The Front Runner (33 page)

As he paced slowly down the center of the red tartan track, the sections of crowd opposite him burst into cheers and warm applause. The applause followed him along like a slow wave.

Few athletes had ever come to the Games trailing as much publicity as Billy had. His fight to get there had finally turned much of the hostility to warmth or at least well-wishing. Most people in the stadium now seemed to feel, "All right, he's here, let's be kind to the Animal and see how he runs."

He was opposite us now. He knew our seats were up there somewhere, and he dared to loose one hand from the flagstaff and toss a little wave at us. I threw one arm around John and the other around Vince and hugged them both hard. I had a lump in my throat. John had tears running down his cheeks. Vince was nodding a little, grinning sadly at his own bad luck.

"Look at him," I said. "He would have made a damn fine Marine."

Delphine was sobbing joyously. "He's so
fresh,"
he kept saying.

Steve had his arm around the Angel, who seemed to recognize his gentle acquaintance down there and was smiling a little, his blond mane blowing back against the knees of a stout middle-aged lady. Betsy was bouncing up and down in her seat, clutching Vince's arm. The Prescotts, sitting in front of us, turned

around with huge grins. Joe slapped me happily on the knee, and Marian squeezed my hand.

"We made it," said Joe. "It just hits me now."

The loudest applause for Billy was from the gays scattered through the stadium. Hundreds had come from the States, scraping together money for tickets and camping in the city parks. The richer gays had flocked to the Cartier Hotel, where John and Steve were staying. They had come from all the Canadian cities. They had even come flocking from Europe. Two rows in front of us, we could see a couple of handsome young Canadian gays in faded levis, yelling Billy's name and hugging each other.

The American team was past now. All we could see was Billy's mop of curls above the others' heads, and the flag snapping. They neared the reviewing stand, and there was the usual moment of suspense. Would the flag dip, or wouldn't it? All the other flags were dipping, one by one, as they passed the Prime Minister of Canada.

Old Glory was coming up to the reviewing stand now.

I leaned over to John and Vince. "He's not going to dip it," I said, and I told them Billy's joke about the flag as a symbol of gay erection. John and Vince broke into helpless laughter.

That flag passed proudly by the reviewing stand, straight up. American arrogance and honor had been upheld once again, by a youth that America had disdained. I was laughing myself. That lump just stayed in my throat, and wouldn't go away.

But the tension in the stadium was real and gripping, and we could feel it that very first afternoon. Every person who was at the Games remembers it as the Games of rumors and threatened violence. The rumors kept coming and going like the sunlight on that first day.

The ghosts of Munich and Mexico marched in that opening parade, carrying their black flags. So many extremist groups had threatened to bomb the Montreal Games  that  everyone  there   sort  of 
assumed 
that

there'd be some kind of massacre. Everyone hoped that the bullets wouldn't fly while they were watching their favorite event. It was a sad proof of how accustomed we all were to violence.

Rumors said that the French-Canadian separatists were going to bomb the Games. Black protestors were going to bomb the Games. The Canadian Indians and Eskimos were going to bomb the Games to protest racial discrimination. Jewish radicals were going to bomb the Games to avenge the massacre in Munich. A few telephoned threats to the Olympic officials had even informed them that the Games would be bombed if they permitted Billy Sive to compete.

So the Canadian government had reacted by throwing a massive cordon of troops around the Olympic area.

When we had arrived at the stadium that first day, we had been amazed at the elaborate security precautions. Every single ticket-holder had to walk past one of those metal-detectors used in airports. If he showed metal, he was frisked. The Olympic Village, where the 1,700 athletes spent all their time save for those moments when they appeared on the field, was under such tight guard that athletes could not sneak in girlfriends and wives as they had done even at Munich. The athletes could leave the village to visit downtown Montreal, but they were warned that they did so at their own risk.

The threats against Billy had upset us all. But the Canadian government assured us that they were taking every precaution. They were treating Billy with great courtesy, no doubt hoping to pick up a few points with their own gay population.

