* * *
We left the lake that day around dusk. Charlie had got a sunburn, but not as bad as it might have been had Uncle Sean not lathered him down from neck to thigh with lotion. I had left them to it. I don’t know, maybe I was hoping that Uncle Sean and Charlie would get kind of interested in each other. That way, Uncle Sean would maybe feel less sad, and maybe he would do Charlie an immense favor in the virginity department.
So I got in the backseat of Uncle Sean’s car and let Charlie ride shotgun. I got a good view of their interaction from the backseat. I think Charlie was struck, as I had been, with Uncle Sean’s beauty, because he kept his face turned to Uncle Sean all the way back to Austin, glancing at me every once in a while and smiling. I think his eyes said “thank you.” When we pulled into town, I suggested that we eat.
We went to one of the off-campus dives on Guadalupe, all three of us looking tanned and refreshed from the lake. Uncle Sean’s cornflower blue eyes and his light pink lips were set off with a fresh flush of sunburn, his hair had captured the sunlight it was so brilliant. But Charlie looked good, as well. He’s dark featured, his lips a dark reddish hue, his green eyes bright. Against a more intense sunburn his features were more shadowed in the café’s low lights; in the center of the table surrounded by condiments, a candle burned in the top of an old wine bottle, coated with a waxy lava flow, giving off just enough light to reflect in Charlie’s green eyes and Uncle Sean’s pale blue. I wondered if Uncle Sean was as oblivious to Charlie’s attention as he seemed to be. He looked around as we waited for the waiter to come by, but Charlie never took his eyes off Uncle Sean’s face. So I watched Charlie watch Uncle Sean and catch his eyes every few minutes. We ordered spaghetti and Uncle Sean ordered a carafe of red wine.
We all ate hungrily and finally got around to just visiting. Uncle Sean told Charlie about his job as an accountant at the electronics company. Charlie told him and me about growing up in San Marcos. His parents were professors at the university there.
“So I always lived among books and my parents made me study more intensely, I think, than other children in my school. I brought home nearly straight A’s all through high school and there was no question I was going to go right into college. They were a little disappointed that I didn’t go to SWTSU, but I just had to come here.”
“Why’s that?” Uncle Sean asked. He smiled at Charlie, and I could tell Charlie adored him. I could even see Charlie’s chest heave.
“I’m hoping to find a boyfriend,” he said, glancing at me, then back to Uncle Sean. “I thought I’d have a better chance here.”
Uncle Sean looked away for a moment, looking uncomfortable, and I could tell he noticed Charlie’s attention. Then he turned back to Charlie. “What about your education?”
Charlie kind of laughed, though I think he was too puppy-dog enthralled with Uncle Sean to let loose. I knew how he felt, because even now, there were times I looked at Uncle Sean and just felt things inside my chest. Then Charlie looked serious. “Yeah, sure…I need to get a degree, only I haven’t decided in what, yet. First, I just need to get this feeling out of my system, that I’m letting my personal life pass me by. I’m nineteen and have never even kissed a guy, Sean. I just can’t concentrate.”
Uncle Sean tried to hide his smile, glancing at me, then back at Charlie. “It’ll happen, Charlie. It’s important, though, that you don’t settle on the first guy who comes along, just so you can say you’ve kissed him—much less gone any further than that.”
I had to smile to myself as Uncle Sean said this, because it was almost exactly the same advice he’d given me four years earlier. I had barely turned fifteen, and Uncle Sean had already told me that he and I couldn’t be boyfriends, though he had done one thing for me. He had kissed me deeply one night, before he let me down about not being boyfriends. Then he had told me to save myself for just the right boy. He was telling Charlie the same thing.
In a way I was disappointed that Uncle Sean wasn’t thinking of Charlie in a sexual way. I thought he had been this afternoon at the lake. But now I realized it was just admiration for a nice-looking body. Uncle Sean was telling Charlie in a kind way that he was a kid, just as he had tried to tell me.
