How Long Has This Been Going On (65 page)

"There's a part for you in Johnny's play. A good one. It'll stretch you a bit."

"The soap-opera thing?"

"I have this idea that he'll finally slug a homer for once in his career if he fills in the backstage of the show. You know: Is the man-eating vixen a homebody devoted to her three children and utterly content with her husband? Is the good father in real life a loveless monster? Do these essential American families reflect or distort the truth of our lives?—which is Johnny's title, by the way. He
has
the concept, he just didn't take it far enough."

"That's my girl."

"I'm going to cast the whole thing with outsiders. Black, Hispanic, Asian, and so on. Exactly the way soap
isn't
cast, exactly what it's leaving out. So of course we've got to have a slice of white bread in there."

"Me?"

"There's something wonderfully medieval about Johnny's writing for a company of players, matching the parts to the talent. I think that's so... What are you smirking at?"

"Christine. You are such an idealist." Slicing the onion now, evenly, firmly, commandingly. "You know what theatre is? Theatre is lunatics trying to straighten themselves out."

"Except you."

"The only sane actors, Christine, are the ones who are in it for the money. It's work, like carpentry. Pure work."

"Anyway, I want you for the hero, this visiting English aristo. Hunk city."

David nods absently as he takes out the steaks.

"In the soap," Chris continues, "he's sort of bookish and inhibited. In real life, he's the ranking couch artist of the soap world, sleeping his way through the greenroom, or whatever they have in television." Mischievous Chris pauses, then: "Ask me if he's bi."

David sighs. "Christine, you're all junked up on fantasies, you know that?" He seasons the steaks: crushed garlic, pepper out of an antique wooden mill, parsley, paprika. Funny how much he knows about cooking, Chris thinks. "I'm going to have to shake those fantasies out of you."

She says, "No, you don't, Lohengrin." But one of her several interior voices says, Maybe I should listen to him, because I usually fall for gays and fakers, while this guy is totally legit. He redeems me. He is the first lover in my entire life who doesn't remind me of Luke and Tom. He is himself, just a man.

* * *

Some gays study bars. Some shop them. Tom and Luke hang out in one, that big new one—trendy this week—right in the center of the Castro. Sometimes they bring Walt along. They run into friends, they dish the talent, they keep in touch. It's the gay version of a swap meet. But you know what? Walt is not shy any more. He walks right up to guys and says, How do? As his politics inform him that all gay people are his comrades, socializing is an act of love. Then a guy will suddenly say, "Let's cut the bullshit—are you interested or not?" And Walt is stunned silent.

But
this
night, Blue is in the bar; and Walt is interested. From the moment Walt saw Blue in that porn movie, Walt was transfixed by Blue, by not only his looks but his sexual authority. Blue became his Number One, and we seldom meet up with our Number Ones, somehow, especially parading nude through a colleague's kitchen, or, now, leaning against the wall, passing his beer bottle across his forehead for a freshening chill, then smiling amiably as Walt approaches.

"Johnny's music boy," says Blue.

"You're the man in the movie."

They shake hands.

Now Walt doesn't know what to say. He turns from Blue to look around the crowded bar as if he were here to conduct a survey and had only paused to say hello. But Blue reaches with his free hand to pull Walt close to him, and, as if such things happened all the time, Walt leans his head on Blue's shoulder, and Blue says, "Yeah, that's real peaceful."

"Walt's gotten loose again," Tom told Luke, nodding at Walt and Blue across the room.

"Who is that guy?" asked Luke.

"Bad news for sure. Probably a drug dealer, big-time."

"How can you tell?" Then, doing Tom in a Bre'r Bear voice: "'I know his kind. I'm gonna walk right over there and tell that piece of trash where to go. Well, you just watch me, pal.'"

"Is that supposed to be me?" Tom asked, amused.

"'Coming on to my cousin,
huh.'"

"When do I get to talk, Mr. Know-it-all?"

Back in his own voice, Luke said, "Don't break it up, because that'll only encourage Walt. Revolutionology. Remember when he introduced us to that guy with the dumb name? The one in the spandex shorts?"

"Spider."

"You did a very impatient number on his name, and Walt immediately made Spider his best friend."

"You live with Jerrett Troy," Walt was saying. "Would he be your lover, then?"

