by L B Winter
Shit.
There wasn’t any time to talk more, at least not with any modicum of privacy. Mom came with the warmed-up pies, and I got up to help her with coffee. After the dinner guests left, Mom and Dad wanted to hear all about school, but I was too worried about Jamie to be much of a conversationalist. Dad went to bed, but Mom, ever the optimist, continued to pry. After I had answered nine consecutive questions with, “I don’t know,” Mom put her hand on my forehead to see if I had a fever.
“You don’t seem like yourself,” she said. “Are you sure you like things at Franklin, sweetheart?”
“What? Yes, of course. I love it there.” I took her hand off my forehead, but I didn’t want to seem too harsh, so I gave it a squeeze before letting go. “I’m sorry, Mom. I’m just really tired. It’s been busy this semester.”
She put her hands on my cheeks and studied my face, silently.
What did I have to lose? Finally, I said, “Would you believe it if I said I had boy trouble?”
She sat back on the sofa, so startled that she almost laughed. “Are you dating?”
I could honestly say, “No, I promised Dad.”
Mom leaned forward and looked at me seriously. “Pauly…I know your father wants what’s best for you. But being lonely isn’t necessarily the best thing.”
That was sweet. Misguided, but sweet. “I don’t like girls, Mom,” I said.
She shook her head and laughed. “No, I know. Believe me, I know. I just…I think maybe you were a bit premature, making a promise like that to your father.”
Whoa. “What?”
“You don’t have any brothers or sisters. Your father and I won’t be around forever. I know you have wonderful friends, but…but maybe it would be wise to think about, if you really are gay, finding somebody to share your life with.”
To say I was not expecting that was an understatement of epic proportions. “Mom?”
She smiled and brushed my hair back from my forehead. “I’m sorry to hear you’re having boy trouble. If the problems are because of what you promised your dad, though—well, I want you to know that I love you just the same, no matter what you do. I’m proud of the person you are, Paul. Just think about what will make you happy, okay, honey? Not your dad, or me. You.”
My eyes got watery, because I had never fully realized before how badly I needed her to say that to me. “Okay, Mom. Thanks.”
“I love you, sweetie.” She stood up to go to bed, turning to say, “While I’m thinking of it, you really need to get a haircut, honey. Want me to call Suzie and make an appointment for this weekend, since you’re in town? It’s getting ridiculous, baby.”
Startled into laughing, I choked out, “That’s okay.” I wasn’t quite willing to put Steven out of his misery on that front yet.
Had that really happened? I never expected my mom to say that she wanted me to date—and to date boys. Had Dad’s opinions on all this changed, too? She had waited until he was in bed to say something, so maybe not.
I didn’t know what to think. But as I sat there in the dim light, remembering what Jamie had said about how lucky I was, I realized once and for all that I was right about him. If he had a support system like mine, his whole life would probably be so different.
I stared at the harvest moon through the window. Where was Jamie now? What would happen with Ellen? Would she take him back? Would she kick him out all over again? Could I have done something to prevent this?
At about ten o’clock, I decided to get ready for bed. It was hours before my normal bedtime, but Taylor wasn’t texting me back, and everybody else was enjoying a Thanksgiving-induced food coma. Trent and Steven were asleep in the guest room (I’d convinced my parents not to make a fuss over them being together) and Lynn had taken my room while I took the couch.
I knocked on my door to make sure she was awake and found her sitting up on my bed, doing supply orders on her laptop. I was getting some clothes out of my dresser when she said, “I’m sorry about messing everything up with Jamie. I feel really bad.”
I sighed. “It wasn’t your fault. I know how he gets. I’m sure he made it sound like the right thing.”
She nodded. “No kidding. He strongly implied that he had somewhere to go, and that things with Ellen were back on track.”
I raised my eyebrows. “If that’s true, it’s news to me.”
“I’m guessing it’s not true.” Lynn looked dejected, which was totally unlike her. “He didn’t even mention it until I was about to leave for New Tower.”