Billy was staying with Mike, Martinson and Sachs in an apartment on the second floor of the U.S. dormitory in the athletes' village. The apartment was under guard at all times, even when the boys were out. In addition, the Canadians had provided two big armed bodyguards who went with Billy everywhere, and one who went with me. The bodyguards could be trusted to do their duty fervently—they were gay.

Now and then I had nightmare thoughts about Billy

being blown up by a bomb, but I tried to relax. You're really getting paranoid, I told myself.

The clank of troops had put a damper on the Games. I could feel it right there in the stadium. The crowd was trying desperately to have a good time, but all around I could hear people talking about their adventures at the frisking point.

"What's the point of having the Games," Mike Stella had told me the night before, "if they can't be open and carefree?"

Everyone—spectators, the press, athletes—kept looking around hungrily for something to give warmth and positive focus to the whole chilly affair. And that something was turning out to be Billy.

He had walked into the athletes' village with his sunlit smile, his mop of curls, his glasses, his brown suede jacket and his spikes slung over his shoulder, and he had said "Hi" to everybody. In about twenty-four hours, his Pied Piper charm had disarmed most of the athletes. They were all young too—sixteen to thirty-five. Many were nonconformists in their own right, and they responded to Billy as someone whose struggle and hard work they could appreciate.

They talked to him and found that the notorious, young, bearded gay was just a human being like themselves. They found that while he'd discuss homosexuality if they pressed him, he really preferred to talk about sport, chess, yoga, rock music, politics, the weather, life and other things. Suddenly the little group of devoted friends around him had swollen to hundreds, of both sexes.

The media were already getting bored with all the rumors of bombings, and they sought out Billy for a little bright copy. The athletes' and the media's warm feelings spread to the spectators. Shortly he was the most popular, most talked-about athlete at the Games.

As I watched it happening, it seemed like a miracle to me. After all the brutality we'd been through, it seemed like everyone's hearts were suddenly being touched with grace.

Billy went wild in the Olympic village, and I let him. He was living as he'd always dreamed of doing.

He had overcome the fury by nonviolence and compassion. He was out front, running free. He was accepted for what he was. He was even valued now, as someone who might speak for a whole universe of human feeling that had been denied. It was so ironic that, after all the efforts to keep him away from the Games, he should become their central figure.

He was everywhere at once. He was playing chess with Armas Sepponan. He was in the Village record shop buying records. He was in the shoe shops trying on new track shoes (and refusing gift pairs). He was walking through the village holding hands with the black African runners (who hold hands with everybody because that's their custom). He was working out on the track with athlete friends jokingly yelling "Go Beelee" from the sidelines. He was holed up in the dorm having serious human discussions with people.

He spent a lot of time in the discotheque, and danced so much that Gus Lindquist complained. The British and European girl athletes were crazy about him, and fought to dance with him. It was that phenomenon of the straight female finding the unavailable macho gay so irresistible.

British girl miler Rita Hedley told the press that she was hopelessly in love with him. "He's the sexiest man I've ever met," she said, "and the closest I can get is dancing."

Billy was very nice to Rita, very gentle, and danced with her to her heart's content. One evening when I was able to visit the Village, I got to see them.

The discotheque was jam-packed, and most of the dancers on the floor had drawn aside to watch Billy and Rita going at it. Rita had on a midi-length red jersey dress that showed off her litheness. Billy was wearing faded bellbottoms, and an ancient T-shirt that said
KEEP ON TRUCKIN',
and he was irresponsibly, gloriously barefoot. Both their bodies were grinding, snapping, whipping, twitching. It was sexual, but also —somehow—pure and joyous. There was that gulf between them. She was dancing at Billy, but without hope. He was dancing at himself and me.

Vince and I stood there watching, as the crush of

young athletes around the sidelines stomped, clapped, whistled and demonstrated their enthusiasm. Several of the other dancers were imitating Billy's style.

