Probation (5 page)

Pow, pow, pow.

Da-dum-dum-dum.

Da-dum-dum-dum.

I ended with a flourish, a magnificent punch that rattled the ceiling.

I dropped my fists and turned to confront him.

“Good speed,” he said, obviously impressed. “Let me show you how to use your shoulders to get a little more power.”

I pulled off my gloves and wiped my forehead.

“No, thanks. I’ll figure it out myself,” I said as I brushed by him on the steps, gloating over this long-awaited opportunity to reject him even though the taste of revenge was far less sweet than I’d always dreamed it would be.

M
att, you think I’ve got no willpower. You think I’m weak, unable to resist temptation. It’s nine o’clock in the evening, early, very early. Atlanta’s a big old city with lots of big, horny men on the prowl. It’s hump night and the boys are out there looking to hump. But I’m going to prove you wrong, you sanctimonious son of a bitch. Who knows what I’m passing up just to make a point? I see they’re filming a movie in town, with you-know-who, that big, big star, the one who joined that whacked-out church after they threatened to out him and ruin his career. I’ll bet tonight’s his one opportunity to slip out unnoticed by the Grand Pooh-Bah of the Celestial Congregation and prowl the underbelly of gay Atlanta. I bet I’m his type, that he’d be all over me, begging to be my love slave, promising to please me like I’ve never been pleased before.

But no. I’m going to lie flat on my back and pound my prick until I squeeze it dry, fantasizing about the best fucking orgasm I’m never going to have.

They kept up the house and the lawn, minded their own business, and that’s all that matters, my father always said. You couldn’t ask for more in neighbors. But when my mother suggested inviting them to a holiday party, he put down his foot with an emphatic no that made it clear the matter wasn’t up for discussion.

Mr. Marion Wright and Mr. Lesley Sax lived in a Victorian pile that lent dignity and a sense of history to the hapless split levels and ranches surrounding it. Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax had never restored the house since, unlike its contemporaries, it had never fallen into disarray. Rather they had preserved it and tenaciously held on to the original boundaries of a rolling lawn that dwarfed the others in the neighborhood. Mr. Wright’s grandfather had built the house before the turn of the century. Mr. Wright’s mother lived there from the day she was born until the day that God finally took heed of her son’s many shaken-fist curses to the heavens above and struck her dead by inflicting a massive stroke. She claimed to never have slept a night of her life outside that house, insisting that she never even closed her eyes during her six-week honeymoon trip to Europe.

I remember the day Mrs. Wright was buried. My father threatened to whup my sister Gina and me for screaming and fighting in the backyard. Show a little respect for the dead, he warned. Late that night, I was awakened by the doorbell. I stood at the top of the stairs, behind my mother. My father told Mr. Sax to settle down and speak slowly so he could understand him. Then, barefoot and wearing only pajama bottoms, he left with Mr. Sax, closing the door behind them. My mother sent me back to bed and went to the kitchen to wait for him to return. An hour later I heard the front door open. I crept down the stairs and listened, safely hidden behind the kitchen wall.

Mr. Sax wouldn’t let him call the police, my father told my mother. Mr. Wright had trashed his mother’s bedroom, breaking furniture, shattering mirrors, ripping her clothes to shreds, tearing the curtains from the windows. The fat old bastard was curled up on her bare mattress, naked as a jaybird, sucking on the nozzle of a pistol. It only took a few sharp words from my father for Mr. Wright to hand over the gun. The goddamn thing wasn’t even loaded. Mr. Sax got him into a bathrobe and my father forced shot after shot of bourbon into him until he finally passed out. Disgusting, the old man told my mother, just disgusting. I should have put the bullets in the gun for him. It’s not like anyone would have missed him if he had shot himself. Well, I suppose Mr. Sax would have missed him, my mother countered. Jesus Christ, Ruth, my father said, the incredulous tone of his voice implying she was crazy.

After that night, Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax withdrew back into their solitude. I knew they were not real men like my father. The old man said Mr. Wright clipped coupons for a living. (I wondered how anyone could make any money snipping the newspaper to get ten cents off a carton of orange juice or a roll of paper towels.) And a good thing too, since he was a little “this way” (my father pursing his lips and waving his hand airily) and then there’s all the goddamn booze…but then again, they mind their own business. When I asked if Mr. Sax had a job, the old man muttered under his breath and told me to go in the house and get him a can of beer.

Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax’s lives didn’t extend beyond the veranda. From the first warm spring evening to the last damp chilly night of autumn, Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax observed the world from the safety of their porch, Mr. Wright in an Adirondack chair, Mr. Sax in a rocker, a small table between them. Mr. Wright sipped a drink from a tall tumbler that Mr. Sax jumped up to refill each time Mr. Wright emptied it.

From the distance of our yard, you could see Mr. Wright’s mouth moving, talking, talking, talking, as he jabbed Mr. Sax with the index finger of his free hand, making sure he didn’t miss his point. Mr. Sax sat rocking, smiling and nodding his head, never saying a word. My sister and I, lying on our backs and counting the stars, heard Mr. Wright’s harsh voice, slurring his words as he lacerated Mr. Sax for some imagined betrayal. The ending never varied: Mr. Wright stumbling out of his chair, Mr. Sax sweetly advising him to be careful, Mr. Wright slamming the door and locking it behind him. Mr. Sax would sit for an another half hour, rocking away, fingering the house key in his pocket and staring at the constellations in the sky, searching for his lucky star to thank for getting him through another day. Regina and I would mock him, mimicking his high, singsong voice—“Be careful!” “No,
you
be careful”—as we wrestled in the grass.

At age fourteen, my father put me behind a power mower and pointed me toward our lawn. Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax sat on their veranda, sipping away in the shade, amused by the struggle between a wiry kid and a six horsepower engine. I felt their eyes assessing me, lingering on my developing chest, Mr. Sax looking over the reading glasses resting on the bridge of his nose, Mr. Wright staring through the blue haze of cigarette smoke. One Saturday morning, Mr. Sax approached my father and asked if I would like to earn some extra spending money. The old man, determined I would repeat his up-by-the-boot-straps-through-hard-work-and-determination-Horatio-Alger story, negotiated the price. Ten dollars for my sweat and the wear and tear on his lawnmower. Five bucks extra if they wanted to set me loose on the boxwood hedges with a pair of clippers.

I acquiesced without argument, not knowing how to explain the queasy feeling in my stomach when I knew they were watching me. I refused to take off my shirt, not even when the temperature spiked into the low hundreds. Of course, Mr. Sax and Mr. Wright were perfect gentlemen, never advancing to remarks, let alone casual touching. Mr. Sax would bring me glasses of ice water or lemonade and, when the labors of Hercules were finished for another week, hand me my remuneration in a thick, cream-colored envelope. Lovely, just lovely, he’d say. I asked Gina why he couldn’t just say good job or nice work. Because, stupid, she said, he’s talking about you, not the grass.

Later that summer, Mr. Sax approached my father again. He and Mr. Wright were taking a short holiday (again, my father pursed his lips and flitted his hands, mimicking the conversation) and the guest house on Cape Cod refused to accommodate pets. Mr. Sax assured me Miss Hellman would be no problem at all. (“The fucking cat’s a male!” the old man sputtered, disgusted.) He was as gentle as a lamb, the sweetest puss on earth. Just change the litter and make sure he had enough food and water. On the third day of cat-sitting duty, I persuaded my mother to take the Grand Tour. She oohed and aahed over each camera-ready tableau. A green velvet sofa with huge carved claw feet dominated the front room. Chairs with needlepoint seats and fierce straight backs were clustered for intimate conversation. Porcelain shepherdesses herded tiny crystal objects scattered atop the occasional tables. Spit-polished brass andirons waited for colder weather to return. Mr. Sax spent countless hours surveying his Master’s domain, repositioning a hair here, an eyelash there, the perfect arrangement never quite achieved.

My mother and I wandered from room to room. But when we reached the wide staircase that led to the second floor, she hesitated, declining my suggestion we explore the rooms above. A troubled look crossed her face and she asked if I had been up there. No, I answered truthfully. She said she shouldn’t have come here uninvited and for either of us to invade Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax’s private rooms would betray their trust. She allowed herself one last indulgence, picking up a china plate to appreciate the delicate blue willow pattern. Imagine the holidays they once had in this house, she said. I tried to picture Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax as they sat down to dinner. Did they huddle together in one corner of the long table or sit at opposite ends?

And where exactly did Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax sleep? I would have to wait until Miss Hellman’s next feeding to answer that question.

The cat sat at the bottom of the staircase, accusing me with his eyes as I climbed the steps. The windows were shuttered, letting in only thin strips of daylight. The first room was a bedroom, meant for guests, its closets and chests full of towels and linens. The second room was a study with walls of books and a prissy writing table with a full complement of expensive writing implements. The last room was for sewing, with an ancient Singer and baskets overflowing with spools of thread. Miss Hellman streaked across my feet, having decided it wasn’t wise to let me wander these rooms alone.