I walked over to her and kicked gently at her feet, which dangled off the edge of my bed. “Don’t feel bad. You did what you always do; you tried your best to help. Even just knowing that you’re willing to help makes a difference. At least, it did for me.”
She looked up and smiled half-heartedly. “Thanks, Paul.”
“Hey, who did you date the other day?”
Lynn looked surprised, then laughed. “Oh! Taylor was right; it was a guy from my gym.”
“You like him?”
She seemed distracted, but she nodded. “Yeah. Hey, are you tired?”
“Not at all. Why?”
“I have an idea.”
Half an hour later, we were driving Lynn’s car onto Jamie’s street. His hometown was small and adorable; park benches under streetlights were radiant in the moonlight, and the house he had shared with Ellen was only a couple blocks away from a church. It had a white picket fence and an apple tree. Of course it did.
“What should we say when we see him?” I asked Lynn, nervously wringing my hands.
“I didn’t think super far ahead,” she said, “but I was going to try saying he’d left something in my car. That way, if he’s there, we can check on him and make sure things are okay.”
“Sounds good. What will you say he left?”
“His phone, maybe?” she asked.
I shook my head. “He sold his phone. Say you found…” I thought for a moment. “Say you found some allergy medicine, and it isn’t yours, so you thought maybe it was his,” I said. She grinned and nodded in agreement.
When we got to the house, Lynn walked up and knocked on the door. I watched from the car while a skinny young woman with short, mousy brown hair and a pointy chin stood in the doorway, arms folded. She was wearing a black t-shirt and loose running shorts that looked like they probably belonged to Jamie. My heart tightened when I saw them. Jamie’s wife, wearing his clothes.
Ellen’s frown deepened as Lynn spoke, and then she shook her head and began to close the door. Lynn tried to keep talking to her, but the door shut in her face. Ouch.
Lynn walked back to the car in a huff.
“That rude woman!” she said.
“Her husband cheated on her,” I pointed out, and Lynn cringed.
“Yeah, I know. Ugh. This is such a shitty situation. Okay, want to know what she told me?”
“Yes!” Of course, obviously.
“He isn’t here. She basically threw him out as soon as he arrived. And now she isn’t sure where he is, but that was hours ago. He doesn’t have a phone, or any money, and she said she doesn’t care if she never sees him again.”
Yikes. That poor woman. Even hating her, I felt more than a twinge of sympathy; you don’t get mad like that if you aren’t in love. “So we have no idea where he is?”
Lynn shook her head. “I’m sorry, Paul. I know he’s important to you, and I really blew it.”
“It’s okay,” I said, even though I was reeling. “He’s an adult; he can take care of himself.”
We drove all the way home before another thought occurred to me. “He might just be around town somewhere.”
“What?” Lynn said.
“Jamie. He might have just been bumming around town somewhere. That’s what he was doing when I met him at church. We didn’t even look.”
Lynn yawned and said, “Can we go back in the morning?”
I looked at her earnestly, and she laughed. “Okay, tell you w
hat—you can take my car. But I expect you back here in an hour!”
I must have been crazy, following Jamie all over who-knew-where in the middle of the night. But Lynn, like always, didn’t judge me a bit. “Thanks, Lynn,” I said, and she took my house key and headed inside.
I drove too fast on the way back—way too fast—but luckily no cops were out, and nothing stopped me. Nothing could have stopped me; I don’t know why, but I felt as strongly about it as I had that day on the roof—that Jamie needed me, and that I absolutely could not give up on him now, not at this moment. I slowed down when I got to town, overwhelmed by what I was trying to do. Where do you even begin to look for somebody in the middle of the night? But looking for Jamie did not prove to be difficult. It was a cold night, and I saw his dark shape in the shadows in the first place I looked: he was sleeping on a bench near the church. It was exactly where I would have gone if I were him. The clock on my dashboard said 11:42. I wondered how long he’d been bumming around town, probably depressed and miserable. Randomly and out of nowhere, I thought, Was I actually attracted to this guy?