Vince was shaking his head. "The whole goddamn place is doing the boogie," he said. "Do you think they know what kind of a dance that is?"

"He's started a fad," I said.

We stood there being very amused.

Billy saw us there and threw us a theatrical wink. The crowd roared with laughter.

"Move it, Billy!" Vince called. "Shake it!"

"Aren't you jealous, Harlan?" asked a Canadian hammer-thrower.

"Jealous?" I said. "What for?"

When the music stopped, Billy and Rita came walking over. Rita gave an ironic little bow in my direction, as if to say that she was returning Billy unharmed to my custody.

Vince went wild at the Games too, but it was a different wildness.

The press, and the gays in Montreal, were aware of his presence there. He was becoming a kind of anti-hero—the one who had been cut down so unjustly. He followed the track and field events, and Billy's performances, with melancholy avidness. Training little now, he put in a couple of token miles around the area daily, and that was it.

In the evenings, when I was talking on the phone to Billy, Vince would plunge off into the night life of Montreal. He had blossomed out in a black leather cap with a gold chain on it, and seemed bent on tricking with every gay in central Canada.

What worried me most, though, was that he was drinking. I reminded him as diplomatically as possible of what hard liquor can do to an athlete's blood vessels.

"Oh," he said carelessly, "I'm just a little depressed and blowing off steam. I'm not drinking much. When we go home, I'll quit and start training again."

Not having drunk hard liquor before, Vince had no tolerance. In the wee small hours of the morning he'd crawl back to the press village totally smashed. He slept

at odd hours, started popping bennies to stay awake, and didn't eat much. It was amazing how unhealthy and dissipated he started to look in a few days.

Billy tried to reason with him too. He was actually curt with Billy and said, "Just leave me alone."

Billy and I didn't see much of each other during the Games. For his own safety's sake I wanted him to stay shut up in that security-ringed Village. The U.S. dormitory was so heavily guarded that, even when I did get into the village, there was no sneaking inside to Billy's room to make love. And I didn't want to make a fool of myself climbing up to his balcony like a lovesick Romeo.

So we did without sex for a whole week. The only thing that made it bearable was the endeavor that we were both caught up in.

Since the USOC considered me persona non grata, they had not brought me to Montreal attached semiofficially to the team as they had several other coaches. To get myself in, I had wangled an assignment from
Sports Illustrated
to write an exclusive report on the Games. This got me in as a media person. Vince came with me as my research assistant. The two of us shared an apartment in one of the buildings in the press village.

So, with my press pass, I could get into the Olympic village to interview athletes and, of course, to see Billy. The military had no qualms about letting me in, because they figured I wasn't going to bomb anybody.

Whenever I came to the Village, Billy was always waiting at the main gate. The minute the troops let me through, he threw Ms arms around me. He stayed with me and Vince all through our interviews with other athletes. With work done, we could stroll over the lawns or sit in one of the outdoor cafes drinking milk or mineral water. We held hands, or had our arms around each other. Everybody seemed to get used to the sight.

When we were apart, we fell back on the telephone. We'd lie on our beds in our separate rooms miles apart, and talk about how much we missed each other.

"I won't last the whole Games," he said. "It'll make me too tense. Maybe one night I'll come out. We can spend the night in Dad's hotel room."

Or we talked about the experiences he was having.

"What a gas," he told me. "All these kids. Some of them are unbelievable. That's what the Games is, isn't it? It's like Woodstock in sweatsuits. It's just a bunch of kids getting together. All the adults with their politics and their rules are just not . . . not the Games at all. And it's so strange to be treated like a human being for a change. I'm going to get a swelled head."

"Are there any other gay people in there?" I wanted to know.

"Listen," he said, "you wouldn't believe. Not many, but some."

And he told me of several young people, two of them women, who had come out to him in private, and told him their gay griefs. He had spent some time with them, trying to help them sort out their feelings about themselves. "After they leave, I always cry," he said. "What can I do for them?"