American Decameron

by Mark Dunn

  “I’m going to the little girls’ room,” Candy announces with a nervous laugh. “There’s Rodney Tomasini over there. See him? The love of my junior year. Damn, he’s looking good.” And as Cindy backs away from me and away from the fast-approaching ex-con Arnold Mordaunt, she adds, “Maybe Rodney’s forgiven me for two-timing him that whole year we went steady. And maybe he’s outgrown all that crazy.”

  “Don’t leave me alone with Arnold!” But Candy pretends not to hear me as she accelerates her retreat.

  Arnold’s eyes have that look—that look that used to send shivers down my spine when he’d get some act of mischief into his head and you could almost see the gears turning as he tried to figure out how he was going to pull it off.

  “Hi Yvette!” he says, putting me into a near-bonecrushing bear hug. “Long time, huh? I’ve been in prison, you know.”

  “Yes, I know,” I mumble, finding it hard to speak in a clear, calm voice.

  “But that’s all behind me now. In prison I found Christ. A minister I’ve been in touch with has lined up a job for me with a church outreach program over on Vine.”

  I relax. I actually start to look forward to hearing how Arnold Mordaunt has turned his life around. And I’m prepared to hear even more of this most inspiring story of faith and personal redemption, but something unfortunate keeps this from happening. Patricia Last-Name-That-Probably-Isn’t-McCloud-Anymore announces through a bloodcurdling scream that my friend Candy Melcori has just been strangled to death in the little girls’ room by a spectacularly vengeful Rodney Tomasini.

  Same ol’ lunatic Rodney.

  1983

  ETCHED IN STONE IN WASHINGTON D.C.

  Ari Gregory hadn’t slept well the night before. It wasn’t the bed; it wasn’t anything about his room at the Hotel Harrington. The problem was Ari. All day he’d been thinking—first in Wilmington and then on the train down to D.C.—about what he’d been reading about the new “gay epidemic.” First the scientists called it “GRID,” which stood for “Gay-related immune deficiency.” For a while, the Centers for Disease Control had taken to calling it, informally, the “4-H disease,” because it seemed to afflict, disproportionately, Haitians, homosexuals, hemophiliacs, and heroin users. Once word got out that prostitutes were also coming down with it, a fifth “H”—“hookers”—was half-facetiously added. Then, just last year the scientific community agreed on the acronym AIDS, the letters standing for “Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome.”

  Ari liked this better, but it didn’t make him sleep any easier. Sometimes late at night he entertained wild thoughts—thoughts that never would have entered his head in the clear light of day—that a person didn’t contract AIDS because of what he did but because of what he was. That there might even be some credence to the malignant words of the smug fundamentalist preachers: that AIDS was God’s punishment for being gay. Yet, if this were true, thought Ari, what had hemophiliacs done to deserve it? Or Haitians? It made no sense. So little of it made sense.

  When Ari confessed this fear to his friend Trevor, the wise British expat didn’t bat an eye. “Gay people are paranoid by nature. Society makes sure that we stay that way. There’s no reason you shouldn’t think you could get a disease just because of who you are. There’s also no reason that I can’t from time to time slap a little common sense into that worrisome puss of yours.”

  It was June. Seven months had passed since the Vietnam Veterans Memorial was dedicated. Ari put off going until the crowds thinned out. He didn’t want the crush of visitors to spoil his pilgrimage. He wanted to see the name of his friend Brad etched into the black granite. He had gone through high school with Brad, and then the two went off to college together—William and Mary. Ari studied colonial history, Brad was pre-law. Ari graduated. Brad dropped out to go to Vietnam, even though nobody—nobody was volunteering go to ’Nam in 1968. By 1968 everybody had gotten the memo: this was a fucked-up war, this was a war that couldn’t be won. Guys were doing everything they could think of to keep from getting shipped out, to get themselves discharged once they got drafted. Even the doyen of broadcast journalists, Walter Cronkite, regarded as the avuncular conscience of the nation, had turned against the war.

