Visible Lives

by Stanley Bennett Clay

  I found my way to the Dachau concentration camp site and took pictures of misery much greater than mine. At Englischer Garten I got pissy drunk on too many mugs of a German pilsner whose name I could not pronounce. I avoided the beautiful landscapes I had read about. I roamed the frigid streets that night in the seediest neighborhoods, donned dark glasses and a Goth-like demeanor. I did not want to experience anything that threatened to pull me out of my funk.

  The next morning my head pounded like it had been beaten with a sledge hammer. I squinted listlessly as my shaking hand dug into my small carry-on and found the bottle of Excedrin.

  Somehow, I made it to the airport. By the time I got there, the Excedrin had kicked in. A sign. Getting out of this fucking country, getting away from him was the relief I needed.

  I turned my phone on once I was seated on the plane back home, parked on the tarmac, waiting for take-off. And just as I suspected, more missed calls from Sean’s cell and that German number, and as many voice mails. I erased them all, each and every one of them, and decided to think about just getting home, back to America, back to my warm and beautiful L.A., back to my warm and beautiful family, the people who loved me, my mother’s judgment-free hug, Frankie’s shoulder to cry on, my brother Andre’s killer barbequed beef ribs and his wife Dee’s Cuban rum punch, my fool brother Craig and his wife and their kids, Uncle Mickey, Aunt Till, cousin Laura and her new girlfriend Cheryl.

  I dialed Frankie’s number. She picked up on the first ring.

  “Hey, Doll,” I said when she answered.

  “Hey, Junie,” she swooned, the hunger for sweet gossip bringing her voice to a delectable hush, “so how’s it going?”

  “I’m on my way home.”

  “So soon?” Then she panicked. “Oh nooo!”

  Chapter Three

  “Your son is gay,” I overheard one of my father’s friends say to him in the middle of their weekly poker games, back when I was in middle school.

  “He’s also left-handed,” my father replied smoothly without ever looking up from his cards. He won the pot with a straight flush.

  “Life is too short to be hating somebody because they’re different,” Dad would always say. He would also always say, “A man is determined by what’s in his heart, not what’s in his pants.” Okay. That’s sweet, if not so terribly original.

  Dad was a sweet guy. If he were still alive today he would be man enough to cry watching Oprah. I remember how he broke down and cried after he brought Mom and my new little baby sister Frankie home from the hospital, sitting in the corner watching Mom gently rocking Frankie, listening to his wife gently singing “Summertime” to his new baby daughter.

  Dad was only sixty-eight when he died; still a young man. If he had a fault, it was that he loved to eat all the wrong things. Mom spent their whole marriage trying to trick him into eating healthy, but he always managed to get hold of fatty pork ribs, six-cheese macaroni and cheese, chitlins cooked in bacon drippings, cornbread pan-fried in butter, and too-sweet Kool-Aid by any means necessary.

  Everybody loved my dad, especially the women he worked with down at the post office on the graveyard shift. Oh, and they all knew he was Mister Strait-Laced, happy with what he had at home. There was no getting into the pants of Jesse Lee Templeton, Jr., no matter how many eyelashes they fluttered or curvy hips they sashayed in front of him, so they decided to get into his stomach.

  Now there was no great conspiracy involved here. They truly did appreciate a man who appreciated his wife so much that it seemed she was all he rhapsodized about, her and his kids. In fact, he made them, inadvertently, demand respect from their own men at home. And whenever they showed up at work, they were glad to bring Jesse Lee, Jr. a foil-wrapped plate from their own table, and Jesse Lee, Jr. was always grateful.

  Dad had a heart attack running down the stairs of our family home toward the car where Mom was idling the engine for their weekly Denny’s senior citizen’s discount meal routine. I’m pretty sure he died with visions of chicken-fried steak, mashed potatoes, and banana cream pie dancing in his head. I’m sure he died a happy man.

  “Mom, would you ever get married again?” I remember asking her once.