I shook the thought out of my head and shifted Lynn’s car into park. Then I scurried out in the frigid air to verify that it was, indeed, Jamie.
He was sleeping sitting up. His coat—a borrowed one of Taylor’s—was not doing a whole lot to keep out the brisk wind, and he was hunched over like a turtle, neck slouched and face ducked to avoid the cold. I couldn’t believe he would choose this over staying with me. Was being around me actually that bad? I mean, was he kidding?
“Jamie,” I said.
He opened his eyes, and for a minute he seemed confused about where he was. Then he said, “How did you find me?”
“Lynn told me where to look.” I shrugged. “It’s a small town. Didn’t take long.”
“Is the car running?”
“Yeah.”
He sprang up at once and hustled toward the car, and I followed, wondering if he could tell how annoyed I was. As soon as he got inside, Jamie began warming his hands on the heater. He was shivering, and his eyes were red and bloodshot.
I wanted to say something, but I wasn’t sure what to say. It felt like a good moment for him to say, “Thank you,” to be perfectly honest, but I’d learned lately that gratitude wasn’t really Jamie’s style—at least, not to me. Would he keep biting my head off? For some reason, I was just tired enough not to care. “So you lied to Lynn,” I said.
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“Tough. You lied to Lynn so she would drive you all the way out here, and what? You just knocked on Ellen’s door and—”
“It’s my house!”
“—expected her to welcome you with open arms?”
“She’s my wife!” Jamie spat back with clattering teeth.
“You cheated on her, Jamie!” He started, visibly angry, and I could see the wheels turning in his head. I bet he would have jumped out of the car, slammed the door behind him, and never spoken to me again, if he wasn’t already so damned cold.
“And at first, I kind of missed that fact,” I went on, “and I felt sorry for you, because I thought you were obviously still gay—confused, but not all that different from me.”
“I’m not—”
“And then today,” I said, talking over him, “I had this conversation with Lynn, and I realized something. One way or another, you fucked up: either you married a woman you didn’t love and aren’t attracted to, because you thought it was the best way to fake being straight and living a lie; or, you married a woman you love and then you cheated on her, just because…I don’t know, just because you can.”
“Paul.” There was anger in Jamie’s voice, but now that I was finally talking openly with him, I wasn’t about to stop.
“And it’s an important difference,” I went on, “because one of those things I can help you with. But the other? I really can’t, and honestly, I wouldn’t want to. Because if you love her, and you want to have sex with her, and you want to live in that house with the white fence and the—” I gestured out the window, “fucking apple trees with her, then you should do that. I mean, if she will ever take you back, which I definitely wouldn’t if I were her.”
He huffed and crossed his arms.
“But if the idea of doing that makes you mildly nauseous, and you can’t stop thinking about what you’re missing, then you know what? You shouldn’t have married her. No matter what the reason is that you gave yourself for doing it, it is never the right decision to live a lie. I’m done wearing the kid gloves with you, Jamie. You want to be honest? I’m here for you. You want to keep lying? You’re on your own.”
“What makes you think I’m lying?” he finally said, through gritted teeth. “Just because you have to beg your friends to find you other perverts to sleep with, you have no idea what it’s like—”
“I know you don’t love Ellen,” I told him, refusing to let him distract me by being the shithead I now knew he was. I said it as forcefully as I could, swallowing the sharp pain in my throat.
“Yes, I—”
“No, you don’t. You would never cheat on somebody you love, Jamie. I may not know you that well, but I know that much.” Remembering our time together at Freedom, how he’d looked at me, how he’d kissed me—hating that I could still remember how he’d tasted—I said, “You’re sincere, and kind, and you would make a great husband—if you could let yourself be with a person you really love, instead of a person you think you should love.”
Jamie swallowed, saying nothing.
