Coming Together: With Pride (26 page)

"Come where?" I asked, hovering close to his mouth, aching for a long, lingering embrace.

"To Nuit Blanche," Lawrence laughed, tapping on my head to see if anyone was home.

"But what about…"

"She doesn't want to come. I already asked," he interrupted. Lawrence could read me like a large-print detective mystery. Giving me a peck on the lips, he went on, "Audrey, she's not going to change her mind this time. Someone who goes to bed at 8:30 most nights isn't apt to attend an all-night art thing."

He leaned in close, nibbling my earlobe. My skin was all goosebumps. I ran my fingers across the short hairs at the back of his head. "Of course I'll come with you.
Mille fois oui,
mon chauve-souris
."

Lawrence glanced queerly in my direction, the way he always looks when he's trying to access his rusty French. "A thousand times yes, my… hot… mouse?"

I had to laugh. "Close. A
chauve-souris
is a bat. I just said it because it rhymed, but actually "
chauve
" means "bald." So, the direct translation would be 'my bald mouse.'"

"How
a propos
…" Lawrence rubbed the top of his head, where no hair dared to grow. "…for a follically-challenged librarian."

Cuddling into his arms, I giggled, repeating those non-sense words, "
mon chauve-souris
."

At that precise moment, I got my hopes up. Always a mistake with Lawrence.

****

When he arrived at my doorstep on September 29
^th
, Lawrence looked gaunt. His cheeks were drawn and dark circles surrounded his eyes.

"What the hell happened to you?" I asked.

"I have shingles."

"You have
what
?"

"Shingles. It's when the chicken pox virus reactivates in your system and you get this rash…"

"I know what it is," I snapped, irritated by his condescension. "Why do
you
have it?"

Shingles was an old-people disease, and Lawrence wasn't old. He was just barely over fifty. That wasn't old. I couldn't stand to think of him being ill. It led to thoughts of him dying, of how I would find out, of crying day and night, of whether I would attend his funeral, of how his wife and two grown kids would react, of being left out of his Will, of how I would cope, of life with no Lawrence.

"I don't know why I have it, but it's going to alter our plans a smidge," he said. "I don't want to make you sick, so we probably shouldn't, you know, exchange bodily fluids. We can still enjoy a pleasant evening at Nuit Blanche, but sleeping together might not be the best idea."

Yes, I know I should have been sympathetic, but Lawrence always somehow managed to ruin our plans. Every single time! All the self-sabotage drove me nuts! I know it sounds terrible, but I was actually angry with him for being sick. Seething, in fact. Plus—I mean seriously!—I was barely twenty-eight years old; what were the chances of me catching shingles, even if we screwed our little brains out into the night? Shingles wasn't even a communicable disease, was it?

I never would take no for an answer, and heaven knows I'd heard enough of them from my
chauve-souris
over the years. You'd think a sex-starved middle-aged man would jump at any opportunity to sleep with a lovely young woman, but not Lawrence. No, getting him into bed was nearly a chore in the early days. He was raised by stiflingly religious parents, too. All this adultery sometimes overwhelmed his conscience. In the past, I'd yelled, I'd whined, I'd begged and pleaded…

"Okay," I replied.

Nuit Blanche's plan of attack would be subtle persuasion.

****

We took the subway downtown. Packed as it was, I nestled myself into Lawrence's fleecy blue jacket. Holding the metal pole with one hand, he wrapped the other arm around me. I wrapped both arms around him.

"So, exactly where is this rash of yours?" I asked.

The goth guy standing beside us scrunched up his nose in disgust and took two steps away.

"On my back."

"Maybe it's just a rash, like an allergy or something. When my grandmother had shingles, she looked like the Phantom of the Opera. Her eye went purple and swelled up until she couldn't see. Maybe you're not as sick as you think you are," I suggested.

"I went to the doctor midweek, and she was pretty sure it was shingles. She wrote me a prescription."

"Bloor Station, our stop." As soon as we stepped out of the subway, we were stunned by the magnificent state of our city. Cumberland Avenue was strung with star-studded blue flags, a "conceptual intervention" imitating a rural Brazilian festival. Yorkville was packed with people. Hard to believe, pressing through the art galleries and past the designer shops, that this district used to be hippie-central. At least, that's what Lawrence told me. That was before I was born.

Wandering up Hazelton Avenue, we stumbled upon the Secular Confession Booth. Our programme read, "It's cheaper than a shrink with no possibility of damnation. Mature personnel will hear your confession, judgment free."

Lawrence and I stood in silence on the dark side of the street, across from a line-up two blocks long. When was the last time my confession was heard? I was still in my teens. I remember bragging that I'd seduced our neighbour, monsieur DesLauriers. It was an act of rebellion. Take that, Church! I wasn't guilty, I was proud. Forgive me, Father… or don't. Whatever. Two days later,
maman et papa
mysteriously knew the whole story.
Tabernac
, is nothing sacred? Idiot priest.

