Equal Affections

by David Leavitt

  She took the book from Louise and deposited it on a shelf behind her desk.

  Louise nodded and sat down again. “Did they get rid of it?” Danny asked.

  “Probably it’ll go right back out as soon as we leave,” Louise said. “You can’t trust these people.”

  “Not even Mrs. Thaxter? I’m sure we can trust Mrs. Thaxter.”

  Louise looked at him, opened her mouth as if to say something, then shut it again. “Did that story scare you?” she asked instead.

  “No, but it might scare some other little kid, littler than me.”

  “Not anymore it won’t, if I have anything to do with it.”

  How strong she could be, when she needed to.

  Strong and frightening.

  ___________

  Danny was sitting in his office when the phone rang. “Hi, it’s your father,” Nat said. “Don’t worry, everything’s okay.”

  “Good,” Danny said. Nat prefaced all his calls with such reassurances, as if he felt obliged to dispel from the start any possibility of bad news.

  “Things are going along just fine here, but I did think you ought to know, your mother’s been having some—well, sort of rash, on her stomach and feet. I’m sure it’s nothing. At first we thought it was poison oak, but it doesn’t seem to be that. Anyway, it’s just a rash, nothing serious, only Louise is kind of uncomfortable. Has to take a lot of special baths.”

  “That’s too bad,” Danny said. “I hope they figure out what’s causing it.”

  “Oh, I’m sure they will. Anyway, just wanted to let you know. Has April arrived at your place yet, by the way?”

  “Last night. You can call her at the house.”

  “Good. I may do that if I have a chance. But you’ll fill her in, won’t you? I just wanted to make sure I knew where I could reach you. And everything is going well with your job and all, I suppose?”

  “Fine.”

  “Your house okay?”

  “Fine.”

  “How’s Walter?”

  “He’s just fine.”

  “Good. Well, I really ought to run. I’m at the office too. Give him my best. I’ll talk to you soon.”

  “Okay. Bye, Dad.”

  “Bye.” He hung up. Nat’s phone calls rarely went beyond such simple goals as determining that Danny was fine, that he knew where he could reach him in case. This giving and receiving of reassurance was a business motivated not so much by love as by anxiety, for Nat had the soul of the caretaker, who checks one house after another and, finding things are as they should be, moves on. It reminded Danny of the way his father used to kick the twenty-year-old cat Elvira when she was asleep, just to make sure she was still alive. This need for reassurance has nothing to do with love. Oh, love strengthens, and purifies, and colors it, but in essence it is virtueless, an addiction. He did what he had to: made the phone call; established that everything was in its proper place and just fine. A matter of clearing the conscience, which, in Nat’s case, seemed to be something like clearing the throat.

  Danny was about to get back to work when the phone rang again.

  “Danny, it’s your mother.”

  “Mom! Dad just called. How are you?”

  “Well, I’ve been better,” she said, in her mock-weary voice. “Just tired. This damned thing keeps me up all night, in and out of the bathtub, otherwise I just can’t sleep at all. And don’t suggest Benadryl—I’m so doped up on Benadryl I feel like I might keel over. But listen, I called to ask you to do me a favor. What I said to you the other night, about wanting to become a Catholic—just forget it, forget I said anything.”

  “Mom—that’s easier said than done.”

  “Okay, okay. Then just promise me something, will you, honey? Promise me you won’t say anything to April or to your father. Please.”

  “Are you giving up the idea?” he asked hopefully.

  “I consider that nobody’s business but my own,” she said. “And I want you to help me keep it that way, okay? I shouldn’t have said anything to you. Some things are private.”

  “Well, of course, Mom. If that’s what you want.”

  She sounded relieved. “Oh, thank you,” she said. “Thank you, Danny, I knew I could count on you.” And suddenly she laughed. “You know what I was remembering this afternoon?”

  “What?”

