Everybody Loves You (33 page)
Read Everybody Loves You Online
Authors: Ethan Mordden
Cosgrove is turned away from us, but Virgil knows all about his little comrade and whispers, “You mustn't cry on the job, Cosgrove.”
“I'm not crying,” says Cosgrove, crying, as he extends the receiver to me. I take it in one hand and gently pull Cosgrove closer with the other. I am thinking of Cliff just now.
“Yes?” into the phone.
“What on earth is going on over there?”
“Hello, Mother.”
“What was that young man talking about?”
“He was trying to tell you that ⦠that everybody loves him.”
Cosgrove burst into sobs at this, and I put my arms around him, and Dennis Savage had to get on the phone and keep Mother busy with the first thing that came into his head, a recollection of the time he and I subverted an all-Jamboree Capture the Flag and were thrown out of the Boy Scouts, woggles and all. Virgil and Carlo pressed close for family support as I realized, startled, furious and full of joy, that I am back where I started, as the middle boy of five brothers: except Carlo and Dennis Savage are kinder to me than Ned and Jim were and I promise not to bully Virgil and Cosgrove the way I did Andrew and Tony. One other difference from the old-style family: no parents. No authority figures saying no. Now the parents are overthrown; we are our own authority.
On the strength of this new union, I told Cosgrove that we would all take care of him, that he was home and free. He held on to me, but his head was shaking, because he has vast doubts that anyone will take care of him for long. True, he has been disheartened by past dealings with incorrect company, by a shortage of Cliffs. But I am determined that my family find a place for the elf child, because I have not forgotten how lonely it felt to be one myself, when I was very young and didn't know the way to Stonewall City.
I've a feeling I'm not in Pennsylvania anymore. And as for what now transpires, I leave you to reckon, boys and girls, for this is the utmost of my report.
N
ONFICTION
Better Foot Forward: The Story of America's Musical Theatre
Opera in the Twentieth Century
That Jazz!: An Idiosyncratic Social History of the American Twenties
A Guide to Orchestral Music
The Splendid Art of Opera: A Concise History
The American Theatre
The Hollywood Musical
Movie Star: A Look at the Women Who Made Hollywood
Broadway Babies: The People Who Made the American Musical
Demented: The World of the Opera Diva
Opera Anecdotes
A Guide to Opera Recordings
The Hollywood Studios
The Fireside Companion to the Theatre
Medium Cool: The Movies of the 1960s
Rodgers & Hammerstein
F
ICTION
I've a Feeling We're Not in Kansas Anymore
How Long Has This Been Going On?
F
ACETIAE
Smarts: The Cultural I.Q. Test
Pooh's Workout Book
S
TONEWALL
I
NN
E
DITIONS
Keith Kahla, General Editor
Buddies
by Ethan Mordden
Joseph and the Old Man
by Christopher Davis
Blackbird
by Larry Duplechan
Gay Priest
by Malcolm Boyd
Privates
by Gene Horowitz
Conversations with My Elders
by Boze Hadleigh
Epidemic of Courage
by Lon Nungesser
One Last Waltz
by Ethan Mordden
Gay Spirit
by Mark Thompson, ed.
God of Ecstasy
by Arthur Evans
Valley of the Shadow
by Christopher Davis
Love Alone
by Paul Monette
The Boys and Their Baby
by Larry Wolff
On Being Gay
by Brian McNaught
Living the Spirit
by Will Roscoe, ed.
Everybody Loves You
by Ethan Mordden
Untold Decades
by Robert Patrick
Gay & Lesbian Poetry in Our Time
by Carl Morse & Joan Larkin, eds.
Personal Dispatches
by John Preston, ed.
Tangled Up in Blue
by Larry Duplechan
How to Go to the Movies
by Quentin Crisp
Just Say No
by Larry Kramer
The Prospect of Detachment
by Lindsley Cameron
The Body and Its Dangers and Other Stories
by Allen Barnett
Dancing on Tisha B'av
by Lev Raphael
Arena of Masculinity
by Brian Pronger
Boys Like Us
by Peter McGehee
Don't Be Afraid Anymore
by Reverend Troy D. Perry with Thomas L. P. Swicegood
The Death of Donna-May Dean
by Joey Manley
Sudden Strangers
by Aaron Fricke and Walter Fricke
Profiles in Gay and Lesbian Courage
by Reverend Troy D. Perry and Thomas L. P. Swicegood
Latin Moon in Manhattan
by Jaime Manrique
On Ships at Sea
by Madelyn Arnold
The Dream Life
by Bo Huston
Sweetheart
by Peter McGehee
Show Me the Way to Go Home
by Simmons Jones
Winter Eyes
by Lev Raphael
Boys on the Rock
by John Fox
End of the Empire
by Denise Ohio
The Listener
by Bo Huston
Labour of Love
by Doug Wilson
Tom of Finland
by F. Valentine Hooven III
Reports from the holocaust,
revised edition by Larry Kramer
Created Equal
by Michael Nava and Robert Dawidoff
Sportsdykes
by Susan Fox Rogers, ed.
Long Road to Freedom
by Marc Thompson, ed.
Sacred Lips of the Bronx
by Douglas Sadownick
The Violet Quill Reader
by David Bergman, ed.
West of Yesterday, East of Summer
by Paul Monette
The Love Songs of Phoenix Bay
by Nisa Donnelly
I've a Feeling We're Not in Kansas Anymore
by Ethan Mordden
Another Mother
by Ruthann Robson
Ethan Mordden
is the author of dozens of books, both fiction and nonfiction, including
Buddies
and
I've a Feeling We're Not in Kansas Anymore.
His writing has appeared in
The New York Times,
The New Yorker
and numerous other magazines and journals. He lives in Manhattan. You can sign up for email updates
here
.
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CONTENTS
The Complete Death of the Clown Dog
“The Complete Death of the Clown Dog” and “I Read My Nephew Stories” originally appeared, in slightly different form, in
The New Yorker.
Copyright © 1988 by Ethan Mordden.
“Do-It-Yourself S & M,” “The Handshake Deal,” and “The Dinner Party” originally appeared, in considerably different form, in
Christopher Street
magazine. Copyright © 1983, 1986, and 1988 by Ethan Mordden.
EVERYBODY LOVES YOU
. Copyright © 1988 by Ethan Mordden. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.
Our e-books may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at (800) 221-7945, extension 5442, or by e-mail at
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eISBN 9781250128263
First eBook edition: June 2016