by Mal Peters
“I don’t think I’ve got any chances left.”
“Well, I’m sure that’s not true.” Hugh sounds so much more certain than I feel; I could almost ask him for his secret. “I’m sorry I couldn’t be a bigger help to you throughout this whole thing, just like I’m sorry you and Nate couldn’t work things out between you. But don’t say there’re no chances left, because if there’s anything I don’t doubt, it’s the fact that Nate loves you, dude. I’ve known that much from the start, even before I knew you were the one he was so crazy about; he told me himself.”
Far beyond the point of tears threatening to spill, I hug my arms around myself and just let them fall to blend with the salt spray on my face, their taste indistinguishable from the sea. “He left,” I say again.
For a moment Hugh looks like he wants to slap me. I almost welcome it. “Don’t be such a goddamned idiot, Phel,” he snaps. “Nate wanted to find some kind of happiness out here as he tried to figure his life out, no different than you. Do you honestly think he would have just walked away and gone back to Ohio if he wasn’t willing to give anything for you to be happy instead?” He lets that sink in for a while, though my brain seems to have a hard time absorbing the words, before giving my knee another gentle squeeze to draw me back.
“You really need to stop living in such deep denial about Nate’s feelings, or your own. I know you love him too, and quite frankly it’s sort of retarded for both of you to go on being miserable on principle alone. At some point you’re going to have to give up on thinking there’s nothing else out there, because that’s a fucking choice, not a reality.” Unspoken is the reminder that Hugh spends a fair time of his own being miserable about Nell, and that’s certainly not by choice. “I mean… look. You’re a surfer, even if it took you a while to know it, and anyone who looks at you can see how naturally you come to the water. Half the waves you spot look like nothing but unbroken water to me, but somehow you always know when it’s gonna be good, and you go for it. Any true surfer knows when they’ve found the perfect wave. So why trust your intuition in the water, but not out of it? What makes you think you can be right about a wave, and not how you feel about Nate?”
“Because I’ve been wrong too many times before.” Pathetic, I know, but Hugh’s faith in me makes me so stupidly hopeful that I don’t know how to trust it.
Sharing my disbelief, Hugh scoffs. “And I was wrong about how awesome the waves were going to be out here today,” he deadpans. “Does that mean I’m not going to come back out surfing again tomorrow?”
No, of course not. Hugh says the words, and I can’t imagine not getting back up on my board after a miscalculated drop leads to a spill, or better yet, not coming back day after day until the tide is just right and the waves, however broken, carry you right on up like you’re a part of the water. That faith is what makes it okay to admit defeat one day and keep on trying the next, anticipating the moment when things are just right and you trust yourself enough to do things properly. The water doesn’t care if you aren’t ready; it’ll wait until you are. Is it the same with Nate and me? Can I admit to still needing him in my life, to wanting to try again, without feeling like I’ve betrayed myself or anyone else? Could I be anything but unhappy if I continued to stay angry and alone?
These questions unanswered, Hugh and I remain a while longer in the ocean until it becomes obvious we should call it a day. The other surfers have all but deserted the beach, and it’s a long paddle back to the shore in becalmed waters. In silence, we walk back to Hugh’s house, where he moves my meager collection of things into the spare bedroom. Like it’s a choice I can accept, or not. There’s no one forcing me to stay or go but myself.
After dinner, I’m alone in my room doing what amounts to staring into space when Hugh knocks on my door and enters with an envelope in his hand, Callie a shadow that trails close behind. He comes over to where I’m sitting cross-legged on the freshly made bed—Callie, forever lacking in propriety, leaps on top of the mattress to settle herself at my feet—and passes it over with a small, crooked smile that’s indecipherable in the dim lighting.
“I got this the other day, after Nate left,” he tells me and with a nod indicates I should open the envelope and see what’s inside. “Dunno whether it was out of hopefulness or frustration, but there’s no date on it. So you can just… do whatever you think is best. Whatever your gut tells you.”
