Comfort and Joy

by Jim Grimsley

  "Ford, did Dan give you that present he showed me?"

  "We traded presents before we came," Ford answered.

  "I'm talking about the present he showed me yesterday."

  Ford looked at Dan suspiciously, and Dan's heart began to pound.

  "Good night, boys. Ford, make sure he gives it to you."

  "What was that all about?" Ford asked, when she was gone.

  Fear engulfed Dan and he stood. "I do have another present for you. I showed it to her yesterday."

  He headed for the bedroom. Ford followed him there, though they left the door open. Blood rising through his cheeks, Dan reached for his bag from the shelf of the closet, then froze. Unable to turn. Ford said, "You're really scared. This must be something."

  At first he could not find it, the wrapped box in the dark bag; then his fingertips brushed the paper surface. He had an impulse to shove the whole bag at Ford and let him fish it out for himself. But he saw Ford waiting. So he lifted the box out of the bag, sat down on the bed, and cradled it in his palms.

  The marriage summit, as Ford came to think of it, took place the January after Ford's first night with Dan. Dr. and Mrs. McKinney drove from Savannah for a long weekend and stayed in Ford's guest room, a room Ford's mother appreciated very much since she had decorated it herself. Ford watched her unpack on the sunny Friday afternoon. His father roamed another part of the house, audible only by the murmuring of ice in his cocktail glass. They planned to stay in Atlanta overnight, then drive to Nashville for the wedding anniversary of a friend.

  Mother and Father were at their most cordial, but something in their manner indicated to Ford that their enthusiasm for this discussion had waned somewhat. Ford himself had felt willing enough to listen to his parents when they suggested the talk, but now, faced with them in the flesh, he found himself sullen and unwilling. The fact of Dan had changed things in ways that Ford had only begun to understand. Watching his mother unpack, he resented the assurance with which she laid her clothing into the drawers of the empty dresser. She unfolded her sky blue nightgown and hung it in the closet. Surveying the Queen Anne bed, the Empire wardrobe, she smiled brightly, pleased with herself. "This is such a nice room," she said, "it's a shame you don't get more use out of it."

  "I could get a roommate, I guess."

  "You know that's not what I mean."

  "I suppose I could open a bed-and-breakfast."

  "Oh, Ford, stop. You think you're being clever, but you're not."

  Father joined them, and the talk passed to more mundane topics, including hospital gossip and family news. Grandmother Strachn had fallen in the bathroom and fractured her wrist; her bones were slow to heal. "I hold Rose accountable," Mother declared, "and I've told her so. Imagine, letting a woman of Mother's age bathe unattended." Courtenay had indeed moved into an apartment of her own, and Mother found it lacking, though she had only heard it described. "Some little rat's nest of a place, you mark my words. Courtenay enjoys tormenting me with this low-class behavior of hers." She had finished unpacking, and the conversation had moved, by then, to the sun porch, where she admired the blooming of the camellias beyond the glass walls. "I've sent her some nice magazines with decorating ideas, but she hasn't said a word of thanks or asked for a bit of advice."

  "Courtenay's got her own mind, Mother," Father said. "Both our children do." With a sharp glance at Ford.

  They all understood the reference he was making, just as they understood the moment had come to have the promised discussion. But now that Father had come to the point of it, his reluctance became ever plainer. They lingered on the sun porch discussing Ford's suggestions for a dinner restaurant. Mother gossiped more about Rose, who had begun to date a man who worked for the Social Security Administration— "I can't imagine anyone more tedious," she sniffed. "He might as well be a grocer."

  But finally, in the restaurant, with their dinner orders placed and wine in their glasses, Father took a deep breath and began. "Well, son, are you dating anybody these days? Your mother says you haven't mentioned a name."

  The name was on the tip of his tongue and stayed there. "I don't have a girlfriend, if that's what you mean."

  "What else would I mean?"

  "I go out with friends. Russell Cohen, the guy I told you about—"

  "The Jew," Mother reminded Father.

  "Oh, yes."