We stayed a little while longer at the café. Charlie seemed to absorb what Uncle Sean had said to him and looked let down. I felt sorry for him, but I admired Uncle Sean more than ever. Even though he was hurting and lonely, he wasn’t going to take advantage of a kid, a virgin, to satisfy some temporary lust or need. He was taking his own advice and saving himself for the right man.
* * *
Later, we drove Charlie back to the dorm then headed to our apartment. Uncle Sean was quiet on the way home, but I could almost hear the wheels turning in his mind.
The thing is, from the moment I laid eyes on Uncle Sean and even through the time that he left the farm unexpectedly to head out to San Francisco, he’d always had my best interest at heart. That had continued the whole time he was in San Francisco, and when he left there and came out here to Texas, he had never forgotten about me or what was best for me. No matter how much emotional strain and heartache he had endured over these past five years, he’d kept me at the center of his heart, I think. Hell, he’d even chosen an apartment close to the UT campus so I could practically fall out of bed into class. Its location meant that he had to commute through all the construction that was going on around I-35 and out north of Austin to Georgetown where his company was located. It meant that he had to get up every morning of the week at five to shower, eat, get dressed, and make it to work by seven-thirty. But he never complained.
The apartment was very nice, but expensive, being this close to UT, and it was nicely furnished with his own stuff, as well as the basics by the landlord. It was a small apartment building. Each apartment had its own patio, where he and I sometimes worked on Saturdays to keep it nice. It was also roomy, and we each had our own bath. He’d chosen a place large enough that Lance and I, when Lance eventually came out here, would have a bit of privacy from the rest of the apartment. I could tell that as soon as I had laid eyes on it in January. The rest of it was made up of a compact kitchen with a breakfast room which let out onto the patio, a small dining room, where presumably he, or Lance and I, could give dinners for our friends. The living room was nice and roomy and felt rich with its wall of bookshelves, floor to ceiling windows on either side of the front door, hardwood floors and high ceilings. Off the living room was a den, which was mainly unused, but Uncle Sean planned to eventually use it as a home office. The apartment building was a turn-of-the-century building that had been renovated.
The landlord was fastidious with the upkeep.
But all that aside, it was always a pleasure to come home, even though Lance was not there. It was always a place where Uncle Sean and I both liked to return to after our long days. So that night, after our time at the lake with Charlie Greenwood, and our dinner at the little Italian café, when we walked in and Uncle Sean had turned on a couple of lamps in the living room he turned to me, his eyes shining with a hint of tears.
“Will, I think it’s time I leveled with you about a few things. I wanted you to have time to get settled in, time to mourn, I guess, for being away from Lance, and to get your first semester under your belt.”
I didn’t know exactly what he was getting at, but his serious tone made me afraid, and I suppose the fear was evident on my face when I just said, “Okay, Uncle Sean. You know you can tell me anything.” In a way, I think I knew that he was going to tell me why he seemed so sad all the time, why he had chosen to almost shut himself off from the gay scene by moving to Austin, where he had complained that the men in the bars were so different and what they called ‘closeted’ compared to those in San Francisco. But then I was projecting my own thoughts onto what it was that Uncle Sean was going to tell me. And I found that I couldn’t—didn’t dare—say anything else. Not even so much as to ask any questions, though a hundred questions came to mind.
&n
bsp; I sat down in an overstuffed chair next to the couch, prepared to listen, right then, but Uncle Sean said we probably needed to change out of our clothes and to get comfortable, so we each split and came back a few minutes later. Uncle Sean was wearing a terry cloth robe and slippers, and I had just pulled on a pair of sweat pants. I was most comfortable without a shirt and shoes, and since it was a warm night, anyway, it was about as comfortable as I could get. Only I wasn’t really comfortable at all, afraid of how seriously Uncle Sean was making this ‘talk.’ I sat down in the same chair I’d been in next to the couch, but Uncle Sean asked me to sit on the couch next to him.
