by Lincoln Cole
“I don’t think so,” Alex said, sliding back out of his shirt and grinning as he moved back to Ed. “It looks like we aren’t quite done.”
***
When Ed finally made it home he felt sick, shameful, and recharged. It was past four in the morning. He’d showered at Alex’s, but still made sure to dump his clothes in the laundry and started it washing before heading upstairs.
The house was deathly quiet and every breath sounded like an earthquake. I can’t keep doing this, he decided, knowing he couldn’t stop. Never again, he told himself, praying it wouldn’t be long before he got another phone call or text.
What do I tell Jessica? he wondered, gently pushing the door open. She was asleep, the room quiet.
Part of him wanted her to find out. Or for her to admit that she knew. He hated the lie, and she didn’t deserve it. But a much larger part of him didn’t want to lose her and the kids. They are all I have. They justify me. I can’t lose them.
He slid into the bed, watching her soft breathing and wishing she could make him feel like Alex did. Then he would never have to leave or search around for something to fulfill him.
I don’t desire you, he thought, lying back on his pillow. God help me, I want to. But I can’t.
He fell asleep, miserable and exhausted.
Edward White
Reconciliation
Present Day
Mellie had you pegged before you turned fifteen.
I never imagined this conversation. Similar ones, yes. I’ve feared those most of my adult life. But never with this man. After everything that has happened, today and in my life, it seems so out of place for this wrinkled old man with rheumy eyes and baggy skin sitting across from me to drop something like that into the conversation. To claim that he knows that I’m…
Even more, to claim that he’s known. For years. For…
God, since before I turned twenty. It seems so ridiculous to think that Calvin, of all people, would be able to keep that secret. He’s not really the secret-keeping kind of guy.
But the way he said it, ‘Mellie had you pegged before you turned fifteen’, doesn’t really leave a lot to the imagination. There’s only one thing he could be talking about once you blow the smoke away. And when I really stop to think about it, it makes a sadistic sort of sense: Emily always was perceptive as hell.
The first burst of anger I’d felt at his words is already ebbing. The terror is fading as well. They are being replaced with a hollow sort of ache that settles in the pit just above my stomach. Angry butterflies, ripping each other apart. I’ve always wondered how a conversation like this would go. The things that would be said. The accusations leveled. In my fifty-two years on this planet I’ve always been afraid of a moment like this.
But now that it is here, I just feel depressed.
“No, Edward,” Calvin says finally, interrupting my musing. I come back to reality to see him shaking his head.
His mouth moves slowly whenever he isn’t speaking, like he’s chewing gum. It’s like watching a cow chewing cud. Calvin’s done that for at least the last four years, maybe even longer. Ever since his teeth were pulled and replaced with dentures. Calvin has never noticed, and no one ever bothers to point it out to him.
He says: “I’m not blackmailing you. I’d never do something like that. Plus I promised Mellie I’d never tell a soul. I broke enough promises to her already, and I ain’t breaking one more.”
“Then why tell me?”
He shrugs. “I just wanted you to know that I know,” he says. “I wanted you to know that someone knows. That it’s okay.”
Okay.
That it’s okay.
I almost laugh.
Instead I nod, but more to be polite than because I agree with what Calvin said. If it looks like blackmail, and tastes like blackmail…
But I don’t want to jump to conclusions. As far as I can tell, if Calvin does know, and if he’s really known for a long time like he says, then at least up until this point he’s been true to his word. He’s kept my secret. But I highly doubt Calvin brought it up just now, on this sunny and auspicious day, without purpose. Doubtless he has some goal in mind. At best it serves to bring it to the forefront of my mind, maybe earn Calvin some goodwill.
At worst…
I don’t shudder, but just barely.
The thing is: it’s a truth I’ve avoided for most of my life. It wasn’t until recently that I really came to terms with it. I don’t regret it—I regret the way I handled it, the way I hid from it, but not it.
I grew up in a conservative household. It was a weekly occurrence that I heard about gay people. God hates homosexuals. They are an abomination against the Lord and deserve nothing from a good and righteous society except a merciful death. That’s what the bible says when interpreted by my father. My father told me what he’d do to gay people, if he ever had the opportunity, and it usually involved his shotgun.
He was an ignorant, foolish, and useless man. Racist, sexist, prejudiced, and believing in his own self-righteousness by being born white and Christian in America. As if he’d done something successful by it. But I didn’t realize any of that until many years later. Parents don’t understand to what extent they influence their children when they spout ignorant principles as if they are the facts of life. I grew up thinking what he thought, saying what he said, doing what he did. I wanted to make him proud, and I wanted to be normal. I wanted to be right. Of course I wasn’t gay. I couldn’t be gay, because that wasn’t natural. My feelings were unnatural, wrong, and the Christian thing to do was to fight back against them.
By the time I understood how wrong that idea was, how full of shit and stupid of a man my father was, it was too late. I had a wife with a child on the way. It wasn’t their fault I was such a stupid bastard. I don’t blame my father, because at a certain point it was my choice. At a certain point my life had become my responsibility, I was just too blind to see it. I could have done different, been different. But I was a coward.
