The Soho Press Book of '80s Short Fiction

by Dale Peck

  After a while, Jim got a real, permanent job, with bene­fits, at one of these places. But I couldn’t quite stomach the thought of making that kind of commitment.

  We stayed in touch though. Sometimes I’d work late xeroxing and Jim would come entertain me and play on the new color copier. He came up with some wild things—erasing bits, then painting over them, changing the color combos, double copying. All this from a machine that was my sworn enemy for eight hours a day. We’d have coffee or go out to a show or back to their place so Scotty could try one of his experiments in international cuisine on us before he took it to the restaurant. Also, Jim helped me move out of my old apartment.

  But Jim and I really started hanging out together a lot after Scotty. Jim had a bunch of friends, but I think he wanted not to be around where he and Scotty had been together so much: the dinner parties and dance bars, the clubs, the baseball team. So he chose to run around with me. To go out drinking.

  We met for a drink the day after Scotty. Then a week later, we did again. Over the third round Jim started to tell me about cleaning out Scotty’s room. But all the sudden he clammed up, he just clammed right up and left. He wouldn’t let me walk home with him. I tried calling him but he wouldn’t answer.

  Then a couple weeks later he called me and said, “Wanna go for a drink?” like nothing had happened.

  We met at Lucky’s. I didn’t say anything about what he had started to talk about the last time we’d met, and he sure didn’t mention it. Well, actually, maybe he did. We always split our tab, and this round was going to be mine. But when I reached for my wallet, he stopped me.

  “This one’s on me, Tonto.”

  “Tonto?”

  “The Lone Ranger.” He pointed to himself. “Rides again.”

  He clinked his glass to mine. “So saddle up, Tonto. We’re going for a ride.”

  We had a standing date for Friday, six o’clock, the Lucky. With the understanding that if either of us got a better offer, we just wouldn’t show up and the other would know to stop waiting about 6:30 or so. However, neither of us ever got a better offer. But we had a great time talking predator. We’d park ourselves in a corner behind our drinks and eye the merchandise. Me scouting guys for him; him looking at women for me.

  “He’s cute. Why don’t we ask him to join us.”

  “Not my type . . . but mmm-mmm-mmm I think some­body likes you.”

  “Who?”

  “That one.”

  “Jim, I’ve never see her before in my life.”

  “I think she likes you.”

  “I think she looks like a donkey. But hey, he looks really sweet. Go on, go buy him a drink.”

  A few times I showed up at six and saw Jim already ensconced in our corner charming some innocent, unsuspecting woman he was planning to spring on me. I usually did an abrupt about-face out of Lucky’s. But one time he actually dragged me to the table to meet whoever she was. Fortunately that evening was such a disaster he didn’t try that tactic again.

  After a while our standing joke began to wear a little thin. I cooled it on eyeballing guys for him, but he kept teasing me, making up these incredible stories about my wild times with every woman west of the Mississippi. It bugged me for a while, but I didn’t say anything. For starters, Jim wasn’t the kind of guy you said shut-up to. And then, after a longer while, I realized he wasn’t talking just to entertain us. His talk, his ploys to find someone for me, were his attempts to make the story of a good romance come true. Jim had come to the conclusion that neither he, nor many of his brotherhood, could any longer hope to live the good romance. He told me late one bleary, double­whiskey night, “Us boys are looking at the ugly end of the Great Experiment, Tonto. I sure hope you girls don’t get in a mess like us. Ya’ll will be OK, won’t you? Won’t ya’ll girls be OK?”

  Because Jim still desired, despite what he’d been through with Scott, despite how his dear brotherhood was crumbling, that some of his sibling outlaws would find good love and live in that love openly, and for a good long time, a longer time than he and Scott had had. He wanted this for everyone who marched 3rd Avenue each June, for everyone that he considered family.

  He’s sitting up against his pillows. I toss him the new Texas Monthly and kiss him hello on the forehead. He slaps his hands down on the magazine and in his sing-song voice says, “I think someone likes you!”

  I roll my eyes.

  He gives me his bad-cat grin. “Don’t you want to know who?”

  “I bet you’ll tell me anyway.”

  “Dr. Allen.”

  “Oh come on, Jim, she’s straight.”

