William J. Mann

by Men Who Love Men (lit)

  “Hey,” I say to Blond Guy.

  “Hey,” he says in reply.

  I grip Blond Guy’s hand firmly.

  “Couldn’t help but notice you over there,” Blond Guy says. “Your friend leave?”

  “Yes. She has a son. Dinner time.”

  “Cool.” He seems both surprised and delighted that I actually came over. His smile is pushing his cheeks up into his eyes. “My name’s Evan.”

  “I’m Henry,” I tell him.

  “Good to meet you, Henry.”

  We’re still shaking hands, and now I’m smiling just as broadly as he is.

  “Oh,” Evan says, finally breaking eye contact with me, “this is Curt.” He indicates the dark-haired, taller guy standing beside him. I let go of Evan’s hand to shake with Curt. “And this is…”

  Evan gestures toward the third guy, a young twink with reddish spiky hair whose name he seems to have forgotten. I quickly grasp that the twink is another new acquaintance.

  “Andy,” the twink reminds him.

  “Andy,” Evan echoes. I shake with Andy, who smiles but quickly returns his gaze to Curt.

  So that’s what this is. Evan was feeling shut out by the fact that his friend had found a potential trick, but he hadn’t, so he aggressively sought one for himself. I can’t help but wonder: is he really attracted to me—or did he just settle on anyone in close proximity?

  No matter. He seems genuinely pleased now that I’ve approached, and I must admit Evan is even more handsome up close than he was from a few feet away. Rare that such a thing happens. Usually it’s the other way around.

  We exchange the usual small talk. Where he’s from (New York), what he does (manages an art gallery in SoHo). In fact, the more we talk, the more we seem to have in common: we’re both Jewish, brought up without strong connections to our roots; we’re both into grunge music, both owning original EPs of Soundgarden’s Screaming Life; we’re both former insurance company drones who made last-minute escapes before corporate dementia overtook us; and we’re both originally from western Massachusetts. Evan grew up just fifteen minutes north of me on Interstate 91 in the town of Holyoke. “No way!” we both say in unison, and we laugh. We’re also nearly the exact same age, just off by a couple of weeks. I feel as if I’ve found a long-lost twin.

  “You have a great body,” Evan says, looking me up and down and clapping me on both shoulders.

  I’m all set to protest, to point out my love handles, but I resist the urge. Instead, I simply clap Evan’s shoulders in a similar way and return the compliment. “Are you a trainer at the gym?” I ask.

  “Me? A trainer?” He laughs. “Oh, you mean the T-shirt. No, I just bought it on my last visit. Thanks for thinking so, though.” He shakes his head, patting his belly. “Actually, I need to get back to the gym. It’s been a while. I’ve gotten out of shape.”

  “Out of shape?” I make a face in disbelief. “We should all be so lucky if that’s out of shape.”

  “Dude,” he tells me, “you’re the lucky one.”

  It’s in that moment that I realize how distorted we all are about our bodies. Here’s this guy with great shoulders and biceps, thinking he’s “out of shape.” And for all my fretting about the tire tube around my waist, I am sure for some guys I represent a physical goal they’ve given up all hope of ever achieving.

  Immediately I like Evan even more. He’s not like Gale, with his perfectly sculpted body, every ounce of fat worked off by those goddamned twists around the pole. He’s not like Luke either, cocky with youth. Instead, he’s like me, just making his way the best he can.

  “So,” Evan says, “you want to come back for a drink and a dip in the hot tub?”

  I smile. “What guesthouse are you guys staying at?”

  “Oh, Curt and I share a place here,” Evan says, glancing over at his friend, whose conversation with the other guy—Andy—now appears very intense. “It’s not far from here.”

  “Sure,” I say. “Why not?”

  Evan smiles at my agreement, then leans forward to whisper something into Curt’s ear. Curt nods, putting his arm around Andy’s shoulders and guiding him toward the exit. Evan does the same to me.

  All the way down Commercial Street, Evan and I stay about four feet behind Curt and Andy. Evan’s arm remains firmly around my shoulder. I snake mine around his waist.

  “God, I love this place,” Evan is saying, inhaling deeply the tangy salt air. “When I get here, I just breathe. It feels like I never take a breath in New York. Here I breathe in the air and breathe out all my stress.” He whistles in appreciation. “The smell of the sea in the air gets me high.”

  “That’s why I moved here,” I tell him. “Why I left behind my corporate job and made a new life for myself.”

  “And you’re one hundred percent happier, I bet.”

  I smile, but I don’t answer. Of course I’m happier than when I was schlepping through that soulless job. But given my recent angst, I can’t wholeheartedly commit to being happy. I’m not so different from J. R., feeling cut off from the world at times. J. R. can’t find a good movie in the off-season, or a store that sells the latest Xbox. I can’t find a boyfriend.

  But Evan’s arm around my shoulder feels good. It may be Labor Day and winter may be looming right around the corner, but right now I feel good. I look over at Evan and he kisses me. He might be rolling—the kiss seems possibly fueled by ecstasy—but it might also simply be a rush of heartfelt emotion, suggesting Evan likes me as much as I’m starting to like him. Could it be possible? Dare I let myself imagine?

