These Things Happen (13 page)

   " Thank you," I say.

   "Enjoy," he says, which we both hate and never say. Then he looks at me like he knows me too well, which he does. "Don't tell me. It didn't go well last night, did it? What was his name? Tyler, maybe?"

   I burn my tongue on the croissant's lava-like filling. "Taylor. And I should have known it would be a disaster. It always is now, when you don't meet on the Internet but on the actual street. I don't want to
meet
people. I just want to read about their characteristics, in a profile. And then judge them." I take another taste. "Harshly."

   "Was he cute, at least?"

   I quote Frank O'Hara, in words culled, years ago, from a poetic but faithless boyfriend. " 'It is easy to be beautiful,' " I say, " 'but difficult to appear so.' "

   "And was he beautiful?"

   I am terrible; I am shallow. "He had a finger," I say, "that was deformed."

"There's always a finger," George says. "Somewhere."

"And he has a one-man show."

   "I'm sorry. Did he do it for you? Was there abuse in it? Mormons?"

   "It was about the Bauhaus. He does all the members, with the German accents. His Oskar Schlemmer was amazing, by far the best I've ever heard—"

   "Lenny," George says. Just that, my name, which is how I know he didn't call me in early for good news.

   "I knew it," I say. "I'm psychic. We're closing, right?"

   "What are you talking about?"

   "George. Come on." I sweep my arm through the air, to take in the pleasant little kingdom we've built over the past decade. "It's dead. You can say it. That's why you wanted me in early, to break it to me."

   "No!" George says. "And since when are you psychic? I just need to ask you something—"

   "Phyllis, in F
ollies
," I say, stopping him before he can tell me; it's an Actor Thing, done for luck: when a fellow actor wants to ask you something, you answer right away with the character you most wish you could play; the idea is that, someday, you'll get a chance to play it. I've left the stage, but I want to keep my options open.

   "This isn't that," he says. "It's this: When did you know?"

   Ah. We are men, of an age, in a city that both is much like New York and is New York, so this question must mean when did I know I was (w
hisper
) (
you know
) (
gay
). How can we have been friends for so long, I wonder, and never have gotten to this? This used to be
the
question, back in the great dead
then
, in the days before knowledge had turned into
information. Forever
; that was an answer. Or
sophomore year.
Seeing some tragic star on tv, her pain and talent so powerful that she could reach out from the screen, grab an impressionable boy by the neck, and make him hers, for life. Whereas today . . . well, enough about today. "Why?"

   "Someone asked."

   " About me, personally?"

   "No."

   "Who was it?"

   "Wesley."

   " Really? Do you think that he might be—"

   But George doesn't let me get out the word, the one I was going to whisper, anyway. He shakes his head, as Armando butts in with a plate of artichoke risotto; the balances were off, subtly, on Saturday night, and George wasn't happy. George tastes it, as do I; we're happy, and Armando goes back to the kitchen.

   "His friend is," George says. Then, in a whisper: "
Gay
," he says. "Remember the kid who came in alone last week? Ginger ale, spaghetti with butter? He came out in school. And because Kenny and I are— you know—" It's now, somehow, even harder to say the word. I try to help.

   "What? Democrats? North Koreans? Tory voters? Help me, a little."

   "This kid wanted Wesley to ask me and Kenny some
questions.
Including the w
hen did you know."

   "What did you say?"

   "I couldn't think of anything," George says. "Like suddenly I had no history. I asked if we could talk about it later. So you think about it, too. I'd really appreciate it." He turns to scan the scorched earth of our reservation book. " Light night." He's on his way to the kitchen when it comes to me, easily. I reach for his arm.

   "What?"

"I don't have to think," I say. "I can tell you now."

"Okay."

   "Flipper." As I say his name I can sense him, here in the room with us, cheerful, meaty, gray. George looks puzzled, which I can't understand, as it's so clear to me. "The question you just asked me! That's my answer! I knew, from Flipper."