He had brought out a bag of marijuana on a tray, with some rolling papers and a pack of matches. I knew he smoked the stuff, but I never shared any with him, because I didn’t really like it. In a way, I didn’t like that he seemed to smoke it whenever he wanted to talk about things. I remember even on the farm, he carried a rolled joint around and took hits off of it when we were alone and he wanted to ‘relax.’ He kind of used pot like other people used alcohol, I guess. I’d discovered that Charlie did too, as a matter of fact, or kind of like some people drink before going to a party, almost like they can’t enjoy themselves unless they’re stoned.
Still, I didn’t say anything. I think if I was as sad as Uncle Sean, I’d probably drink or even smoke pot to dull the pain, too.
I watched him thumb off some of the pot from a tightly packed stem, then separate the seeds from the leaves. Even unburned, the pot had a distinct odor, which wasn’t unpleasant at all, except maybe what it represented to me. I also watched his hands and fingers as he fiddled with the rolling papers, even now admiring how sexy his hands were as they worked, especially how delicate and strong they looked at the same time. I also imagined that his hands were warm and, for a moment, I thought of Lance and how it felt for him to run his hands over my butt or to caress my face.
We were sitting side-by-side on the couch, and again I felt a little uncomfortable, but this time for different reasons, because it was the most intimate we had been in the seven months I’d been here, other than our occasional hugs. When he leaned back on the couch with the joint rolled and ready to light up, our shoulders touched, as well as our thighs, and for a moment I was afraid he was going to make a move on me. I knew I would let him, because right then, I would have been unable to resist the still strong feelings I had for him. I trusted him to not do anything wrong, and I figured that if he needed me in that way, I would carry through. It made me feel guilty to know I would do that for Uncle Sean, and I hoped Lance would understand. I also knew I would tell him.
He settled back and put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me close. My heart was pounding as I settled against him, trying at the same time to keep my legs from shaking, and then he leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. I could feel his breath on my face, and I shut my eyes, trying to sort out my feelings, because I loved him desperately, but I also loved Lance.
“Thank you, Will,” he said in a soft voice. “Just having you close like this makes me feel better. I hope you don’t mind. I just need a little body contact.”
I shook my head slightly, tried to speak, and croaked, “no…don’t mind.”
For a moment neither of us moved, and then Uncle Sean sat up, leaned over and retrieved the pack of matches. He lit the joint, holding it to his lips and took a long drag. Then he passed it to me, and I did the same. It was the third joint I had ever smoked, and I figured it wouldn’t be my last. But tonight, I was going to allow myself to let its effects soften my fear, maybe even cloud my conscience.
So for another few moments, we passed the joint back and forth, until it was half gone, then Uncle Sean tongued it out and laid it in the tray. He settled back, again, and pulled me to him as before.
And then he began to talk.
Oddly enough, he started way back when he was a kid, saying that he was the youngest of a large family. By the time he was born most of his brothers and sisters were gone from home. By the time he was a teenager, his parents were elderly.
“They were awfully set in their ways, Will. My father was strict and both my parents were religious fundamentalists. They found fault with every one of my older siblings, including your mother, which is probably why they all scattered to the four winds. No one ever returned home after a while. So I grew up alone and lonely. Arlene and Roy (he meant my parents) were the only ones who ever took an interest in me. So I jumped at the chance to spend summers with them there in Hachita. In a way, it was just as lonely for me out there as it was at home, but your mother and father tried to teach me other ways of thinking about things, other than what my father taught.”
I had always thought my father was strict, but Uncle Sean’s must have been even more so.
“I think that’s why Arlene never raised you kids to go to church. She didn’t see much good in it, and maybe she was rebellious. Roy was her way out of her family, and she took the opportunity. He was a good man, Will, as I’ve told you many times and, in the end, just before he died, I think he was trying to hold you kids together. When I came there to stay after I got out of the hospital, I think he saw me as a threat. Especially for you.”
Uncle Sean looked at me just then, and I found that I couldn’t speak because what he said was true.
“You understand, don’t you, Will, that part of the reason I left was because I didn’t want to upset your father any more than he was? Especially since he had the notion that I was gay and that I was more of a threat to you than ever?”
