The Wild Swans

by Peg Kerr

  Now, as Elias reached for his jeans and supped them on under the blanket, the bathroom door opened, and Sean came out in a cloud of steam, with a towel around his waist. He walked past the weight machine standing in the corner (evidently, he used it often), drying his hair briskly with another towel. Stray drops sprang everywhere, catching the sunlight as they trickled over his shoulders and disappeared into the down over his pectorals. One drop eluded the corner of the towel and slithered even farther. It left a glistening track as it nudged its way down through the dark brown hair curling around his navel, disappearing into the towel around his waist....

  “There’s plenty of hot water,” said Sean pleasantly. “Do you want a shower?”

  Startled, Elias met his gaze, and when he read the wry amusement there, he realized he’d been staring. Elias looked away quickly, heat rising in his cheeks. “I’d ... I’d like that. Thanks.” Seizing the pile of towels, he retreated to the bathroom.

  The hot water pulsing over his face and shoulders felt wonderful. Elias scrubbed hard, soaping and rinsing himself again and again to rid himself of every last trace of two weeks’ worth of grime and stink from the warehouse and the streets. Then he heard the bathroom door click open and he froze, staring at the edge of the shower curtain like a startled animal.

  “I was just going to start some laundry,” Sean’s voice said, reverberating hollowly across the tiles.

  “Would you like me to toss in your jeans and jacket, too? I have some clothes here I think would fit you.”

  After a moment, Elias found his voice and answered, trying to sound casually relaxed. “That would be great. Thanks.” He heard Sean moving around, saw a shadow on the curtain, and held his breath. Then, as the shadow moved away again, he thought of something else. “Oh, and you can ... uh, just throw out the muscle shirt.” He wasn’t sure, but he thought he heard a chuckle before the door shut again. Eventually, he reluctantly turned off the water and pushed the shower curtain aside with a rattle of rings. A pair of chinos and a blue polo shirt lay neatly folded beside the towels; underneath the pants he found a pair of underwear. He put the clothes on. The chinos fit a bit loosely around the waist, but wouldn’t be too bad if he put on his belt, he decided. The shirt seemed just right. The aroma of coffee wrapped around him warmly as he stepped out of the bathroom, making his mouth water. He went over to get his belt, draped across the back of the couch, and put it on. Several instrument cases lay crowded together in the corner. The stereo played Irish fiddle music, something bright and lively, turned down low. Curious, Elias tilted his head sideways like a parakeet, scanning the titles on the neat row of cassettes: Chieftains, Planxty, Silly Wizard, Alaisdar Fraser, Bothy Band, Horselips, The Dubliners, Battlefield Band... He picked up a cassette over to one side. The cover read

  “Clannad” and “Crann Ull.” Yeesh. Which is the album name and which is the band name?

  Sean glanced up from setting the table. “Sorry, I don’t have any opera. Or Judy Garland.”

  Judy Garland? Rather alarmed, as if he had been caught red-handed shoplifting, Elias hastily put the cassette back in the row. “I don’t particularly like Judy Garland,” he blurted out. He felt as if he had missed some kind of joke. Are gay men supposed to like her or something?

  The corners of Sean’s lips twitched. “Neither do I. Well. Looks like I guessed about right on the clothes,” he added, looking Elias over appraisingly. Maybe even appreciatively? Elias wondered, and hoped, suddenly, that Sean liked what he saw.

  “They fit great. Thanks.”

  “It figures. I haven’t been able to get into those pants for about three years.”

  Elias resisted the urge to observe that the jeans Sean wore suited him just fine.

  “I’ve got coffee going.” Sean went over to the cupboard and took out a couple of plates.

  “Yeah, I can sure smell it.”

  “Cream or sugar?”

  “Both. Please.”

  “Syrup okay for your waffles?”

  “Yeah... but I don’t want you to go to any trouble or anything.”

  “No trouble. They’re frozen, out of a box.”

  They sat together at the table and passed the margarine and the orange juice pitcher back and forth. Sean spread peanut butter on his waffles.

