“Who’s there?” I asked.
“Me,” said a strange voice. “Jasper.”
Jasper? Why the hell was he here, and . . . oh. He was loitering for the solo like a distant relative waiting for me to die and the last will and testament to be read. I wasn’t leaving him my solo.
“Go away,” I said. “I’m singing the fucking thing, even if they prop me up with a broom.” Then it dawned on me that I hadn’t a sense of time. I may have even missed the event. “What day is it?”
“It’s the day. You have less than an hour to get ready. That’s why I’m here.”
“Less than an hour?” I tripped about the room looking for my pants. I was bare ass naked, probably a short cut for those toilet dashes. I was embarrassed to have my ass flashed at . . . of all people, Jasper — goofy looking, big eared, second rate tenor, Jasper. “Where’s Matt?”
“He’s been sick too?”
Sick too? This thing isn’t catching, although we were all susceptible.
“Where is he?”
“He’s been bunking with Russ and Tim. He’s caught a cold — a doozey. I’ve been tending to your . . . well, I’ve tried my best at getting you to take the kaopectate, but you’re the worst patient.”
I recalled none of this, but gazed at Jasper in a different light. If he was trying to stop up my anal dam, he certainly wasn’t fishing for my solo. Well, of course, he had the duet with me, and if I didn’t sing, what would he do? He was my backup, but no one was assigned to fill in for him.
“Help me find my pants, and . . . thank you.”
“We gotta go now, Martin. We’re due to line-up for Buell twenty minutes before curtain.”
I had never regarded Jasper as anything more than a musical rival, but during the rehearsals, he actually tried to blend, and now, as he helped me on with my pants, I had a funny thought. No matter how abrasive we could all be at times, family is family, I guess.
2
I was never happy with our director’s decision to ditch our tux for this performance, opting instead for black pants and white shirts, open at the top. Now I was grateful. I would have never been able to negotiate a full tux and still arrive at Buell’s door on time. As it was, Padgett was pacing in counterpoint with Todd, and two of the three Rons were on the look out.
“Thank God,” Padgett said. “I thought you’d abandoned us.”
“Not if I could help it,” I said.
I spotted Russ and Tim. Russ shook his head. I must have appeared like quite the zombie, but then again so did he. Then I recalled what Matt said, and that led me to thoughts of Matt. I bolted from Padgett’s attention.
“Russ,” I stammered. “Is Matt here?”
Russ pulled me aside.
“Your cowboy is out of the saddle.”
“How so? I know he hasn’t been sleeping with me, although I don’t know why I even noticed.”
“Harsh, man. Harsh, man.”
I pulled away.
“What do you know about it?”
“As much as you do. Listen, hon, you might have your feathers in a fluff, but as sick as Matt is, he checked on you constantly.”
I stopped. I was still too dizzy to flare into some queenly rage. I just gazed toward the queue and our director, who was waving me forward.
“How sick is he?”
“Bad cold, hopefully. He’s got a fever and I thought it best he stayed away.”
“I should go to him.”
“You should, but not until you dispatch this Injun solo.”
I glanced into Russell’s eyes, those once lively eyes, now bagged and sunken.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“Nothing that you’ve done and nothing that you can stem. So just knock the socks off these fairies.”
The director reached me, tugging me into the line-up. We were moving into Buell.
“Listen, Martin,” he said. “You too, Jasper. Don’t over sing in Buell. I’ve been told the acoustics are dead. You won’t hear a thing. But in Boettcher things are so lively, you can’t let it get away from you.”
All I wanted to do was find a crapper, because my stomach rumbled. I turned to Jasper as we came through the back stage area.
“If you smell something during the number . . .”
Jasper smiled.
“I’m used to it, Martin. You have a distinctive smell.”
I laughed, and then mounted the stairs. There was a round of applause as we came onto the stage and climbed the risers. I didn’t have far to go, tenors being in the front and I, on the first step center. I gazed out and saw . . . nothing. The lights were so bright and from the deadened applause, it was difficult to assess the audience’s size.