  “And how do you know, Miss Lock-Up-Your­-Daughters? Just because she doesn’t wear overalls and a workshirt.”

  “Jim, you’re worse than a Republican.”

  “I am, I am a wicked, wicked, boy. I must not disparage the Sisterhood.” He flings his skinny hand up in a fist. “Right On Sister!”

  I try not to laugh.

  “Still, what if Dr. Allen is a breeder? I’m sure she’d be very interested in having you impart to her The Love Secrets of the Ancient Amazons.”

  “Jim, I’m not interested . . .”

  “Honey, I been watching you. I seen you scratching. I know you been itchin’ fer some bitchin’.”

  He makes it hard not to laugh.

  “Jim, if you don’t zip it up, I’ll have to shove a bedpan down your throat.”

  “In that case I’m even gladder it’s about time for Dr. Allen’s rounds. She’ll be able to extract it from me with her maaaar-velous hands.”

  And in sails Dr. Allen, a couple of interns in tow. I get up to leave.

  “Oh, you don’t have to leave.” She smiles at me. “This is just a little check-in with Jim.”

  Jim winks at me behind her back.

  I sit down in the folding metal chair by the window and look at downtown, at Elliott Bay, the slate gray water, the thick white sky. But I also keep looking back as Dr. Allen feels Jim’s pulse, his forehead, listens to his chest. She asks him to open his mouth. She asks him how it’s going today.

  “Terrific. My lovely sister always cheers me up. She’s such a terrific woman, you know.”

  I stare out the window as hard as I can.

  Dr. Allen says how nice it is that Jim has such nice visitors, then tells him she’ll see him later.

  “See you,” she says to me as she leaves.

  “Yeah, see you.”

  The second she’s out the door, Jim says, more loudly than he usually talks, “That cute Dr. Allen is such a terrific woman!”

  “Jim!!” I shush him.

  “And so good with her hands,” he grins. “Don’t you think she’s cute? I think she’s cute. Almost as cute as you are when you blush.”

  I turn away and stare out the window again. Sure I’m blushing. And sure, I’m thinking about Dr. Allen. But what I’m thinking is why, when she was looking at him, she didn’t say, “You’re looking good today, Jim.” Or, “You’re coming right along, Jim.” Or “We’re gonna have to let you out of here soon, Jim, you’re getting too healthy for us.”

  Why won’t she tell him something like that?

  There’s a wheelchair in his room. Shiny stainless steel frame, padded leather seat. Its arms look like an electric chair.

  He’s so excited he won’t let me kiss him hello. “That’s Silver. Your dear friend Dr. Allen says I can go out for some fresh air today.”

  “Really?” I’m skeptical. He’s hooked to an IV again.

  “Gotta take advantage of the sun. Saddle up, Tonto.”

  He presses the buzzer. In a couple of minutes an aide comes in to transfer the IV from his bed to the pole sticking up from the back of the chair. The drip bag hangs like a toy. I help Jim into his jacket and cap, put a cover across his lap and slide his hospital slippers up over his
woolly socks.

  “Are you sure you feel up to this?”

  “Sure I’m sure. And if I don’t get a cup of non-hospital coffee, I am going to lynch someone.”

  “OK, OK, I’ll be back in a minute. I gotta go to the bathroom.”

  I go to the nurses’ station.

  “Can Jim really go out today?”

  The guy at the desk looks up.

  “Dr. A says it’s fine. You guys can go across the street to Rex’s or something. A lot of patients do. They uh . . . don’t have the same rules as the hospital.” He puckers his lips and puts two fingers up to mime smoking.

  “Uh-huh. Got it.”

  Back in the room I take the black plastic handles of the chair and start to push.

  Jim flings his hand in the air, “Hi-Yo Silver!”

  I wheel him into the hall, past doctors and aides in clean white coats, past metal trays full of plastic buckets and rubber gloves and neat white stacks of linens. Past skinny guys shuffling along in housecoats and slippers.

  The elevator is huge, wide enough to carry a couple of stretchers. Jim and I are the only ones in it. I feel like we’re the only people in a submarine, sinking down to some dense, cold other world where we won’t be able to breathe. Jim watches the elevator numbers. I watch the orange reflection of the lights against his eyes.

