Now the incandescent teeth of the blade are running up my throat.
He drops his hand and pleads with me. “My dad can’t know that I’m gay. If people found out, it might hurt his reputation.”
I hold on as long as I can. I beat back the urge, but it was too hot to keep down. The searing sting of the truth is impossible to quell. I snap aloud, “Shut up,” at him, and he flinches back against the fury of my voice. I shoot up out of my chair and begin to pace around the room. Hopefully, I can regain some composure by pacing out the intense heat inside my body. Jonathan reaches for the call button, but I lunge across the bed and smack it out of his hand. I lean over him, sticking my finger in his face saying, “Listen, what those men did to you, they did out of hatred and fear. Some people are always trying to hide the evil in the world. Don’t make their job easier.”
I take the call button and toss it on Jonathan’s lap.
“If you truly believe that you are to blame, then press the button. Press the button if you can honestly, from this point on, look yourself in the mirror and say you deserve those scars and bruises.”
He takes the call button in his hand, staring at it as his chest fills with air, then lowers it rapidly. His eyes snap from me to the clunky device in his hands. His breathing softens. The air begins to pour out of his nostrils in low and steady gusts. His chest settles. He raises the huge remote up in his hand and tosses it to the side of the bed. The AC unit kicks on and the room fills with the smell of bleach and the bitter chill of cold air.
After that, we stew in the silence. Neither one of us have the words to segue into a goodbye. No buzzing comes from my pager, no knock on the door from a nurse comes to break this horrible moment. I can’t rely on the world outside of this room to take pity on us. Finally, I tell Jonathan that it’s ultimately his choice, his decision on how to handle his life. I walk back to my seat, letting out a deep sigh. He is telling me, “I just didn’t want other people getting hurt on my behalf.” His head lowers under the weight of his thoughts.
I tell Jonathan, “You know you don’t have to worry about Maddox. He is pretty tough.” We talk about his fight, his recovery, how I got to know him. Talking about Maddox seems to help Jonathan smile more. He speaks louder and moves his hands when speaking. Maddox is our common ground, our mutual friend who is a selfless protector as much as a broken mess. By the time my pager does buzz and the nurses knock on the door, we had talked for twenty minutes or so. I leave Jonathan with a smile and he returns one back to me.
Chapter 29
I move around the rest of the day making rounds, monitoring patients and consulting. In certain pockets of free time, between the moments of absolute concentration, I think about Jonathan. He had adopted a vision of how his world worked from the petty minds of demagogues. It served him well enough at least for vanity's sake. He also harbored another vision though, one where he could freely move through space without the stigma of labels. The two visions, of course, clash and one would take root, grow large and prosper for a time.
He had to make sure he was acting like a straight guy, whatever that entailed. I imagine that he would have to make flirtatious comments to the female nurses as much as possible when it was necessary and when certain people were in the room. However, that would become exhausting, and inevitably there would be a moment where he realized the absurdity of keeping his homosexuality a secret.
I wish I could tell myself that Jonathan will have it easier from now on. I wish I could say that he won’t have to worry. The hidden glances of disapproval in his family will continue and take varying forms. I wish I could say that he will be stronger after all this, that the visible scars will fade with time. I wish I could tell him every time he doubts himself that he only needs to be reminded of how he took his hits and still stood tall. The truth is, I have no idea how he’ll handle any of this. I only hope that in the future he can stand up for himself and not the vanity of others.
Chapter 30
The streets out of the city beat up my balding tires. It isn’t until I cross the threshold to the outer limits of the county that they begin to smooth out into long ribbons of gray asphalt. The speckled, rectangular lights of the city give way to the beanpole lamps. Their glow hangs like yellow halos over the streets. The road begins to cut a free path over the land. It makes swaggering, bowed out curves and rolls up and down the hills as if it enjoys the rising and falling of the earth.
I’m pushing the pedal to the floor over each ascent. The car revs then pulls back with the action of my right leg. I’m letting myself feel the excitement of each moment when the headlights can’t bend their light over the top of the road. Every new descent brings a shock of adrenaline. At exactly the moment when I peak the hill, my legs go into a tingling sensation and the full weight of the car lifts then comes back down hard on the bouncing suspension.
Past these snaking roads, rising hills and falling valleys, Maddox waits for me. I let the radio sing to me. I move my hand off the steering wheel to change the station but stop as soon as I touch the dial. It’s like the touch of the dial triggers a memory because I can see my mother. She is driving me to school. Or maybe she is driving me and my sister, Jasmine, the eternal do-gooder, to a friend’s house. Either way, I move my hand away from the dial. She never picked a station she just let it play.
