“Do you want me to stay?” He asked.
Everyone turned to me and waited for an answer. I, of course, responded with my clever and insightful, “Huh?”
“Do you want me to stay with you?” Cai repeated.
I thought about how he must be feeling right now. How difficult it must be to choose between his mother and the only people who never failed him. I hoped to hell he wasn’t hinging his decision on me. I wasn’t exactly impartial. “Yes. I want you to stay. I think it would be best if you stayed. No one could love you as much as Peter, not even your mother. But I’m biased when it comes to mothers.” I went back to reading my magazine. “And…I like you, too,” I grumbled.
He kissed my cheek, and I felt the wetness on his lips. First thing I was teaching him was how to not cry all the goddamn time. I didn’t look up when he made his announcement. “I’m sorry, mamma.”
“No. I will not allow it.”
“Let me know when you’re done with this conversation. Peter needs his tongue bath. I mean sponge bath.”
“Austin, Dammit!” Peter rubbed his face.
Cai hiccupped a giggle. Everyone else was silent as I licked a finger and turned another page.
“You see? He is an animal. You want my son to be with an animal? Sex. All he thinks of is sex. He does not even have a table for a family meal.”
“Aaaand we’re back to that,” I said, flipping another page. I opened my mouth to say exactly what I’d do to Peter on a dining table, but Peter must have read my mind.
“Not helping, Austin.” he took a deep breath. “I promise I’ll buy a table. We’ll eat dinner as a family. I’ll even take Cai to the mosque.”
“But…um…I don’t believe in,” Cai meekly trailed off, “God.”
The argument waged on for an hour. Cai pulled up a chair next to me and watched them like a home movie, cringing in parts, crying in others, sometimes burying his face in his knees.
“It shouldn’t be this easy to say goodbye to her,” Cai said for my ears only.
“It shouldn’t,” I agreed, “But it’s not your fault, kid. You don’t know her. And staying is what’s best for you. She’ll realize that before she goes.” In retrospect I shouldn’t have been the one comforting Cai about his mother leaving. My interest lay in his feelings. I had little sympathy for her. Or mothers in general.
In the end, Rosafa did realize what was best for Cai was staying with Peter and Darryl. I had to give her credit for that. Later, I would find that my behavior with Rosa that day incited Peter to insist I resolve things with my own mother.
Questioning the Gay
Angelica had me thinking about proposals and the future. Gay. It changed everything. But then, it always had. Being gay had defined my whole life, and I hadn’t even been aware of it.
Gay was the reason I had no close male friends after high school. Except for Dave. Because I was never attracted to him. Dave was safe. Other men weren’t.
Gay was the reason I quit playing football with the guys. After a few boners in the middle of a game, I gradually became busy on Sundays so I could spend them with Luis, with Dave and Marta, with Angelica. Excuses so I could avoid my reactions to sweaty male bodies.
Gay was the reason I hopped from one woman to the next. The reason I never held onto a relationship. If I dug deep enough, I could probably find a host of other ways that being closeted had impacted my life. But what was important now, what I couldn’t stop thinking about was: Would my outlook change now that I had accepted I was gay? Would my moral views change? Did I believe the same things? Monogamy? Marriage? Kids? Peter seemed to think I shouldn’t.
“I’m just sayin’ it’s not realistic,” he said, placing his foot on my chair between my legs.
“You and your realism.” I lifted it and pulled his sock on, then forced his foot into his shoe. “Because I’m gay I’ll suddenly change?”
“Because you’re just out. You’re going to find a lot of things change. Starting a relationship with the same mentality isn’t realistic.”
I finished tying his sneaker and motioned for his other foot. He complied, smiling as I rubbed the arch before shoving his foot in the other sneaker. “What about you?”
“It’s different for me.”
“Because you’re not gay?”