"Johnny uses me as a defense against lovers. That whole love world that tears you up. All that hungry, and that Where have you been all night or I'll kill you? He doesn't want to be a prisoner. But when they say, Are you gettin' it each day, as a man should?, he can point to me and say, Yes, I am Johnny and I'm gettin' it. Which he really has to be able to say, I tell you true. It's a social thing. Been happenin' for quite some years now, us two like so."

"But do you ever..."

"You don't see it yet," said Blue. "And that's sweet, because yer the wonderin' kind that a guy can do anything to. I'd get nested inside you, deep and full, and we could get to know each other real nice, I guarantee."

"I've been yearning to experience just how that works," said Walt. "But I'm afraid to go that far, at the same time."

Blue had his hand under Walt's chin—gently, gently—and Walt grew still.

"The hottest thing," Blue said, "is some young kind of kid who's afraid of it and wants it. Now, I would be really careful about you, work you open and ease into you with the deep breath thing, where I hold on to your shoulders and you just let it happen. You shouldn't worry none. You got Blue for a friend tonight."

"It's reassuring to hear," said Walt, feeling like a non-swimmer treading water in the deep end, "because I want to feel at one with my brothers and maximize the gay experience. Everyone says getting fucked is the ultimate thing, and I have to know about that. I have to. Of course, we'll do it safe-style, won't we? I've been going out with condoms and spermicidal for so long now, night after night, with no reason except who knew if..."

Blue put a hand on Walt's shoulder, and Walt looked up at Blue with alarm. This was the moment when it comes together, and Blue said, "I won't hurt you, my friend."

* * *

"Look, it's not my job to police him," Luke was saying. "He's got to—"

"I
told
you—"

"Uh-oh, take a gander."

Tom took a gander. Walt was gone and so was Blue.

"Well,
shoot,"
said Tom. "Think they went back to the house? We could beat them there and—"

"Walt's not that dumb. He went home with the trash.
If
he's trash."

"Trust me, he's trash. He was all over Walt as if this was a back-alley sex club."

"What's made us so conservative?" Luke asked, thoughtfully. "Monogamy?"

Tom made no reply. Luke strongly suspected that Tom had sex with other men, easy to arrange in a building contractor's unstructured workday. And Luke had his moments, though few and seldom. Even in this medically dangerous age, it was absurd to expect an attractive and dynamic man in his mid-thirties to turn down opportunities that came his way. The bond, Luke felt, was what counted, the uniquely steadfast quality of their lifelong friendship. He just hoped Tom was well supplied with a sound brand of condoms.

"You know," said Tom, "there's nothing conservative about wanting the best for Walt."

"Maybe this is the best. He can get the slumming out of his system, and then it'll be good-bye to Spider and those rallies and the lectures. I pray."

"I know one thing. If we don't handle him right, he could be a very rebellious problem on our hands. You know?"

Luke nodded. "I know."

In Blue's room in Johnny's house, Blue and Walt got undressed watching each other, Blue with his easy smile and Walt serious. Then Blue took charge, kissing and stroking Walt till they were both full-mast, and Walt whispered, "If you're going to possess me, I have to say that this is my first time."

"How come yer whisperin'?" Blue asked, kissing Walt.

"Okay."

"First-time fuck is the most beautiful trim of all. I'm gonna score yer cherry tightness, and that will certainly content me."

"I'm always missing out on things," Walt explained, as they held and caressed each other, Walt aping Blue's movements because Blue was sheer porn and porn teaches how. "I hated myself for missing the riot last year, when Dan White was released. I was a coward, I have to admit that. And most of the time, when I go home with someone, I don't stay hard for very long. I must be this total gay flop."

"Shh," said Blue, moving Walt to the bed.

"I'm just wondering if this will hurt at all," said Walt.

"It's love, ain't it?" Blue replied, as he set Walt up on all fours. "Love hurts."

"Please don't hurt me, Blue."

Greasing the boy up, Blue said, "This is called the dog, fer clear reasons. It's proper fer a newcomer like you, 'cause you can back onto me bit by bit, and that'll ease the pain. No, don't tighten up, now. You give it all up fer me. First-time tightness, yeah. You tempting fine boy. I'm gonna pleasure-fuck you just right, okay?"

