Twist
After a few weeks, I ask Jack if he wants to meet Billy.
"I don't know," he says. "Do you want to meet my last girlfriend?"
Since I know they're estranged, I say, "I would if she was your best friend. I would if she was the most important person in your life."
On our way to Billy's, Jack says, "Now would be a good time to tell me that I have nothing to worry about." He suggests I assure him that there's no chance I'll ever go back with Billy. "Or tell me how much you fought."
"We didn't fight," I say.
He says, "Maybe I haven't made myself clear."
I kiss him on the mouth. "Would it help if I told you we never had sex?"
He thinks I'm joking. "It would be better if you said you never had it in the last year," he says. "Or that it was never really good."
I repeat: "We never had sex."
"Why?"
"We weren't that kind of couple," I say.
"You mean the couple kind?"
"We were a couple," I say. "We just didn't have sex."
The cab pulls up to Billy's building. Usually Jack insists on paying the fare, but he doesn't even seem to notice the cab has stopped. I hand a ten to the driver. "Keep $7, please," I say.
On the sidewalk, Jack says,"I don't understand."
I hesitate. It doesn't feel like my secret to tell. Even now, Billy doesn't tell people he's gay. He's never even told his parents, though he insists they know; he says, "In the South, talking about your personal life is considered bad manners." The first time he told me that, I said, "Whereas having sex in truckstops is genteel?"
He said, "It's private."
Billy has lit about a hundred tea candles, and his apartment looks almost religious. Though it's summer, I sing, "Silent night, holy night," as we walk in. Jack takes in Billy's living room - the bleached wood floors, the pure white sofa, the fresh white tulips - and turns to meet Billy, himself in a white shirt and white pants.
The two shake hands, and Jack says, "I wasn't prepared for this."
Suddenly, I'm worried about what Jack will say; I feel protective of Billy the way I did of my grandfather when I was little and heard boys cursing in the street.
But Jack says, "I think I should've showered more thoroughly."
Billy laughs and says that he only invites people over so he can clean up afterward.
"Really," I say to Jack, "trash the place."
Billy asks what we want to drink.
"You can have anything you want," I tell Jack, "as long as it's clear."
Jack says, "Martini?"
"Olive or twist?" Billy asks.
I do the twist.
"Oliver Twist," Jack says. "You think that's how Dickens came up with the title?"
"Probably," Billy says. "He did come up with 'Master Bates, with his hands in his breeches-pockets, and his face twisted into a look of semi-comical woe.' "
They go from English literature to French, down to South America and north to the New Yorker. They disagree on everything, but happily, and I realise they are getting along man-style.
At dinner, they ask first-meeting questions, but it's as though they're just going through formalities they're already way past. Billy says, "I hear you're a big wheeler-dealer."
Jack says, "I'm more of a wheeler-wheeler, since none of the deals are going through."
I am ecstatic watching my males bond.
At dessert, Kind Of Blue comes on, and they talk about how it was recorded in a single session and defined the art of improvisation. Jack tells a story about what a slob Miles Davis was, and makes his voice hoarse imitating him: "So what? I play the music. Someone else cleans up. That's the deal."
They laugh and I laugh, too, but I get this pang. I remember the way I used to when Billy had men over; I'd pretend that I belonged, even though I felt like a Naugahyde ottoman among chintz divans, and suddenly I am more than kind of blue.
I am thinking it is past time to go when Billy excuses himself to get his saxophone. I am having trouble looking at Jack, so I clear the dishes, and he helps. He notices the picture of me and Billy on the refrigerator. It was taken during art school, and we're dressed sort of alike; at a glance, we could pass for twins. Looking at the picture, Jack says, "I can't decide whether you're cute or sick."
I say, "I can't decide whether you're cute."
Right away I wish I could take it back and I try to. I say, "I'm just kidding."
"Very funny," he says.
In the living room, Billy begins to play his saxophone, and I say, "Go, cat, go," even though I'm thinking, And Miles to go before I sleep.
Billy plays beautifully; he always does. When he finishes I applaud along with Jack, but I think, I am the sound of one hand clapping.
In the cab, I pretend to doze on my boyfriend's shoulder; back at his apartment, I pretend to fall asleep in his bed.
I hear him brushing his teeth. He opens the refrigerator, drinks from the bottle of water, turns off the lights, and climbs up to the loft bed with me. He puts his arms through mine, his hands on my breasts.
In sleep, he nuzzles into me. That's good, I think. But then: He's asleep; he could be dreaming about anyone.
This is the first night we haven't made love; that's bad, I think. But then: I'm the one who faked sleep.
I remember the muscle I used in order not to know what I knew about Billy early on, and I ask myself if I am using that muscle now.
I remember telling Billy, "But we're the perfect couple," and his response: "Except we don't couple." Now, all these months later, I'm stunned not by his words but mine. They echo here in the quiet of my new boyfriend's apartment.
When I wake up, Jack is making coffee. From my perch, I look down at his apartment, at the map of Iowa tacked to his wall, the records in crates, the futon sofa, and I think, No gay man could live in such a profoundly undecorated apartment. But then I think, Oh, good, now I'm relying on stereotypes to figure out my life.
Then Jack comes up to the loft and sets my coffee and his on the ledge. He lies beside me in his boxer shorts.
I try to act normal. I say, "Did you like Billy?"
"I did," he says. "You were the one I had the problem with."
I feel as naked as I am, and I pull the sheets up to my neck. "I guess I knew that," I say.