Hugh is gone again when I look up. The only company left in the room, aside from my misery—if I’m allowed to be really maudlin—is Callie and the plane ticket she’s curiously trying to sniff in my hands. I stare disbelievingly. There’s no departure date specified, as Hugh said, and no doubt it cost him a small fortune to arrange it that way, but what’s clear as day is the destination: Columbus International Airport. My breath catches audibly in the quiet room, and the tumble in my gut is precisely the same feeling I get when crashing over the edge of a monster wave, the perfect ride sweeping up out of nothing but hope and a prayer.
It’s there for me to take it, if I’m strong enough. If I have faith, I think. If I could walk up to the man I love with forgiveness in my heart and certainty in our future, and say, Hello, Nate. Remember me? The yearning is so strong that I can feel it vibrating through the core of me like a tuning fork struck to the perfect pitch, can feel it the way I felt something click into place as I looked across a crowded bar and saw him standing there, looking back at me like he already knew my name and where’d I’d been. It feels like holding the whole ocean in my hands, all its terrifying danger and fathomlessness and possibility; it feels like looking over the edge of a cliff of water. I can go forward, or I can remain as I am. I know this.
So I close my eyes and let it carry me over.
11
Nate
THERE is only a slim—really slim—possibility that I will ever write a book of relationship advice for women, but if I had to come up with something, I would probably include this nugget of wisdom: When your ex-husband finds his way back to you on the tail of a yearlong queer love affair and immediately starts restoring every piece of furniture in sight, you are absolutely within your rights as a woman to start drawing conclusions about the relative insanity of gay men. Or carpenters.
Emilia, to her credit, doesn’t make any loud noises about what my little adventure might have done to my mental faculties, but there are times I can tell from the look in her eyes that she isn’t sure it’s anything good. My son is a bit more forthcoming in his opinions, the way ten-year-olds tend to be, but the first time he comes out and says, “Dad, you were a lot less crazy before you were gay,” I can’t really refute his observation. Trying to explain that I’ve always been gay—and crazy—probably wouldn’t help much either.
While driving across the country, I had some time to think about what I wanted to do first after California. Too many miles and too many empty roads made it impossible for my mind not to wander, but on some mornings, when I woke up to face another day of seemingly endless highways, it felt like I could keep driving until the singularity and still not find any answers. The great unknown is a scary place to be with too much on your mind; you begin to wonder if it’s possible for the human psyche to swell and swell until it has no choice but to collapse in on itself, a psychic supernova. Afraid of creating any black holes out there in the desert, I stuck to trying to figure out the stuff I could, like where I would live or what I would do for a job once I reached Ohio. Definitely not anything along the lines of Will Phel ever talk to me again? or Will I ever meet another man like him? Do I want to?
Admittedly my big plan turned out to be a little anticlimactic. The most I could decide was that I probably needed to find a hobby and should get back into carpentry. I didn’t care what—furniture, cabinets, the old countertop Emilia and I had been meaning to replace for ages…. If it had a surface that could be sanded down and refinished, I wanted to restore it. Of course, this decision seemed sensible as I drove through the southern states, but I realized a f
atal flaw somewhere around Missouri: it ain’t exactly balmy in the Midwest this time of year, and the garage, while insulated, is still cold enough to make my nuts shrivel to the size of kidney beans. Not what you’d call ideal field conditions. Even Lucy became a target for my resentment when the weather got real nasty.
But where there’s a will, there’s a way, and on most days, I had enough willpower to distract myself from what I’d left behind in Cali and the recurring full-color fantasies of wearing nothing but a smile and Phelan’s mouth. Once home, I cherished the opportunity to hug my son whenever I felt like it, despite his protests, and being back on familiar turf filled me with a not insignificant sense of relief. Nevertheless, it wasn’t long before a feeling of crushing depression reasserted itself, a familiar specter from my days alone on the road. Every tall dark-haired man to cross my path made me do a double take, and that was all the reminder I needed that yep, I was back in Ohio and the love of my life was still a week and thousands of miles away. While traveling, I couldn’t begin to count the number of times I almost turned Lucy around and drove back the way I’d come, needing Phel like a fish needs water. But the water didn’t need the fish, I guess, because he was never there swimming after me in all the backward glances I spared.