  Ari had wanted to tell Brad what a mistake he was making. He’d wanted to beg Brad to stay home, to finish college, to be the lawyer he’d always wanted to be. Ari loved Brad. But it was a different kind of love than the kind that Brad felt for Ari. He was Ari’s best friend—Damon to his Pythias. The two had run track together in high school, had worked on the yearbook together. But Ari’s feelings for Brad ran much deeper. Ari loved Brad more than he’d loved anyone in his life. He had followed him all the way to W & M, for Chrissakes.

  After Brad’s death in Ninh Thuan in May of 1969, Ari had been shattered. He’d even contemplated suicide. Life was different for Ari after Brad died. From that point forward it was a life only half lived.

  Ari wondered if seeing Brad’s name on the Memorial wall would help him let go. It was all pop-psychology shit, he knew that, but he was willing to try anything. Fourteen years was a long time to mourn someone who didn’t even know you’d been nuts about him.

  Because Ari had never given Brad even an inkling as to his true feelings. Because Brad was as straight—as proud a pussy-loving heterosexual as they came. There was a silver lining to Brad’s death, Ari would have to admit: that Bradley Patterson didn’t live long enough to have to face the day when Ari, unable to contain his feelings any longer, confessed his love and let the chips fall where they may. It could have been messy. It could have been very, very messy.

  Today was Brad’s birthday.

  Ari grabbed an egg sandwich and cup of coffee at a counter-diner in the neighborhood of the hotel and then walked over to the Mall. It wasn’t too long a hike—just long enough to give Ari more time to think. And to worry. The world had never been a safe place, especially not for people like him, but things seemed even more precarious now. Several months earlier, Ari’s brother and sister-in-law in Lawrence, Kansas, had acted as extras in The Day After, a television movie about a nuclear attack on the United States. The movie was set to air in November. While Reagan was busy rattling his presidential saber at the Soviet Union and forming his global shield initiative (dubbed “Star Wars” by a skeptical press), an American embassy was bombed by Islamic terrorists in Lebanon with great loss of life.

  Reaching Constitution Gardens just north of the Reflecting Pool, Ari quickly found himself convoyed by several groups of people moving silently—almost reverently—in the same direction. Though referred to as “the Memorial Wall,” the monument was actually two walls that came together at a 125-degree angle, both seeming to rise up out of the ground to convey the sense of a great gash—a wound that was now closing up, in the process of healing. People of all ages and ethnicities stood or squatted or bent down before the wall, each relating to the monument in his or her own way. Hardly anyone was speaking. There was a sepulchral hush among the memorial’s visitors that was undisturbed even by whispers. It was as if all conversation in this sacred place was limited to telepathic dialogues between the living and the dead.

  Ari stopped first at the directory at the west end of the wall. The directory contained the names of the nearly 58,000 dead and missing servicemen and their location on the 144 panels. He quickly located “Bradley Patterson, Panel 25W, Row 81.” He walked to the designated panel and then counted down the rows to number 81. There, flanked by a Marvin E. Park and a Washington Pauley, was Bradley Patterson. All three men shared the same death date: May 12, 1969. There were others who’d died on this day as well.

  With his fingers, Ari traced the straight lines and the curved contours of the etched letters. Several panels to his left a woman was making a pencil rubbing of one of the names. Ari had no desire to do this. He had other, more meaningful totems by which to remember Brad—snapshots, his high school annuals, the Cream album (Disraeli Gears) that Brad had bought when Ari dared him to take a sabbatica
l from country music and get himself something halfway hip, and which he had ended up gifting to Ari after tripping out one night and ever thereafter swearing off both psychoactive drugs and psychedelic rock.

  Ari allowed his fingertips to linger there for a moment longer and then he pulled his hands away. He stepped back. The ground right in front of the monument was covered in flowers and dog tags, teddy bears and toys. Ari was reminded that most of the American men who had died in the war were hardly men at all, so many of them mere teenage boys with mothers and fathers who had many years of life left to mourn their fallen children.

