Love the One You're With (11 page)

“He's all for it.”

“He's all for
it
?”

“Yup.”

“What is
it
?”

“You know, for us.
Meeting
.” He placed his left hand on top of my right.

He's
got
to be kidding. I removed my hand. “We are not
meeting
.”

He frowned. “We're not?”

“No, we're not. And I don't understand why you would think,
how
you could think we would be.”

“Don't you wanna rock me for old time's sake?” He smiled. “
Roll
that tongue up in me for old time's sake?”

“I have someone else to rock-and-roll, thank you.”

“But … he doesn't have to know. It would be our secret. I would have no reason to tell him.”

“
I
would.”

“And Brad would understand. He knows there are needs he can't meet and is okay with me having them met elsewhere.”

“Brad is okay with you sleeping with other men?”

“Not other
men
. Just you.”

“Me?”

“Yes, you.”

“He is all right with you sleeping with your ex-lover?”

“Yes. I've told him all about you.”

“Oh, have you?”

“Yes. He's not good like you are.”

“Was that a compliment?”

“Yes, it was.”

“Didn't sound like one to me.”

“Well, it was. I have to practically do everything with him. He's so passive that he doesn't even initiate sex. And I'm sure I don't have to tell you that he's not … well … packin' and stackin' like you. Ha, his behind is so flat you could use it as an ironing board! And the
cock
?! As he's said about his kind: ‘When God got to us in that department, he didn't break the mold; he forgot it!'”

I don't know what disturbed me more—his use of the word
cock
(I guess a zebra can't change his stripes) or the racist humor.

“He knows the chances of you two meeting are slim. I think the fact that you're not in the same city or state makes it easier for him to accept this arrangement.”

This arrangement
. Other Black gay men (most notably, public figures like activists, artists, even porn stars) have such “arrangements.” They are hitched to a Caucasian so they can sip (they could never taste) the power, privilege, and prestige white men have as a birthright, but get their kicks with us—with their white massa, uh, man's permission. They get to have their trophy
and
their trick—in some cases at the same time.

The message: We're good enough to bed but not to wed.

“I'll be in New York once a month starting in April. I'll be helping them set up the office here, and I'll need to—”

“Excuse me,
Pete
,” I interrupted, “but has it ever occurred to you that maybe what you
need
to do is drop Brad and find someone you can really show off with
and
throw down with, like, say, I don't know … a
Black
man?”

Judging by the stupefied expression on his face, it hadn't.

“You know what? This time,
I'm
going to be the one to leave in a rush.” I sprang up. I rummaged through my pocket and tossed a five-dollar bill on the table. I flung my coat over my right arm. “We had fun. We had laughs. But to paraphrase Lalah Hathaway: ‘What we had is better as a memory.'”

He was
geeking;
his mouth opened but nothing came out except a sound similar to a baby's squeaky toy.

I flounced out without looking behind me.

“
THAT MUTHA-FUCKA
,”
POOQUIE SNARLED
.

I giggled. I had him on speakerphone. I was sitting up in bed.

“I can't believe he thought you would just go fuh some shit like that,” he went on. “He better hope I don't run inta his Oreo ass when he come back out this way.”

“Now, Pooquie.”

“Now, Pooquie
nuthin
.'”

“You sound more upset about it than me.”

“I
knew
he wanted ta hit it. Why else would he wanna see you after all this time?”

“Well, he can only dream of hitting it now. And, he could never dream of hitting it—or loving me—the way you do.”

“Ha, you know it, Baby.”

“In a way, I am glad I saw him tonight,” I admitted.

“Why?”

“Because it reminded me just how lucky I am to have you. It's jood to be with someone who isn't afraid of the person looking back at him in the mirror.”

“Yeah. That mutha-fucka prob'ly scared of his own fuckin' shadow.”

“I'm sure.”

“So, did you 'n' Gene go out last nite?”

He knows we did; he left three messages on Gene's answering machine. We didn't get in until after four. He and I played phone tag the rest of the day. “We did. To Body & Soul.”

He drew back a breath. “Uh … you dance?”

“Yes. Makes no sense to go to a party like that and not dance.”

Silence.

I knew what was going through his mind … “Yes, Pooquie, I danced with someone: me.”