  Elias took his first bite and decided it had been too long since he’d had waffles for breakfast. What did gay men usually keep in their refrigerators, anyway? At least Sean hadn’t served him quiche for breakfast. “So,” he said, reaching for his orange juice. “What do you do for a living?”

  Sean indicated the desk in the corner with a tip of his head. “I’m a writer.”

  “No kidding? What sort of stuff do you write?”

  “I’m a freelance journalist.”

  Elias looked around the apartment with new respect. Sean’s home was by no means lavish. Certainly the furnishings didn’t resemble a photo spread out of Architectural Digest, although the room looked well appointed and comfortable. The stereo didn’t look cheap, and a couple of limited edition prints hung on the wall. “I thought it was pretty tough to make it that way.”

  “It can be. It’s more difficult if you’re doing fiction.”

  “You seem to be doing okay.”

  “Well...” Sean’s mouth quirked. “I’ll admit I’m not doing it entirely on my own. My great granddaddy was a railroad robber baron, and my cousins and I got a trust set up for us. It doesn’t mean I live in the lap of luxury, but it does keep me in beer and skittles.” He got up and went over to the coffeemaker to retrieve the pot. “Oh, and speaking of family by the way, I gave Rick a call this morning.”

  “Uh ... Rick?”

  “Yeah, my cousin, the one who manages the photo shop. It’s in Midtown, on Fifth Avenue. He’s still looking for somebody.” Sean filled both cups. “So I told him he might be getting a call from you later today. That is, if you want to follow up on the lead, of course?” He cocked his head, a mild challenge in the lift of his eyebrow.

  The idea of landing a job, of being able to actually get off the streets, made Elias almost dizzy with relief. He raised his chin and met Sean’s look squarely, aware he was being tested. “Can I call him now?”

  Smiling, Sean looked over at the clock. “Mmm. Almost ten-thirty. He was a little grumpy when I called earlier, but by now he’s undoubtedly had his first couple cups of coffee, so you should be safe. Yeah, go ahead. The number is on the pad by the phone.”

  Elias got up and dialed. The line rang twice, and then a voice answered curtly, “Van Hoosen Photography.”

  Elias took a deep breath. “May I speak with Rick, please?” he said firmly.

  “Speaking.”

  “My name is Elias Latham, and I’m calling to ask about the job I heard about from your cousin Sean?”

  “Yeah. Counter job, entry level. Got any retail experience?”

  “Um ... I worked for two summers in a department store in my hometown, in the electronics department. Selling mostly radios, TVs, calculators, that kind of thing. We didn’t have too many cameras, but we sold some. I usually answered most of the questions about them, because I’ve been taking pictures since I was a kid. And I’ve had some photography courses at school, including darkroom experience.”

  “Yeah, well, this would involve working with commercial processing equipment, but that’s okay, I’d train you in. And— ‘Scuse me a minute.”

  The sound on the phone line became muffled for a moment, as if the speaker held the mouthpiece to his chest while speaking with someone else. Elias reached for his coffee cup and sipped at it to steady his nerves as he waited.

  “... be with you in a second, ma’am. You still there?”

  “Yes. Yes, I am,” Elias replied, realizing after a confused moment he was being addressed. “Um ... would you like me to send you a resume or something?” He wondered fleetingly how he could work one up. Perhaps Sean might let him use his typewriter?

  “What time can you get here?”

/>   “Uh—excuse me?”

  “Look, I need to hire somebody. I’m swamped with customers at the moment, but if you can get here in an hour, I’ll give you an interview.”

  “An hour?” Elias glanced over at Sean and waggled his eyebrows. “Can I get there in an hour?” he whispered, covering the receiver.

  Sean hesitated, and then nodded. “By subway,” he whispered back.

  “Yes, I can make it there by then.”

  “Fine. I’ll be expecting you.” Without any further ceremony, the line went dead. Elias found he was grinning as he hung up the phone. He came and sat back down at the table. “If I can get there in an hour, I get an interview.” His face abruptly fell in consternation. “Oh, god ... all I have to wear are those jeans and that jacket. I don’t even have a shirt!”