“Because I’ve sucked and fucked enough to figure out that one dick is just like another, one vagina isn’t any more special than another, and I’ve got more important things to do than looking for a new trick every night.” He winced and rubbed his abdomen. “I already found out that marriage isn’t what holds people together, Austin. And infidelity isn’t what tears them apart. We’re going to be together on our own terms.”
He pulled off his shirt and immediately my questions took a backseat. His abdomen was a patchwork of scars, from the surgical one running straight down his torso to the smaller ones from his colostomy bag and the bullet wound. Their red raw nature reminded me that Peter was still in pain. That his wounds itched and burned so badly he slept in fits. Not a good time for me to start an argument.
As he pulled on a fresh t-shirt, I determined not to give in to the heart pounding fear that was tying knots in my throat. My hands shook as I secured his other shoe. The fight wasn’t worth the heartache. “We can talk later.”
“I thought we worked this all out?”
“We worked out that I forced monogamy on you when I didn’t really figure out if that’s what you wanted. Or even if I could be.”
“You think I feel obligated to be with you on your terms?” He smiled, tossing me an empty gym bag. I started to pile in the clothes that Darryl and I had bought for him.
“Your mother thinks you’re indebted to me because you owe me money. Darryl thinks you owe me because of Cai. And Rosafa thinks you’re with me because Cai is choosing to stay here after you decided to move in with me. Yeah, I think you might feel obligated.”
“Overthinking. It’s like a disease with you. They should make pills for it.”
“They do. Little blue ones that drive the blood from the brain straight to the cock.”
“Hard-ons don’t make you think less. They make you think stupid. Which makes me think you must have one 24/7.”
“Ouch.”
“Austin.” He propped back on his hands, his t-shirt sliding up to reveal a portion of the scar on his abdomen. My stomach contracted in empathy. “For the record, I want to be exclusive.”
He had carefully avoided my question. “Do you feel obligated to me or not?”
“Of course I do. I told you that before. But it’s not why I want to be with you.” He zipped up the bag and picked up the newspaper-wrapped gift I’d given him an hour earlier. Instead of opening it, he’d set it on the side table and ignored it while he got dressed. In the wake of this discussion, I had forgotten it. Now it rested ominously in Peter’s lap. Like he expected it to hold some clue to our future.
“I’ll get the release forms,” I said, standing up.
He ripped open the package before I could escape. “This is why I want to be with you, Austin. Not because of money or emotional debt.” He fingered one dingy ear of the slippers I had rescued, his smile taking my breath.
My stomach flipped a few times. “Because I dry cleaned your slippers?”
“Because you value what’s really important.” He inhaled and exhaled loudly and set the slippers on the bed beside him. “Now I have to ask you for one more thing.”
“If it’s a three-way with Darryl, I am not going to be the girl.”
The severity of his gaze made me glad my nose wasn’t within flicking range. But, since his tongue could be just as sharp as his fingers, my ears were already preparing for his barb. “I think you should go see your mother before she dies.”
There was no preparing for that.
Whatever It Takes
“No,” I said, keeping the rage out of my voice with herculean effort. “Are you ready to go?” I held out my hand. He passed me the gym bag,
keeping hold of the handles as I grabbed it. I couldn’t jerk it away without jarring him. I let go. “I don’t have a mother.”
“Not for me. Not for her. For you.”
This could be an argument by being stubborn, or I could convince him how bad an idea it was. I sat next to him, staring out the window. “You want me to tell off a dying woman?”
“If that’s what it takes,” he said. “You’ve been here six weeks, every day, and didn’t even visit when you tested to donate your liver to her! She’s one floor up.”
“There are a lot of strangers one floor up. Am I supposed to visit them, too?”
“You walked right past her room.”
“We should talk about something more important. Like who is supplying your information.” There was only one person who could have told Peter I had been upstairs. “You know what I find ironic? My homophobic father has spoken to my male lover more times in two months than he has to me my entire life.”
“You know what I find ironic? My homophobic mother offers you her cabbage rolls as a truce and you respond by asking her if it was ’tacit approval‘ to suck my cock.”