I just nodded, feeling the pain all over again the day he just took off without explanation. Of course, he’d tried to explain in his letter, but he had no way of knowing that morning when he left that I wouldn’t find the letter for a long time.
So far, what Uncle Sean had told me didn’t add up to a whole lot, though it did clear up what was sometimes a vague question in my mind why my mother’s family never got together after they had all grown up and married. I had long ago figured out that Daddy’s family was as scattered and disinterested in each other as Mama’s was. So I understood a little why Daddy was afraid our own family would disintegrate. I remembered with clarity and guilt that I had become rebellious, myself, after Uncle Sean left, and tears sprang to my eyes knowing that Daddy had died early on from ulcers and his operations, still afraid that our family was going to fall apart and that his one son—me—didn’t respect him as much as he probably needed.
We were still sitting close. Uncle Sean still had his arm around me. But now I was completely comfortable, maybe even like a little kid sitting close to his father, feeling protected. Only it was Uncle Sean who needed what a kid needs from his father. In a way our roles had been switched, or we were both giving and getting a kind of comfort from each other.
“But why are you sad all the time, Uncle Sean? You’ve got Mama and the girls out here. May’s happy where she is, and we do hear from Julianne and Marsha, you know? They’re busy with their own families, but we stay in touch. You don’t feel guilty about anything do you?”
He squeezed me and kissed my cheek again. “I’ll get to that, Will. I just wanted you to understand a few things about your family’s past.”
So, then, Uncle Sean talked about San Francisco. “I’ve always wanted you to respect me,” he said. “So I haven’t told you a few things about how I lived out there.”
“You mean with your boyfriends?”
He took his hand off my shoulder and ran his fingers through my hair. It was an affectionate gesture, but it made me feel a little turned on at the same time. “No, not my boyfriends, Will. There weren’t that many. When I left the farm and finished up my degree at Berkeley, I think I let loose, trying to rid myself of so much pain. I went through a period where I just gave over to the sex there in San Francisco. I never told you because I didn’t want you to think I was just a whore.”
“I never would have thought that!” I said. “I can understand it, I really can. Only it’s not what you
wanted, is it? I mean just fucking guys.”
“No. It wasn’t. It was only a temporary solution against feeling lonely. After a while, it wasn’t even good for that. It was mind and soul numbing, but it didn’t alleviate the guilt I felt. It only made the loneliness worse, I think. I knew I just had to live through the pain, not only from losing Teddy there in Vietnam, but also in all the hurt I caused you and felt because of our circumstances.” He took a deep shuddering breath. “You were just too young to know what all was wrong with how you felt about me. But, Will, you have to know that after a while I was feeling things toward you that weren’t right. Your father sensed it and so did your mother. And I’m afraid that, after that night on the way back from Deming, when I kissed you, I almost crossed over that line. You were growing into such a lovable kid. You were so ready for exploring your gay feelings, I just knew I would have an unhealthy effect on your development had I stayed. But more important, I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold off much longer. So I left. I’ve been wanting to tell you the real truth about that for such a long time. The guilt—”
“No!” I said, cutting him off. “Don’t feel guilty, Uncle Sean. If that’s what’s eating you up, just forget about it.”
But still, he started to cry a little. “I’m not as good as you make me out to be, Will.”
“Why do you say that?” I asked. My heart was pounding. All kinds of feelings were rushing through me, and I knew I could turn and kiss him on the mouth and let things go on from there. But I held back. “You’ve done nothing to feel ashamed of. If anything, I pushed you. You ask me, you were just responding like any man would.”
He laughed at that, but a sob was hidden within the laughter. “So you understand? I knew I hurt you when I left.”
“That doesn’t matter, either,” I said, quickly. “Your letter helped me more than anything, Uncle Sean. I got turned around in school, and when Lance came along, I knew you had been right about everything. Only…” I trailed off, thinking of the way Uncle Sean still kept the dog tags and picture of him and Theodore Seabrook on his dresser. But I didn’t think it was my business to tell him he needed to get over him.
All Over Him Page 7