Beautiful Losers (Modern Erotic Classics)

by Remittance Girl

  The plan we’d made was to meet for dinner and then to head over to Jean’s apartment so I could change before the show, but by the time we’d finished soundcheck, I couldn’t see Sebastian. Jean was sitting at one of the tables by the bar looking bored.

  ‘Where’s the Master of the Universe,’ I said, sliding into the chair beside him.

  Jean gave a little head toss that told me he was pissed off. ‘Sebastian begs our forbearance and says he’ll meet us at the show.’

  ‘Really? What’s up?’

  He stood up, and exhaled his impatience. ‘Come on, let’s eat. I’ll tell you something about our dear Sebastian but I need a drink first. Pasta?’

  We walked to the restaurant. It was only a few blocks from the venue. The weather had turned wet and warmer and the air smelled of decaying leaves. There were a lot of people out on the street. Friday was the beginning of a long weekend and I guessed the world was set for a party night. It bode well for the turnout at the gig.

  When we’d been seated and Jean had browbeaten first the waiter and then the maître d’ into furnishing him with a particular bottle of white, when he had smelled it, rolled it round his mouth and kindly swallowed it, I said: ‘So, what’s up with Sebastian?’

  ‘You don’t want to know.’ He took a second, less theatrical sip from his glass.

  ‘I thought you wanted to tell me?’

  ‘I do, but you don’t want to know.’

  It wasn’t easy to keep the impatience out of my voice. ‘Well, tell me anyway.’

  ‘How do I explain this? Our Sebastian has a tiny problem with emotional commitment.’

  ‘That’s the talk around town.’

  The waiter brought us our pasta and made his escape before Jean could grill him a second time on the state of the truffle shavings. Jean glanced down at his plate and shrugged.

  ‘No. It’s not quite that simple. He does commit. He means exactly what he says. But it seems to overwhelm him for a little while and he goes off the rails – in a controlled sort of way.’

  ‘He does?’ I forked some of the spaghetti into my mouth. I wasn’t that hungry. I never was before a show.

  ‘He did it about three days after we first started fucking. I think he’s done it again.’

  ‘What exactly does “off the rails” mean?’

  Jean lifted a flake of black truffle off his linguini and slid it, disdainfully, onto the far lip of his pasta bowl. ‘He gets scared. The feelings scare him. Sometimes he’s such a man, you know? So he works it out on other people. I think it’s a bit like stag night for him.’

  I put my fork down and sat back. ‘But he was the one who made the monogamy rule!’

  The bland smile Jean gave me was eloquent. ‘Well, he didn’t make it for us, honey. He was making it for himself. Not that I expected him to stick to it. Plus, he can get surprisingly jealous, you know.’

  ‘Damn, it’s a good thing we don’t have the same problem.’

  ‘Speak for yourself. I’m jealous as sin. I just don’t let it show.’

  His delicate hand was on the table, fingers worrying the stem of his wine glass. I reached across and slid mine over them. ‘Are you hurt? Do you want me to call him?’

  ‘No, it’s who he is. It’s how he gets past it. He only did it the once, you know. Until this time.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I whispered.

  Jean straightened his shoulders and shook his head. ‘I’m not. It means he loves you. I know it’s a strange way to show it, but that’s what it means. We’ll just have to wait it out. He’ll be back.’

  ‘When?’

  ‘At a guess? Tomorrow. Smelling of foreign parts and looking like hell.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I repeated. ‘Damn, Jean. I didn’t mean to fuck you guys up.’ It seemed such a lame thing to say, but I meant it.

  ‘Stop it. You’re going to have a fabulous gig, and then we’ll go back to Seb’s place and raid his wine cellar. He’s got four bottles of Quinta do Noval ’85 and I plan to make a serious dent in them. Then we can make a serious mess on his bed. That’ll teach him.’

  I grinned and licked my lips. ‘That’ll teach him.’

  The club was packed to the tits. It seemed that everyone and their dog had decided they needed a night out on the town. As I climbed onto the darkened stage, I spotted Jean at a table off to the side, sitting next to Lindsey’s better half. Max was sitting across from them with an older guy with the shaven head. I guessed it was the A & R man from San Francisco.

  I can’t say I remember how most of the set went, because I never do. The lights come on and the music starts and time slips into fast-mo. I’ve often wondered if it’s a fugue state or a neurological disorder. I do remember clearly turning away from the mic stand, and seeing a glimpse of the back projection playing over Dave’s face and up the wall. I had a momentary swell of elation, thinking Sebastian had decided to play faithful companion after all.

  The crowd was up for it and moving like a multi-celled, hive-minded organism in front of the stage. When they’re like that, I sing to the sea they become and there’s nothing else in the world.

  We got two encores and had a band-huddle when it looked like we’d have to play a third. It was unanimously decided that we should leave them wanting more. Especially in light of the visiting A & R man. After the house music came on, Max brought the guy backstage. He was cool and casual, but I could tell he’d been impressed.

  Jean came back, beaming. ‘Fuck, girl. You were spectacular.’

  I blushed a little. ‘It was a team effort, you know.’