Evan was eating out Alice's cunt deep-dish style, whispering her usual litany all the while. "Go ahead, baby. Let me taste, baby. This is you, baby." Alice liked to be silent during sex and to hear nothing, but Evan was a sound track. "Oh, so licious," she goes. "Oh, tasty. My girl. My love one. Nipples. Thighs. Your lips," like a demented tour guide. "How deep can I go? Tell me."

"Deeper," says Alice, between sighs.

"So ordered," licking away, strong tongue, feasting on the wetness there, gripping her girl by the sides, the legs, the hair, always on her, never a pause. Evan likes it breathless. She likes it with Alice's legs over her shoulders, eating like that and stroking Alice's thighs. Alice emits a high-pitched moan then, pulls away, gets pulled back, sees the rough smile on Evan's mouth, fears and kisses it. Evan likes, especially, the fear in love. Evan likes forcing Alice. Alice turns onto her stomach in defense, but Evan licks Alice's back, biting her shoulders, licking then to salve the wound, biting again, lying atop, grasping all of Alice at once.

"You're like a man," Alice breathes out, and Evan loves that most of all.

Blue took a while greasing Walt up, telling him of the other positions they'd be sampling—the alligator, with Walt flat on his stomach; and the kiss-and-come, with Walt on his back.

"This is part of liberation," said Walt. "This is how I earn my wings."

"No, you got to talk about how it feels to be doing the dog with Blue. Love stuff and such. Yeah, yer workin' loose now. One finger, two fingers, three fingers, and turn. Doing the dog. Fingers here... Tell Blue how it feels. Speak to me, boy." "Arf."

"Spoilin' my mood, huh?" said Blue; but he was laughing.

Evan is shrimping Alice, sucking on her lover's toes one by one, making the greedy noises of a child attacking the cookie jar as Alice, head thrown back, black hair flared behind her, paws the bedclothes as if she'd like to crawl through her body and become one with Evan's hunger.

Evan's delight is to take Alice too far, and make her weep and want it. Evan calls this "the tingles." She tells Alice, "You've got the tingles, and the only cure for the tingles is a very heavy fuck. Come on, now." "No," says Alice.

"I can't help it if you're always getting the tingles," says Evan, moving Alice into position, kissing her tenderly to emphasize the violence that is coming, mooning over Alice's breasts, sucking on them with a brisk innocence.

"I don't have the tingles," Alice protests.

"I can feel it in your skin," Evan replies, running her hands along the curve of Alice's hips. "Your buttons are up," she adds, massaging Alice's nipples as if making an inspection. "It's the tingles, all right." "No," Alice moans.

"Let me test your kisses," Evan suggests, looming over Alice, pulling her up, loving the way Alice's arms wind around Evan's neck. They meet, these two, passionately, perfectly. "Oh, yes," Evan gasps. "It's the tingles, to be sure. Lie back, babe, it's time." "It's too much sex," Alice cries.

"Dykes are the women who have sex," Evan explains, her hand reaching for the truth of Alice, her centerpiece.

Gentle as he was, Blue did hurt Walt at first, but Walt was determined to stick it out, and after a bit the pain leveled off somewhat. "You okay?" Blue asked, several times, and Walt breathed out, "It's beautiful."

No, it was uncomfortable. This, Walt wondered, is the ultimate thing? Turning Walt on his side, Blue ran his hands over Walt in a teasing way as he pumped the boy's ass, and Walt really did try to
undergo
it, discover the magic. It should have been working: Blue was Walt's Dream Man, after all. But "Blue!" Walt cried. "It's hurting again!"

Blue pulled out, put his arms around Walt, and rested there with him.

"I'm sorry, Blue."

"'S'okay, now."

Blue rolled Walt onto his back and gazed down on him.

"I told you," said Walt. "I'm just this big gay flop. It never used to bother me, but now..."

"Hold on a bit." Slipping off the condom, Blue got up, went to the stereo, and put on an LP of some big orchestra cooing through an easy-listening program.

"Mantovani," said Blue.

Woeful Walt announced, "It's my funeral music."

"You ain't givin' yerself a chance," said Blue, holding out his arms. "Come dance with me."

"What?"

"Come along, lad."

Walt obeyed the summons, and he and Blue went into a box step, Blue leading.

"Slow dance is my fave," said Blue. "Hold me closer, though. Relax. No one's gonna know about it but us."