  Ari had seen the name he had come to see. He didn’t feel like looking at the names of the other men—many of whom, had they lived, would be close to his own age: thirty-five. The number of the dead—his contemporaries—whose names had been forever carved into that wall overwhelmed him. He turned, and in doing so came face to face with a young man who looked to be in his early twenties. The man bore a very strong resemblance to Brad. In fact, the resemblance was so striking that Ari was taken aback. It was as if Brad had been standing behind him, looking over his shoulder for the last several minutes.

  The mystery was quickly solved. The young man said, “Are you here to see my brother—to see my brother there on the wall? I noticed you were touching his name. You weren’t touching any of the other names.”

  “Is your brother Bradley Patterson?”

  The man nodded. He had long ash-blond hair that he brushed away from his eyes. They were Brad’s eyes—the same emerald brown, the same smiling creases in the corners.

  “You’re Randy, aren’t you?”

  The young man nodded. “And you’re Ari.”

  “You were, what—six or seven when he died? In my mind I don’t think I ever let you grow up.”

  Randy Patterson shrugged and half-grinned. “But since my name isn’t Peter Pan, I didn’t have much choice.”

  “What are the odds that we’d both wind up here on the same day at the same time?” asked Ari.

  “Not so bad. This being Brad’s birthday and all. I wanted to come early because I have to get back to New York. I go to Columbia.”

  “What are you studying—no, let me guess. Pre-law like your brother?”

  “I don’t know. I haven’t made a declaration. Right now I’m spending most of my time working for Gay Men’s Health Crisis. Have you heard of it?”

  Ari nodded.

  Randy elaborated: “AIDS is already an epidemic, but they’re predicting it’s going to get a lot worse before the guys in the lab coats can get a handle on it.”

  Ari, noticing the close proximity of several of the other visitors, said, “Are we done here?”

  Randy nodded. The two men started to walk away from the wall, and toward the lake.

  Ari pointed. “Last year they put a memorial on that island. It’s dedicated to all the signers of the Declaration of Independence. I thought I’d check it out.”

  “I remember somebody saying you studied colonial history at William and Mary.”

  “I did, but who would have told you—Brad? You were a little kid at the time.”

  “One of my parents, I guess. Later. Maybe years later, I don’t know.”

  “So there was mention of me after Brad died.”

  “You were my brother’s best friend, weren’t you? The two of you used to do everything together. Dad said he always knew you were gay, the way you ran after Brad like a frisky little puppy.”

  Ari stopped. “I didn’t come out to anybody until I was almost thirty. Your dad must have had some finely tuned antenna when it comes to this sort of thing.”

  Randy nodded. He smiled. “Hey, he figured me out before I was twelve. I think it was the way I threw the ball during all those Dad-mandated t-ball games. Brad was dead and I was his surviving son, and talk about one father’s lousy luck. The dead son was a Vietnam War hero and the live one’s a ‘fucking fruit salad.’ Direct quote. And I didn’t come out quietly, either. The shame of it was enough to make him resign as president of the Rotary Club.”

  The statement had bite. And relevance. Brad’s kid brother didn’t hold back. His frankness was a little startling, but also refreshing, especially given that so much of Ari’s interaction with the world had been so guarded, and far from indicative of who he really was.

  “You have to catch a train?” he asked.

  “I’ll catch a later train. You hungry? Can you look at your 1776 memorial some other time?”

  Ari nodded. “A friend of mine recommended the cafeteria at the National Gallery. Don’t laugh, but they’re supposed to have this really great Southern menu.”

  Randy grinned. “Do the cooks charm the husk right off of the corn?”

  “Yes, Mame. I understand that they do.”

  The two men had an early lunch of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, collard greens, and cornbread.

  Randy remarked that he felt like he was back visiting his grandmother in Oklahoma.

  Ari remarked that he had been in love with Randy’s brother since the two boys met in the seventh grade.

  “What do you think he would have done if he’d known?” asked Ari.

  “Probably knocked your block off. From what I heard—and remember that I didn’t have the pleasure of getting to know my brother all that well—he probably wasn’t, in truth, the paragon of sensitivity and tolerance that you wanted him to be.”

