by Edmund White
“I’d never hurt him,” she said, quickly adding, “or any man. Men are so sensitive about their looks. It’s their greatest virtue and their biggest failing.”
“And their biggest—wow! You really know how to turn a phrase. How late did he stay?”
“Almost another hour. In the end he invited me out for dinner, but I said I was otherwise engaged. I was a rag after he’d made so many gibes.”
“You were holding your own,” Jack said. He let out a big breath; he was feeling more sanguine.
“I do my best.”
“Want to see that new movie tomorrow night, Dr. Strangelove?”
“Is it kind of political?”
“It’s supposed to be funny.”
Will was out of the office all the next day. That evening Alex didn’t mention him, not even when they went for a late bite at Brasserie in the Seagram Building and sat at the counter; the combination of casualness and elegance there suited them both.
Jack walked her home and then, still wearing his suit from work, went to a bar he’d heard was a little bit gay. As soon as he stepped into the place on Second and Seventy-eighth, he realized it was just another straight pickup bar. He stayed for one drink and left, but on the sidewalk a guy in his late twenties cruised him hard. He even turned around and started following Jack. The guy wasn’t in a suit but was wearing a powder blue crew neck sweater and carefully ironed chinos. They went back to his place, a studio crammed with color photos of his very blond parents and siblings. Strewn about were lots of nautical mementos, including a model of a big sailboat in a glass vitrine. When they kissed standing up and groped each other, the guy didn’t seem unduly impressed with Jack’s huge penis, and Jack felt relieved but also slightly confused, like a movie star who finally finds a Caribbean island where no one recognizes him.
The man lowered the lights, put on a Frank Sinatra LP, mixed them martinis, and sat in an armchair until he suddenly leapt up, joined Jack on the couch, held Jack’s face between his hands as if it were a precious object and kissed him slowly with lots of tongue, and said, “You look wonderful in that dark suit. What do you do?”
“Corporate lawyer,” Jack said.
“And your name, your first name? I know your last name is Heaven.”
“It’s Hal,” Jack said. “Hal Heaven. And yours?”
“Billy Delight. I own IBM.”
They both smiled, and soon they were undressing each other. The couch opened up into a bed with very clean sheets carefully ironed. Billy was romantic throughout and even afterward. He “freshened” Jack’s drink when they were back in their underwear and told him about his childhood summers in Blue Hill, Maine. “The Commodore was the big cheese of the little Blue Hill yacht club.” Jack wasn’t sure whom he was talking about.
Jack was tempted to spend the night and actually fell asleep for a moment. He liked this guy—so much less of an egomaniac than Peter, more just a good-time Charlie. But then Jack pulled himself together and dressed and kissed Billy at the door. Billy had written out his telephone number on a deckled card. He was wearing a citrusy cologne.
Jack walked ten blocks before he hailed a cab. The streets were nearly deserted up here on the East Side—it was three o’clock in the morning.
At home he lay on his couch and thought about Billy. Admittedly Billy was a bit spinsterish with his ironed sheets and his ironed boxer shorts with the pearl compression buttons. But he was sweet and a good, appreciative kisser and not too carnivorous. For once Jack hadn’t crumpled the number and thrown it away on the doorstep.
Jack thought about how he analyzed every small move either Will or Alexandra made, how Olympian their lives had become for him, though neither of them was dramatic and they were both too discreet. While they were inching toward each other like snails, he was in full flight, beating his wings against the bars of his cage. But his flights were accomplished in the dark, and he never reported anything to them or to anyone else. Here was this nice Billy, with his family silver all polished on the sideboard next to a nautical brass-and-mahogany tambour clock. Jack had kissed him, and Billy, with his narrow hips only an octave wide, had sat on Jack’s cock, and Jack had stood and carried him around the room like that and even pushed Billy’s back against the cool wall next to the bathroom door; Billy was that light. His body was as small as Peter’s but not as muscled. And no one would ever know of all these exploits or just the simple human pleasure of the story that began, “I met a blond boy on Second Avenue, and he invited me in, and soon enough his legs were wrapped around my waist.”
