First You Fall: A Kevin Connor Mystery (14 page)

Roger opened it to reveal a tubby man of about five foot five. His head was mostly bald, except for thin strips that rested like twin caterpil ars above each ear. He wore black sweatpants and a black Tshirt with the logo from
Miss Saigon
on it.

“Thanks,” he said, reaching out for the box. He took it and put it on a table by the door. He looked at me for a half a minute, hungrily.

If there’s one thing I know, it’s when a man wants me. I hooked my thumb inside the waistband of my shorts and waited for him to invite me inside.

“OK, bye,” he said, and closed the door in my face.

What the fuck?

I knocked on the door again.

Roger opened it a crack.

“What do you want?” he snapped.

“Nothing,” I said, “it’s just…”

“Fine, then,” he said. “I already thanked you. Are you waiting for a tip?” Roger opened the door and reached over to the same table where he put the box. He picked up his wal et. “I must have a buck or two here somewhere …”

“No, listen,” I said. It was apparent that, despite my youthful yumminess, Roger didn’t want me around. But I had to talk to him. “I, uh, I need to use your bathroom.”

“Oh,
that
.” Roger opened the door. “OK, fine. Just be quick about it.”

Roger’s apartment was decorated in 1980’s theater fag. The art deco furniture looked as if it came from the road show of
Anything Goes.

Posters from Broadway musicals lined his wal s.

He showed me into the bathroom, where a signed 8x10 picture of Stephen Sondheim hung over the toilet.

I real y did have to go, so I peed, flushed, and washed my hands.

Just for good measure, I “accidental y” left the snap of my shorts open.

I came out to find Roger standing by the door.

I ignored him and walked into the living room.

“Listen,” I said, “it’s hot as Mars out there. Think I could get something cold to drink?”

“There’s a bar down the street,” Roger said not looking at me.

I laced my fingers together and stretched my arms over my head, letting my T-shirt ride up even more and thrusting out my basket. “Come on, man. I’m hot and sore from carrying that heavy box. Just some water would be great.”

This time, Roger did look at me. If this were a cartoon, his eyes would have fal en out of his head and bounced off the floor. Oh, he wanted it al right.

But he was fighting it. I wondered why.

He cleared his throat and looked away.

“Fine,”
he snapped, walking into the kitchen. “I’l be right back.”

I sat down on a sleek black leather couch. Roger returned and handed me what had to be the smal est glass in his kitchen.

“Here,”
he said.

“Nice place you got here,” I said, although it wasn’t.

Roger just looked at the wal behind me, wil ing me to finish my water and leave.

“While we’re talking,” I said, even though we weren’t, “why’d you leave The Stuff of Life, anyway?” Roger looked at his coffee table.

“I’m sure it’s none of your business.”

“I’m just saying, everyone liked you so much, and you did such a good job,” I lied again.

Roger looked at me. “What did you say your name was?”

I told him.

“You’re the kid who left a message on my machine the other day, aren’t you?”

I wasn’t sure if he’d placed me. I smiled, winningly I hoped. “Guilty as charged.”

“What did you want?”

This guy is al charm.

“I just wanted to make sure you heard about Al en Harrington’s death,” I told him. “Seeing as you two were friends and al .”

Roger sniffed. “Yes. Wel . We were. Poor man.

What a loss. Although I can’t say I was surprised.”

“What do you mean?”

“Suicide. It’s just so cliche isn’t it?” I leaned forward. “How’s that?”

“Oh, please.” Roger stood up, began pacing. “It’s the oldest story in the world: Old queen can’t stand the fact that she’s getting older. She looks in the mirror and sees herself turning into the kind of old man she made fun of when she was younger. Fat where she should be thin, soft where she should be hard.” His voice took on a weird sing-song. “So sad, too bad.”

I hated what Roger was saying, but I needed to see where this was leading.

“You think that’s why Al en kil ed himself?”