  Sean picked up the plates and headed for the sink. “Just wear those clothes I gave you.”

  “Really? You’d let me?” Elias smiled, in gratitude and relief. “Thanks!”

  “Sure. They’ll do fine. And like I said, the pants don’t even fit me anymore.”

  “Oh ... what if he asks for my address? What should I tell him?”

  Sean shrugged. “I can give you my phone number. You can say you’ve just gotten to the city, so you’re crashing on my couch.”

  “I guess it’s the truth, anyway.” Abruptly, Elias remembered his manners and got up to help clear the table. As he put the orange juice back into the refrigerator, he glanced over at Sean, suddenly shy again.

  “Hey ... uh, thanks. If I... if I really get the job, I won’t ever make you sorry you recommended me.”

  Sean only smiled in reply. He had rolled his sleeves back to do the dishes, and Elias’s attention was caught by the sight of his forearms. Strong, capable looking, with just the right amount of hair over the back of his hands. And those strong musician’s fingers—Elias swallowed. His eyes met Sean’s, and from the look there, he guessed that, again, Sean knew exactly what he was thinking.

  “Here.” Sean plucked a dish towel hanging from a cupboard doorknob and tossed it in Elias’s direction. Elias was slow to catch it, and it smacked him in the face. “It’s about a twenty-minute trip to Rick’s shop, so we’ve got time to do the dishes. You can help dry. When we’re done, I’ll pull out the map to show you which subway to take.”

  Elias walked into Van Hoosen Photography an hour later. A chemical tang hung in the air. A man stood behind the camera counter, sipping a cup of coffee as he stocked a bin of film on the back wall. At the jangling of the bell hanging from the door, he turned around and saw Elias. “Yeah?” he said unsmilingly as he tucked the cup underneath the counter.

  “I’m Elias Latham, and I have an appointment with Rick, the manager.”

  “Yeah, I’m Rick. Hi, Elias.” Although a bit shorter than average, the manager had powerfully built shoulders and biceps. His intense blue eyes considered Elias appraisingly as he extended his hand across the counter. Elias came forward to shake it. The other man’s grip felt firm and cool. He had a short beard and thinning, no-color hair gathered in a tail extending halfway down his back. Rick leaned back to call over his shoulder through the open doorway behind him. “Hey, Tony, mind the counter.”

  “Yeah, just a second,” responded a voice from the back.

  Picking up his coffee cup again, Rick tilted his head toward the left. “This way.” Elias followed him down the length of the counter and through a door at the back corner of the shop. Here, a narrow hallway led to a small office on the right, hung with black-and-white photographs and crowded with a desk, a table with two chairs, and a battered typewriter. Elias blinked and peered more closely at one of the photographs. Yes, it was a picture of Sean, grinning as he played his guitar for a crowd on a street corner, his hand lifted in a flourish over the strings. In the corner a small stereo system played a tape with the volume turned down low. Something by the band Yes.

  “Sit down,” Rick said, indicating one of the other chairs as he sat behind the desk. “You didn’t bring a portfolio, I see.”

  “No,” Elias said, with a stab of disappointment. Did that mean he didn’t have a chance?

  “Well, that’s all right. This is an entry-level position, like I said. But I need someone with an artistic eye, who can talk with people who want help improving their pictures. Besides taking your turn in the back running the lab, you’d be selling cameras, film, accepting exposed film for processing, that sort of thing. We do a fair amount of custom work and some of our customers are pretty picky, but we run machine prints all day, every day. I’ve got a 5s and 8s printer and a Kreonite processor—do you know what any of that is?”

  “No, I—”

  “That’s okay, you’ll learn. That is, if you’re interested.”

  “Sure, yeah—uh, do you do any actual photography? I mean, taking pictures?”

  “Not the shop, but I do. Weekend weddings. Why?”