Of course, there was nothing to suggest that Billy was a good conversationalist or that they shared any interests, but he did have a pretty body and he was a sophisticated East Side New Yorker.
Jack didn’t want to call Billy from home or work, but the next day he did call him from a pay phone. Billy answered after three rings, and he asked Jack over for dinner on the next night. “Do you like polenta?”
“I’m not sure what it is,” Jack said.
“It’s like grits.”
“Then sure, I’ll like it plenty.”
“Why don’t you come over after work, and we’ll have some drinks and I’ll throw something together.”
“Okay, but only if you’ll cook in the nude.”
Billy said in a natural low voice, “Mister, you got a deal.”
Up to the very last moment Jack thought of not going to Billy’s. He knew he was completely untraceable. Even on the Lexington Avenue subway he thought of getting off and heading back downtown.
Billy’s apartment looked dusty in the last shreds of daylight coming through the single window that gave out onto an air shaft. But Billy, who was running late, pulled the heavy black-and-white tweed curtains shut, switched on the many atmospheric lamps, made them martinis with big green olives sweating in them, and then said, “I’m going to take a quick shower before I get into my regulation togs.” He stood on his toes and kissed Jack coolly on the lips. Did “regulation togs” mean naked?
Jack sat down and wished there was a dog to play with. The martini turned like a trenching spade going down a narrow hole into his bowels. It cored him so quickly that by the time Billy emerged, riding on a puff of perfumed steam, Jack was tempted to doze off, but when he did so, his whole body revolved and he lurched up.
“Want me to freshen that?” Billy asked.
“I need black coffee and amphetamines, not another martini.”
Billy was naked, and his body looked much more childlike than Jack remembered. He had a shower-pink butt, very prominent and cherubic but unwobbling, and a kid’s little paunch with a tidy “inny” belly button and just a touch of blond pubic hair dusted around a small penis that curved snugly around his sac. His chest was hairless and flat and his arms slightly plump. Resting on top of so much childish inconsequence was a big, surprisingly adult head with horrible razor-cut hair, a geranium-red complexion, and heavy smoker’s lines bracketing his mouth. Jack no longer found him appealing.
Fortunately Billy picked up on this mild distaste and did not cook in the nude but slipped on some faded jeans.
“You could have a shower too, while I make the polenta.”
The nozzle was dialed to produce a wide spray that enveloped Jack’s body. The bathroom was perfectly sterile, just as Jack liked it. No question mark pubes interrogating the tub, no nail clippings winking in the sink, no ghosts of old soap bars haunting the small plastic imitation-horn box next to the cologne bottles.
When he looked around, a white terry cloth robe (Jack’s size, not Billy’s) had been invisibly spirited in and laid on the closed toilet. Jack liked the attention, but he disliked it that Billy was such a practiced geisha.
They ate their polenta with a tomato-and-caper sauce and a salad and a store-bought dessert and drank two bottles of red wine. When the meal was over and Jack was leaning back, still in his robe but with his legs spread, Billy passed him a little bottle. Jack didn’t quite know what it was, but he inhaled the stuff and a mo
ment later Billy was kneeling under the table licking Jack’s balls. When the rush died down, Jack pulled Billy up and said, “Come out of there. Here. Sit on my lap. Tell me something average. Talk to me. Let’s take it slow.”
“Sure, Hal. Anything you say. I do average very convincingly.”
Jack liked having this warm boy sitting astride his legs, even though his face was disconcertingly mature. Jack decided to look not at his face but at his underarms, for Billy had laced his hands behind Jack’s neck. A suspicion of pale silk floss floated away from paler silk skin. “And my name isn’t Hal. It’s really Jack. Sorry about that.”
“Strangely enough, mine really is Billy.”
“Yes, but your name is on the bell, Mr. William Haddington III.”
Billy told him about his father, the Commodore, though he was quick to add that “commodore” was only an honorary title in the Navy. “It used to be above captain and below rear admiral, but now it means nothing, though Daddy likes us to call him that. He’s a businessman, but in his dreams he’s always sailing.”