  “He was good to me. We were pals.”

  “But he didn’t know the real you. I’m not saying he was an asshole underneath whatever it was he put out to you; I’m just saying he was probably just like every other straight guy who grew into red-blooded American manhood back in the sixties. The whole idea of homosexuality was a real brain-fuck to them. Same as today, maybe even worse now. You know what they’re saying about gay men these days—that we brought this disease on ourselves. I’ll grant you the promiscuity in the gay community is something that’s a little hard to defend. But speaking as a bona fide fruit salad, we don’t deserve to be marginalized, or worse, demonized. Reagan hasn’t said a word about the AIDS crisis, and I don’t think he’s going to. The only time he’s opened his mouth about gay people was to remind voters during the election that he doesn’t condone their ‘lifestyle.’ And my mother wonders why I’m an activist.”

  Ari stood up. “I’m getting more coffee. Do you want anything?’

  “No thanks.”

  Struck by a sudden thought, Ari sat back down. “You think I’m a little nutty, the way I’ve carried a torch for your brother all these years?”

  Randy shook his head. “I know you loved Brad, even if in my lowly opinion there might not have been enough there to sing a torch song over. Don’t get me wrong. He was a good man. I loved him too. He was my brother. But he wasn’t out to change the world. He wanted to get his degree, get himself hired by some big corporate-ass-kissing law firm, snag himself a blond trophy wife, and sire his two and three-quarters children, just like society expected him to. You fell in love with him—if I can be so bold—because he was one hell of a looker. God, was my brother gorgeous. I don’t blame you. But be careful how you lionize him or whatever. He was a guy who—I’m trying not to oversimplify this, but I can’t help myself—a guy who just happened to be blessed with very good looks. As you can probably tell, it runs in the family.”

  Randy winked.

  “I did notice that you inherited some of those same genes. But I think you’re wrong about Brad. And me. I’m not that shallow. There was something else going on there.”

  “Your homosexual fantasy. What is this masochistic thing we gay men have for straight guys? Hey, I need to get to Union Station.”

  “Any chance I could—”

  “See me again?”

  “Well, yeah.”

  “What? To give me another shot at trying to topple my brother from that pedestal you’ve placed him on? Or is there some other reason?”

  “I’ll take ‘B.’”

  Randy shook his h
ead. “Presently celibate. And planning to stay that way.”

  “Since when?”

  “Since I contracted AIDS. You don’t want to get mixed up with me, Ari. I wouldn’t wish this disease on my worst enemy.”

  Knocked back by this admission, Ari didn’t speak for a moment. Then, softly: “Do your parents know?”

  Randy shook his head. “I’ll tell them when I have to. Look, I didn’t intend to drop this bombshell on you, but given the fact that you sometimes have trouble letting go of people, I thought it best to nip this in the bud.”

  “You’re being awfully presumptuous.”

  “I can tell by the way you’re looking at me. I can tell that you’re looking at me and thinking of Brad. And I know that this can only lead to a bad end.”

  Randy stood and held out his hand. Ari, a little dazed, shook it slowly in a loose grip. “Bye, Ari. You take care of yourself. I mean that in every possible way.”

  Ari watched as Randy walked out of the cafeteria. Ari finished his second cup of coffee and then wandered through the museum, only half registering the paintings that hung all around him.

  Later he returned to his hotel and cried. He cried for a very long time.

  And then he went to the Air and Space Museum.

  1984

  PATRIARCHAL IN CALIFORNIA

  Regina appreciated the support. She really did. Because she didn’t want another child. No matter how much Guy did. The Chillwaters had four children already—all girls. A fifth kid—that much-hoped-for Chillwater boy—well, look, it just wasn’t going to happen. Not if Regina and the couple’s four daughters and Guy’s sister and her husband and Guy’s mother had anything to say about it.

  Yet Guy was obdurate, immovable, infuriatingly pigheaded in refusing to give up on his dream of perpetuating the family name through a son. Even though his own mother didn’t seem all that broken up about seeing this branch of Chillwaters get an unintended pruning.