Kevin Corrigan and Me

by Jere' M. Fishback

  Of course I still craved Kevin’s physical attentions. My sexual hunger seemed to grow stronger every month, but so did my self-respect, and maybe I no longer needed Kevin’s approval in order to feel good about myself.

  The second Friday in November, Lane’s parents took me and Lane to Cocoa Beach, on Florida’s east coast, with our surfboards strapped to the roof of the Davises’ Chevrolet station wagon. They rented two rooms, one for themselves and the other for me and Lane, at a nice motel with coconut palms, a swimming pool, and shuffleboard courts. The motel was right on the beach and within walking distance of the Cocoa Beach Pier, a wooden structure extending two hundred yards into the Atlantic.

  When we arrived at the motel, the sun had just set over the Banana River to the west. Lane and I visited the beach, where several surfers bobbed on their boards, just north of the pier. The waves rolling in were far larger than those at the Treasure Island sandbar; most were shoulder height, and I licked my lips with anticipation. Tomorrow, Lane and I would rise when the sun did. We’d wax our boards and paddle out, and as I watched one surfer ride the face of a slablike wave, I wondered just how well I could handle the pier’s larger swell.

  Friday night, Lane and I walked down a sidewalk abutting A-1-A. The four-lane highway buzzed with traffic while an onshore breeze tossed our hair into our faces. We visited an amusement parlor where we played a few games of pool, and we chattered away while we did so. By now each of us seemed thoroughly comfortable with the other, and we never really ran out of things to talk about.

  Of course I didn’t tell Lane about my relationship with Kevin. Nor did I allow myself to think of Lane in a sexual way. He was good-looking, of course. If he’d made a pass at me, I would have jumped at the chance to touch him. But he had never said anything or made a single gesture that indicated a sexual interest in me. We were friends, nothing more, and I was fine with it.

  Back at the motel, after we undressed, we climbed into our respective twin beds. Our surfboards leaned against a wall; they stood on end and looked like a pair of tombstones. After Lane extinguished the lamp on the bureau between us, we lay beneath the covers, and then Lane spoke of a vacation his family took in July each year.

  “We always rent a cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains, up in North Carolina, for two weeks. The temperature’s cool there in summer, but the sky is sunny. Every day, we do a different hike. There are waterfalls and rapids, things you’d never see in Florida. And we always rent horses for an afternoon. Ever ride one?”

  “Never.”

  “Maybe this summer you can come with us. You’d have a good time.”

  I didn’t know what to say. Until that day, I’d never been farther from St. Petersburg than Ft. Lauderdale. The thought of traveling to North Carolina seemed like a trip to the moon.

  “That would be great,” I told Lane.

  I found it hard to fall asleep that night. I was keyed up about being in Cocoa Beach and staying in a motel room with Lane and also about the possibility I might vacation with the Davises later in the year. It all seemed like a dream to me. I lay in my bed and listened to Lane’s soft snoring, and I wondered what Kevin might say if he saw where I was and who I was with.

  Kevin, I knew, had never enjoyed the type of friendship I had developed with Lane. In fact, by Kevin’s admission I was his only real friend, and really, what kind of a screwed-up friendship did we have? I was someone Kevin only came to when he was bored, or horny, or when he felt threatened by life. Otherwise, he could do without me just fine.

  Wasn’t it time I did fine without Kevin?

  “Holy crap,” Lane said in a half whisper.

  We stood on the shore, just north of the pier while the sun’s upper edge appeared on the eastern horizon, providing just enough light for us to see a wave break, about halfway between shore and the pier’s end. The wave was bigger than those we’d seen the previous afternoon. Already two guys had paddled out on their boards; they bobbed on the Atlantic’s surface while staring eastward and shading their foreheads with their hands.

  Above us, stars still appeared in the brightening sky and a half-moon was sinking toward the Banana River on the barrier island’s opposite side. A light breeze ruffled our hair while we watched one surfer turn the nose of his board toward shore. Behind him, another wave rose like a liquid wall. The surfer paddled furiously, chopping at the water with his hands, and then the wave lifted him. He popped up on his feet with his left foot forward and his right trailing. Then, after he turned the nose of his board, he skimmed across the wave’s face with his arms extended and his knees bent.