  “Who could compare?” she said so matter-of-factly that she stunned me into silence. To have lived with and to have loved that which was the very best for her was her continued joy, now to be cherished through memories. No one could equal Dad in her heart, in her mind. And no one else would fill that place inside of her that was held sacred just for him. She was happy with that. I could see that. We all could.

  And that’s what I wanted. That’s what I foolishly thought I could have had with Sean.

  Oh, by the way, I did finally contact him, via text. I could not bear hearing the sound of his voice. I knew he would be in Europe for the next few weeks, doing the film and getting done by Brad Pitt’s twin, no doubt, and which was now none of my business, but other business had to be taken care of, therefore necessitating contact.

  I called my housekeeper Mrs. Tremaine and asked if she would be willing to come in an extra day and help me pack up all Sean’s belongings which I would then deliver to a public storage facility, and then mail the keys and vital information to Sean in care of the Bayerischer Hof hotel in Munich, Germany. Mrs. Tremaine was more than willing. She actually danced a jig.

  From the moment I walked into my brother Andre’s house that Labor Day Monday, I knew that town crier Frankie had apprised the family of my return to singlehood and the spicy details that prompted it. That they loved me so much was never in doubt, but the group hug they smothered me with, the saddened eyes, the smoochie and piteous puckers, the head pats—yes, head pats—were just a bit much.

  “You all right, dude?” my fool brother Craig asked, with a stunned look on his face as if I’d just escaped a burning building.

  “Baby, I knew from the moment I set eyes on him,” my mother cooed, pinching my cheeks like she did when I was three, “that boy was no good for you.” Having never met him, she made that assessment from a fashion layout she saw of him in Details.

  Uncle Mickey and Aunt Till, bless their hearts, having been forewarned of my unfortunate situation, did not come empty-handed. Fresh from their church choir, they offered up Hector Henderson. Now I love my Uncle Mickey and Aunt Till, but they’re just a bit too Pentecostal for my Religious-Science-Agape-Church-going taste. And although Hector seemed like a nice enough guy and was as gay as pink ink (because Lord knows I don’t do DL), bad teeth, bad skin, and “more-to-love” are not qualities I seek in a man I’m intending to romance. At least clean under your nails! But since he’s a good Christian brotha, or seemed to be, I’m sure the Lord will provide him with a gay Kirk Franklin, or a Kirk Franklin as is.

  Having escaped the well-meaning clutches of my caring adult relatives, it was rather nice being bombarded by all my young nieces and nephews who always saw me as the fun uncle, the playful one, the big kid in the family who could really relate to their devil-may-care youthful derring-do. Boy, if they only knew.

  Andre’s twin girls, Denise and Debrina, were, at nine, two of the most beautiful little brown fairy princesses one could imagine. The only time they ever got ugly was when they openly bickered over which one of them was going to marry me.

  And fool brother Craig’s brood of five—Kimberly, the ten-year-old gymnast, eight-year-old Herbie, Peewee, the Pop Warner Junior, six-year-old Dempsey, the dude from another planet, four-year-old Miss Cynthia, destined to be a future America’s Next Hip-Hop Top Model—was as foolhardy as their daddy. It’s a good thing Andre and Dee’s property was childproof.

  And then there was my beautiful cousin Laura. Laura was the political lightning rod of the family. The first black lesbian to head the gay-straight alliance at her conservative Orange County high school, a prominent organizer of the radical “Snatch Back Your Snatch” campaign, and a major activist in probably half the marriage equality campaigns in the state of California, Laura was always on m
e about settling down with a good and decent man so that he and I, and she and her partner Cheryl, could be two of the first black couples to walk down the aisle of same-sex marriage in the state, once the state legalized.

  In the meantime…

  The thing I have to realize about my family is that they believe everybody ought to be in love twenty-four/seven. I get it. But after Sean, I was about as in love with love as Dracula was in love with a spike through the heart.

  So in spite of my family’s Von Trapp–Swiss Family Robinson–Huxtable gaiety, gay me was currently queer for the cynical delights of anything but love. I wanted some of what Brad Pitt’s stand-in was getting, the milk without being bothered with the cow.