  “How once when I was a little girl—seven or eight maybe—it was my mother’s birthday, and I’d been saving and saving to buy her this little blue ceramic pillbox I’d seen at the five-and-ten. It was very pretty, with white ribbons that weren’t really ribbons—they were molded out of the ceramic, which at that point I thought was the height of elegance. Anyway, this was the first time in my life I’d ever bought anything at a store, and the lady took my money—it must have been pennies mostly—and counted it, and handed me the pillbox in a little bag. I was so excited I started skipping. And then, about halfway home, I dropped the bag on the sidewalk. Now the box itself, it was all right. But the top—the top was completely smashed. I almost started to cry right then. All those weeks I’d saved to buy something pretty for my mother. And, you know, she always said I couldn’t do anything properly. So I went back to the store—I was terrified, shaking all over—and I stood by the table where the pillboxes were, and when no one was looking, I grabbed another top. I just grabbed it and ran. I ran all the way home, and when I got there, I hid under the bed for an hour. I was convinced the police were chasing me and were going to drag me feetfirst from under the bed. But no police came. Finally I got out from under my bed and took the pillbox out of the bag to wrap it. And wouldn’t you know it—it was a blue pillbox, and I’d grabbed a pink top.

  They were both quiet for a moment.

  “That’s a terrible story, Mom,” Danny said.

  “I don’t know why I remembered it just now. Funny, the way things come back to you. And at the oddest times. I guess it’s just part of being old.”

  “Mom, you’re not—”

  “Thank you again,” she said, “for your confidence.”

  “Of course—”

  “Son,” she added, as an afterthought.

  ___________

  April was asleep on the living room sofa when Danny got home, surrounded by scattered sheets of music and magazines, her guitar upright against the wall. A sweating tumbler of partly melted ice and Tab was slowly soaking ruin into the mahogany coffee table. Gingerly Danny picked it up and carried it to the kitchen, trying not to look back at the perfect circle of discoloration it had left in its wake.

  “April,” he said quietly when he walked back into the room.

  “What?” she shouted, and bolted up from where she lay on the sofa, all waving arms and flying blond hair. “Who’s there?” She looked up at him in confusion. “Danny,” she said.

  “I’m sorry I woke you.”

  “What time is it?” Shifting onto her side, she peered intently at her watch, as if struggling to remember how to tell time. “Six-fifteen! Jesus, it was four o’clock a minute ago.” And brushing her hair from her eyes, she looked up at him and smiled coyly.

  Danny smiled back. “You deserve the rest.”

  “Yeah, I guess I was more bushed than I realized. I mean, this concert life can really get to be exhausting. But you know that.” Pulling her legs in front of her, she maneuvered into a sitting position, buried her elbows between her knees, and yawned into her hands. “I’m sorry if I scared you,” she said. “I don’t know why, I always panic when someone wakes me up. Wonder what nether region of my psyche that comes from. Anyway—oh, shit!” she said when she saw Danny was unloading groceries from a paper bag. “I was going to surprise you! I was going to go to the store and have dinner and my special Bundt cake waiting for you when you got home! Shit. I’m sorry.”

  “April, you don’t have to cook for us.”

  “But I want to. You know I love your kitchen, it reminds me of Mom’s kitchen.”

  “So you can stand around and think wistful t
houghts. You don’t have to cook.”

  “Excuse me a second.” Pulling herself onto her feet, she stumbled into the bathroom and locked the door. When she emerged into the kitchen a few minutes later, she looked considerably more herself: hair brushed, face washed, the smell of cologne emanating from her neck. She was wearing her usual jeans and rumpled blouse. “Can I help?” she asked.

  “I’m just unloading groceries,” Danny said.

  “A hausfrau, as always. Grandma would laugh.” She took an apple out of a bowl, bit into it, and threw it away. “Who’d have guessed it’d be me, the girl, traveling around all the time, while my little baby brother becomes the hausfrau?”

  “You sound envious.”

  “Maybe,” she said. “Part of me longs for a kitchen like this, all the time. Going to the store, and baking cookies, and watching soap operas all day.”

  “You wouldn’t last a month,” Danny said.

  “Do you have any gum?”

  He shook his head.

  “Then maybe I’ll make brownies,” said April, suddenly excited by the prospect of a project. “Do you have any brownie mix? Flour? Sugar? Chocolate?”