I’d said my vows, sworn my oaths to my wife, and I grew up believing that meant something. Not as a Christian, not from some misguided principle of religious loyalty, but because it was the right thing to do. The moment I fathered a child, the second I made the decision to bring one into the world, my life stopped being about me. My life took on new meaning, and my job was to raise that child as best I could. To do for that child what my father never did for me.
I refuse to be one of the ‘me, me, me!’ parents that expects entertainment to raise their children. Someone who is wrapped up entirely in their own lives. Their own happiness. A lot of parents nowadays seem to be almost surprised that they have kids. All of their energy goes into their own careers and their free time is dedicated to their own happiness. I think that most parents today are selfish, letting their kids get away with anything to justify their own inattention.
I guess I’m just old fashioned.
Point is: I would never consciously do anything to jeopardize my family, even at the cost of my own happiness. My own love. I decided early on that I would be there for them no matter what, and I would love them and accept them unconditionally. I’ve made my peace and come to terms with it, and for the most part it’s never really been brought up.
Yet here Calvin sits, throwing it all in my face. After the countless nights that I spent lying awake in bed, different versions of my wife’s accusations playing out in my mind, Calvin is the one who finally broaches the topic. And now butterflies are raging, I have a headache, and anxiety and terror dance their way up and down my spine. Because there’s been one common thing for each of those imagined conversations:
They all ended in tragedy.
“You’re thinking awful hard over there,” Calvin says, his words slow as he chews on his invisible food. He is so tiny, I realize. Tiny and frail, perpetually stooped over with only the barest few white hairs still covering his pockmarked scalp. The chair practically absorbs him. He used to be a tall and a
ttractive man with a sharp chin and strong features, but all of that strength and vitality is gone. Gone like dust in the wind.
I rub my eyes. “Why didn’t you ever tell anyone?”
“Your secret. Was never mine to tell. If you want to keep it, then you can keep it. You have grandchildren now, I hear.”
“Two,” I agree. “Quincy had twins.”
“And you love them.”
I nod. “I do love them.”
“You love your wife?”
“As any brother could love a sister. Or as close friends. She means the world to me because she’s a great mother. But I don’t… It’s hard to describe.”
Calvin waves his hand. “I’m sure it is.”
A moment passes in uncomfortable silence.
“I knew when I was twelve,” I say suddenly, eyes on the table in front of me. “Or, not so much that I knew, but rather I had the inclination. I never acted on it or even desired to act on it. I was afraid of my father.”
“Afraid he would hurt you?”
I shake my head. “Afraid he wouldn’t love me. That meant way more to me. I was afraid he would find out and then I would be alone. So I never really took it seriously. I knew, but I didn’t really get it. There’s a difference between knowing something and understanding what it means. I had no clue what it meant.
“By the time I turned sixteen I started to understand. What it meant. How it changed things. I just thought I was broken. It was so completely unacceptable of a desire that I never stopped to think I would stay that way. I was wrong. I thought I needed fixed.”
I glance over at Calvin, abashed. Now that my mouth has started moving it doesn’t want to stop. “But you don’t want to hear about this.”
“I do,” Calvin says. “I’ve always kind of wondered. It shocked me, and I didn’t believe it. Mellie said it was fine and natural and that we’d be there for you if you ever needed us. She changed my mind about a lot of things.”
“Is this one of them?”
Calvin is silent for a moment, staring. “I’m not sure. I grew up thinking it was wrong. Everyone thought so. But the thing is, you’re a good man.”
I nod, nothing to interject.
“And you’re good for your kids. They love and adore you in a way mine never did. You’re a better man than me in all the places it matters. And I know, Edward, so if you want to talk about it, then talk about it to me. I’ll never say a word.”
“You sure?” I ask.
“Tell me everything,” he reiterates. His expression is grim, but his eyes are twinkling. “Tell me, and I’ll take it to my grave.”
I can’t help but laugh. Conniving bastard. I stare at the marble table in front of me. I always loved this table, and the lawn. It’s well kept. The grass never climbs higher than a few inches before someone is out to trim it back down. This is the kind of place I want to live after I retire. The kind of place I can settle down and relax. With my wife. I love her dearly, but…
“Jessica is my best friend,” I admit. “I actually used to think that was all there was to it between man and wife. You married your friend, someone you enjoy spending time with and want to be around. I thought eventually the feelings would come. The desire would manifest itself. But it didn’t. I never understood how important the sex was. The love. The lust.”
Calvin nods and chews.
“I always wished I could give her more. To love her in the same way she loves me. That little extra bit that everyone feels but no one really talks about. I finally figured out that it wasn’t going to happen. Ever. I could hide my feelings, bottle my emotions up for weeks. Months. But then they would come out in a rush. I did things that are terrible.”
I pause here, the words hanging heavy in the air. I can practically see them, dancing in front of me, mocking me in their finality. That side of me, locked up and ignored, but never forgotten. Never far away.