   "I'll tell Wesley. Now, I have to try that risotto again."

   But I take his arm again, to stop him, to tell him. And as I do I'm eleven again, nuzzling twelve, in that string of Saturday nights; my parents are out, my brothers and I are in the den, and my grandma is at work on one of her needlepoint pillows of Jewish Giants of Show Business. We're waiting for
Flipper,
me most intently, despite the fact that by 1980 the show is reruns of reruns from the mid-'60s, ghosts of itself. The show comes on, with its two motherless boys, its hirsute dad, and Flipper, the shimmering friend. I'm a year or so from figuring out that I'd happily replace him as friend to the older one. What I do know, for sure, is that I want passionately to be with them in Florida, in the Keys or the Glades or wherever such goyim live.

   So one night, I say, I'm almost asleep. I turn to the window, and there's this large f
ace.
Flipper's. Smiling. He tells me to hop on. Then, just like that, we're skimming along the surface of the ocean. He laughs, and then, in a cloud of shpritz, shoots up into the air, comes down, and dives under, through universities of fish, until we come to a great set of gates that open to reveal a town. Then Sandy, the golden older brother, swims forth and says, "Lenny! Welcome. We've been waiting for you." He offers his hand, and even down here, where there is no sun, some sort of light catches the gold of the hair on his forearms. Then Flipper expands to a hundred times his usual size, opening his smiling mouth to reveal a beautiful room. And as Sandy and I start to swim in together—

"That's when you knew?" George says.

"I guess so," I say, because I see that now.

"You want to add anything?"

"Well," I say, "once we're inside—"

   George puts up a hand. "Send me the link," he says, which is our code for
I've just stopped paying attention.
He straightens a few posters of forgotten flops; life, according to our walls, is a place where all hopes die and nothing works out. "So I might have to ask you to cover for me tonight. There might be some stuff, upstairs."

   "That's fine. Could I just ask one question?" He doesn't say no. "Why don't I like Kenny?"

   "I don't know," he says.

   Neither do I. He is handsome, necessary; he's made a difference in the lives of thousands of gay people, and not just the cute ones. "Is it because he isn't funny?"

   I have to give George credit; he considers what I've asked, as opposed to just slugging me. "Maybe," he says, "it's that you're not as funny as you think you are, and he's funnier than you know. Because you can't know, right? About how anyone is, when they're alone with the person they love." He brushes some dandruff from my shoulder, even though I don't have any. "I wish you liked him. He knows you don't. So. Calamari? Any thoughts?"

   This is a daily question, as calamari is a signature dish. We stuff it, fry it, braise it in a stew. "Grilled?" I say. "We haven't done that since last Monday, and it sold."

   "Yes." He likes this; we're a good team. "In a salad. With baby scallops."

   "Smaller," I say. "Newborn."

   He doesn't laugh, and I didn't intend him to; a small joke at the right time can act as a miner's light in the cave of a friendship, a search for what's in the dark. And I know something is; I know George; I hear it, whatever it is, breathing.

   And I'm right. "Kenny's getting an award," George says; he may not know this is the start of something, but I do. "Even though you don't like him." He takes down some chairs, centers a cruet, shuts his eyes and sniffs to make sure the right aromatic balance found between Forty-seventh Street and Tuscany; we have a story to tell here, every day.

   "When isn't he getting one?"

   "And Wesley needs us," he says. "He said so, just flat out." He takes more chairs down, setting them just so; he holds a water glass up to the light, turning it, in search of fingerprints. "He needs Kenny, that is." This glass has passed inspection; on to the next. "His dad."

   "I know who Kenny is." I help with the chairs, help to make a beautiful room. We've had a light past few weeks, so each day we stage the floor is a statement of faith. We move past each other, easy in our choreography, doing our jobs and silent for a while.