God watch over me and my sphincter, I prayed as our concertina commenced.
3
Exactly how our numbers went and precisely the impact of the Cree piece as it hit the boards, I couldn’t say. The director was correct. I couldn’t hear a thing, not even the chorus behind me. I didn’t hear Jasper and needed to carefully follow the baton to maintain a proper timing. My great arching high note was lost to me . . . lost somewhere just a foot away. I could have belched and it would have been just as fine. There was applause, but it too was muffled. I was just thankful that I didn’t crap on the stage.
“It was just fine,” the director told us as we scurried off and down a flight of stairs and then up another to the large venue next door — great, cavernous Boettcher.
“I couldn’t hear a thing,” I complained.
“It was fine. You didn’t over sing it. Just be careful in Boettcher. It’s a live hall. Very live.”
We waited in the wings for the New Mexico Chorus to finish their Spanish lullabies. I glanced at Jasper, who was moistening his lips.
“I guess we did okay,” I said.
“I wish I could tell,” he said.
Then the applause happened for New Mexico, like a roaring, thunderous rattle. Live hall, I thought. An understatement. Then came, Now welcome, from the Great State of New Jersey, the New Jersey Gay Sparrow Choir.
We swept onstage quickly. The venue was humongous, the towering curtain legs rustling in the fans. The lights were three times as powerful as Buell’s — no, four times.
My stomach rumbled in earnest now. I was suddenly out of my body. Although the lights were raging and hot (another reason to be thankful to perform without a tuxedo), I could see the phantoms in the three tiers. I was suddenly disenchanted. Matt wasn’t here. I wanted him to hear this, and not on the recording. I wanted his loving angel heart sitting somewhere mid-orchestra mouthing the words in Cree. However, I was suddenly realizing that as sick as I was as I waltzed onto that stage, my little blue-eyed flower was tucked in bed — not even in our bed, shivering from a fever and a real bad cold. I cursed this mountain sickness in all its forms, and then watched our director, who stood a mile away raising his baton.
Our first three numbers I hoped were letter-perfect, although I noticed we seemed not to be in sync with the baton. Distance, I assumed. And the reverberation from the balconies was unsettling. We were like little mice in the mouth of a whale, fearful of being swallowed by the audience and the hall and the lights and the high arch of the curtain. The applause was thunderous, with some bravos and here and there a Woohoo. Then, silence . . . total silence. Not even the proverbial cough or throat clearing. Jasper and I stepped forward standing before our Cree warrior back-up group waiting for Tim’s downbeat to start the number.
Strange. I had never really heard the work before now. The hall enlivened the wonderful melody that my fellow Sparrows warbled, the basses on point today with their driving Gu-ma Gu-ma to-ba-fo-na and the tenors with their sweet A-fa-lit-ta do-me-zu-na floating above it. Then, Jasper entered, his voice the best I had ever heard it. I was so entranced by the doings that I became quite lost. In fact, I nearly missed my entrance — a quarter beat late, which received a raised eyebrow from the baton. However, soon Jasper and I were swimming in a land of
lilting dance in honor of the fallen danseur.
Mo-shu-fan-to Ko-ler-ran-tu-Mas-hu-fi-na Mashu-mashu, with the basses Guma-guma beneath us. The dance song became wild, and the full chorus shouted their call to the great Father — Mish sha Shona, Mish sha Shona, and then lapsed into Latin, Gloria in excelsis, Mish sha Shona. It was glorious. It grew, the crescendo leading up to my great moment, but as it approached, I heard another sound, and so did Jasper.
Oh, please God, I thought. Not here, in front of three thousand fairies.
The music accelerated and the gas dropped. I was approaching the moment like a freight train off its tracks. I couldn’t concentrate. The baton was poised to cue me in. I gasped, took my launching breath, and then clenched my ass checks with a mighty snap and out came . . . the most glorious note of my career. It soared to the top tier. It touched heaven itself, lingering — hovering. It echoed, and then burst into a firework explosion in reverberation. Then another salvo as the solo arched and swayed from ear to ear, my lips trembling and my vibrato calling from my bowels to save the world, if not my dignity on this the biggest stage of my life. Then, the chorus, like a wave beating on a jetty, inundated first me and then the audience as we clinched the finale.
