THERE COMES A TIME in every hopeless relationship when you have to give up on it. For me, the final straw in my tortured alliance with Mario came with yet another surprise. One afternoon, the secretary from Mario’s office called. She said she had beeped Mario several times but he hadn’t called back. When I told her he wasn’t home, she told me that one of the company’s service technicians was locked out of his apartment, to which Mario had a set of keys, and the technician was tired of waiting out in the cold. When I asked the technician’s name, she said the one name I knew I would hear—David Taylor.
After promising me that he had broken it off with David, I found out that Mario and David had worked for the same company for more than a year and that Mario had helped David secure the job.
For me that was it. I confronted Mario, and again there were tears. This time, though, he suggested maybe it was time for us to take a break. When I asked him if he was moving back in with David, he said no. Over the next two weeks, I helped him find a studio apartment in Harlem near his family.
I was hoping that maybe Mario’s being away from me would bring him to some startling realization that he couldn’t live without me. During this time, I continued to see my therapist. The Group picked up the social slack by planning more and more out-of-town trips, introducing me to anybody they thought I might be remotely interested in.
I met a few guys that I found interesting, but I was still in love with Mario, even though I was convinced he was using sex as a bargaining tool when he wanted something from me like a nice dinner or a sympathetic ear. Mario and I would see each other sometimes twice a week. There were some painful moments, like when he would show up at my apartment dressed nicely in a sweater or jacket that I had given him as a gift.
Sometimes when we had dinner, I would inquire about his plans for the weekend and he would look at me and say, “I don’t think you want to know.” I took this to mean he would be spending the weekend with David.
Everywhere I went in New York reminded me of Mario and the time we had spent together. I stopped therapy because the doctor couldn’t provide me with a way to save my relationship. I became depressed again, and the only solace I found was with my friends and vodka.
At night when I went home alone, with the knowledge that Mario was probably enjoying himself with David, I would drink alone and cry. The tears flowed plentifully though silently. Those days would be among the worst of my life.
CHAPTER 11
When the American Airlines jet landed and the flight attendant announced, “Welcome to Chicago,” warm tears slid down my face. It was the third day of the New Year, 1986, and hopefully another new beginning for me. But when the passengers started to move toward the door, I wanted to scream, “Turn this muther around and take me back to New York City!” My emotions were all over the place: from gratitude to fear. Would Chicago really be different for me? I wanted to be back in my apartment, in my bed with Mario beside me, gently stroking his hair and listening to him say how much he loved me. I knew that wasn’t going to happen ever again, but it didn’t stop me from wanting it.
That fall I was seeing less of Mario, and he was seeing more of David. I couldn’t stand it anymore, so I decided I needed to leave before I embarrassed myself. I chose Chicago, because I had had a great time when The Group and I visited the city on one of our weekend excursions. As a big city, Chicago offered many of the things I loved about New York. In Chicago you could walk along busy streets and think about life, and maybe find true love on Michigan Avenue.
The day I arrived was a cold, drizzling day, with the sky low and gloomy and no sign of the sun. Fully aware that it was January, I longed for warmth and wondered if I was making another mistake.
When I had started to think about leaving New York, I contacted an executive recruiter who arranged for me to interview with several Chicago computer companies. I decided that if I got an offer, then it meant that Chicago was where I needed to be. When a small computer company offered me a job after a four-hour interview, I figured it was a sign.
I knew that I was wearing out my welcome at AT&T because of my constant absences. I had only worked there less than a year. I left Wang because I thought AT&T sounded more impressive. AT&T had just started a new computer division located at 2 World Trade Center and hoped to compete with IBM. I was hired after only two interviews, possibly because of my IBM background and because I was black. If I had learned anything since I had left the University of Arkansas, it was how to interview. Almost every honorary society I was a member of required an interview.
I was still dealing with a dormant kind of depression by partying into the wee hours of the morning and often showing up at work without sleep. Things came to a halt one day when I fell asleep, snoring while morning drool crept from my mouth, during an important meeting with a Smith Barney customer. My boss was present, and I’m still amazed I wasn’t fired on the spot.
But I knew that if I stayed in New York I would remain in the emotionally abusive relationship with Mario. In one of our last conversations before I left New York, he had told me that I was the kind of guy you married, and he wasn’t ready to get married.
The months before I left New York I had become more severely depressed, wearing my friends’ nerves down with my constant moping and crying about the love I had lost. When I moved to Chicago, I thought about finding a therapist, but didn’t. I was meeting new people, but I couldn’t bring myself to become involved with anyone. I still held out hope that Mario would come to his senses and beg me to come back to New York.
In Chicago I quickly fell into another damaging pattern. I tried to mask my pain and lack of love in my life with material things. I moved into a new apartment on Chicago’s Magnificent Mile and paid cash for a brand-new navy blue BMW. I quickly made friends with several high-profile personalities whom I had met in straight clubs, as well as with several gay men who lived their lives in the closet. I became a regular at the lowest-of-the-low black gay bar in town, another hole-in-the-wall called the Rialto, located under the el tracks in downtown Chicago.