My sister and I would always want to change the station. We would argue with our mother until she reluctantly allowed us to filter through the bad music in search of what we felt was truly decent. When we finally found a station, we would listen to one or two songs until we decided to change again, and then the process would repeat for the length of the drives. My mother sighed in protest. It got even worse when the two of us couldn’t agree on what was considered “good” music. We’d shout in an attempt to drown out the other’s opinion. So my mother prohibited us from touching the radio at all. Mother would say, “There’s good music on every station,” her eyes never leaving the road. She would keep one hand on the wheel and with the other, point a tyrannical finger at us saying, “If you’d just be patient and wait a while, you’ll hear something good.” Then she would quickly look over to me and smile. There would be long stretches of time before I heard anything I liked, but when I did hear something I liked it felt new, better and somehow special.
I let the radio play. I let the road wind around, taking its time as if it, too, is making its way to Maddox’s. I feel the resistance of the gas pedal on the right foot as I push down hard on it. The needle of the odometer is steadily rising. It shoots across the glowing numbers like a comet across the night sky. Fits of static roll over the songs, cutting them up into small slivers of actual music. My attention moves away from the raspy tunes. I’ll be arriving at Maddox’s soon, according to the little box on my dash. He called me while I was at work. When I saw his name on my phone I could feel the corners of my mouth rise. He invited me to dinner. I asked everyone I could to cover me for my shifts so I could spend at least one night with Maddox.
As I drive, I assume the house is the home of Maddox’s late grandmother, which would make the roads that I’m now driving on the same he took into the city. He drove through the same hills and turns. And because it takes some time to get from the house to the city, he had time to think. I imagine that he must’ve tortured himself the whole time. I’m not entirely convinced he is a reformed man, but I definitely think he’s worth more than the sum of his failures. When I think about Maddox, it occurs to me he has no equal. I can’t even find a comparison in the people I’ve known in my life. Maddox, it seems, is a wholly original person.
He has the gift to make me smile just by looking at me. Who wouldn’t, with those eyes? They are a color unmatched by any that I’ve seen, somewhat blue yet light green-- aqua---like the color of blue-green ocean water, the kind that’s shown in vacation advertisements for the Bahamas and the like. That’s the word I come up with to describe them.
He moves with the pain of his injuries, but somehow s
till remains sure-footed. He confidently strides next to you and every time I speak, he turns his head to listen. His presence is welcoming. He is very handsome and aware of it, but not arrogant. He could easily play the good-looking asshole who gets by on his looks, but I think he has too much going on inside to be swept up in vanity.
This is not to say that he does not exude confidence. He swings his massive shoulder as he walks. He raises his eyebrows in an effort to question you without saying it out loud. When he looks away from the conversation, I can tell he is forming his own self-assured opinion. Maddox is not simply, or easily, categorized.
I struggle to think of a concise set of adjectives to use in describing him. This struggle intensifies when I think of how I’ll tell my sister, Jasmine and even worse than that, when telling my mother and suddenly I surprise myself at even thinking about me and Maddox like that, with a future.
I have five minutes until I reach Maddox’s place. Even in the darkness the massive houses are visible. Their arching frames and vast windows reach for the sky in praise to the grandeur of their inhabitants. Lights encased in beautiful glass adorn the houses and shine bright enough to display everything from the house to the driveway. The lawns are expansive, well-kempt fields that lead to a panoply of flowers, shrubs and trees, all contained within a specific degree of curtailment. Nothing is out of place. No wayward leaf has ventured beyond its designated borders. No gardener has tracked the cement with green shoe prints or wheel smudges of a deep green.
The whole scene looks like an immaculate ghost town. No oak-lined streets with couples leisurely strolling along the sidewalk, out for an evening walk. No, these houses are partitioned off from the road with high hedges and trees and with only the wrought iron bars of the gates allowing enough of an opening to peek into their plush realms. Other than a few lights from within the houses, there is no sign of life. The roof tops shoot up in grand triangular forms.
I’m a minute away from Maddox now. I sail through the street, all too aware of my own presence. I am completely out of place. Even the road feels too pristine to drive my car on. I feel strangely alienated by the giant window-eyes of the houses. As if from behind these sheets of glass, there are judgmental eyes.
The gray box on my dash tells me I have reached my destination and just as I notice this, I see a driveway on my right that leads up to a cathedral of a house. This is more than I had pictured when Maddox said he lived with his grandma, far more than I had expected. I suppose that he will be staying here until her estate can be sold. It will be fun to have dinner here and see what the inside looks like. Maddox, a huge mansion and he’s cooking. He just keeps on surprising me at every turn.
Chapter 31
My car is dwarfed by the huge driveway. It is a veritable parking lot, in fact, and the house itself is just as large. I shut my car door, sending out an echo into the neighborhood. I don’t realize the amazing silence until I produce some noise. In the city, there is no shortage noise. Garbage trucks, street sweepers, the backing up beep of large, industrial vehicles and airplanes all play a part in a grand symphony of the city.
But now, in this neighborhood, the only raucous sound is the now-faded echo of my car door. As I walk up to the door, I can’t help but linger a little longer in the silence. It absolutely fills the streets. It soaks into the trees and grass and marks its line at the summit of each house. A stiff breeze jostles the leaves at the top of a far-away tree. The pom pom shake of the leaves eventually dies down and the silence comes strolling back.