“No,” I decide, “not terrible. I never did anything risky, just things I promised myself I wouldn’t do. It took me forever to figure out that I couldn’t change how I was born. No matter how badly I wanted to be different, this is what I am. And now that I understand, it makes sense. I’ve come to terms with it.”
“It’s not as big a deal anymore,” Calvin says. “When I grew up you just didn’t talk about it. We pretended gays weren’t real.”
“It was a different time. If I was born today…or even twenty years later…I don’t know what would have happened. What I would have done. I do wonder, sometimes, how different my life would have been if I’d been with…” I trail off, a sharp pang in my chest “…instead of Jessica.”
“You couldn’t have the children,” Calvin says firmly. Now I have a pretty good idea of where Calvin stands on the situation. He only sees a family as one thing: a man and a woman having children. The idea of a gay couple adopting probably doesn’t even cross his mind, and if it did he’d have serious reservations, like most Americans. They’d rather the child suffer in foster care, alone and neglected, than to think of them raised by someone from an ‘alternate lifestyle.’
I disagree with the old man’s viewpoint. I have, in fact, met and spoken to several gay couples on the internet—male or female couples—who have adopted children and live happy normal lives. Those children are being nurtured and loved in a way that foster care never could. But Calvin comes from a different era, and no matter how willing he is to let bygones be bygones because of Emily, I know better than to think he will ever truly understand.
“No,” I agree to be polite, “I wouldn’t have the children.”
“Did you love any of the men,” Calvin asks suddenly.
“One of them,” I reply with a shrug. “There only ever was one that mattered, over a few years period. It was like a short hurricane in my life. Threatened to uproot everything. It ended badly. None of them were interested in anything except satisfying lust. But the one I loved, I loved the same way you love Emily.”
Calvin seems to think about this. “You’ll still have to answer to the Lord.”
My heart sinks. This was the conversation I’d expected to have. Fire and brimstone, the Lord’s wrath, all of that. The conversations my father would have had.
“For being gay?” I ask. “You think I’ll have to answer for that?”
Calvin shakes his head. “No,” he says. “The Lord made you exactly how you’re supposed to be.”
“Oh,” I reply, flummoxed. “Then why?”
“You said your vows to your wife. Promised to be faithful.”
“Those were vows I hoped I could keep.”
“But you didn’t,” Calvin replies. “It’d be the same if you weren’t gay and you cheated on your wife. You still cheated.”
I nod, conceding the point. I suppose if I took religion seriously it might mean more to me.
“You weren’t honest with yourself.” Calvin chews for a second. “But I suppose its people like me, too dumb to know any better, who forced you to hide who you are. I reckon the Lord will be pretty lenient when it comes to your sentence, considering.”
That, I decide, is the closest I’ll ever get to an apology from our bigoted culture.
Maybe it’s enough.
“So what now?” I ask after a minute. The moment has passed. I’m not sure yet if Calvin knowing the truth about me changes anything. I always expected there to be a weight lifted from my shoulders. Some sort of euphoria in being able to share my burden. But I don’t feel any different.
“Do you want some tea?”
I nod. “Sure. I can go make it,” I say, starting to stand up. Calvin waves his hand, laboriously pushing out of his chair.
“No, no, you stay put. I can still make some damn tea. I’m only eighty-two.”
I smile, sitting back down. Calvin is eighty-four. Sometimes I think he remembers just fine and enjoys messing with people.
Calvin disappears into the house, hunched over and taking tiny strides to keep his balance. He barely tops five feet now, and his
clothes are loose and baggy.
I pull out my phone. I’d felt it vibrate a couple of times while we were talking but thought it would be rude to interrupt while Calvin was here.
Two missed texts, one from my wife and one from Bethany, and then a missed call from my daughter. Portia just turned twenty and is in her second year of college.
The messages are inane—Jessica wants to know what I want for dinner and Bethany wants to make sure Calvin is doing okay—so I decide to call Portia back first.
She answers on the third ring. “Hey dad,” she says.
“Hey pumpkin,” I reply, smiling. She just laughs. Five years ago she would have screamed at me for calling her that, but now she thinks it is amusing.
I am thankful—more than for most things in my life—that both of us survived her teenage years.
“How are you?” she asks.
“I’m fine, how is school?”
She reports that it is good, then goes into a patronizing explanation that all of her classes are harder this semester than the last. It’s a speech she delivers from rote, because every year I try to warn her that it’ll get harder. She doesn’t believe me, but she likes to spout my speeches to butter me up.
Which means she wants something.
“So what do you need?” I ask her when she’s finished.
“I was just calling to say ‘hi,’” she lies.
“Uh huh,” I reply. “How much money?”
“Dad,” she admonishes. “I don’t only call you when I need money.”
“I can’t think of any other time.”
“What, I can’t just call you, no strings attached, because I love you?”
“I suppose you could, but you never do.”
“Well this time I am, and I’m offended that you would think otherwise about your own daughter!”
“Oh, well then I’m sorry I questioned you. I’m glad you called.”
She laughs. “Okay, you got me. I need money. But it’s for a good cause!”
“Oh? And what cause is that?”