  "I have a few Christian friends, too," Ford added.

  "Don't be a bore, Ford. I was only reminding your father who he was."

  "We have Jewish friends too, you know," Father said.

  Ford apologized, and an awkward lull ensued. A bus-boy filled their water glasses. Father became increasingly discomfited in the silence, and finally asked, "Are you still seeing your therapist?"

  "No, sir. I stopped a while back."

  This was news to his parents, and his mother stepped in. "You didn't mention this at Christmas when we talked. And I know I mentioned her."

  "We didn't actually talk at Christmas."

  "We most certainly did. I told you that I thought she was responsible for this whole attitude of yours, that you can drift toward the future without any plans or prospects."

  "I stopped seeing her before Christmas."

  "I thought she was helping you."

  "She was. She did." He watched his father fidget with his silverware, straightening the knife and fork. "So now I'm cured, and I don't see her anymore."

  "You should answer your mother's question and stop being a smart aleck," Father said, his tone darkening. "Was it all that therapy that got you so confused on the subject of marriage?"

  "I'm not confused."

  He laughed in a fairly sinister way. "Oh, yes, you are."

  "Dad, I really don't see the point in discussing marriage when there's not anybody I'm interested in marrying, not right now."

  It seemed to Ford, watching his father, that there was another part to the question, that the words were almost formed on his father's lips, a specific question with nouns and verbs, but that his father pushed it back. So Ford continued, noncommittally, "I don't know what I'm interested in that way, Dad. I'm sorry but that's the best answer I can give you. I don't know any women I'm interested in marrying or even dating, at the moment. Maybe that will change. Who knows?"

  "How can you be so casual?" Father flung down his napkin and would have gone on but for Mother's touch on his arm.

  Mother spoke more gently. "It's very hard for us to understand, Ford. We thought you were quite happy with Haviland Barrows, we thought you two were perfect for each other. Then suddenly you broke her heart and the story was all over Savannah. And you've never given the least explanation."

  "I never loved Haviland, Mother."

  "You said you did."

  "Well, I was wrong."

  "How do you know you were wrong?" she asked, but a shrill note entered her voice, and the question immediately embarrassed her.

  "Mother, please."

  They sat in uncomfortable silence. Except for Father's scowling, the dinner table became almost serene. When Mother spoke again, it was to relate a bit of gossip about the hard times that had befallen the Barrowses. Father allowed himself to be drawn into speculation on exactly where all the money had gone, and his manner gradually softened to geniality. The difficulty ended. But Ford understood from glances his parents traded that their questions about him had become more urgent than before. Only their fear kept them from asking questions to which he would have to give more specific answers. Sooner or later they would figure it out, he was sure of that.

  Telling Dan about the conversation, Ford had found himself more confused and upset than he had realized, both from the memory of his parents' visit and from Dan's reaction. Ford told the story on his first overnight visit to Dan's apartment; they had seen each other only a couple of times and were still uncertain of each other. Dan thought the story of the conversation amusing. "Are you really that much of a coward?" he asked.

  Ford felt himself
flushing. "I'm not a coward. What do you mean?"

  "Tell your parents the truth."

  A knot of fear settled in Ford's stomach. "Tell them about you, you mean."

  "That's one way to do it."

  "But what if things don't work out for you and me?"

  Dan blew out breath impatiently. "So? You're still going to be gay, aren't you?"

  "I'm not gay. I never said that."

  "Well, you may not be, but you sure fooled me a couple of times."

  The fear persisted, and Ford fought off a feeling of panic. "Telling my parents about all this stuff is not as simple as you make it sound."

  "Yes, it is."

  That he would insist in this way made Ford furious, and he spoke sharply, unable to contain the anger. "Well, I said it isn't, and you're just going to have to believe me."

  Dan's eyes narrowed in anger as well, but he let the moment pass.

  They avoided the topic of Ford's parents for a long time after that.

  In those early days, through the first winter, they were together two or three times a week, dating, as Dan called it, using the word deliberately, since it clearly disturbed Ford.