“She shoved a phallic symbol my way and told me to eat it.”
“If your idea of a cock is a stuffed green leaf covered in red sauce, we have more to discuss than monogamy.”
“You used ironic incorrectly.”
“Shit happens!” He spat. Oops. I had hit the Peter-thinks-I-think-he’s-stupid button.
“Then again, so did I.”
He narrowed his gaze and blew out a breath. Our relationship was a series of volatile reactions. With the rollercoaster ride my pulse was on, I could honestly say that I liked it that way. These days our arguments were heated, but not cruel. Our makeups were even better.
He chewed his inner lip. A sign I always took as him figuring out how to get me to do something. “I think you should see your mother. Something is making your dad get involved with all of this.”
“You’re a manipulative asshole, you know that?”
“You love it.”
“Only when your manipulations are to get into my pants.”
“Yes, my so clever manipulations to get into your pants. What were those again?”
“Breathing. Talking. Existing.” Snagging his suitcase, I swung off the bed and hid his shaved head with my baseball cap. As I fit it over his brow, I made him laugh with a wiggle of my brows.
He straightened the cap and tucked his hands into his pockets. “Well?”
“Yes, you’re still hot. Too tall. A little too skinny now. I miss your hair. But the scars are sexy.” I feigned innocence with a grin while he stood there, waiting. My hand dropped, the bag bouncing heavily against my leg. “Let it go, Peter.”
He looked away and nodded. “Okay.”
Releasing the bag, I leaned in, tucked my hands behind his neck and pressed my mouth next to his ear. “Let it go.” He turned and caught my lips with his. A second later, the ground tilted and I was wrapped in him.
I never tired of kissing Peter. His myriad of tastes and scents, of touches and sounds overwhelmed the senses. I sometimes felt the strange sensation of levitating when I tried to take in everything. Erotic meditation I called it.
His rough hands gripped my arms, pressing me closer. He smelled of hospital soap and over-the-counter lotion. He gasped, and his breath excitedly exhaled, heating my lips. He tasted of lime Jell-O. I considered buying cases of it just to relive this kiss. But the next kiss he would smell of lemon or cinnamon or aftershave, and he would moan, or whisper my name instead of gasping; and he would taste of mouthwash or the Pixie Stix he shared with Cai or whatever soda he was drinking. And then I’d want a case of those.
I was still in that dazed, erotic meditation, freefalling when Cai interrupted. “Oh. Um. Sorry.” He scratched his head and bounced up to his toes. “I just…Darryl and your mom…I think he might, um…hit her.”
Peter looked from Cai to me. His laughter trailing to a knowing smile. “Breathe, Austin.”
I tossed Cai the keys to Arturo. They bounced off his chest and fumbled into his hands by accident rather than design. “See if Darryl will let you drive home. We have something to do.”
Peter stuffed his hands back into his pocket, laughing at the speed of Cai’s departure. “Your mother?”
I nodded.
“What changed your mind?”
I traced his lips with my thumb. “Erotic meditation.”
“It’s a little sad that after making out for five minutes, you’re ready to do anything for me,” Peter teased.
“I haven’t had sex in six weeks. My erections are boring holes through my pants. Pulling up your sleeve at the right moment might convince me to sign over my checking accounts.”
“Good to know.”
“But I’m not doing this for you.” I turned his hat backward and trailed my fingers lightly down his neck. “We have enough baggage without my mother.”
“Okay. I mean…good. Yeah. Whatever. Okay.” He bit his lip.
Jesus, he was cute. “Speaking of sex, how about a hand job in the elevator?”
He dragged his fingers through my hair and pushed down. “How about you suck my cock right now?”
Are You My Mother?
My father stood when I entered the room. I used that excuse to avoid looking at the bed and concentrated on his wary head tilt. His eyes floated past me to the doorway where Peter leaned casually with his hands in his pockets.
