simply wasn't compelling enough to make him leave the place in the world he knew best and felt he understood. Despite any negative feelings he may have harbored against the town and its people, Porterfield was his home. It was where his family was, and had been, for many years.
He remembered trips to Fort Wayne with his family as a little boy, returning to Porterfield in the evening, seeing from a distance the illuminated clock tower of the Stratton County courthouse rising tall and proud in the night. As a child, he’d thought the regal, imposing sandstone building, its tower piercing the sky, protected the town and all who lived in it. As a gay man alive and well in 1981, he suspected little justice would be due him inside its walls, but still felt an odd sense of protection from the building itself.
As if to remind him of its presence, the courthouse’s clock tolled the hour, seven bell strikes resounding across the cold, crisp air over the town. He turned to the north, but trees obscured the view of the tower.
His concerns about continuing his relationship with Rick in such a town were reasonable ones, but he knew somehow he’d made his peace with it. Stratton County and Porterfield were his birthright, and no one’s talk—misguided, hateful, or ignorant—could change that. If Rick chose to leave, Ed would leave with him, and with no second thoughts. Ed knew, though, they didn’t have to leave. The strength of their love would see them through any adversity the town might show them. Mrs. Penfield had shared that wisdom with him, and hopefully she was sharing it with Rick at this very moment.
He heard the front door open quietly behind him. He turned and watched Rick walk across the porch and down the steps.
“Hey, baby,” Rick said softly.
“Hi.”
Rick came to a halt behind Ed on the front walk and lightly placed his arms around him.
“Can we go for a little ride? I’d like to get outside of town, where we can really see the stars. It’s a beautiful night for it.” He kissed the back of Ed’s neck. “Damn, you’re cold, baby. Come inside and warm up a bit before we go, okay?”
“What about Mrs. Penfield?”
“She’ll be fine. The drive is her idea. We won’t be gone all that long.”
Ed, puzzled but feeling hopeful, followed Rick into the house. Rick pulled himself into his winter gear, and they walked out the back entrance to Ed’s truck.
“Where to?” Ed asked, once he had started the engine.
Rick smiled at him. “Just someplace dark and quiet, where we can see the stars.”
"My Little Town" was still in Ed's mind. The line about the dead and dyin' played on his internal stereo and he almost laughed. Instead he smiled back at Rick. “Okay, I can do that.”
He promptly drove to the little cemetery where his ancestors were buried.
Rick shook his head while Ed carefully navigated the snow-filled drive to the older part of the cemetery.
“I should have known you’d get me back here someday. You just want my body, don’t you? Well, you’ll have to wait. We have some talking to do first.”
Leaving the truck running, they hopped out, the virgin snow crunching under their boots. Arms around each other’s waists, they turned their eyes heavenward, where the skies were ablaze with stars in the clear, cloudless night.
“Isn’t it something?” Rick murmured. “We can’t see it in town, with all the lights. I’m glad Mrs. Penfield suggested it, although I’m about to freeze to death.”
“Why’d she want us to come out here?”
“She said we needed to get outside of the town, look out into the universe, and put it back into perspective. She was right. I feel better already. Porterfield really isn’t that important in the bigger scheme of things.”
“I don’t think I’m following your thoughts, Rick.”
Rick chuckled. “That’s okay. Let me back up. Mrs. Penfield gave me the lecture she gave you last fall, all about the unique problems we’d face as two men in love, trying to build a relationship. I’d thought it was pretty good, getting it secondhand from you, but it was really something, straight from her mouth, with her words. I needed to hear it.
“She told me a lot of other things, too. She told me how much she loved her husband, and how the loss of their only child could have torn them apart, but it only made them closer. She absolutely blew me away when she told me, in her opinion, that our love was the most sincere and honorable she’d seen in anyone since her husband died. She said we had an obligation—to ourselves and to each other—to see it through, despite the odds against us.”
Rick sighed. “She also said that Porterfield did have the power to hurt us, if we let it; that, yes, I could lose my job; that other kids could be cruel to Judy, Josh, and Jane; that people could be just as cruel to Claire, or to anyone in your family. She reminded me that people could indeed try to hurt us physically.
“But,” Rick said definitely, “she also reminded me
that every single person in this town lives with the same fears and possibilities, but for different or even similar reasons.”
“Wow,” said Ed, trying to take it all in.
“Yeah. It was quite a lecture, but everything she said was right. And true. Our situation may be unique, but the fear isn’t. Everyone’s afraid of something. She asked me, would I feel any safer if we packed up us and our families and moved to San Francisco or New York? She reminded me that we might lose our fears about gay prejudice, but we’d be adding a great many fears to our lives that we don’t have here in Porterfield.”
Even with Rick’s arm around his waist, Ed was damned cold, standing in the snow, looking upward at the distant stars.
“So what are you trying to tell me, darlin’?” he asked, shivering.
“I’m trying to tell you that we stay. We fight, if need be. Most importantly, we love. We love our families, and we love our friends. And best of all, I get to keep loving you, and you get to keep loving me. I hate to sound overly dramatic about it, but I’d die if I couldn’t keep loving you, baby. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: I don’t care where we are, as long as we’re together and we love each other. But this town, for all its faults, is our home. I choose to continue loving you right here.”
Ed turned to Rick, smiling. “I knew that crafty old broad would get you to see reason.”
Rick’s loud, happy laugh echoed among the trees and tombstones. “Oh, baby, I guess I always knew you didn’t want to leave, and I don’t blame you. This is your home. I’ve never felt that way about Indianapolis. I guess I’ve always known my home would be wherever my heart is. Right now, and forever I think, it’s with you.”
Their lips came together. The strength of their love flowed between them, warming them against the frigid night, and protecting them, at least for that moment, against anything in this world that could harm them.
“We’re gonna be okay, baby,” Rick whispered against Ed’s lips. “I know that now. Just standing here, looking at the universe, I know we’re gonna make it. Mrs. Penfield said the universe had worked hard to bring us together, so surely it wouldn’t make any big effort to tear us apart. I believe her. Do you?”