  Ford's reluctance on that subject—the reality of his feelings for Dan—struck Dan as amusing. Standing together in line for a movie, or waiting for a table at a restaurant, Ford's stiff posture and glances at the rest of the crowd made it clear he was terrified of what people might think. Once, while they were waiting to be seated at a jazz club near Buckhead, Dan touched Ford on the forearm, a brief gesture but clearly an intimate one. Ford nearly jumped out of his skin, then blushed, and said nothing. He pouted for the rest of the evening, then, in the car, asked, "Do you have to put your hands all over me in public like that?"

  "Like what? Like when I touched your arm?"

  "I was so embarrassed."

  "You reacted like I'd stuck my hand down your pants or something."

  "What did you expect me to do?"

  Dan chuckled, though the conversation had begun to sting a little. "Were you embarrassed when Haviland Barrows touched you in public? Or one of those other women you told me about?"

  "You don't have to make a big deal out of this. I just think it's stupid when a couple is all over each other in front of other people."

  "I wasn't all over you, I laid my hand on your arm for a couple of seconds. Maybe you should call that therapist of yours again. It sounds like to me you need a booster shot."

  "What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

  "Maybe you need some help getting through all this."

  "Getting through what?"

  Dan allowed a silence to pool and spread. "People are going to know about us, Ford. And I don't see anything wrong with that."

  "I don't see why It's nobody's business what we do in private."

  "Oh, please."

  "No, I mean it. We don't have to be a couple like that. We don't have to walk down the street holding hands and that kind of crap."

  "Why is that crap?"

  "Men don't do that stuff. Kissing good-bye in airports and all that mess."

  "Why not? What's wrong with it?"

  "It's silly. It's not necessary."

  "You're just afraid people are going to know something about you that you don't want them to know. And you think I'm going to help you keep your secret."

  Ford exploded, gripping the steering wheel. "Look, stop pushing me. Now I've told you I don't want you touching me when we're out together and I mean it. And i don't want to talk about it anymore."

  Dan, furious, faced the passenger window and said nothing at all. They were silent the rest of the way home, and Dan slept in his apartment that night, alone for the first time in days. He could no more endure it than Ford could, and the next time they were together, it was as if the conversation had never taken place at all. Rather than provoke the fight again, Dan accepted the slight bitter aftertaste, and trusted time to make or break the rules.

  It was in planning a trip to New Orleans that they discovered the argument about money.

  "Buying first-class tickets is ridiculous." Dan waved airline ticket portfolios over Ford's kitchen counter. "Look at these prices! I've never paid this much money for an airline ticket in my life."

  "I always fly first class," Ford said.

  "Well, I don't."

  "There's no room for my legs in those seats at the back."

  "Well, you're crazy if you think I'm spending this much to go to New Orleans."

  "I'll pay for the ticket. I told you that."

  "No way."

  Ford gaped at him, red-faced. "You're being ridiculous. I have plenty of money, I can afford it."

  "I can afford it, too, if we buy tickets that don't cost my whole month's salary."

  "Well, I'm not changing these tickets."

  "Fine. I'll buy myself a ticket."

  "In coach?"

  "Yes."

  "But then we can't sit together."

  Dan shrugged again.

  "But I've already bought you this ticket."

  "I'm sure you can get your money back. And this way you won't get embarrassed that people might think we're actually traveling together."

  Gorges rising, they glared at each other. Ford, stunned speechless, slammed the ticket on the counter and stalked away.

  So they flew to New Orleans in separate cabins on the same plane, Ford sipping his first-class cocktail while Dan drank a free soda from the drink cart. The separation brought a coolness between them that lasted through their first night in the hotel.