   Then George continues. "Because there was something else Wesley asked this morning," he says, answering a question I haven't asked, one that he's put to himself, it seems. "If we thought being gay was a choice. And Kenny didn't even have to think about it. He said no, almost before Wesley could even finish his sentence. He said— who'd choose a life that would be like this?" George gets a text, which startles him. He takes out his phone but doesn't read the message; he just turns the phone in his hand, breathing on it, polishing it. Then he looks at me. "He was so sure. And I usually love that. But isn't it my life, too? I thought,
Do I know
any
thing? Do I
know this man?"

   The reservation line rings, which is good, which means business. Caller ID tells me it's our stalwart, Mrs. Engler, who wants me to reassure her for the thousandth time that the osso buco is tender today. As I do that three more calls come in, then a fourth. As the last is from
Private Caller
I grab it first, as that can sometimes mean someone wonderful. I affect a slightly Italian accent. What if it's Angela Lansbury? It's not. It's a man, clearly calling from a noisy place, asking to speak to "Mr. George Seeger," and as he says this I realize it's been a long time since I've heard his last name, as in here he doesn't need one; he's just George. There are more calls now, a dozen emails from Open Table telling us of reservations for the next few days. Does this mean we're turning around? The theater is always the Fabulous Invalid; does that apply to theater district restaurants? I remember that I've got someone on the other end waiting for George. I turn, hand him the phone. Mrs. Engler calls back, this time for George, as he's the one whose tenderness meter she trusts.

   "Mrs. Engler," I whisper, covering the receiver, but when I turn George isn't where I left him. He's in the middle of the room, in his coat, frozen in place.

   "George?" I say. "Are you okay?"

   "I can't find my scarf," he says.

   I go into action, not questioning this, giving him mine. When I hold it out to him, though, he doesn't take it.

   "Here's the thing," he says. "It's Wesley, see. That was the hospital. Something's happened."

W
e're crazy today. Well, all days, really. Give me your tired, your poor, your poorly dressed, as Hector, my favorite nurse, puts it. We have to take you in; we're the city. And, even with all this, I still pick this guy out of the crowd as he comes in, stepping into the light like an actor making an entrance. He actually was one, if I remember right, between stops on a tour of something. I could be wrong; it was a few hours one night, years ago, and somehow I am now
so fucking old.
But it's him; it's got to be. And will he know me? No way. He couldn't. Not here in the hospital, anyway. Because when someone winds up here they cross a line where they're not themselves, for a time. So you're not you, either.

    "Excuse me," he says.

    "Yes."

    "There's a boy here. Two, actually. I got a call at work, this person said they'd been hurt."

    "Name?" I act bored, busy; our workplace space psychologist told us that flat affect actually helps people in distress, and he certainly seems to be.

   "Wesley." He points to my computer. "Is he in there? His last name's Bowman, B-o-w-m-a-n. He's fifteen."

   "Give me a minute here," I say. "I've been up and down all day."

   "With what? Your mood?"

   I laugh, although I see he didn't intend me to. And I make the choice to initiate CEC, which is what we call compassionate eye contact and which we're taught to use sparingly. "With my
system.
It happens all the time, we're actually pretty primitive here. Let's just give it a second. And you are—?"

   "Me?" He seems surprised. "Oh, I'm not anyone. I'm— just George."

   
Yes
, I think;
it's you
. I try to remember his last name. I can't. "So then you wouldn't be Mr. Bowman."

   "Oh, no," he says, "his father is. Wesley's not my son. I'm—"

   "Just George," I say, which I wouldn't have said if I didn't want him to remember me suddenly, to have pined for me all these years, here in this place where I'm not the hot-enough guy from twenty years ago but just a bureaucratic pain in the ass, hiding behind a computer.

   He doesn't seem to have heard me, though. "George Seeger," he says. "The other boy's name is Theo."

   "Theo what?"

   "Shit," he says. "Sorry. But I don't think I even know it."

   "That can happen. Things can get scrambled up in here. People forget the most important stuff about themselves."

   He seems grateful for this. "They do?"

   My screen pours out a few more facts. " Could his name be Rosen? I have a Theo Rosen, age fifteen."