  So it was fortuitous that my phone vibrated in my side pants pocket as I looked over my kith and kin in the throes of the dizzying power of love and family. The music was too loud, the laughter too boisterous, the joy too feverish for me to have heard it ring.

  I pulled the phone out of my pocket, hoping that Sean had gotten the message. Perhaps he had. I checked the caller ID. It wasn’t Sean, thank God. It was William. William Castle.

  “I heard.”

  “Hey, Will.”

  “You and Sean.”

  “There is no me and Sean.”

  “That’s what I heard.”

  “You heard right.”

  “You poor thing.”

  “Please, I’m fine.”

  “Trash.”

  “Already on the street for pick-up.”

  “Good for you, Jesse.”

  “Thanks.”

  “You do sound fabulous, though.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Considering.”

  “Thanks.”

  “And it sounds like you’re already celebrating.”

  “A family get-together.”

  “What you need is a real get-together.”

  “You don’t know my family,” I laughed.

  “You deserve to treat yourself to something naughty.”

  “Like I said, you don’t know my family.”

  “So what does February look like for you?”

  “Why? What’s going on? Another all-boy cruise?”

  “Better.”

  Let me tell you about William Castle. Will. Will always smiles, even when you can’t see him. There’s always a smile in his voice, even on the phone. That’s because Will Castle is always happy, always mellow, always satisfied, like a gourmet after a fine meal. It is totally impossible to be down in the doldrums when Will is speaking on the opposite end of the phone.

  A bald-headed, mahogany butterball with a salt-and-pepper mustache that is always impeccably coiffed, and the hand flutters of an Italian maestro, Will has done quite well for himself as a travel agent specializing in leisure excursions that are of a particular interest to black gay men and men who love them.

  Two years ago I made extra brownie points with my sister Frankie when I took her on Will’s Southern Caribbean New Year’s Cruise. It wasn’t so much the ports of call that had baby sis in such rapture, but spending parts of eight days and seven nights with her favorite author E. Lynn Harris, who had been booked as Will’s special celebrity guest, was a dream come true for her. I was even able to get Will to arrange for her and me to be seated at the same dining table as E. Lynn.

  Frankie and E. Lynn became more than celebrity and fan. They became friends. The quintessential gay literary luminary had found in Frankie the perfect good-girlfriend fag-hag. She has a wall in her study covered with the dozens of photos I took of her and Lynn horseback riding on the private Bahamian island of Half Moon Cay, sunbathing on the white beaches of Aruba, hiking through the lush landscapes of Curaçao, and dancing the night away in the ship’s disco. She didn’t even mind that not one of the two-hundred-plus men in our group was sexually available to her. As long as she could laugh and gossip and hang out with E. Lynn, she was more than satisfied. Besides, there were plenty of drop-dead-gorgeous waiters, busboys, barmen, cabin stewards, and fitness instructors from around the world more than willing to take my drop-dead-gorgeous sister down to their rooms in the bowels of the ship and sexually service her in ways she breathlessly described as multilingual.

  Although there was definitely debauchery intended on these exotic sojourns orchestrated by the illustrious Mr. Castle (after all, boys will be boys), there was also a great deal of genuine romance permeating the titillating sea air, prompted by the smiling moon in a clear black sky reflected off a gently rumbling sea, pulsating with a swooshing rhythm that seemed to sing of love in four-four time. Not every man on Will Castle’s gay cruise client list was looking simply to get laid. A good many of them were looking to get loved.

  Same gender-loving couples signed up enthusiastically for Will’s dream cruises. Even I had been thinking about surprising Sean with a late honeymoon trip on Will’s upcoming Christmas cruise to Costa Rica. Obviously that was scrapped.

  Also, there were always a few lesbian couples that joined the party. Will, being the smart cookie that he always has been, made sure he orchestrated specific all-girl events for his female clientele, as well as co-ed, non-sexual events suitable for both genders and the handful of straight friends and relatives who just wanted to be on a cruise with a bunch of fun people, and Lord knows, nobody knows how to have more fun than a bunch of black gay folk.