  “Well...” Elias gave an embarrassed laugh. “Once, when I was working in that electronics department I told you about, a customer told me you can always tell a longtime professional photographer ‘cause he’ll always have one shoulder that’s higher than the other, from toting all those heavy camera bags over the years.”

  Rick stared at him for a moment, expressionless, and then suddenly smiled for the first time. “Well, okay, so I guess you’re observant.” He leaned back in his chair. “Tell me about how you started doing photography.”

  “My father gave me my first camera for Christmas when I was eight.” He paused a moment, surprised by a small stab of pain at the memory. Christ, my father bought me my first camera. He framed some of my pictures to hang them in the hallway. He used to sound so proud, pointing them out to people who came over to visit: My son took those. Would he take them down now? Throw them away? Elias cleared his throat, tried to recapture his train of thought. “It was a Honeywell Pentax, thirty-five millimeter. I must have used up about twenty rolls of film the first month, just playing with it.”

  Rick smiled again. “What did you photograph?”

  “You name it, I took it. About a million shots of my family, the dog, the house. But you can only take so many pictures of your mother frying eggs or the dog sleeping, so after a while I switched to photographing stuff around town. I got interested in the effects of light on water and night photography. I played with different f-stops and shutter speeds, and weird camera angles. Within six months, I was begging for a telephoto lens....”

  As they continued talking about cameras, the portion of Elias’s mind that was listening and evaluating himself was cautiously pleased. He was coming across okay, he thought. Intelligent, but not too cocky, eager to learn without being too ingratiating. Mr. Ideal Potential Employee. Hire this kid and put him to work. And then Rick asked a question that momentarily threw him into confusion.

  “You’re—what, about eighteen? High school grad?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Are you hoping for something part-time you can schedule college courses around? I’m looking to hire full-time.”

  “I’m going to be—” Elias stopped himself. Of course he wasn’t going to be starting the fall semester at Cornell. He’d been accepted, but that was back when his parents were going to pay his tuition. Back before the path to his future ran into a brick wall.

  Rick was still waiting. “That is ...” Elias continued after a pause, “I’m looking for full-time work right now. I might look at starting night classes next term or something, at the university, maybe. But even then, I’d probably hope to be working full-time.”

  Maybe he could do that, he realized with a jolt as Rick nodded and moved on to the next question. Maybe he still could go to the university, putting himself through instead of having his parents pay. If he had a job, he could do it. Hell, maybe he could even call Cornell, explain that there’d been a change in his situation, and ask about financial aid. When he’d been kicked out, he’d been too stunned by the changes in his life to even think of do
ing that. Even if it was too late for him to start this fall, maybe something could be arranged so that he could go after saving up money for a year. Or perhaps Cornell could even put together a financial aid package that would allow him to start second semester. He felt something shift inside himself at the thought, at the very idea that he might have the possibility of a decent future, something he might plan and work toward. My god. I could have a real life. And landing this job is the first step, another part of his mind said firmly. Resolutely, he turned his full attention back to the interview.

  They talked about the composition of some of the pictures hanging on the office wall, and more about the job duties and the hours required, and then Rick began wrapping up the interview. “So, do you have any questions for me, Elias?”

  “Yes. Assuming I’m hired, would this job have any possibility of promotion eventually? If the company’s pleased with my work, I mean?”

  Rick scratched his beard. “Well now, theoretically if you learn everything about how the shop works, you eventually could be in line for the manager’s position—but I guess you’d have to wait a long time.”

  He gave a crooked smile. “I’ve been the manager for eleven years, and I don’t have any plans to step aside for the up and coming.”

  “I see.” A dead-end job, then, probably.

  “And frankly, I’m afraid the salary isn’t much over minimum wage.” He raised an eyebrow at the change in Elias’s expression. “You still interested?”

  Elias hesitated. Not much above minimum wage. Could he live on that? Better than earning nothing and living on the street, isn’t it? If I can actually find a way to swing college, it wouldn ‘t have to be forever. The important thing is, it’s a start.