  For once, this guy is definitely my type. Finally—a mature, well-muscled, handsome man. I like how solid Evan feels. I move my hand up from his waist to feel his back. Hard, sinewy muscles. I begin to get an erection.

  “Do you know what I love best about Provincetown?” Evan is asking, as we round the bend that Commercial Street makes at Perry’s Liquors. “I love the love. Do you know what I mean?”

  “I think so, but say more.”

  “I don’t want to sound syrupy,” he says. “But I mean it. From the moment I get here from New York, I feel like I belong here. That this is my real home. That I never want to leave again.”

  I smile again. This is one sweet man. Not many guys would allow themselves to come across as so emotional, so soft, this quickly. Evan’s the kind of part-time resident I always think about when some year-rounder stands up at Town Meeting and laments the houses bought by out-of-towners that sit dark all winter. Sure, I understand the need for more housing for those who make Provincetown their full-time home, but to castigate the seasonal people as leeches or selfish rich boys just isn’t fair. Most of them, I suspect, are like Evan, who deeply love this place, who cherish every moment they can spend here, and wish they could spend more.

  Evan shares my love of this place. That much is clear. He sees beyond the standard images of Provincetown that are shared by most gay men—the gaudy parade of street theater under a blazing hot sky, Cher on a motor scooter, shirtless gay men holding hands, dykes on bikes roaring through town. He’s found the other face of Provincetown, the way I have and, for him, this is home, not merely a vacation destination. The hardy band of tough-skinned, warm-hearted folk who populate this village year round can no more claim ownership of Provincetown than the person who has just stepped off the ferry for the first time. No one can claim Provincetown as more theirs than anyone else’s. It belongs to all. That’s the beauty of the place, the enchantment.

  Last summer, one of our guests, a young gay man who had never before set foot in Provincetown, was particularly sad as he checked out. “I feel as if I’ve been waiting to come here all my life,” he said to me.

  He knew nothing about local politics—about the history of conflict over the late-night gatherings at Spiritus, for example—only that those assemblages of hundreds of gay men and women was an incredibly affirming experience for him. He didn’t know that some in town didn’t really want him here, that i
nstead they wanted to redirect the town’s tourism to focus on straight families. All this young man knew was that he couldn’t wait to return here again next year to walk among people like himself.

  So many things he didn’t know about Provincetown. He’d probably never heard that a pirate ship had been found in the harbor, or that a rare species of tree frog populated its woods, or that Divine once worked here slinging hash. He may have had some inkling that Provincetown was a famous art colony, but I doubt that he could have told a Hensche from a Hoffmann—as if I could.

  Yet, despite all this, the town was his. This young man, like so many others, felt the mystical lure of the place where the land meets the sea, where the road ends. Four days were all he spent here, in the middle of the Fourth of July crush, but when he left he shed tears at our front desk. “This is the warmest, happiest place on the planet,” he said to me just before he boarded a Cape Air flight and flew out over Hatches Harbor back to his home in the Midwest. I believe this firmly: Provincetown belongs to him as much as it does to me.

  Evan’s making that whistle of appreciation again. “God, smell that air,” he says. “I wish I could bottle it and take it back with me to New York.”

  Overhead there’s a slight rumble of thunder.

  “The forecast said we might get some rain,” I report.

  Evan peers over at me and offers a goofy, boyish grin. “You know what else I love?”

  I smile back at him. “There’s more?”

  “Fuck, yes.”

  I nuzzle his nose with my own. “Tell me.”

  “To run barefoot along the beach when it’s raining.”

  I think I’m already a little bit in love with Evan as we turn down a daisy-lined path toward his house. It’s a small attachment to a larger residence that may have once been a garage.

  Once inside, Curt mixes us martinis while Evan opens the spa out on the deck. I’m not really in the mood for an orgy, but given that Evan has paid no attention to Andy and Curt has paid no attention to me, I suspect the dip in the hot tub will only be foreplay. Afterward, we two couples will each head off separately—though, as I look around the place, I see only one door that might lead to a bedroom.

  Still, I disrobe without thinking too much, enjoying the floating sensations courtesy of the alcohol. I’m struck at once by how beautiful Evan is—hard, square pecs, defined abdominals, all covered in soft blond fuzz.

  The water in the spa is hot—over one hundred degrees—and I need a few seconds to adjust before I crouch down onto a seat. The water rises to my shoulders. One by one the others get in. Evan makes a beeline to me. We clink our plastic martini glasses and begin to kiss. Out of the corner of my eye I notice Curt and Andy are now liplocked as well.

  “You are so sexy, Henry,” Evan whispers in my ear. “Don’t disappear from my life after all this is over. Promise?”