  But what Will had in mind for February was something completely different and right up my newly cleaned-out alley.

  “How does a Santo Domingo land excursion sound?”

  “The Dominican Republic?” I asked with stupid glee.

  “But of course,” he cooed.

  “I want all the details.”

  I stepped out onto my brother’s front porch, away from my family’s festive howling, and listened intently to the naughtiness Will was about to describe.

  “Just imagine,” he began softly, slowly, conspiratorially, “three weeks of the most incredible sex with some of the most beautiful men to walk the face of the earth, men with erotic skills honed to please your every fantasy. Imagine, dear Jesse, dozens of men to choose from, buff and slim, every shade of chocolate, tops and bottoms, dick for the Gods, ass for the nation, romantic Afro-Caribbean Latinos to coddle you, to kiss you, to suck and to taste every part of your body, offering up every part of their bodies with an erotic generosity and dexterity that will reduce you to panting, a shortness of breath, moans and groans of sheer pleasure and indescribable delight.

  “Imagine unimaginable international ecstasy, my friend, the pungent aroma of man-to-man sex floating on a tropical breeze.”

  If nothing else, Will Castle was the ultimate drama queen. My embarrassing hard-on out here on my little brother’s front porch was a salute to his royal gift.

  “And all, so very much for so very little.”

  “Huh?”

  “The bugarrones await you, my friend.”

  “The who?”

  “The bugarrones. The Dominican men who play for pay.”

  “For pay?”

  “But of course, dear Jesse. Do you think all that pleasure comes for free?”

  “I don’t know, Will. I’ve never paid for sex before,” I said, a little nervous even as pre-cum dripping in my boxers revealed my intrigue. “And I don’t know if that’s something I want to start doing now.”

  I know, I know. That’s what they all say. But really, I had never done anything like this. The thought had never crossed my mind. Well, maybe crossed it. But it kept on stepping. Ego and vanity cheerleadered me past those occasional men who pleasured the desperate for pay.

  But the way Will described it made it sound, not so desperate, but adventurous, an adventure that costs money like any good adventure, like a cruise or a movie, like a good lap-dance. Or what it was: three weeks in Santo Domingo for the sole purpose of making love, no, having sex with beautiful Dominican men who knew how to make a traveler feel good for a price.

  “About a hundred pesos,” Will continued, ignoring my
weak protest. “A hundred and fifty, if they particularly impress. Twenty dollars. Thirty.”

  “So who else is going?” I needed to know. Nasty loves company.

  “Well, let’s see. Oliver Bevins from Atlanta of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “And Doctor Mo from our neck of the woods, oh, and Tim Thompson and Henry Anderson from the Oakland Dinner Club, the Hicks twins, and Art Pierce.”

  “Art Pierce? I thought he was in a relationship.”

  “He was.”

  “What happened?”

  “Same thing that happened to you. Trust, there will always be a handful of gay divorceés on board. Oh, and of course, you know Father Martin is coming.”

  “Martin Carl.” I smiled to myself. Knowing that he was coming was nearly enough to persuade me. I always liked and admired Martin. I looked up to him, we all did, that’s why we often referred to him as Father Martin, the senior member of our traveling group. Nearly sixty, Martin would go anywhere at the drop of a hat. He’d been working for the City of San Francisco for more than thirty years and was sincerely considering early retirement. But he liked his work, almost as much as he liked his play. And as long as he could build up a week here or a week there to hop on a plane, and as long as he could double up and work all the overtime he wanted, he maintained the best of both worlds; that of a working professional and a world traveler. I hadn’t seen him in a while. It would be nice hanging out with him again.

  But still, I had reservations, a fear of the unknown, a fear of the unknown me. What if I got down there and went buck wild? I’m not that kind of guy. But could I be?

  “I don’t know, Will,” I hedged. “Let me think about it.”

  “Well, don’t think about it too long. I’ve extended the invitation to only a select few of my traveling clients, you, of course, being one of my favorites.”

  “I certainly appreciate the consideration.”