If I live to be fifty, I shall never forget the sound of those lucky people who heard me that day. I remember that I didn’t bow, but nodded, fearing that the ocean stopped up inside me would erupt if I so much as bent at the waist. We turned and marched into the wings. The director beamed. Tim bobbed his head with a satisfied grin. I felt the back pats of my fellow Sparrows as we gave up the stage to the Baton Rouge Lesbian Choir.
“That was remarkable,” Jasper said.
“You were great yourself,” I said, and then realized it was the first time I had ever complimented the man.
“Party time,” Padgett announced.
I turned to Jasper.
“Thanks,” I said. “I need the latrine. Could you ask Russ to take me back to the hotel . . . and to Matt?”
“Sure,” he said.
Suddenly, I had only one person on my mind now.
4
Russ didn’t come in. He just gave me his room key and led me to the dark room. Matt was on top of a pile of blankets. The room stank — not the same as our room, but salty, if that can be said to be a stink. Matt coughed, a wheezy full phlegm cough. I turned on the lights. It was still daytime, but the drapes were drawn. I tripped over shoes. In fact, the place was a pigpen. I scarcely could believe that there were gay men residing here — clothing strewn everywhere and I didn’t even want to think about the bathroom.
“Pumpkin.”
Matt was awake, but his voice was hoarse. How he knew it was me, I couldn’t tell, still I had forgiven him for his lie of omission, even though he still denied it was such. He sat up as I approached. He looked like hell, his black hair matted across his sweaty brow.
“Are you okay?” he asked. “You were none to good last time I saw you. Some case of the shits.”
“I’m fine now. But you?”
“Just a damn bad cold.” He then must have noticed my white shirt. “Shit, I missed it didn’t I?”
“You’ll catch the recording.”
“Damn.”
I went to him. Then I noticed he was hot as hell and wet. In fact, the blankets were soaked.
“Matt, you’re sweating like a race horse.”
I pulled the blankets back. The sheets were drenched.
“Maybe you need a doctor,” I said.
“No doctor, Pumpkin. It’s just the mountain sickness. It’s not even catching.”
“No?” I asked. “Well we’re a fine pair. We’re the best damn couple in the state and here we sit, Mr. Soaked and Mrs. Shitz.”
I felt his head. It was hot, but I wouldn’t say it was boiling hot.
“You’re not staying here. Back to our room, so I can take care of you. If you won’t see a doctor, you just need to settle for me.”
“Nurse Ratchet,” he said, giggling.
I hugged him. Salty.
“I’ll Nurse Ratchet you. Have you been taking aspirin or something?”
He coughed — really hacked. He never answered me.
“Come.”
I helped him up. It was the shaken leading the shook.
“I’ll get you some Nyquil.”
“Drug me, will ya?”
“It’ll conk you out. Aspirin. Cold compresses and . . .”
“Kisses.”
“We’ll see.”
“I won’t go then if you don’t fulfill the whole prescription.”
I gathered him into my arms, and then kissed him.
“Can I have two of those every hour?” he asked.
“We’ll see. Watch your step. This place is a shit house. I’ve never known Russ to be so untidy.”
Then I recalled that . . . Russ had changed.
Chapter Seven
And the Rockets Red Glare
1
The festival was over, the last vestiges of choral singing reaching the zenith. The closing ceremonies were a last ditch effort to keep the spirit of singing alive until the next GALA gathering in four years down in Tampa. Matt managed to attend the final shindig, although he dozed off during the unison caroling of Bernstein’s Somewhere. There were parties deep into the night, but I chose to sit quietly with Matt and watch the Fourth of July fireworks from our window. Governor Romer had gathered on the dry pitch banks of the Platte and thanked the gay community for having chosen the fair city of Denver for their festival. He praised the courage of our leadership and stirred every pink and lavender soul there by assuring that the evil Proposition 2 would never take hold in the great State of Colorado. (Of course, neither his good wishes nor our fond hopes could stand up against the Bible thumping rutabagas of Colorado Springs and Pueblo. It would take a court to set the constitution back on its heels and recall the public to the good sense that it’s In the Courts do we Trust).