  At that moment, the axis of the earth shifts. Everything around me—the water, the other guys, the sky above—disappears. Suddenly I’m sucked feet first into a time tunnel, and I’m zipping along faster than the speed of light, my head rolling back and forth, barely able to catch my breath. When I open my eyes and take a look around, I see Evan sitting in a rocking chair on the front porch of a beautifully restored Victorian house, gazing out over the ocean. And wonder of wonders—I’m sitting next to him. A bottle of champagne rests on a table in front of us. Evan reaches over and takes my hand. We’re celebrating our tenth anniversary. At our feet is our dog, another pug, who we’ve named Clara II.

  “Dude?”

  I blink. Evan is looking at me over the rim of his martini glass.

  “You seemed to zone out there for a moment.”

  “Sorry,” I say.

  I reach over and kiss him. His tongue fills my mouth.

  Just then it starts to rain. I feel a light tickle of drops on my forehead.

  “After we make love,” I whisper to Evan, “let’s walk barefoot on the beach in the rain.”

  He smiles—but it’s a smile that’s interrupted by Curt, who floats over to ask Evan quietly, “Honey, did you close the skylights? I don’t want the rain getting in.”

  I freeze.

  “Yeah,” Evan replies. “I closed them before we left for Tea.”

  Curt nods and returns to Andy.

  Honey.

  Curt just called Evan honey.

  Of course. How stupid of me not to figure it out! Evan and Curt are lovers. They’re not just two friends who own a house together. They’re lovers who own a one-bedroom condo and who’ve been through this little scene many times before. They’re in a goddamned open relationship, and spice up their sex life with a steady infusion of new blood.

  Just like another couple I know.

  Part of me wants to stand up, get out of the hot tub, put my clothes back on and go home. But Evan is kissing me again, and his hand is on my dick. I’m raging hard. I can’t back out now.

  I allow myself to be led out of the hot tub and wrapped in a thick terrycloth towel. I follow Evan into the bedroom. Curt and Andy are hot on our heels.

  Evan didn’t lie to me. He told me he owned the house with Curt. He used the revealing pronoun “we,” but still I heard only what I wanted to hear.

  On the bureau opposite the bed is a photograph of Evan and Curt in tuxedos.

  “Your wedding?” I ask Evan.

  “No,” he tells me. “Last year’s HRC dinner. Our wedding picture is over there.” He points. On a table is another picture. They’re in flower-print boardshorts wearing leis around their necks.

  “We had our commitment ceremony on the volcano in Maui,” Curt says, coming up behind me.

  “Really? Maui?” Andy asks. “How cool.”

  Yes, I think. How fucking cool.

  I lay down on the bed. Evan places his body—still warm from the tub—on top of mine. We kiss, but I’m losing my erection. The image of Evan and me on that front porch with Clara II is fading away, replaced by that picture of Evan and Curt on that goddamned volcano.

  Evan is a great kisser, though, so I surrender to the sex. He gives an incredible blow job. But Curt and Andy are right there next to us on the same bed, and at one point Curt reaches in to kiss Evan, and Andy places his sloppy wet lips over mine. My erection goes up and down. Curt eventually fucks Andy while Evan and I watch. Everyone comes but me.

  There’s a moment of stillness as we all lie on the bed just breathing. I’m the one to stir first. I get up off the bed and bring back a hand cloth.

  “You’re a doll,” Curt says, accepting the cloth to clean up the mess that’s dripping from his—and everyone else’s—torso.

  Except mine.

  “Henry,” Evan says, pulling me to him, “don’t you want to come?”

  “No,” I tell him truthfully. “I’m kind of beat.”

  He kisses me. “Should we take that walk now?”

  “What walk?” Curt asks, flopping horizontally across the bed, his head coming to rest on Andy’s stomach.

  “On the beach,” Evan tells him.

  “But it’s pouring,” Curt retorts.

  Evan winks at me. I manage a small smile.

  “Look,” I tell them, “I have work to do back at the guesthouse. This was fun.”

  “Will we see you later?” Evan asks.

  There’s that pronoun “we” again. How different his question sounds from his earlier plea not to disappear from his life. But in truth, both requests were saying the same thing: You’ll fuck with the two of us again, won’t you?

  “Well,” I say, “you know how to reach me.”

  Evan sits up. “It’s the Nirvana guesthouse, right?” he asks, jotting the name down on a pad next to his bed. I wonder how many names and numbers have been jotted down on that pad.

  “That’s the one,” I say, pulling on my jeans.

  “We’ll do that walk another time,” Evan promises.

  I give them all a little salute as I leave. My throat is suddenly too tight to speak.

>   Heading outside, I try not to think, to block any unwanted thoughts or feelings from intruding into my mind. I shudder. The rain is coming down heavy, and it’s cold. Much too cold for a barefoot walk on the beach, I tell myself.

  I stuff my hands down into my pockets and hurry home.

  12

  NIRVANA GUESTHOUSE

  I’m standing behind the front desk watching Luke vacuum in the nude.

  Okay, so he’s not totally nude. He’s wearing a neon-pink thong. He’d been sunbathing on the roof during his break, and decided not to pull his shorts back on when he resumed his work. When I tried to object, Lloyd overruled me, insisting, “It’s good for business. Do you know how many guests we’ve gotten because they’ve heard we have a hot houseboy?”