He followed me up to the third floor. The door at the end of the hall was open; a huge canopy bed, mattress riding high above the floor, overwhelmed their bedroom. Books were neatly stacked on the nightstands on each side of the bed. A pair of reading glasses sat on one table. Mr. Sax’s side of the bed. A cigarette case and silver lighter rested on the other. Mr. Wright’s side.

The cat leaped onto the dressing table where he could watch my every move. I kicked off my sneakers and hopped on the bed. Giddiness overwhelmed me and I rolled from side to side, one minute Mr. Sax, the next Mr. Wright. Kiss me, you fool, I said, puckering and smacking my lips. Yes,
mon amour
, I said, hugging my ribs, a fourteen-year-old’s idea of passion as inspired by crummy old movies. The cat licked its paws, bored by my childish shenanigans. I flopped on my back and threw my legs over the side of the bed. When I reached down for my sneakers, I saw them, a stack of magazines on the floor, nearly hidden by the dust ruffle, on Mr. Sax’s side of the bed.

They sure as hell weren’t
Life
or
Look
or
The Saturday Evening Post
. A chiseled figure flexed his enormous biceps on the cover of the magazine at the top of the pile. I knew I’d hit the jackpot, understanding for the first time the concept of “impure” I’d been taught in catechism.
Physique, a Magazine for Gentlemen
. I tossed them on the bed and raced through the pages. All the models had short crew cuts, clipped close to the skull, and every one was stark naked except for a little sock slipped over his penis, secured by a string around his flat hips. Dipping, stretching, flexing, stretching some more, looking right, looking left, looking down at their toes and up to the sky, always careful to keep that silk sock front and center. They made me think of my older cousin Bobby, who lived on a farm and who, that summer, had taken to strutting around his bedroom in nothing but his underpants, showing off his newly muscled chest and arms and legs and the bulge between his legs.

I dropped to the floor, looking under the bed for another stash. All I found was a pair of slippers with the heels stepped down. But the black-and-white magazines I found in the cedar chest at the foot of the bed made
Physique
seem as tame as
Weekly Reader
. The sailors didn’t just pose alone in the sun. They sprawled in pairs on beds, on couches, on rugs. Black strips were burned into the photos to conceal their eyes. They had long flaccid dicks and balls that hung like weights in their wrinkled sacks. They smiled and reached out to each other, never actually touching. They had pimples on their asses, scars on their veins, and their arms were tattooed with Chinese dragons and bleeding hearts pierced by daggers.

I broke out in a sweat, my heart racing in my chest and blood pounding in my ears. My legs started shaking and I pressed my thighs together as tight as I could. My dick felt full, like I needed to piss, but better, warmer, more tingly. My hand, not even knowing what it was doing, yanked at my zipper and the cat looked up, surprised to find my pants down around my ankles. I rolled over on my stomach and rubbed against the mattress, not thinking about the men in the magazine but about Bobby strutting back and forth, remembering his smell, imagining myself on the floor with him, rubbing faster and faster, until I was so hard I was sure I would burst. I wouldn’t, couldn’t stop, and at the very last minute I panicked, realizing I’d lost control and nothing, not my gritted teeth or the hand squeezing the head of my dick, could stop me from pissing all over the bed.

Only it wasn’t piss or anything like it. It was white and sticky; it must have been the stuff Bobby meant when he bragged about creaming the bed. It smelled like my socks after I wore them three days in a row. The cat pounced on the bed and sniffed at the dribble on the bedspread. I watched, appalled, as he licked it clean. I jumped off the bed and into my pants, anxious to get out of there.

That night at dinner, I couldn’t look my parents in the face, absolutely certain they would realize something was different about me and interrogate me about what had happened in the few hours since breakfast when the old man had threatened violence if I kept flicking Alpha-Bits at my sister. I promised God I would never, ever, do anything like that again if He let me get away with this. And when He did, I climbed the stairs to Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax’s bedroom the very next afternoon and every day up to the evening they came home.

Mr. Sax was delighted to find Miss Hellman healthy and happy and insisted I accept a ten-dollar tip on the twenty he had promised. August turned to September and then it was fall, Mr. Wright and Mr. Sax still watching me from the veranda every Saturday until the weather turned cold and the lawnmower went into hibernation for the winter. One thing changed, though, after they came back from their holiday. I started taking off my shirt, my adolescent chest glistening with sweat, compensation of a sort, or maybe bribery, for the stolen contraband hidden in a small footlocker stashed in the corner of my bedroom closet. If they ever missed their copy of
Sailor Tails
they never said anything.