Jack pulled Billy tighter into his arms and squeezed him. He ran his hands over the small, elegant bumps of his spine, as evenly spaced as rosary beads. Then he relaxed him until he was almost reclining, and he kissed his small maroon nipples and his clavicle, which came swimming out of his shoulder like a spatula in batter.
The couch was opened into a bed, and before, during, and after making love, they talked and talked about New York and college and when did you know you were gay for sure. Jack even told Billy about his shrink.
Billy said, “I don’t really care about getting well.” He bit his cuticle. “I guess I should, but I don’t. Can you picture me with a wife and children?”
Jack glanced automatically down to Billy’s very small penis, then caught himself and looked away. “I’m not sure,” he said.
“Well, I can’t. Call me sick, but I like men. I guess I’m pretty passive.”
“Thank god,” Jack whispered as he kissed Billy’s ear.
What Jack liked about Billy was how relaxed he was. He seemed to be shuffling through life, eyes half closed, humming a tune so broken up it couldn’t be reconstructed. Jack was used to a supplicating look in men’s eyes, which led him to feel nothing but stubborn resistance. With most guys Jack never had enough room to stretch out, but here was Billy letting him breathe and turn around—in fact, Jack wondered how many other gentlemen Billy was stringing along. He was so good at it and seemed so undesperate. So accommodating.
For Jack the most romantic moment occurred when he was heading home alone in the cab and thinking about the evening. He realized it was wrong to get too comfortable with another man. Next thing you knew, he’d be giving his hair a henna rinse and adding a little girly skip to his walk. Loving another man, a gay man, didn’t make much sense. No other man (unless he was a real glandular case) would know how to fit his body or psyche to a male partner’s.
And yet here was Billy, who knew, maybe because he was so super-casual, how to bend and snuggle right into the contours of Jack’s body. It wasn’t as if a woman was all that easy to get along with either. Let’s face it, he thought: people are obstacle courses.
Over the next two weeks Jack saw Billy every other night. He finally even got up his courage and invited Billy to a restaurant. He could always say they worked together—unless they ran into someone from the office. Billy dressed well. He didn’t lisp. Hell—Jack didn’t owe anyone an explanation! If Billy had been just a few years younger, Jack could have said they’d gone to school together in Michigan. Jack regretted Billy’s big, grown-up head. And yet Jack found himself smiling whenever he thought of Billy. Billy wasn’t the kind of guy who could burrow into your heart—there was nothing elusive about him or even resistant. He was just an easy habit to acquire. He soothed the soul, but he didn’t fire the imagination. Nor was there any future with him. Even with Will the most Jack had dared to hope for was two years. Now the thought of this foolish hope made Jack wince. His head hurt with the memory, and he massaged his temples.
Jack invited Billy down to his apartment and cooked him a chicken breast, which he’d learned from Rebekkah how to dip in egg and flour and then sauté. He even sprinkled it with chopped parsley and served it with frozen petits pois, which Alex had assured him always came out well.
Jack made martinis for them and had bought a bottle of white wine, which by mistake tasted sweet. Jack had decided that Billy was very “cool”—that was his word for him. As he’d look at Billy, the word “cool” would recycle like water in a diagram about precipitation. What a cool guy, he’d think. He has a beautiful slow smile, little feet that feel good when he presses back against my bare chest like a cat “kneading bread.”
After Billy left, Jack said out loud, “I really gotta stop this dating—it’s fuckin’ faggy.” He started taking his meals with his girls again. Alice asked him if Will and Alexandra had ever been introduced.
“It didn’t really take,” Jack said.
“What do you mean?”
“They kept spatting,” Jack said. “I couldn’t believe it.”
Alice knocked back a jigger of whiskey and played with her spaghetti. “That can be a sign they’re attracted to each other. It’s called sex antagonism.”
“I’d never fool around like that with sex antagonism!” Jack exclaimed.
Alice laughed a polite but noncommittal honk of “Huh!” and lit a cigarette.