  He glanced around and smirked at my band mates. ‘You were all outstanding, but you,’ he said, eyeing me, ‘you were divine.’

  The kiss was urgent, all teeth and tongue, fists in my sweat-drenched hair and a thigh between my legs. For a moment I was conscious that everyone in the room was staring at us, and then I didn’t give a fuck. I snaked my hands under his shirt, down the back of his jeans, and felt his ass flex as he rubbed me into the wall.

  ‘Get a room!’ shouted Matt.

  But when we broke off and I caught a glimpse of his face, there wasn’t derision there any more. There was longing and envy and, just perhaps, a flicker of admiration.

  We let ourselves into the dark, empty house. Jean went in search of the fabled Quinta do Noval and a pair of glasses, leaving me to light a fire in the living room grate. I’ve never been very good at it building fires, but I certainly couldn’t be trusted not to cork the port.

  I had just finished tongue-chasing a rivulet down Jean’s neck when the doorbell rang. He gave a low, throaty laugh.

  ‘That was quicker than I’d expected. And he’s lost his keys. Typical.’

  ‘Aren’t you going to let him in?’

  ‘In a minute. Make him stew a little.’

  The bell trilled again. This time it sounded different. It tore through my ears. ‘You’re just so cruel,’ I teased, hauling myself to my feet.

  Before I got to the door, I knew something wasn’t right. Memory is strange and perhaps I can’t tease apart the threads of time now, I’m not sure. But somewhere, deep under my skin, I think I knew the person at the door wasn’t Sebastian. And maybe Jean felt the same, because he was barely a step behind me when I pulled it open.

  The cop was young, thin and gangly. There was a policewoman behind him, also in uniform, but she stayed quiet.

  ‘Is this the Delacroix residence?’

  Jean stepped beside me. ‘It is. Can I help you?’

  ‘Is Mr or Mrs Delacroix at home?’

  Suddenly Jean’s face went grey beneath his make-up. His voice was tight and cold. ‘There is no Mr or Mrs Delacroix. They’re deceased.’

  The cop eyed Jean and then me. ‘Can you please identify yourselves, ma’am?’ He turned his attention back to Jean. ‘Sir?’

  Jean automatically reached for the wallet in his back pocket, but I stopped him. ‘No, officer. Actually, I’d like you to explain why you’re here first. What
’s the problem?’

  It was such a young face, I thought. Too young to be a cop. He swallowed and looked uncomfortable. I glanced behind him to his partner, who seemed older. She was fascinated, it appeared, with her own shoes.

  ‘There has been an incident. We’re attempting to contact next of kin.’ A radio squawked on his belt, and he reached for it, but not to use it. He turned the volume down and said: ‘Could we come inside, ma’am?’

  ‘For who? Whose next of kin?’ I demanded. But even as the words came out, my legs went numb. There was a steel band around my chest. And I knew. I fucking knew.

  ‘Sebastian Delacroix’

  ‘Where is he? Is he okay?’ The questions were Jean’s and they sounded shrill and at a distance. ‘What hospital is he . . .’

  ‘No, sir. I’m afraid he’s not.’

  It’s strange, the things you notice as the world collapses. I stepped aside to let them in and caught my reflection in the hall’s oval mirror. Jean’s lipstick was a deep red smear across my face.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX:

  CHAIN LINK HEART

  When you’re not straight, not married, linked by something other than DNA or by the small number of acceptable and socially recognized bonds, you’re fucked. At best you don’t exist at all and, at worst, you’re a suspect.

  The police treated him as if he were a suspect. No matter that he loved Sebastian. No matter that they’d been a couple for almost a year. No matter that we’d been together all evening and there were dozens of witnesses to attest to it. As far as the police were concerned, he was a freak and Sebastian was a freak, and freaks generally murdered each other. And, according to Jean, they had no problem in saying so. But I found all that out much later.

  They kept him for hours. The only thing I could do for him was to call Lindsey and find him a lawyer. She gave me the number of a criminal lawyer at the firm she was clerking with.

  I waited for Jean in the shabby, empty institutional waiting area. Just me and a slowly drying puddle of vomit no one had bothered to clean up. And I knew nothing beyond the fact that something had happened to Sebastian. I only found out he was dead because they don’t have visiting hours for the morgue.

  And, in truth, it was lucky that they, if only momentarily, suspected Jean of killing him. Because if they hadn’t, we would not have known what had happened to him until we read about it in the paper the next morning. Relationships like the one we had don’t rate.

  When they told Jean he could go home, it was almost six in the morning. He emerged like a wooden effigy, stiff and brittle, holding himself together with bits of Scotch-tape. Kathleen, the lawyer, followed him.

  ‘Okay, so we’re done here,’ she said. She looked almost as tired as Jean. ‘I’m going to get in touch with the GBLT coalition about this. This was fucking disgusting. Unforgivable.’

  I didn’t really know what she was talking about, and didn’t care. When I wrapped my arms around Jean’s shoulders, he stood rigid, not breathing. After a few moments, I felt him go limp in my arms. He dropped his head onto my shoulder and began to make dry, wrenching noises, as if someone were gutting him.