  “Amazing,” I said to Lane. “Think we can do it?”

  He looked at me and shrugged. “I guess there’s only one way to find out.”

  We walked our boards out till we were waist deep in the chilly water. Foam remnants from broken waves swirled around us. We waited for a lull in the arrival of waves so our paddle-out would take less effort, and after a minute or so, a respite came. We hopped onto our boards, lay our stomachs, and paddled like crazy until we reached the “outside,” a spot just a little beyond where the morning’s waves broke.

  We both sat on our boards, bobbing with the ocean’s roll and looking eastward for oncoming waves. By now the sun was fully above the horizon. It looked like a fiery coin, and the glare it produced made me squint while I savored the ocean’s briny aroma. Off in the distance, a manta ray the size of queen-size blanket leapt from the ocean with its whiplike tail twitching and water streaming off its skin. Then it came crashing down, spewing water everywhere.

  Lane pointed eastward. “Here comes one,” he hollered, and then we both watched the wave approach. It looked even bigger than the ones we’d seen from shore, with a glassy face and a curling lip that reflected the sun rays. We both turned the noses of our boards toward shore, then began to paddle. I heard the roar of the wave behind me—it sounded like a freight train—and then it lifted me. My board took off like a rocket while I popped up into a crouch with my arms extended. I shifted my hips for only two seconds, and my board turned into the wave’s face. Lane had done the same, and now both of us zoomed along the wave’s face like a pair of snow skiers screaming down a slope.

  Lane lifted his face; he hooted at the sky like a Comanche, and I did as well.

  Our ride probably lasted ten second before the wave petered out near shore, and both of us fell from our boards and into the shallow water. I felt so exhilarated I could barely speak. The ride had seemed like a religious ritual incorporating some sort of narcotic. Lane and I stood there, holding onto the rails of our boards, just staring at each other while huge grins painted our faces. Water streamed from our hair; it glistened on our shoulders.

  “Can you believe this?” Lane finally asked.

  I shook my head. “That wave felt like a locomotive,” I said. “It came up so quickly I didn’t have time to get scared. I just let it grab me, and then I stood up.”

  Lane nodded while he pushed wet hair away from his face. Then he looked at me. “We have to come over here more often.”

  We surfed about three hours that morning, until the waves subsided and our arms were rubbery. Several times I’d misjudged the size of a wave I tried to catch; I positioned myself too far forward on my board. Each time I did, the nose of my board went under, and so did I. I found myself spinning underwater, and each time, when I finally surfaced, I coughed up sea water like crazy.

  Still, I didn’t let myself get discouraged. My first ride had hooked me like heroin, and all I wanted was more waves. If half drowning myself was the price I had to pay for those waves, I’d gladly do so.

  When we finally came ashore and returned to our room, both of us showered and changed into dry clothes. This was the first time I saw Lane naked, and though I had promised myself I would never think about him in a sexual way, I couldn’t help myself. His broad shoulders tapered to a narrow waist, his chest was defined, and his creamy buttocks had a nice curve to them.

  There in th
e motel room, I had to tear my gaze from Lane’s body before I got stiff.

  Get yourself under control, Lockhart.

  After lunch at a cafe, Lane’s parents took us to the Kennedy Space Center, where we looked at the Mercury rockets NASA had used in its early launches, and also a Saturn V rocket identical to one launched in an unmanned flight, only days before. The Saturn was huge, longer than three football fields, and I could not imagine how such a large and heavy object could actually launch into space.

  That night, we dined on seafood at an outdoor restaurant overlooking the Banana River. I had fresh grouper stuffed with crabmeat, and I don’t think I’d ever eaten something so delicious. I don’t know why. Maybe because we dined outdoors, or perhaps because it felt so good being part of the Davis family’s weekend.