  “Probably I have everything except one essential ingredient,” Danny said.

  “I’ll check,” April said, bounding up with renewed energy. She rummaged through the pantry, filled her arms with canisters, jars, and bottles, then lined them up on the kitchen counter. “No chocolate,” she said. “Damn. Well, I could run out and get some. Only I don’t really feel up to it.” Suddenly she put her hand on her stomach. “On second thought, maybe I don’t feel up to making brownies.” And she collapsed into one of the kitchen chairs. “I get nauseous so easily these days.”

  Danny started to put back the various canisters, jars, and bottles April had taken out of the pantry.

  “Powderfoot,” she said, “what would you consider the most surprising news I could tell you right now?”

  “Oh, let’s see. That you’re marrying Oliver North? That you’re giving up your singing to work for the Nicaraguan freedom fighters?”

  “Well, not quite. But I do have some surprising news.”

  “Oh?” Danny said from the pantry. “What?”

  April audibly shifted in her chair. “Well,” she said. “Okay. How to say it? Oh, hell, I guess I just have to say it.”

  “Don’t tell me,” Danny said from the pantry. “You’re a lesbian. Oh, my God!”

  “Better than that. I’m . . . pregnant.”

  Danny turned to face her. April shrugged her shoulders and smiled.

  “How the hell did that happen?” Danny said.

  “Not in the usual way,” April said, and looked at her brother as if trying to read his face. “Oh, don’t worry, no penis has come near my body in at least ten years. No, it was more complicated than that. But before I get into the details, tell me what you’re thinking. Are you happy for me?”

  “Well, April, of course I’m happy for you. It’s just a little bit of a surprise, that’s all. I mean, I’ve read these stories in tabloids about sperm on toilet seats accidentally impregnating nine-year-old girls while they pee and everyone thinking it’s immaculate conception, but to be truthful, I never believed such a thing could happen to my sister.” He smiled oddly. “You’re kidding me, aren’t you? You’re joking. You better tell me, April, if you’re kidding, because you know I can never recognize obvious jokes, so taking advantage of me is kind of like taking advantage of a handicapped person.”

  “I don’t make it a habit to sit on that sort of toilet seat,” April said.

  “You’re not kidding.”

  She shook her head.

  “Well, how did it happen?”

  “It’s a long story. You better sit down.”

  “I don’t want to sit down.”

  “Suit yourself. You remember Tom Neibauer? Tall, good-looking, with a beard? He does computer music and has a deaf Chinese lover?”

  “No.”

  “Of course you do, you met him lots of times; he was in that house with me senior year of college. Anyway, for the last couple of years Tom Neibauer’s been suggesting to me that I have a baby with him. Fairly casually, at first, but then the more I saw him, the more serious he got. You see, it seems that for years he’d been looking for a gay woman to have a baby with, and he decided I’d be perfect. So he came over for coffee, and he said he wanted to prove that that homophobic notion that homosexuals can’t procreate was bullshit, he wanted to prove that we could have children too, and be an example, a role model for other gay men and women. And he also said he’d be the primary caretaker and all that too, that he’d raise the baby and the baby would live with him if that’s what I wanted, and I could see the baby when I was in town. He said all this at once. And of course at first I just laughed. I mean, I totally dismissed him. It’s true, he’s a very sincere, progressive, forward-thinking man, but what I basically decided was going through his head was, I want April Gold to have my baby, because in his crowd April Gold having your baby is something that would carry a lot of cachet. Or at least back then it would have carried a lot of cachet. Now I’m not so sure. But anyway, he kept calling and asking me to think about it, and I kept thinking about it, and as I thought about it, it occurred to me that, well, maybe it’s not such a bad idea. I mean, I have had these sort of bizarre mothering instincts come over me a few times during my life. I’d thought about it too, but never really that seriously, because I have to travel all the time, and I wasn’t sure I was ready for the responsibility of raising a child. But then I thought, if Tom takes primary responsibility, I’d have a baby, and Mom would finally get a grandchild, and there certainly would be a lot of songs to get out of it, though that really wasn’t a primary consideration. And Tom, who is a very good salesman in his own way, I guess he sensed that I was getting close to saying yes, so he showed up at my house one day with these composite pictures he’d made up with a computer from a photograph of me and a photograph of him, and he said, ‘This is how beautiful a baby we could make.’ And right there, on the spot, I just decided, why not?” She laughed suddenly. “It’s funny,” she said, “I imagined the whole thing would be very scientific, very medical, with doctors and nurses and sterilized gloves. But what really happened was nothing like that at all. Whenever I was home in San Francisco, and I’d get my period, I’d call Tom, and he’d make some calculations, and on the appointed day he’d jerk off in a cup, I guess, and either he or Brett, his lover, would run over with this cup and a turkey baster. I said I didn’t think that was very precise, but he insisted he’d consulted with a lot of people he knew, and that he didn’t want to get involved with hospitals or doctors or anything like that. So he’d come over with his little cup of cum, and either Fran or Nina Klenck—you remember her, my old friend from college who’s subletting my house? she married Jeff Bernstein last year, incidentally—one of them would be over as well, and we girls would go in the bedroom and basically do it with the turkey baster. Only I kept laughing, because I was thinking, how ridiculous to be lying here on my bed with no pants on and a turkey baster like Mom used at Christmas between my legs. So we’d fill up the turkey baster and empty it and fill it up and empty it, and when all the stuff was gone, we’d make pancakes. This was about three years ago, incidentally.”