The Rialto could be tough and was often filled with trade, masculine men (some ex-cons) who would make you feel good for a couple of beers and a couple of dollars, even though they didn’t consider themselves gay or bisexual. I was constantly reminded how harsh and mean black gay men could be. Once, after accepting a couple of drinks, a man I had my eye on told me that he had no interest in going home with me. He added insult to injury when he told me I could be attractive if I lost some weight. I was so drunk that I told him to kiss my fat ass and I moved to the other end of the bar.
For a while, I pretended things were fine. Even as I actively pursued a new life, I still thought about Mario every day. He even made a few trips to Chicago—at my expense, of course—and we had decent times. The trips stopped when I realized after each visit that he had made phone calls to David’s number.
I decided to go back to therapy to deal with my self-esteem issues and sexuality, but I stopped seeing my black female doctor when she told me there was nothing she could do to change my sexuality, that there was no magic pill. Despite my constant trips to the Rialto, I still prayed that being heterosexual was possible. At least that’s what I prayed for when the depression returned. I blamed my depression on my homosexuality. I thought if I could change my sexual attraction to men, happiness would be waiting.
About a year after I had moved to Chicago, things began to come apart during my most severe bout of depression. The kind that paralyzes you. I woke up one day and simply didn’t think that I could live another second. I found more comfort in darkness than sunlight. My drinking had increased to the point where I was now mixing my alcohol, starting with wine before dinner, vodka afterward, and ending the evening with cognac or something similar.
One cold, especially gray Chicago morning, I was consumed with the fear that I wouldn’t see the end of the day. Somehow I felt that this particular day would be my last on earth. I knew I needed help, so I
called a medical hot line and told them how I was feeling. When I told them I was afraid to drive my car because my father had been killed in a car wreck and that I felt I was doomed to the same fate, they quickly recommended a doctor who was close to my apartment.
They asked for my phone number, and about ten minutes later a doctor called. We talked for about thirty minutes, and with a cool, soothing voice he convinced me that I owed it to myself to at least wait until the following day to meet him and see if he could help me. I don’t know why, but I believed that this man whom I had never seen could help me.
The next day I walked to an office building on Michigan Avenue, about eight blocks from my apartment, and entered the small office of Dr. Gary Willer. He was a fragile white man with ocean-blue eyes and light blond hair. He wore wire-rimmed glasses and walked with a slight limp. He had a kind smile to match the voice that had gotten me through the previous night, and I immediately felt safe with him.
Our first session, scheduled to last one hour, went on for more than three hours, with me tearfully telling Dr. Willer about my stepfather, Ben, my life as a black gay man, and my recent relationship with Mario. I talked about the friends I had left in New York, how they had been among the best friends I had ever had in my life, but that I didn’t understand why they wanted me as a friend. I told him I feared I would die before I ever experienced the one thing I wanted most in my life: true love.
Dr. Willer prescribed a medication he said would help me sleep and reduce my anxiety. When he warned me it would be dangerous to mix the medication with alcohol, I promised him that I would stop drinking. I lied. The pills didn’t help me sleep, I thought, but alcohol did. So what if I never remembered taking off my clothes and climbing into bed?
Over the next four months, I saw Dr. Willer five times a week, every morning at 10 A.M. A week after I started therapy, he filled out a form that qualified me for permanent disability, since during this time I felt safe only in his office. The bookshelves lining the walls and the floral-covered furniture made me feel like I was at home. I would lie on the sofa and share my innermost thoughts with him.
During those dark days, I felt I could trust nobody but Dr. Willer. I confessed feelings to him that I had never admitted to myself: I felt bad about being born out of wedlock and felt like it had been a curse on my life; that men were not interested in me sexually or romantically unless there were financial rewards; that I felt I could only have sex with men if I had been drinking. Even though I knew my family loved me, I didn’t think they would understand what I was going through. Maybe I required more love than my family or the world was willing to give. Every now and again, when I had moments where I felt I could sound happy, I would call my mother and Aunt Gee and tell them I was doing fine. I didn’t want them to worry about me. It seemed that ever since I moved to New York I had distanced myself from the very people who had loved me unconditionally—my family.
Slowly Dr. Willer convinced me to rejoin the world, to start doing things I once enjoyed, like going to the movies, the theater, and to sporting events. I didn’t tell him that I was still occasionally drinking, but I was convinced he could tell, because on the days I drank I would invariably be overly dramatic and far more depressed. When I was away from the safe confines of Dr. Willer’s office, I needed alcohol to fall asleep faster. When I slept, I didn’t feel pain and I wasn’t afraid.
There were times during my therapy when I felt I was making progress, when I saw a glimmer of hope, usually when I talked to Dr. Willer about my dreams of finally loving myself. In fact, it was to him that I first voiced my desire to be a writer. I dreamed that if I could find the words to describe the pain that I felt being black and gay, maybe it would help someone else. When Dr. Willer encouraged me to write some of my feelings down and pursue a career as a writer, I would retreat, telling him that Randy was the writer of The Group and that I could never compete against him, since he was one of the few people I felt loved me despite knowing everything there was to know about me.