I could
feel
that sigh of relief. Pooquie can be a little possessive, so the last thing he would want to hear is that I shook my shimmy with someone else. He also didn't
need
to hear something like that right now—being so far away, in a strange city, and given all the stress and pressure he's under, there's no sense in making him antsy or uptight. And I wasn't lying—I
did
dance with myself (before Montee showed up).

“And even if I
did
dance with someone other than myself,” I reasoned, “you know that's all it would be.”

“Yeah. I do.”

I'm glad he did 'cause, for the first time, I wasn't too sure about it myself …

I recalled the convo with B.D. and Gene at the restaurant. “I know you worry about another man getting close to me. But if anyone should be worried, it's me.”

“You?”

“Yes.
You're
the big-time model and soon-to-be movie star. And you
are
in the place where all the beautiful people play.”

“Ah, c'mon, Little Bit. You know I ain't even inta any of that.”

“Yes, I know. Which is why it doesn't even have to be brought up.”

I could see him nodding.

“Oh, Pooquie, let me go. I have to call your brother-in-law before it's too late. We have to talk about our trip on Sunday.”

“What trip?”

“Remember, we're going to see our father.”

“Ah, yeah. Tell Adam I said hay.”

“I will. My mom says to tell you hi. And
jood
luck.”

He laughed. “Tell her I said thanks.”

“Will do. Call me again the same time tomorrow night, okay?”

“What, you ain't comin' home straight from school?”

Ha,
he's
sounding like my father. “I'll just be dropping off my bag. I'm having an early dinner with Gene, then heading over to the Brotherhood meeting.”

“Is he goin' wit' you?”

“No.” Gene doesn't believe in being a card-carrying member of anything except American Express. As he put it, “
Being
a homo is enough of a political act—why join a group?” Pooquie would probably agree, but for a different reason: He (like all the homiesexuals I've ever known) doesn't identify as gay/bisexual/queer/———(fill in the blank) and rejects the cultural history and political baggage surrounding them as identities. But neither has tried to convince me to quit; they've supported me (Babyface and B.D. have also—by joining—but their very busy careers have prevented them from being active in the group). I've been a member of the Brotherhood for a year and a half, and it's made me feel I'm part of a larger community of Black Same Gender Loving men. Sometimes we need to be a part of something that gives us a better sense of self—or a
new
sense of self—and the Brotherhood has done both for me. After quitting my job as an editor at
Your World
and suing the magazine for racial discrimination, I craved a space where I could fellowship with others who looked like
and
loved like me, where all that I am would be recognized and appreciated. Lawd knows I've never been a comatose Negro like Peter, or one of those deep-in-the-vault, tryin'-to-play-and-lay-“straight” boyz, but one doesn't have to fall in either category to seek affirmation from those who really know what it is like being you.

“A'ight. But just wait fuh me ta call, Baby, please? I just wanna hear yo' voice.
Pleeze?
”

There he goes, beggin' again. Yeah, I fell for it. “Okay, okay. I'll be walking in at three-oh-five, so make sure you call me by three-ten.”

“I will.”

“All right. I love you, Pooquie.”

“I love you, too, Little Bit.”

Smack. Smack. Smack.

“Jood nite, Baby.”

“Jood night.”

The Brotherhood has its weekly meeting on a Tuesday, which still seems odd to me. Most gay social groups in the city meet on the weekend. But when Ras Akhbar, the current executive director, came on board, this was one of the things he sought to change. He reasoned that most are in a party mood on Friday (the original meeting date), and the group would increase its membership if it met during the week. After surviving a manic Monday and a trying Tuesday, Ras knew the brothers would need to be emotionally and spiritually reenergized to get through the rest of the week—and his observation appears to have been correct. Before the switch, membership peaked at three hundred. It has since tripled. On average, one hundred men come out each week, and depending on the guest speaker(s) and/or subject being discussed, it can swell to two hundred.