  “How did Fran feel about all this?”

  “Well, it was sort of interesting. Fran was all for the whole thing, even after we broke up. But the other lovers I’ve had since, most of them have gotten pretty nervous. The last one, Summer, said she couldn’t handle it at all, it was just too heterosexual for her, and whenever Tom or Brett came over, she’d have to leave the house for the day. But to continue—it went on like this for three years, and nothing happened, and I figured after a while nothing was going to happen, not because there was anything wrong with me or Tom but because the whole thing was so haphazard—you know, the sperm could have died in the car or whatever. But Tom insisted he wanted to do it the natural way; he didn
’t want doctors involved except this holistic guy he sees who I can’t stand anyway. I would have forgotten about the whole thing, except he was very persistent, very industrious, he kept calling to find out if I’d had my period and when I was going to be in town and all. And he kept showing up with his cup, and I kept doing the thing with the turkey baster and thinking, Really, this has got to stop. And then, lo and behold, here I am on tour, and I don’t get my period. Very interesting. So I go out with Mikel from the band, and we buy one of those little home tester kits where you pee and if it turns blue you are and if it doesn’t you’re not. And it did. And I went to a doctor. And your sister is eight weeks pregnant. The end.”

  Danny sat down. “I can’t believe this,” he said.

  “All true. Girl Scout’s honor.”

  “So how do you feel?”

  April shrugged. “Happy. A little scared. But happy. Actually, I’m totally confused.” And she looked into the distance of the kitchen window, in which her own reflection hovered over Walter’s newly planted vegetable garden.

  “How long have you known?” Danny asked.

  “Three days.”

  “Have you told Mom and Dad?”

  “No, I wanted to tell you first.”

  “Well, you better tell them soon because if you don’t, I’m just going to have to do it myself.”

  April’s mouth opened in outrage. “What the hell does that—” It shut again. “I was planning to call them tonight,” she said softly, looking away from her brother. “I haven’t even informed the father yet.”

  Abruptly Danny stood, circled the kitchen table, then sat again, his forehead on his fist. “Look,” Danny said, “let me just first say I think this is great. I do, I’m really happy I’m going to be an uncle. But there are a few things I’ve got to ask you about. First of all—well, I know this is a hard question and all, and that you trust your friend, but as he is a gay man—well, has he had an AIDS test?”

  “Boy, you go right for the jugular, don’t you?” April said, and laughed. “But don’t worry. I freaked out about the same thing about a year and a half ago, and before I’d even mustered the courage to ask him, he called me up to tell me he’d gone to have the test, and he was negative. He’s so responsible he even had the doctor send me a letter confirming the test results.”