  When the elevator opens to the bustling main entrance foyer, his eyes widen. It isn’t as white and quiet as he’s gotten used to. In his attempt to tell himself he isn’t so bad off, he’s made himself forget what health looks like. I see him stare, wide-eyed and silent, as a man runs across the foyer to hug a friend, as a woman bends down to pick up a kid. I push him slowly across the foyer in case he wants to change his mind.

  When the electric entry doors slide open he gasps.

  “Let’s blow this popcorn stand, baby.” He nods across the street to Rex’s. “Carry me back to the ol’ saloon.”

  I push him out to the sidewalk. It’s rougher than the slick floor of the building. Jim grips the arms of the wheelchair. We wait at the crosswalk for the light to change, Jim hunching in his wheelchair in the middle of a crowd of people standing. People glance at him then glance away. I look down at the top of his cap, the back of his neck, his shoulders.

  When the light changes everyone surges across Madison. I ease the chair down where the sidewalk dips then push him into the pedestrian crossing. We’re the only ones left in the street when the light turns green.

  “Get a move on, Silver.”

  The wheels tremble, the metal rattles, the IV on the pole above him shakes. The liquid shifts. Jim’s hands tighten like an armchair football fan’s. His veins stand up. He sticks his head forward as if he could help us move. I push us to the other side.

  We clatter into Rex’s. There’s the cafeteria line and a bunch of chairs and tables. I steer him to an empty table, pull a chair away and slide him in.

  “Jesus,” he mumbles, “I feel like a kid in a high chair.”

  “Coffee?”

  “Yeah. And a packet of Benson & Hedges.”

  “Jim.”

  “Don’t argue. If God hadn’t wanted us to smoke, he wouldn’t have created the tobacco lobby.”

  “Jim.”

  “For god’s sake Tonto, what the hell difference will a cigarette make?”

  While I stand in line, I glance at him. He’s looking out the long wall of windows to Madison, watching people walk by on their own two feet, all the things they carry in their hands—briefcases, backpacks, shopping bags, umbrellas. The people in Rex’s look away from him. I’m glad we’re only across the street from the hospital.

  I put the tray on the table in front of him. He puts his hand out for his coffee, but can’t quite reach it. I hand him his cup and take mine.

  “Did you get matches?”

  “Light up.”

  “It’s good to be out . . . So tell me, Tonto, how’s the wild west been in my absence?”

  “Oh, you know, same as ever . . .”

  “Don’t take it lightly, pardner. Same as ever is a fucking miracle.”

  I don’t know whether to apologize or not.

  When we finish our cigarettes, he points. “Another.”

  I light him one.

  “You shouldn’t smoke so much,” he says as I light another for myself.

  “What?! You’re the one who made me haul you across the street for a butt.”

  “And you drink too much.”

  “Jim, get off my case.”

  He pauses. “You’ve got something to lose, Tonto.”

  I look away from him.

  He sighs. “We didn’t use to be so bad, did we Tonto? When did we get so bad?”

  I don’t say, After Scotty.

  He shakes his head as if he could shake away what he is thinking. “So clean it up, girl. As a favor to the Ranger? As a favor to the ladies? Take care of that luscious body-thang of yours. Yes? Yes?”

  I roll my eyes.

  “Promise?”

  “Jim . . .” I never make promises; nobody ever keeps them.

  “Promise me.”

  I shrug a shrug he could read as a no or yes. He knows it’s all he’ll get from me. He exhales through his nose like a very disappointed maiden aunt. Then slowly, regretfully, pushes the cigarettes towards me.

  “These are not for you to smoke. They’re for you to keep for me because La Dottoressa and her dancing Kildairettes won’t let anyone keep them in the hospital. So I am entrusting them to you to bring for me when we have our little outings. And I’ve counted them; I’ll know if you steal any.”

  “OK.”

  “Girl Scouts’ honor?”

  “OK, OK.”

  The cellophane crackles when I slip them into my jacket.

  “Now. Back to the homestead, Tonto.”

  The Riding Days:

  One hung-over morning when Jim and I were swaying queasily on the very crowded number 10 bus to downtown, I bumped into, literally, Amy. She was wearing some incredible perfume.