It was over and it had been everything that I had hoped for and nothing that I expected. Matt’s fever came and went and I counted the minutes for us get airborne again and return to sea level. At least out of these mountains my bowels would moderate and his wheezing would abate. As for that other issue — Luis’ demise and the shadow of another germ, I tried to put it behind me. Matt had not really lied to me, I reasoned. I had never encouraged him to speak about Luis since that evening at The Cavern. I had sympathy for the little Spanish drag queen who was pummeled by hecklers and expired in a back alleyway, which, as I learned, was the truth. However, it was his compromised immune system that failed him in the short run. They were saying in all the New York buzz-rags that no one ever dies of AIDS. It’s the ravages of other stuff — canary something and old age bruises and sheep rash that does you in. I usually skipped the details, but now . . . now perhaps I’d read a little deeper.
I was encouraged on the day we departed. Matt seemed to rally, his fever abating and he even insisted on carrying his own baggage. I wouldn’t let him, but he fought me. Then, on the plane he conked out, his wheezing and coughing aggravated by . . . well, I chalked it up to the altitude. I mean, altitude gave him this, and flying higher than the mountains certainly wouldn’t help. The outbound flight was more subdued than the raucous Colorado or bust flight. Padgett sat quietly beside Todd, I guess each deciding whether they should kiss and make up and in the process they stayed mum — a record for both. Russ and Tim held hands, while the three Rons engaged Brian, the Librarian, analyzing the merits of the various GALA participants from Vancouver to Key West. I tried to sleep, but it wouldn’t come. I just wanted to land, catch our ride back across New Jersey to the shore. I was sure that once Matt was in his own surroundings, he would rally. A few days more would do the trick. I had to be back at work, but I was positive that Axum Labs would extend Matt’s vacation by a few days.
There are moments of serenity and anxiety in our lives. Mary, Mary, its quite the notion that my life was cut and squared away like my linen
closet. However, more than my bowels were acting up now. A deep-set anxiety grew in the pit of my stomach and a sinking feeling craved my heart. It was like what Matt said on the mountain. It’s like I have a blackness in the soul. I had never felt so empty and full at the same time. I wanted to cry for joy and sadness. My mind must have being going, or so I thought. Love’s a bitch. Here I was higher than a mile now, safe in the hold of a metal tube catapulting through space, but feeling like I did near that ledge — on the pinnacle, with the angels screaming at me — Jump. Jump! The only thing that went through my head was — Gu-ma Gu-ma to-ba-fo-na, mish sha Shona. Mish sha shona. The angels were not letting me off easy. They wouldn’t stop pestering me until I let go and dove off the edge. Gloria in excelsis, Shona.
2
I called Mr. & Mrs. Kieler as the ambulance arrived.
“Meet me at the Hospital,” I squawked as I watched them lift Matt onto the gurney.
He hadn’t done so well after the flight and the trip home. In fact, he was having more and more difficulty breathing. Sea level did not work the miracle that I fully expected. I panicked. He wouldn’t see a doctor, but he was choking and I didn’t know what to do, so I dialed 9-1-1 and paced. I was beyond anxious.
“Matt,” I stammered. “They’re coming.”
“Mama?”
That’s when I realized that we’d been living in a vacuum and the Kielers hadn’t a notion that their son was ill. Yikes. I had to be the one to summon them. What would they think? They’ll blame me and my fucking trip to the mountains. Matt didn’t warble. There was no need for him to trek out to the Proposition 2 state to catch the first craggy bug that crawled out from some swampy bottom.
“No, Matt. The paramedics are coming.”
“No.”
“You need help,” I said. “They’ll give you . . . air. And I’ll call your parents just as soon as the . . .”
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