  At the end of the evening, when Lane and I climbed into our respective beds and Lane turned out the light, I lay between my cool sheets and replayed the events of the day inside my head. How could things have gone more perfectly? The surfing was fantastic, the trip to the Space Center was a treat, and—

  A vision of Lane naked and drying himself with a towel stole into my thoughts, and I couldn’t help myself; I reached between my legs and brought myself to orgasm as quietly as I could. After I cleaned myself up with the sheet, I rolled onto my side. A slice of light from a corridor fixture entered our room from the edges of the drapes, and I could just make out Lane’s facial features: his straight nose, jutting cheekbones, and cleft chin. His hair was fanned out across his pillow.

  I turned onto my back and stared at the ceiling.

  He’s your friend, Lockhart, and that’s all he is.

  Accept it.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The Thursday following my trip to Cocoa Beach, our desk phone rang at precisely eight p.m. I sat at our dining table, working on an essay for my English class, and when I heard the phone, I glanced at my wristwatch. Right away I knew who was calling.

  My sister was babysitting for our neighbors and my mom was playing bridge with neighbors, so I was alone. When I answered the phone, I didn’t even say hello.

  “What do you want, Kevin?”

  “How did you know it was me?”

  I rolled my eyes. “It doesn’t matter,” I said. “Just tell me why you’re calling.”

  “I thought maybe I’d spend this weekend at your house, if you’d like that.”

  I shifted my weight from one leg to the other while I twisted the phone cord around my finger. “Don’t you have a football game Friday night?”

  Kevin cleared his throat before he answered. “I injured my knee last week. I can’t play for the rest of the season.”

  “What about the dance on Saturday? What about the girls from St. Mary’s?”

  “I can’t dance either, not right now because I limp pretty badly.”

  I could almost feel steam pouring out of my ears. “Listen,” I said, “the last time I saw you, I finally figured something out: you’re ashamed of me and what we do when we’re alone. And I’m not important, either; I’m just somebody you see when you have nothing better to do.”

  “That’s not true, I—”

  “Why don’t you find some other queer to use? Go see your neighbor; maybe he’s more desperate than I am.”

  I slammed the phone’s receiver down on the cradle and stood there staring into space while my chest rose and fell. I felt a mixture of pride and regret: pride for finally standing up to Kevin, and regret for passing up an opportunity to have sex with him.

  Well, what’s done is done.

  I returned to the dining table and got busy with my essay. I chewed my pencil’s eraser while I tried to focus on my work instead of Kevin, but it was hard not to think of him and the sex we might have enjoyed on Friday and Saturday nights if I’d been more receptive to his request. Many weeks had passed since I’d last touched Kevin, and now my hormones were raging. I could almost smell Kevin’s piney scent when I imagined the two of us moving against each other between my bedsheets.

  Perhaps twenty minutes passed, and then I heard a familiar sound: the rumble of a Mustang’s muffler. I glanced out a window in time to see Kevin’s headlights illuminate our garage door. I sat in my chair, as still as a mannequin, while I listened to Kevin exit the Mustang. Moments later, he rapped on our front porch’s screened door.

  I flicked on the porch lights and met Kevin at the screened door. I kept telling myself, Don’t lose control. Stand your ground and don’t let him take advantage of you.

  I gazed at Kevin through the screen, but I didn’t invite him inside; I just stood there staring at him while he looked up at me from the stoop. I heard his breath whistle in his nose while his chest rose and fell. He wore a Keating sweatshirt and blue jeans, and the glow from our porch lights reflected in his yellow hair. He leaned against an aluminum cane with a rubber tip on its lower end.

  “Can I come in?” he said.

  “What for?”

  His gaze left mine for a moment, and then he returned it to me. “We should talk,” he said. “I know you’re mad, but—”

  “You’re damned right I’m mad, and I have every right to be after the way you acted at the dance. Do you know how it made me feel?”

  He shook his head.

  “Like a piece of dog shit. That’s how.”

  Kevin lowered his chin while he cleared his throat. Then he looked at me again. “I’m sorry, okay? I shouldn’t have done what I did. Our friendship’s more important than those kids in my car.”