“Imagine this, Jamie. Imagine God loves you no matter what. Imagine he made you, and he loves you. Your parents love you, and your friends love you, too. Being gay doesn’t bother them. It doesn’t bother anybody. It’s just part of who you are. You don’t even have to think about it that much. You can fall in love, you can get married—you can do anything that you know in your heart is right, and the whole time, you can go to church as often as you like, and you can come home on holidays.” I stared at him until he looked into my eyes. “Imagine there’s no such thing as reorientation, and you’re allowed to be exactly who you are. What would you do then?”
Jamie held on for one more second—just one more—and then, when he tried to open his mouth to answer, he just crumpled. His body shook with big, shaking sobs, and suddenly I felt so sorry for him. He was red and blotchy from the cold, and his skin looked chapped. I couldn’t believe he had stayed in the car with me all this time; if he hadn’t been so cold, there’s no way he would have let me say all those things to him.
In a softer voice, I said, “That’s my reality, Jamie. That’s my world. And if you want to be honest, too, I’ll help you. We all will.”
Jamie rubbed his nose, and when he looked up at me again, all the fight was gone from his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, Paul.” He had slouched down over his knees, and I almost reached out to him, before I remembered how much it hurt to keep getting stomped on.
But then he sat up and reached for me, laying his head on my shoulder and gripping my arm tightly. “I’m sorry,” he repeated, and I finally gave in.
“I know.” I pried my arm from his grip and wrapped him in a hug. I felt his body cave with relief as he pressed closer, and I realized how badly he needed this.
“I don’t love her,” he whispered against my chest. “I wanted to, but I never did.”
I nodded. “I know.”
“I shouldn’t have married her. And then…and then I hurt her. I did everything wrong.” He wiped his nose on his sleeve. “I lied to everybody. I’m so stupid.”
I probably should have told him that he wasn’t stupid right about then, but I wouldn’t have meant it. He’d said so much shit to me recently, and even more just now in the car, that I honestly agreed with him. He was stupid, and he’d made tons of mistakes. But maybe now we could fix them.
I met his eyes, squeezing his knee. “Thank you for being honest.”
He hiccuped,
then lunged forward and pressed his lips to mine. And for all the months I’d spent pining after him, that was just so far from what I wanted. A closeted, hot mess in total denial about his feelings was not my idea of romantic. “Whoa, Jamie,” I said, trying to pull away.
His eyes widened, and he said, “I’m sorry.” He started shaking his head vigorously and breathing quick, shallow breaths, like he was starting to have a panic attack, and my heart really did ache for him. But there was no way I was getting involved with the douchebag who just told me I was begging to sleep with perverts.
It was all I could do to tell him, “It’s okay. You’re confused right now, and that’s okay. Let’s just get going; more than anything right now, I think you need some sleep, somewhere safe.” I put the car in drive.
“Where?”
“My parents’ place. It’s Thanksgiving, you know. We’re all there for the weekend, remember?”
He sniffled and rubbed his nose. “Oh, yeah. Thanksgiving. Happy Thanksgiving, Paul.”
I glanced at him. “You, too.”
He let out a humorless laugh. “Thanks. I guess.”
CHAPTER 11
It is What it is
__________
I let Jamie sleep on the living room couch, and I made up a sleeping bag for myself on the floor in the basement. Remembering that my parents wouldn’t know who their house guest was when they came downstairs in the morning, I set my alarm for 6 A.M.
Jamie hadn’t talked much on our drive home. I’d asked him if he wanted me to warm up any leftovers for him when we arrived, and he declined. As is frequently the reaction, he expressed awe at the size of our house.
“Didn’t you say your dad is a pastor?”
“Yeah,” I said, checking under the mat for the key Lynn had left us.
“How can you guys afford a place like this?”
I always got great enjoyment from answering this question. “He isn’t the only one who works. My mom’s a senior VP at her company.”
“Wow. What’s the cost of living around here?”
I honestly didn’t know the answer to that question, or why he would be asking. “Um…low, I think? We have a lot of poverty, I know that.”