  ‘Can we go?’ I asked her.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Does he have to come back?’

  She scraped her teeth over her bottom lip. ‘I don’t think so. If they ask him to come back, call me. Immediately.’

  ‘Can you get us a cab, please?’ I asked the lawyer.

  There were two photographers as we walked out onto the street. I heard the whine of their cameras, the click of their shutters.

  ‘Fuck off!’ I pulled Jean’s head into my shoulder. All I could think was that he would hate to be seen this way, looking like a car-crash with his make-up all smeared across his face.

  ‘No,’ said Kathleen. She turned to the photographers. ‘People need to see this. This is how the guardians of our wonderful city treat members of the gay community!’

  Had I had a gun, I’m pretty sure I would have shot her. ‘He’s not a member of a fucking community, you cunt. He’s a person,’ I hissed.

  But that was only the beginning.

  My first instinct was to take Jean back to Sebastian’s, but I worried the cops might be there, searching the place. Then I thought of going to Jean’s apartment, but with the lawyer and the photographers, I worried that someone might be there, too. So, I took him home to my house, to my tumbledown rental and my ass-kicking, no-nonsense roommate. Because, beyond all other considerations, I trusted Lizzie and I knew she had Valium. And what I thought Jean needed, more than anything else in the world, was a few kind hours of oblivion.

  Between us, Lizzie and I managed to get 10 milligrams down his throat, and I wrestled him out of his clothes and tucked him up in a nest of blankets on my bed. At least the sheets were clean. I stayed with him while he stared at the scuffed-up paint on the wall and finally the drugs took him away.

  I couldn’t have slept if I had tried, so Lizzie made tea and we sat for a while across the old melamine table, before she went to work.

  ‘Do you know what happened?’

  ‘Not really. No one will tell me anything. It’s fucking unreal. And I didn’t want to ask Jean.’

  ‘Absolutely nothing?’

  ‘Well, Sebastian is dead. I think someone killed him.’

  ‘Where?’

  I thought for a while, remembering the questions the cops had asked us at Sebastian’s place. ‘Somewhere out near Granby Park, I think.’

  ‘Cruise city.’

  I nodded my head.

  ‘You know, there have been three murders out there since the beginning of the year. All gay men. They think they’re hate crimes.’

  I lay my head down on my crossed arms and nodded. I felt her stroke my hair away from my face. ‘Maybe you could use a Valium yourself, sweetie.’

  ‘No,’ I whispered.

  ‘Why not?’

  But I didn’t answer her. Because I could not shake the feeling of unreality. Because when I blinked, Sebastian was there. With his crooked smile and a nasty little sparkle in his eye. Because I could feel the press of his lips against my skin so vividly. Because I could see him stuffing waffles into his mouth. I could smell his sweat and hear the sound of his breathing and the hoarse, throaty noises he made when he came.

  How could Sebastian be gone? And when would I know he was? Not yet, I thought, closing my eyes. No need to speed him on his way.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN:

  FRAIL DEEDS

  It took them two weeks to release Sebastian’s body and another three days to arrange for the funeral. Jean wanted to see him, and begged me to go with him, but I couldn’t. By then, despite all the feelings and sensations and images I tried to hold on to, I knew he was gone and whatever was left, in the basement of the funeral parlour, was not Sebastian.

  We decided on a service at an interfaith church in the East End. Not because any of us were religious, but because Sebastian had taken Jean there once. He’d loved all that brooding granite and gothic stained glass. We chose to have it in the evening, because Jean wanted a thousand candles lit and he wanted each and every one of them to count.

  A lot of people came: friends and people we knew from the clubs, gallery owners who’d shown his masks, and a few collectors who bought them. Of course, the band was there and Lizzie too, with her latest giant biker boyfriend in full leathers. As requested in the invitation, most people came dressed to the nines. Sebastian would have been very gratified; all those beautiful people, all there for him.

  Jean had chosen a couple of very poignant biblical passages for the minister to read. I realized that he knew far more about religion than I’d expected. He also chose the poem ‘Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night’, and he read it beautifully.

  When it came to my turn, I stood up at the lectern, but would not let Jean sit down. I made him stand beside me as I read what I had written.

  ‘Of all the ways in which death is cruel, it’s cruellest in the w
ay it reduces and redefines us. It disdains whatever private order we have crafted for ourselves and those we love. It robs us of our voice and classifies us as it sees fit. That’s what death did to Sebastian.

  ‘Sebastian was not straight or gay or bi. He was all that and so much more than any of them. He wasn’t a freak or an anomaly living on the margins of decent society. He was a creative man, a charming man, an artist and a good soul. He was Jean’s lover. He was my lover. And he would have hated to be defined as nothing more than the victim of some sick bastard’s hatred.

  ‘Sebastian taught me how to walk on shifting sand. Not to let all the names we have for each other become the traps we live in. He taught me that people are people, regardless of our genes or the configuration of our body parts, how we are brought up, the clothes we wear, the people we choose to fuck or the ones we love.

  ‘We are human. Absolutely everything else is negotiable.’