“Are you going to smoke through the whole meal?” Jack asked.
Alice merely looked at him and blinked. “I heard it’s called dining à la russe.”
“What is?”
“Smoking through the meal.”
“Nice name for a filthy habit,” Jack said.
“Your manners could use a little work too. You’ve spattered tomato sauce all over your face.”
Walking home, Jack realized that spending so much time with Billy, far from making him more effeminate, more homosexual and prissy, as he’d expected, had actually coarsened him. Billy was pushing him into a more manly role. With a girl, a guy had to tiptoe around not to offend her. Women wanted you to be gentle, but other men liked it rough.
When Jack called up a week later, Billy didn’t question him or register any hurt. He certainly didn’t come across as wounded. He talked about a trip he’d made to Boston to see some old friends from Colgate. Jack wondered if he’d even noticed that Jack had been missing in action.
The truth was that during the first half of their evenings, before Jack climaxed, he liked Billy and enjoyed himself. Billy was smart and could talk about politics and was pretty conservative. But the minute Jack came, he was sickened by their organs, their breath, the futile desire of one man to climb inside another. Billy was aware of Jack’s darker postcoital moods and would get dressed quickly. It was as if Billy’s mature head was the person who talked about the virtues of the Republican Party, and his boyish body was his other personality: generous, passionate, the liberal!
After sex Billy was perfect. He turned on the TV and talked back to the announcer. No signs of affection. They could have been dorm-mates at Colgate.
One Sunday morning Jack was wandering around his apartment alone in his underpants and cooking a hamburger for breakfast (it was noon) when Alexandra phoned him. “So what do you think of the review?”
“What review?”
“In the Sunday Times book review? Of Will’s book? Didn’t you see it?”
“I’ve got it here—was it good?” Jack asked. Now he was sitting on his corduroy couch. His legs looked very long and meaty, surprisingly powerful thighs that could feed a family of four.
Alex laughed sadly. “ ’Fraid not.”
“Oh god,” Jack said.
“It’s very small, the review, on a page with … three … four! other reviews.”
“But not good?”
“Mainly descriptive but no, a damning last line. And even the description makes it sound inoffensive.”
/> “Not good,” Jack said. He thought the soles of his feet looked yellow—was he eating too many carrots? Could carrots turn your soles yellow?
“Poor Will,” Alexandra said.
“He’ll be crushed. Can you hang on a second? I have to—one second—” He turned off the fire under the burger and went back to the couch and phone with a cold cup of coffee. “There. I thought the book was good, didn’t you? Kind of good. Pretty good.”
“Poor Will,” Alex said. “You should call him up, Jack. Or maybe he has a girlfriend to look after him?”
“I don’t think so,” Jack said, “but who knows? He’s so mysterious. Of course, he’s got his sister.”
“Oh, what’s she like?” And they were off on a conversation about Elaine.
The review, only two paragraphs long, summarized the plot and then added, “The prose is at once shimmering and exact, the characters well observed and the story worth the telling. An unfortunately cloying feyness, however, hangs over everything, and some readers may break out in hives after such a prolonged exposure to whimsy. Nevertheless, Mr. Wright seems to have talent and his very next book could easily be a roaring (and not another treacly) success.”
Jack called Will and Elaine’s house several times but did not leave a message with the service. At last Elaine picked up. They talked for a while, and then she said in a low voice, “Will is absolutely devastated, but he’s pretending to be very jaunty. He went out for a long walk and came back sort of drunk and said something sarcastic about his whimsy hives bothering him—obviously an allusion to …”
“Do you think he’d come here to dinner tonight if I invited him?”
“That’s so sweet of you, Jack. Here, I’ll go get him. Hang on.”
After a while Will came to the phone. “What are you up to on this drizzly Sunday? What’s happening, man?” He sounded tired but brave, or so Jack interpreted his tone of voice.
“Wanna come to dinner?” Jack asked. “I’m roasting a chicken and potatoes, and I’ve also got salad makings. I’ve also got a fifth of J&B.”
“Now you’re talking. Only one rule—”