  Waking beside each other in the strange room, however, they thawed somewhat. By the time they ordered breakfast, the argument was forgotten, or at least submerged by the fact that they were, after all, together in a new place. From the hotel they walked down Bourbon Street, past T-shirt shops, oyster bars, strip joints closed for the morning; past yellow carts shaped like hot dogs and Takee-Outee stands where the egg rolls dripped with southern grease. In the lower Quarter they found several gay bars, all of which Ford refused to enter, and one gay disco frequented by hustlers and transvestites, some of whom appeared to have been hanging around the dance floor since the night before. Dan persuaded Ford to enter by going inside himself, and they ordered morning drinks, and watched the flashing lights of the mostly empty dance floor. They spent an uncomfortable few minutes at the bar, Ford laughing outright when Dan asked whether he wanted to dance. "No way," Ford said, "you'll never get me out there in front of all these people."

  "Why not?"

  "Are you crazy? I can't dance."

  "Not even drunk?"

  "No way."

  Dan eyed him sullenly, unconvinced; then he let the subject drop. They left soon after, when the bartender sidled up to Ford across the bar and started to flirt with him so openly that a visible blush rose up from Ford's collar like a tide. Dan hardly knew whether to be jealous of the bartender or amused at Ford's discomfiture.

  For the rest of the trip they spent their time in the places where heterosexuals drank and ate, leaving Dan with the feeling that he had crashed a fraternity mixer or a Shriners' meeting. They watched an early Mardi Gras parade, and begged for beads and doubloons with the rest of the crowd. They ate beignets in the Cafe du Monde and wandered along the river walk, where the Mississippi River flowed muddily past, and they took a ride on a river-boat, listening to what was billed as New Orleans jazz. Now and then on the street they passed a pair of men standing too close to each other or holding hands right out in the open; Ford could hardly keep from gaping.

  "There's a lot of gay people here," Ford said.

  "No shit," Dan answered, but later, reflected that, for the first time, Ford had spoken the word himself.

  Checking out of the hotel at the end of their vacation, they quarreled again about splitting the bill; in the end Dan paid his share and Ford accepted the money, mouth set in a stubborn line.

  Times of awkwardness alternated with times of harmony, when it seemed to both of them that t
hey had always been together and always would be. Their sex was like a signpost for all the rest: sometimes their bodies blended as easily as on the first night; at other times they met like blunt objects, colliding with graceless thuds and thumps. At such times, Dan's questions about Ford came to the fore.

  "You never kiss me," Dan said, one day in late spring. "Why is that?"

  "I do so kiss you sometimes."

  "No, you don't."

  They were lying on Ford's bed, the windows open, listening to warblers in the yard. Dan's question drifted outward and dissipated to the point that he wondered whether he had asked it at all. "Are you going to answer me?"

  Anger settled as a stillness over Ford's features. "This is stupid, I don't want to talk about it."

  "Do you think it's not safe or something?"

  "Dan, please." Rolling over to face the window, throwing an arm over his eyes. Soon, as happened so often, his breathing deepened, and he was gone.

  He fell asleep; he was tired. He worked long hours at the hospital, sometimes two days without stopping, or even more. At home, he slept. In the middle of a conversation, he lay his head on a pillow, and, as long as Dan was close by, he drifted away. Without a thought or a care, complacent, he slept hours and hours, and Dan sat there, maddened by the regular rhythm of Ford's breathing, wishing he understood why Ford wanted him there at all.

  "Are you comfortable having sex with me?" Dan asked. "I was pretty sure you were, at first. But are you now?"

  Groggy, irritable, Ford shook his head, not as if in answer but as if the question should not have been asked at all. He lumbered to the bedroom and lay down again.

  "I need to know," Dan said, but his voice echoed and no one answered.

  They talked about spending more time alone, each of them. Dan said, "What difference would it make? You're never awake when I'm here. Why do you want me with you if you're going to sleep all the time?" And he would go home for the evening instead of sitting in Ford's house, with Ford exhausted, snoring on the couch or on the bed. Dan would sit with his cats and a book and stare at the wall above the book and hold the thought of Ford in his mind, the sweetness of Ford without any verbs, any action; and late in the night there would come a knock on the door, the turning of a key, and Ford would slide beside him in his narrower bed and say, "I couldn't rest."