"It was fine with Billy," he says. "But it might not have been. He's your ex-boyfriend, even if he is gay. You could've looked out for me a little. I would've done that for you."
I know he would have, which is just one reason I don't want to lose him. "I'm sorry," I say.
"It's okay," he says. He looks at me then, in a way that Billy never has or will.
But I've never been more aware of how little I know about loving a man straight on. It feels impossible to figure out and do at the same time; it seems to require eye-hand coordination I don't have.
Then he picks up a corner of the sheet and pulls it down. I think only a twisted sister would resist what she herself wants, and I do not resist. I am the chicken who crosses the road and gets to the other side.
Mox
After dinner, Lisa tells me we need to talk.
I'm at the sink. She's at the table.
I say, "Sure," as though I have nothing to worry about, as though this talk could just be the talk she was talking about when she said we never talk.
I clear the rest of the dishes as slowly as I can without appearing deliberately slow.
When I reach for her wine glass, she says, "I'm still drinking this," with the quiet authority I have heard her use with insistent telemarketers and my right-wing colleagues.
"Sorry," I say, and then hesitate. In counselling Lisa complained that I seem to speak without feeling; so I ask myself, Am I sorry? I am, though not for taking her wine glass. I let the "sorry" stand.
I get the wine from the refrigerator and refill my own glass too full, conspicuously full, as though I know that our talk calls for anaesthesia. No - the less prepared for her news I appear, the harder it will be for her to deliver. I pour the equivalent of a gulp back into the bottle; a sip runs down its neck.
When I offer the bottle to her, I realise that I should've poured her glass before mine. "Thanks," she says.
I say, "You're welcome," a phrase strangers but not couples use; thank you - yes, you're welcome - no. Although I am trying to remain calm, it is clear to me on some level that the situation is panic-worthy - whatever level it is that makes a man say "you're welcome" instead of nothing.
She says, "Come sit down."
I say, "I just want to finish up," as the idea occurs to me, a good idea, a great idea: I will load the dishwasher, which is her job, thereby showing her that I am capable of spontaneous reversals. I will change before her eyes.
With gusto, I rinse our water glasses, bowls and plates; with devotion, I rinse the silverware, one utensil at a time. I would happily wash the pots and pans, but this would come across as my usual ostentatious display of generosity.
Instead, I reorganise the dishwasher to make it easier for Lisa to empty tomorrow. I am putting forks with forks and knives with knives when she says, "Max."
"Max," she says, not "Babe" or "Honey" or even "Mox", the nickname she uses to tease me out of what she has termed my Germanic severity. "Hey Mox," she said only a month ago, while I was grading papers from my graduate seminar, "why so shtern?" To explain, I quoted from the most dismal example. Only now do I recognise the narrative shift in her tone - from present to past, second person to third; she was already in the living-room-to-be of her future, saying, "I used to call him Mox."
Now I think of saying to her, Why so shtern? A joke would be just what she wouldn't expect from me, a joke is just what I need.
Instead, I say, "One sec," or I think I've said it; maybe I just meant to. On my way to the bathroom, I imagine her saying, He'd just walk out of the room while I was talking. So, I call out, "One sec," just in case.
In the bathroom, I look in the mirror. I try to see my face not as mine but hers - the face she has been looking at and doesn't want to look at any more. I pull at my jowls. I unfurrow my brow. Relax, I tell myself. Cheer up!
When I come out, I am smiling like an idiot. I sit down with her, waiting for her to see the open and cheerful man I have become.
She's wearing the sweater with the extra-long sleeves, the one I think looks misshapen. "That's a pretty sweater," I say.
She says, "I thought you didn't like it."
The old me would say, If you know I don't like it, why do you wear it? The new me says, "I love it!" and as I say it, I do. The sleeves are so long that only the tips of her pale, pretty fingers show. She looks like a little urchin, so vulnerable! But clean, too: Her nails are pink and white rimmed, shiny with clear polish.
She notices me looking at them, and she pulls the sleeves all the way down. I am the author of this reaction; I am the one who taught her that I notice only what I am about to criticise. She tells me that it's time to quit.
She goes on, explaining why, but her voice is just sound to me; I can't make out words. Then I remind myself that I am no longer the man she is describing. I think, I am another man. I am a new man. I am the next man she will love. I change every "you" to "he". Now I can listen with compassion. I listen with love. With my eyes, I tell her that I understand and agree completely. I want to say, You think he crushed you! Wait till you hear what he did to me! But I remember the counsellor saying, "Don't interrupt."
When she stops, I say, "Go on," just as the counsellor did. "Please."
The counsellor would observe that I am thinking of what to say next, instead of listening to her. As the counsellor, though, I forgive myself: first, because forgiveness is essential to moving beyond difficulty; and, second, because I'm not thinking of my arguments or of undermining hers. All I want is to make her happy.
In my head, I ask for help; I even bring my palms together as though in prayer. The phrase We are all God's children comes to me. Of course! She hasn't mentioned children for years; she must have been hoping I would raise the subject, and now I will.
I'll tell her that we can have as many as she wants. I will finally give her the joy she deserves! Joy in abundance! Joy overdue! I will tell her that we can name the first boy after her father! We can name all of them after her father! Leo I! Leo II! Leo III! I am trying not to smile. I am careful not to interrupt.
It is Lisa who interrupts herself. She says, "Are you okay?"
I say, "I've never been better," with all of the feeling I feel right now.
© Melissa Bank, 2000. All characters in these stories are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