I take out my phone and begin to shuffle through the names until I find Maddox’s. I stop and stuff my phone back in my pocket. I’m standing right in front of the door and for a moment I have the thought to call him. I’ve done this kind of thing before where I arrive at someone’s place and call them instead of knock or ring the bell. In this neighborhood, I would feign respect for the serenity of silence.
I knock three times and wait. In such a big house, maybe it was necessary to call after all. The porch I’m waiting on has two wicker rocking chairs. In my mind I could see Maddox and his grandmother leaning back in the white chairs and enjoying the last bits of light the day had to offer.
The door flings open and Maddox stands in the threshold with his chest heaving up and down. His smile is its own embrace but one that beckons me. He begins to explain something, but I can’t stave off the urge to touch him. I pull his face down to my lips with my hand on the back of his head. The sensation of kissing is tactile, of course that started when our lips met. Soon hormones are transferred through saliva and scent detected, registered for possible compatibility, and the great nature of selecting a mate has begun. At least that’s how my science textbooks would explain it, but I don’t give a shit about that because right now, it just feels so damn good to feel his lips. We stumble back into the house as I taste every delicious bit of his kisses. I angle his body to the nearest wall, slamming his back against it while his mouth meets every one of my advances with an equally desperate hunger.
I’m sliding my hands along the sides of his face. And every tactile response generated in my fingers runs the length from my hand to the synapses in my brain and back to my insatiable lips. It feels like a trail of fire blazes through its entirety. I pull back, opening my eyes so they can drink in his gorgeous face. I push my lips into his again while he tries to mumble something. I let go to allow his fumbling mouth the words to speak and he apologizes for taking so long to get to the door. I dip my chin to my chest and feel a slight heat of a blush rising in my cheeks, and reassure him it’s fine.
He takes my hand in his, saying, “Do you usually greet people like this?”
I tilt my head to the side and put my finger to my chin, trying to think of something clever to say to divert the attention away from my overzealous behavior.
“Um...just ex-patients, oh...and current patients and, of course, Mormons.”
He smiles, nodding his head with raised eyebrows, and says, “Oh. Okay. Well, if that’s how you greet people, I’m sleeping next to the door in anticipation of your arrival.”
We kiss again, the touch of his lips light this time, and the sensation of him lingers. I pull back my head with my eyes closed, wondering if every embrace will be this good, and I open my eyes to see a chandelier hanging above me. It bends and curves so beautifully. The light from its slender bulbs illuminate an enormous foyer. A table in the center of the foyer is the only piece of furniture other than the coat rack next to the door. I expected the house to be grand, but my expectations are exceeded by the sheer amount of space in this one room. I turn, wide eyed, to Maddox and with an exhale of disbelief, I say, “I think this room is bigger than my whole apartment.”
He laughs, saying, “The exploits of my grandmother’s intellect paid off, and then some.”
The bannister on the far end of the room catches my eye. As I walk towards it, the detail of its design become more and more clear. I place my hand on the swirling end and think of the cold metal rail that I have to use at my place. I turn to look back across the room to Maddox. He stands as I did under the chandelier, whose center bulb design drops to a point over his head. It hangs from the ceiling by a thin wire that looks as if the weight of dust could pull it loose.
Maddox’s footsteps echo off the tile floor, off the molding and the panel walls and I realize that this very bannister, and this foyer, were part of a scene in my head when Maddox explained what happened the night of the fight, one in which I saw Maddox stumble up stairs past his gracious benefactor and loving grandmother. I play the scene in my head and then look to Maddox.
“Is anything wrong?”
I open my mouth to speak, but the words get backed up in my throat. I close my mouth but his eyes beckon the truth, so I reluctantly tell him.
“I, uh, have this image of you...walking up these steps. Past your grandmother...and, well, when I saw the stairs, I couldn’t help but be taken back to what you said.”
He blinks and his eyes s
hift to the side as the weight of my words sink down on him. But he nods, and in a warm voice he continues.
“I feel the same way.” His eyes sway back to me. He extends his hand out to me. “I don’t think I’ll ever see anything else, but...it’s my motivation.”
I place my hand in his.
I ask him, “For what?” as I squeeze his hand.
And in a relaxed tone, he says, “To be better than I was.”
I blink and smile at him.
“Come on,” he says, and leads me out of the foyer.
I look down at our hands clasped together as we pass into the kitchen. And then a realization hits me. I’m being taken care of by another person. I can smell the faint scent of freshly-baked bread. I have a vision of Maddox perusing the recipe, taking extra care to measure every ingredient before it’s added. I don’t realize until just now how good it feels to be cared for. I mean, I care for people, but out of necessity. Maddox does it just because...well, I hope because he likes me. Was he cooking for me the way everyone cooks for a date? Guys cook for my sister all the time. She told me it lasted once or twice, then immediately stops as if the novelty was too ephemeral to be kept up. If the cooking was Maddox’s ploy, what is mine?
Lily's Temptation Vol. 1 Page 18