"Is your conscience heavy?" I asked Lawrence. Stupid question.

"Of course."

"Do you want to confess?"

"No," he replied.

We stood in silence.

"Do you?" Lawrence asked.

"No."

That wasn't entirely true. I sort of did want to confess every sin I'd committed over the past fourteen years, but was it really worth waiting in line? No. Instead, we walked south towards the University of Toronto.

"You know, I always was jealous of you Catholics," Lawrence began.

"Don't call me that," I interrupted.

"Sorry. Okay, then, I was always jealous because Catholics got to confess. We Baptists have to stew in our sins while you're released from yours. It's not fair."

"You did it again," I said, more irritated the second time.

"Sorry."

Following the crowd, we arrived at Trinity College's rugby field and my favourite installation. It was called
String of Diamonds
. Strung up on helium-filled balloons, white Christmas lights floated through the air, sparkling like starlight overhead. Young people, in pairs and in groups, lay in the grass, staring up at the illumination against the night sky. Lawrence and I lay down, too, our backs to the rugby field.

Beating a dead horse, I began, "So, if your doctor wrote you a prescription, does that mean you're on the road to recovery?"

"Yeah," he replied. "They're fast-acting pills. Three days later, there's almost nothing left of my rash."

I grinned. "So, you're probably not even contagious anymore."

"Maybe not."

Nestling against the warmth of his blue fleece jacket, I wove my fingers together with his. Holding hands, we gazed into the heavens, an imitation-couple staring at imitation-stars.

"Doesn't it look like they're falling?" I commented dreamily.

"Yeah," he agreed. "But it's just an illusion."

I believed him even when the lights seemed close enough to reach out and touch. I believed him until the string of LED bulbs lay across our chests.

"I guess you were right," Lawrence conceded. "They were falling."

A young man with a patchy beard and bushy hair took hold of the purple balloons, refilling the helium without acknowledging us.

"Should we move on?" Lawrence asked, picking up the change that had fallen out of his pants pockets.

"Sure."

****

Around 2:30, we decided the Art Gallery of Ontario would be our last stop. They were hosting the "End of the Party Party," complete with two drag queens and a guy in an afro wig singing ABBA songs.

"Look at this," Lawrence shouted over
Waterloo
. On a make-shift coffee table in the retro-décor space stood a stuffed beaver with evil eyes wielding a wooden spear in his taxidermically-preserved paw.

"Freaky," I yelled back over the blaring music.

"What?"

"THAT'S FREAKY!"

I could tell by his goofy grin and nod that he didn't hear me.

The night air provided little respite after the sweaty '70s dance party. Almost October, and I was walking around in my T-shirt at 3am. Talk about global warming! As our subway tokens clinked into the turnstiles, I wondered what Lawrence looked like in the seventies. I bet he listened to Dylan publicly and to ABBA in secret. That was Lawrence, never admitting to the guilty pleasures. Me, for instance.

Leaning against the door of the subway conductor's booth, I asked him which exhibit was his favourite.

"
The Kiss
," he said. A funny little installation with two illuminated TV sets facing each other, their screens touching like lips. That one was cute, but my favourite was
String of Diamonds
—because of the company, primarily. When would Lawrence and I ever again get to lie together in the middle of a rugby field and stare up at the stars?

"Will you promise me something?" Lawrence asked.

"Maybe."

"If you do catch what I have, will you let me pay for the medication?"

"I'm not going to catch it," I laughed.

"But if you do…"

"I'm sure my medical plan will cover the pills."

"But if it doesn't…"

The look of concern on Lawrence's face tugged at my heartstrings. "Okay."

When we got back to my apartment, Lawrence went into my freezer like it was his own to fetch the ice cream. I liked that he was eating my food without asking. That's what married people do. Tonight we could pretend. He made us floats with vanilla Breyer's and Dr Pepper, and we parked our weary selves on the couch to watch the end of that Cary Grant movie with the tiger. I hoped the delicious man-smell of him would seep into the sofa and never leave my apartment.

"I should probably head home now," Lawrence said, kissing my hair. My stomach clenched.

"No, don't leave!" I whined. How could I persuade him to stay? "I want to see your rash."

"What?"

"I don't believe you have shingles. I want to see the rash."

Lawrence furled his brow, squinting at me like I was nuts. I get that look a lot.

"If you have shingles, you'll have a rash," I repeated. "Show me the rash."

Childlike eyes blue and fearful, Lawrence pulled his T-shirt over his head. His chest looked the same as always, belly muscles on their way to being well-defined. No rash there.