“Son, I do not think it is appropriate for you to bring—”
“My faggot boyfriend in here to flaunt my faggot lifestyle?” Crossing my arms over my chest, I leaned back against the wall furthest from them both. “You should thank him. He’s the reason I’m here.”
“It is inappropriate to bring a stranger into her room without her permission,” he ground out.
“Desmond, would you fetch a nurse?” My mother laid a hand on his arm. I willed her gnarled fingers to wither and crumble under my glare.
My father barely hesitated before striding out the door.
Peter caught my eye. I looked down and gave him a slight nod to indicate he could leave me alone with her. He slipped backwards out of the room. When the tip of his sneaker vanished around the corner, I finally allowed my eyes to rest on her.
She wasn’t the beautiful, composed woman who graced my father’s arm at charity functions so long ago. Her eyes were hazel baubles surrounded by a brownish-yellow sea. Her skin had a taint of jaundice, and deep lines burrowed into her forehead and at the corners of her eyes. Botox must not be a good mix with liver failure.
My analysis complete, I kept my neutral expression and waited. I wasn’t going to give her the upper hand by speaking first. I would not reveal the depth of my rage; it was so profound, my upper lip twitched with the urge to sneer. I would not give her a goddamned thing.
“You look like my brother,” she said.
“That’s…” Interesting? Who gives a crap? About twenty-six years too late?
“Neither here nor there, I know.” She waved a hand blithely and took another sip. “You don’t want to hear about Denny or me. You’re pissed off, and you want to let me have it. Probably with buckshot.”
“Mother’s intuition?” I said coldly.
She barked a laugh and took a long gulp from a pink plastic cup when the coughing fit started. The soft color was striking against her pale lips. “Sound like Denny, too.” She put the cup down and closed her eyes. “He was a homosexual. Died of AIDS in…’88? ’89?”
Her words were a rain of stunning blows. I couldn’t speak. I wanted to ask about Denny, about her family, but my tongue was glued to the roof of my mouth. My fingers bit into my palm and arm.
“If you come back, I’ll show you some pictures. Tell you what I remember about my folks and Denny.”
“I won’t be coming back,” I said stubbornly, even while another part of me longed for knowledge.
“Suit yourself. You got some cousins and
an aunt. I’ll just leave you notes with the albums.” She pursed her lips and shrugged delicately.
Her fingers swished around in the cup. I heard ice click against the sides. It was the only sound in the room. My rage magnified with each clack.
“Are you human?”
“You think I should be groveling for your forgiveness and giving you a list of excuses about why I abandoned my family. That isn’t going to happen. I didn’t want to be a mother.”
“No shit.”
She fished into the cup and popped a few slivers of ice into her mouth. The crunching sound raked along my spine. “That’s as much of an explanation as you’re going to get.”
“I’m so glad we settled this.” I pushed off the wall, determined to get out of there before I strangled her. Before I could open the door, she hit me with another stunner.
“Don’t you want to know about your brother?”
Baggage for Two, Please
“How old is he?” Peter asked.
The restaurant we stopped at on the way home was filled with family units. My eyes settled on a nearby couple with two rambunctious children. “Six.”
“How old is your mother?”
“Forty-five.” One of the boys tipped sideways and held onto his seat while looking upside down under his chair. The mother, a woman not much bigger than her child, leaned over and blew a raspberry on the boy’s back. He giggled and nearly fell off.
While observing the little kid, all I kept thinking about was Peter. Peter and me. After all the shit we’d gone through, was there even a Peter and me now? I couldn’t look at him. So I watched the little boy’s antics. Until Peter forced my attention back to him with a gentle tap of my hand.
“Earth to Austin.”
“I agreed to take him.”
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Peter replied. “What’s his name?”
“Stuart.”
“Your father agreed to your having custody?”
“He didn’t have a choice. She’s got maybe a few days left since my liver wasn’t a match. If she dies—when she dies—she threatened to leave her half of the practice to me if he didn’t sign over his parental rights.”
Shattered Glass Page 38