In his always dimly lit office, I began to deal with the anger I felt toward Mario and Andre. I spent entire sessions screaming and yelling at my invisible former lovers, telling them how badly they had hurt me and how all I wanted to do was to show them love. The exercises helped, but whenever I got a call from Mario, who now was trying to be my friend, my anger would return.
I don’t think Mario really meant to hurt me, but he didn’t seem to understand that I didn’t want to hear about his trip to Paris with David for the Christmas holidays or how happy he was. During this period of inner struggles and healing, I confided only in Randy and sometimes Richard, who didn’t believe in depression. Richard thought I should just say “fuck it” and get on with life, while Randy, as hard as he tried, could take only so much of my doom and gloom.
THERE WERE A FEW BRIGHT SPOTS in Chicago. I met friends like Chris Martin, a talented photographer with a wicked sense of humor who always made me laugh, sometimes even at myself. I had met Chris on a visit to Chicago with The Group, and we had kept in contact. He was the first person I called when I moved to Chicago.
I also met another hopelessly heterosexual man who would be the object of my attraction for a time. I met Troy Donato at a sales conference in California. He is a handsome man with a smoldering sensuality. Troy has milk-coffee-colored eyes that are lively and flirtatious, and a smile that is so contagious it makes him look like he is beaming. We hit it off immediately, and I thought, once again, I had met the love of my life. I invited Troy to Chicago, and he made the trip a couple of weeks after we met.
I had never considered dating someone I worked with, but I was willing to make an exception. Troy had a lot of the qualities I’d admired in Hugh, but this time I was going to try and be honest about my feelings right away. On the Sunday Troy was going to leave after a wonderful weekend, I sat on the sofa next to him and told him I was gay and interested in him. Troy smiled and his face softened, and a tenderness came into his eyes as he said, “I’m not, but I would still like to be your friend.” Thank God I said, “Sure, I’d like that.” Even though romantic love had escaped my grasp once again, the chance to have someone willing to love and treat me the way I treated them had not. This was the first time I had met a man so comfortable in his skin that he didn’t consider my sexuality a problem, but rather an opportunity to expand his view of the world.
IN THE MIDST OF MY THERAPY in the late 1980s, AIDS became a part of my life for the first time. Around the last week in March, I got a call from Randy telling me that Willa needed to see me. When I asked him why, he said Willa wanted to tell me in person and would pay my way to New York if I didn’t have the funds. I had spoken with Willa a couple of weeks prior and he had sounded like he always did, busy and in perpetual party-planning mode.
Two days later, as I was leaving my apartment headed for New York, I got another call from Randy.
“Bill passed,” he said softly.
“Passed where?” I asked.
“Child, didn’t you hear me? Willa’s dead.”
When I asked what had happened, he simply said, “You know.”
I didn’t go to New York that day, but two days later—for the Saturday funeral. It was the first time I had attended a funeral of a close friend. The service was early, and the spring day was beautiful as we entered William Rhodes’s church in Jersey City. The Group all sat together holding one another’s hands for support. We all had these strange looks on our faces like we couldn’t believe Willa was dead. There were no tears until a youth choir from the school where he taught sang the gospel song “I’m Going Up Yonder.” Denise started crying first, then James, then me, and soon the church was filled with loud sobs.
After the service, we followed the casket outside and were greeted by a driving thunderstorm. Later we would joke that Willa was already in heaven creating havoc and had ordered the storm to get even with the people (namely, regulars from the Nickel Bar) who had shown up for curiosity’s sake.
; Later that afternoon, we had a potluck supper similar to our Saturday evenings in the past, and then we went on a tour of all the bars in New York that we had frequented when Willa was alive. Of course, we all got drunk, and by nightfall every single song we heard provoked tears—anything by Phyllis Hyman and especially “That’s What Friends Are For,” the popular AIDS anthem, which Willa had sent to us right before the holidays. I learned that Randy had known about Willa’s illness for a couple of years but had been sworn to secrecy.
Following Willa’s death, I knew I had to come back to the real world. I felt I had to get over my depression so that I could be a better friend to Randy, who had just lost his best friend and was also now dealing with the illness of his lover, Deric, a handsome married man Randy had been seeing for almost five years. Deric’s illness shocked me, because during that time there was a feeling that the only people getting AIDS were bottoms (passive men), and from outward appearances and what I had picked up from conversations with Randy, there was nothing passive about Deric.
I would soon learn that Willa’s death was just the beginning; two weeks later I lost another friend, Larry Stewart. I had always loved and admired Larry because he was from Little Rock and had been so nice to me when I moved to New York. Larry was in the hotel business, but when he moved to New York had decided to pursue his childhood dreams of becoming a performer. When I ran into him in New York, he was starring in one of the hottest shows on Broadway, Dreamgirls, and had appeared on the soap opera All My Children. He was a few years older than I, and I remembered thinking how handsome he was when he’d dated my baby-sitter, Jean.
After I moved to New York, during one of my trips to see Dreamgirls, I stood at the stage door of the Imperial Theater to get Larry’s autograph. When I told him I was from Little Rock and reminded him of Jean, he took an immediate, protective-big-brother stance toward me.
What Becomes of the Brokenhearted Page 17