“Cut your dad some slack,” Emilia told Liam one night when she didn’t think I was listening. She had crept into his room before bed under the pretense of wishing him good night, not realizing I was only a few steps outside the door and perfectly within earshot of their conversation. “If you’d been through all the same things as him recently, you’d be feeling a little crazy too.”
When I started my first restoration project, all she said was “Do what you need to do, but you better not track any wood shavings into the house.”
So I got to work refinishing the dining room table first, thinking Emilia might like it prettied up before Christmas. In actual fact, I was distressing the wood and going for a more rustic antique effect, having gotten it into my head that the old farmhouse look was exactly what our house was missing. The table, a hand-me-down from my dad, was the right size and shape to pull off what the folks at Restoration Hardware charged thousands of dollars for. Emilia didn’t say much to dissuade me, although she did often shake her head in disapproval on the nights she caught me buried in sawdust out in the garage, dressed in a parka, wool hat, and gloves to fight off the chill.
In a familiar scene, I caught her watching me from the garage doorway, a robe pulled tight around her middle and a mug of hot coffee ready for me in her hand like a peace offering. “I think you should call him,” she once suggested, her voice encouraging. I considered it an achievement that I’d let coffee and manual labor replace my hankering for a shot of whiskey or five, but in lieu of a fuck no, I thanked her for the drink, turned the sander back on, and readjusted my safety goggles to let her know I wasn’t ready to talk about it yet.
She stopped mentioning it after that, for which I was grateful. I mean, not only is it hella weird for your wife—even soon-to-be-ex—to start offering you relationship advice about your gay lover, but she had to know I couldn’t think about it anymore. I’d explained the situation over the phone while I was still in Cardiff, so it’s not like she didn’t know how things ended between me and Phel the second time around. It cheered me up to know she wanted me to be happy, but even Emilia’s cautious optimism and strange unflagging faith in gay love stories weren’t enough to keep me going. I was emotionally and mentally wrung out. Phelan had chosen his anger over me, and that was that. I couldn’t argue with him over the ghost of our first relationship, no matter how much it haunted my daily (and nightly) existence months later. I just couldn’t.
A few weeks went by. Nothing major in the grand scheme of things, but enough for me to start to feel settled in my routine again and take over a side of the responsibility for Liam I’d never experienced when working all the time and, oh yeah, forever driving to Columbus to be with Phel. It’s not like my kid is particularly high maintenance, but it felt good to make his breakfast in the mornings and be the one to drop him off and pick him up at school each day. I turned into the kind of father and partner who had dinner on the table ten minutes after his co-parent got home.
My days were spent tinkering with things around the house and looking for work to last me until the spring, at which point I felt reasonably confident Craig would give me a job again. I knew I didn’t want my old position back. There were various reasons for it, but mostly I didn’t want to go back to Columbus and see all the places Phel and I had been together. Instead I found myself wanting something simple that would give me more time with Liam. I hoped there were still spots left among the laborers so I could continue on with the carpentry. Working with my hands and creating things felt cathartic and required enough focus to keep my mind from straying into more dangerous territory.
From what I learned on the phone with Hugh, things seemed par for the course in California. Writing was going well, Callie was great, the surfing was as awesome as ever. He missed having me around. All he ever said regarding Phelan was that he was quiet but otherwise okay, but I could tell from Hugh’s voice that he was as worried about Phel as he was me. Sometimes he made frustrated noises about how stupid we both were, at which point I usually shut the conversation down or changed the subject to something else. I never asked whether Phelan said anything about me, because I didn’t want to know either way. Eventually Hugh shut up about it altogether.