“It’s the lifestyle, darling,” Roger said. He became increasingly agitated and started waving his arms around. “Don’t you see? It’s
wrong.
It’s immoral and wasteful and against God’s wil . It leads
nowhere.

Don’t you see?

“I tried to tel Al en that, but would he listen? Of course not! Just a few days before he died, he was on the phone with me; we got into a terrible stew.”

“What were you fighting about?”

“About me. About how I was growing and changing, and about how much that scared a man like Al en.”

“Al en was scared?”

“Al en was scared of the
truth.”
Roger sat next to me. “But the truth shal set you free!” he shrieked hysterical y, reaching his hands to heaven.

This guy was nuts.

“What truth?” I asked.

Roger sat next to me and took my hands. “The truth, my darling. The truth about homosexuality.” I thought he was coming onto me, and then realized it was worse. He was trying to
save
me.

“You don’t have to be gay,”
Roger crowed. “You
can
change. But did anyone at The Stuff of Life want to hear that? Of course not! They were so stuck in their old ways of thinking—I didn’t dare bring it up!

Look what happened when I tried to share it with Al en—he turned on me!

“That’s why I had to get out of there. Don’t you see? Away from al that cognitive dissonance and deathstyle.”

That word. Where had I just heard it?

Focus, Kevin, focus.

And what was this odd mix of religion and psychobabble?

Roger squeezed my hands tighter. It was starting to hurt, but I didn’t want to say anything and break his stride.

“You had to get out,” I repeated his words, a trick I learned in my psychology classes to keep a person talking.

“I did.” He squeezed even tighter. Ouch.

“It must have been hard for you,” I said.

“Yes! Yes! To see them al , wasting their lives, wasting away in sin. I tried to tel Al en, I did, but I was too late. If only I had reached him sooner.” Roger surprised me by breaking into tears. He buried his face in his hands. At least he let go of mine.

When the feeling returned to my fingers, I patted his back. “It’s not your fault,” I told him. “You did your best.”

“I know, I know,” Roger sobbed. “What hope did I have of changing him? Not even his own family could help him.”

What did
that
mean?

I was about to ask when Roger grabbed my hands again. This time, I could have sworn he was
trying
to break my fingers.

“But it’s not too late for you, my boy. Look at you, you think I don’t know what you are? Dressed like a whore?”

I swear, if one more person cal s me a whore tonight…

“It’s al about sex, isn’t it? Getting it up and getting it off.
Disgusting
',” Roger hissed. Beads of sweat dotted his forehead.

“Of course, you’re young, you’re beautiful. Look at you. Those sexy legs in those tight shorts. The way they show off your ass, so fucking tight. That bulge in your shorts. Your T-shirt so snug with those little nipples jutting so proudly, so proudly out at me.” The way Roger was talking, even though I didn’t want to, I had to look down. Yep, there it was—his erection tenting out his sweatpants.

No doubt about it, he was one sick puppy.

Roger shook his head as if tossing a bad thought out of his mind.

“Of course I want to fuck you right now, and I know you want me to. But I don’t have to give into it, and neither do you. You can re-program yourself, son.” Roger got up and ran over to the desk. Grabbed a business card and thrust it into my hand. “They can help.”

I looked at the card, and handed it back to him.

I didn’t need it.

I already had it.

The Center for Creative Empowerment Therapy.

The group run by Al en Harrington’s son, Michael.

“Deathstyle.” Now I remembered hearing Michael say it at the reading of his father’s wil .

Roger Folds was Michael’s—what? Patient?

Student? Disciple?

Here it was: The first link I had between people who might have wanted to see Al en dead.

I didn’t need to connect the dots. They were connecting themselves.

I got out of Roger Folds’s apartment as soon as I could, skipping the elevator and running down the stairs.

That guy was a
freak,
I thought, as I hit the street.

Jesus.

The evening was just starting to turn to night, although you wouldn’t know it from the ever-present heat and humidity. Stil , even the stale summer air felt good after being trapped with that born-again lunatic.