  “Hi,” I tried to sound normal. I gripped the leather ceiling strap tighter. “What are you doing out at this hour? On the bus?”

  “Well, the Nordie’s sale is starting today and I want to be there early. But Brian’s car is in the shop so he couldn’t drop me off.”

  “Jeez. Too bad.”

  “Oh, it’s not that bad. He’ll be getting a company car today to tide us over.”

  “How nice.”

  She smiled her pretty smile at Jim but I didn’t introduce them. She got off at the Nordstrom stop.

  After she got off, Jim said, “She’s cute, why don’t you—”

  “She’s straight,” I snapped. “She’s a breeder. Now. She used to be the woman I used to live with. In the old apartment.”

  “The one you’ve never told me about,” he said.

  I stared into the back of the coat of the man squished in front of me. “Jim, shut up.”

  “I’m sorry, babe . . .” He tried to put his arm around me.

  I wriggled away from him.

  “Hey, she’s not that cute,” he said when I jumped off the bus at the next stop. It was several blocks from work, but I wanted to walk.

  That afternoon, Jim sent me a box of chocolates. The chocolates were delivered to me in the xerox room. They were delivered with a card. “Forget the ugly bitch. Eat us instead, you luscious thang.” I shared the chocolates with the office. They made the talk, the envy of the office for a week. I kept the contents of the card a secret.

  Jim sweet-talked my apartment manager into letting him into my tiny little studio apartment so he could leave me six—six—vases of flowers around my room when I turned twenty-seven. He taught me how to iron shirts. He wore a top hat when we went to see the Fred and Ginger festival at the U.
He knew that the solution for everything, for almost everything, was a peanut butter and guacamole sandwich. He placed an ad in the Gay News for Valentine’s Day which said, “Neurotic lesbian still on rebound seeks females for short, intense, physical encounters. No breeders.” And my phone number. Then let me stay at his place and laughed at me because I was afraid the phone might ring. He brought me horrible instant cinnamon and fake apple flavored oatmeal the mornings I slept on his couch, the mornings after we’d both had more than either of us could handle and didn’t want to be in our apartments alone, and said, “This’ll zap your brain into gear, Mrs. Frankenstein,” and threw me a clean, fresh, ironed shirt to wear to work. He fed Trudy his whole-food hippie cookies to keep her quiet so he and I could sneak out to Jean and Ange’s porch for a cigarette and a couple of draws on the flask.

  He wore his ridiculous bright green bermuda shorts and wagged his ass like crazy, embarrassing the hell out of me, at the Gay Pride March. He raised his fist and yelled, “Ride On, Sister, Ride On!” to the Dykes on Bikes. He slapped high-heeled, mini-skirted queens on the back and said in a husky he-man voice, “Keep the faith, brother.” I got afraid some guy might slap him or hit him with his purse, or some woman might slug him. When I started to say some­thing, Jim stopped. The march kept streaming down 3rd Avenue beside us. The June sun hit me on the head and Jim glared at me. He crossed his arms across his chest like he was trying to keep from yelling.

  “Tonto, what the hell are you afraid of anyway? You may like to think of us all as a bunch of unbalanced, volatile perverts, but every single screaming fairy prancing down this boulevard and every last one of you pissed-off old Amazons is my family. My kith and my kin and my kind. My siblings. Your siblings. And if you’re so worried about their behavior you should just turn your chickenshit ass around and crawl back into the nearest closet because you are on the wrong fucking ride.”

  I didn’t say anything. He stared at me several seconds. Then a couple of punky women dancing to their boom box dragged Jim along with them. I watched their asses wag off in front of me. I started to walk. But I was ashamed to march with him again. Then, when he saw the Educational Service District workers contingent in front of us, their heads covered in paper sacks because you can still be fired from your state school teaching job for being queer, Jim turned around and hollered, “At least you don’t have to keep your sweet gorgeous sexy face covered like that anymore, Tonto.” I stared at my pathetic, scared, courageous former colleagues. Jim pranced back to me and yanked me into a chorus line where everyone, all these brave, tough pansies, these heroic, tender dykes, had their arms around each others’ backs. Jim pulled me along. I felt the firmness of his chest against my shoulder.