Like tonight. I was a bit shocked at this particular standing-room-only crowd: the program wasn't exactly sensational (the “Whose Got the Power: Tops or Bottoms?” session exposed a very nasty divide between those who get done and those who don't), controversial (the two brothers who dared to extol the virtues of interracial dating were literally run out of that meeting), or explosive (there were so many tears shed during “Our Love/Hate Relationship with the Black Church” that someone had to go out and buy a couple of boxes of Kleenex). I surmised, though, that many in attendance wanted to hear for themselves the man that Ras had showered with so much praise. No, make that
doused
. You can't have a discussion with Ras without his reciting the line “And, according to the
honorable
Ahmad Khan …” The man isn't Elijah Muhammad (hell, he's not even a Muslim), but he certainly is in Ras's eyes. A former Black Panther who spent fifteen years in jail for the rape and attempted murder of a white woman (a crime he did not commit), Ahmad received a bachelor's degree in history behind bars and, since his release in 1991, has written three books:
The Soul of a Man
, his autobiography;
The Spooks Who Still Sit by the Door
, a critique of the failure of Black political leadership in America; and
Let My People Go
, sort of an instructional manual for Black folks on how to detect, treat, and eradicate the white supremacy that surrounds and lives within us. Unlike other self-proclaimed uplift-the-race philosophers like Dr. Frances Cress Welsing, Jawanza Kunjufu, and Neely Fuller, Ahmad does not view us—meaning homosexuals—as a group attempting to shirk our responsibility to Black women by “acting” like them, or a threat to the evolution and survival of the Black family. You know,
the enemy
. Ahmad believes the Black community can't really be a community (and grow into a nation) if it continues to sacrifice any of its members because of prejudices (most notably, sexism, classism, homophobia/heterosexism) that have their roots in the very evil (white supremacy)
all
Black people have to overcome.

Ras has sworn by Ahmad's prescription for our healing as a people, but his passion for the man's politics (and his incessant pronouncements about his love for “his tribe”) have alienated many. He can be a little too abrasive and annoying in his quest to, as he puts it, “wake the masses up from their comas.” Remember Spike Lee's
School Daze
? Ras reminds me of that film's super-pro-Black activist, Dap—
on speed
. No one can tell Ras he is wrong about
anything
, and if he feels that he is losing ground or can't convert you to his way of thinking, he'll resort to name-calling (“Don't be a fool”), and/or try to shame/humiliate you (“I'm so sorry that you've chosen to be culturally unconscious” and his favorite “I am offering you freedom and you'd rather be a slave”). Such rhetoric always stifles any debate and casts him, no matter how inappropriate his comments about a person's character or level of awareness, as the Great Emancipator trying to lead us, the ignorant and misguided souls, to the Promised Land. His antics have moved some to leave the group while others complain in silence. I've witnessed him perform several times and have called him on it—but not in front of the group.

Despite his well-intentioned but warped sense of advocacy, the brother's heart is in the right place and he does make a lot of sense. (And it doesn't hurt that he is a brawny man with light caramel skin, curly brown hair, green eyes, and dimples in both of his chipmunk cheeks; as one member remarked, “Yeah, he can be an asshole, but he is so fine it's hard to stay mad at him.”) So, many of us have overlooked the high-handed, high-minded presentation and embraced his agenda, as well as Ahmad's teachings. His membership support, though, wasn't enough to convince the Brotherhood's board of directors it would be worth flying Ahmad in from Oakland and paying him $5,000 to do a lecture (“Claiming Your Throne as an African King”). But Ras was determined and resourceful: he offered his own place as lodging, would pay for Ahmad's meals, got a friend who works at Continental Airlines to arrange a very cheap round-trip fare, and convinced Ahmad to cut his fee in half. For Ras, Ahmad's appearance would be his crowning achievement at the Brotherhood. Over the past year, he's been molding and reshaping it to be something other than another pickup spot for the brothers. At a time when the group was embroiled in several scandals (the issue of whether white men could attend meetings reached a fever pitch, the treasurer embezzled $25,000, and the former executive director was arrested for “lewd behavior” in a public park), Ras won the ED job by appealing to the board and members with a practical yet profound plea: “It's time for the Brotherhood to live up to its name.” With too many of us dying because of physical (from AIDS to cancer to heart disease) and mental (loneliness, depression, self-hatred, and malnourished spirits) ailments, the Brotherhood had to be a vocal voice to help fight our invisibility and possible extinction. And his pitch worked: even though he had no experience being in such a leadership position (he has a bachelor's degree in anthropology from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst), he got the job with a unanimous vote.