The Center for Creative Empowerment Therapy.

Shit. Al en Harrington’s son was running a group that promised to convert gays to heterosexuality.

I knew a little about scams like that from various new reports.

They usual y are based on religion, but Michael’s group sounded like it threw in some pop psychology, too.

Shit!

How twisted was
that?

Did Al en know?

Of course he knew.

I remembered something Al en had said in his video. “What you are doing, Michael, makes me especial y sad.”

And Roger’s words:
not even his own family
could help him.

But Al en never said anything about his son to me.

Maybe Tony was right—Al en wanted to be strong for me. He didn’t share his burdens. I had to admit I didn’t know Al en as wel as I thought I did.

And if Tony was right about that, maybe he was right about Al en’s death being a suicide, too.

How did Al en feel when he found out what his son was up to?

He must have been devastated.

He must have wanted to
die.

The realization hit me like a blow to the stomach. I felt dizzy and leaned against a street lamp.

Shit!

Did Al en real y kil himself? Was this why?

“Excuse me,” someone shouted. It took a moment to realize he was shouting at me.

I looked up. A middle-aged man with a Donald Trumpian comb-over sat at the curb in an expensive Lexus.

“Yeah?” I asked him.

“You working?” he whispered loudly.

“What?” I went closer to his window.

“I said, ‘are you
working
?’” he asked nervously.

I looked down at myself. The skimpy T-shirt, the Daisy Duke shorts stil unbuttoned at the waist.

“Sorry, I don’t work the streets,” I said.

“Oh, please,” the man said. “Look at you. Let’s not play hard to get. I got fifty bucks for your time. We could do it right in the car.”

“Sorry,” I said, leaning in. The guy might have been an asshole, but the air conditioning coming from his expensive car felt great, “First of al , I am
not
working. Second of al , if I
were
working, it would cost you a hel of a lot more than fifty bucks.”

“Sixty?”

“No!” Now I was getting offended. “Do I look like the kind of guy you could have for sixty bucks?”

“Wel , how much, then?”

“Listen,” I said, deciding to give him some advice,

“if you’re going to haggle over price, don’t drive a Lexus.”

“It’s a lease,” he clarified.

I had enough of this nonsense. “Sorry, buddy, but…” I began.

Then I heard my name cal ed out.

“Kevin?”

I turned around and saw Freddy, with a Versace shopping bag in each hand and a horrified expression on his face.

He looked me up and down.

“Are you
streetwalking
?” he asked, appal ed.

“Excuse me,” the man inside the car cal ed out.

“But I saw him first. We were in the middle of a negotiation here and …”

“No we weren’t,” I shouted back at him. Freddy frowned. I shouted at him. “I
swear.
Stop looking at me like that.”

Freddy leaned over into the car and dropped his voice an octave. “Listen, man. You want to deal with my boy, here, you gots to deal with me. I’m his pimp, and unless you show me five hundred large real quick, we’re gonna have us some problems.” The man showed his appreciation for Freddy’s words by demonstrating just how quickly a real y nice car can accelerate.

“Asshole,” I yel ed after him. Then, to Freddy: “That guy was trying to get me to go with him for sixty bucks!”

“How much were you charging?” Freddy asked.

“Nothing! I’m tel ing you, I was just walking, wel , leaning, and the guy pul ed over and propositioned me.”

“You were standing out here dressed like that and you’re shocked that someone thought you were hustling?”

I had to laugh. I twirled around for him, showing off my trampy style. “You like?”

Freddy looked at me hungrily. He dropped his bags and pul ed me towards him. He ground his crotch into mine.

“I like,” he said hotly into my ear.

Damn, he was built.

An old woman stepping into her building yel ed at us, “Get a room!”

I laughed and pushed Freddy away.

“No, seriously,” Freddy said, picking up his bags.

“Why are you dressed, wel , half-dressed, like that?”

“It’s a long story,” I said. “Come on, I’l tel you about it over a snack.”