I should have known better than to trust my brother or a period of such calm—it ought to have been damn near conspicuous—but after so much drama, I think I was happy to latch on to the illusion of normalcy, let myself become complacent and resigned and numb. This is a life, I told myself. Eventually I would be happy again, because the human capacity to heal itself and move on is nothing to sneeze at. Then one day the doorbell rings, and the routine I only just started to enjoy again goes down the shitter.
It happens on a perfectly average Thursday night, the way these things do. Since most of my friends are either shared with Emilia or not the type to make house calls, I don’t get much by way of visitors in Mount Vernon. Fewer since I got back. Emilia knows how much I hate being interrupted when I’m at work in the garage, so she can usually be counted upon to get the door or phone when she’s home and I’m busy burying myself beneath a pile of sawdust. Still, I pause in the middle of varnishing a table leg to listen for the sounds of the door being answered, then return to what I’m doing once I hear her voice, muffled through the door, brighten in greeting. The male voice that answers is indistinct and all too easy to ignore, but by then I’m already back to dipping my paintbrush into the thick amber goo and smearing another coat onto the wood in thin, even coats, taking distinct pride in my work as I see the color grow dark and rich like good whiskey.
Ultimately it’s the quiet moan of pain coming from the doorway between the house and the garage that pulls me away from my work yet again. At first I’m not sure I’ve heard anything at all, except maybe the howl of the wind clawing its way beneath the garage door, but a prickling instinct has my hair standing on end before I can truly convince myself that’s all it is. The sound is a soft, low note of misery like a wounded dog might make. Or like someone swallowing reflexively to prevent anyone from hearing. Maybe I’ve been a dad too long not to respond viscerally to a thing like that, not to want to find whatever’s hurt and make it better. Or maybe it’s a pang of recognition that’d strike me anywhere, the way twins sometimes know when the other is injured or sad. I can’t ignore it, at any rate, so I turn. My breath catches and I push my protective goggles up my face so I can see better. Of course it’s him standing there in the doorway, bundled in a wool overcoat and jeans and gloves, flecks of melting snow dotting his dark hair and chimney chute eyelashes. And just like that, I’m back to thinking my dreams have come to life to haunt me during my waking hours.
I almost do rub my eyes to clear my vision, but I notice Emilia standing behind Phelan,
her figure half-silhouetted in the light that spills into the garage from the house. She gives Phel a little shove in my direction and steps back with a quirk of her lips, the latter aimed at me. “I’m going to take Liam to the mall for a while,” she says. “Leave you two to talk.”
I don’t know whether I want to thank her or beg her to stay, wrap my arms around her knees like a kid terrified of being left alone in the dark. I’m still half-convinced I’m hallucinating, maybe from having inhaled too many fumes from the varnish.
Phelan watches her go with a similar expression on his face, then turns back to me. There’s a fucking interminable pause as we stare at each other. Finally he shifts and says, “Hello, Nate,” awkwardness seeping through the crack in his voice and the way he shoves his hands deep into his pockets. With a small self-depreciating huff and a ghost of a smile, he adds, “Remember me?”
Ever the picture of intelligence, I blink. “Are you for real?” I manage to force out after another drawn-out silence. I take a step forward with my hand outstretched like I expect it to pass through him. For all I know, it will, because even though I know he isn’t actually an apparition, it’s a hell of a lot easier to convince myself I’m stuck in a deleted scene from Ghost than figure out what the fuck Phelan is doing in my garage.
Clearly misinterpreting my question, Phel falters and takes a step back just as my fingers brush the lapel of his coat. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—” he begins, swallowing when I grab a fistful of the thick wool to pull him back. “Nate?”
“How are you here?” I ask him. Still searching for a tangible explanation, I slide my hand up his chest to cup his face. His skin is warm almost to the point of feverish, and the whiff of sunscreen and sand and Phel that comes off him tingles straight from my nose down to my dick. It’s a sensory association I didn’t realize I’d developed while in California. Part of me wonders if I’m going to spring a boner every time I smell salt water or Hawaiian Tropic from now on. “Why are you here?” A terrible thought strikes me and manages to break through my stupor. “Is Hugh okay? Is he hurt?”