  I hissed and shook my head. “If our friendship’s so important, then how come I haven’t heard from you in what…a month? It’s the same thing, over and over with you: I see you a few times, and then you fall off the radar. No phone calls, no visits, just…nothing. It’s like I don’t exist.”

  Kevin raised his voice a notch while he gestured with his hands like a lawyer pleading his case to a jury. “You don’t know how busy I am, and not just with football. I have school and my counseling sessions. And even though my dad’s gone, Mom still needs my help around the house. I do the yard work and clean the pool, all that stuff.”

  I crossed my arms at my chest, then raised my voice as well. “But now that your leg’s screwed up and you can’t play football or dance, you’ll have plenty of time for me. Is that how it works?”

  Kevin kept his gaze fixed on mine while he let out his breath. “Are you going to invite me in or not?”

  “I have homework to finish.”

  “I won’t stay long; a half hour tops.”

  When I motioned Kevin inside, he winced when he made the step up from the stoop to the porch. He lurched into the house like Quasimodo while his cane clunked against the floorboards.

  “Jesus,” I said, “you really are hurt.”

  He nodded, then gritted his teeth while he sat down on our sofa. “They think I tore something called an ACL,” he said. “The doctor told me I might never play football again.”

  I sat on the sofa alongside Kevin. “They can’t fix it?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “If the knee doesn’t heal by itself, there’s not much they can do.”

  We sat there for several moments, listening to the sound of traffic pass on Gulf Boulevard. Neither of us looked at the other. Kevin asked where my mom and sister were, and right after I explained, he placed his hand on my thigh. His gaze met mine and he raised his eyebrows.

  Don’t do it.

  I kept my gaze fixed on Kevin’s while I shook my head. “I don’t have the time,” I said.

  Kevin moved his hand to my crotch. He gave me a squeeze, and right away, I stiffened, something he most certainly felt. “It won’t take us long,” he said. “You know that.”

  I looked down at his hand and pulled it from between my legs. “Sorry,” I said, “but you can’t have me.”

  “Why?”

  “I already explained: I won’t let you treat me like crap any longer. Either we’re boyfriends—and that means I come first—or we’r
e not. You need to make a choice and stick to it.”

  Kevin gazed into his lap while he rubbed his lips together.

  “You don’t have to decide right now,” I said. “Take your time. But you can’t stay here this weekend, not without making a commitment first. It’s the way things have to be from now on.”

  Kevin bobbed his chin, but he still wouldn’t look at me, and I could almost hear his brain fluids churn. Finally he turned his gaze to mine, and he cleared his throat.

  “All right,” he said. “You win. Just tell me what I have to do.”

  I didn’t let Kevin touch me that night, but we agreed he would spend the weekend with me.

  “I won’t be able to surf,” he said. “Even walking is painful, so don’t expect a whole lot from me.”

  The next day, Kevin showed at my place around five p.m. with his overnight bag and his cane. My mom and sister fawned over him like he’d been the victim of a heinous crime or a war injury. They listened raptly while Kevin explained what had happened the previous Friday night.

  “A receiver I defended managed to catch a pass. When I tackled him, he was still in midair. He fell on top of me and then my leg got twisted. Right away, I knew something was wrong. It felt like someone had jabbed a knife into the side of my knee.”

  At the dinner table that night, my mom told Kevin he needn’t help with the dishes, but Kevin insisted he would. “I’m not that crippled,” he said, and soon we stood side by side at the sink. I washed while Kevin dried and put things away, just like we had that summer when Kevin lived with us.

  We passed the evening playing gin rummy with my mom and sister, then watched the CBS Friday Night Movie, an Alfred Hitchcock thriller called Torn Curtain. To be honest, I felt bored and restless. Normally, Kevin and I would have left the house to walk on the beach or maybe we’d have played mini-golf. We might have fished at the John’s Pass Bridge. But none of that would happen, not with Kevin’s knee injury in the mix, and I slowly began to realize just how serious the situation was.