Nightswimmer (10 page)

Sometimes when I’m making love the feeling changes almost inappropriately to a kind of spiritual elation. I start to remember things that are pristine rather than erotic, like being a child again, bundled up and warm in the midst of a cruel, cold afternoon, the sky an unblemished cobalt, and everything crystalline and pure liquid chill. And so I had this sudden vision of us in deep winter, months away, skating a frozen pond. You were teaching me the hockey moves, how to cross-over skate, how to do the T-stop, your face flushed, eyes ablaze with purpose. As I took your cock in my mouth, I could almost hear the sounds of the blades carving their purchase on the ice and sending up fine frozen powder as we flew across the glazed pond. And the trees on the opposite side were veined with snow and there was that quiet exultation that winter, my favorite season, brings.

“I hit the wall, I think,” you said.

I turned and found a pale blot dripping down. “You did,” I confirmed. “I wonder what makes it fly like that?”

“Pent-up emotion, probably.”

And after lying there for a while in the narcotic stupor that follows sex, you suddenly turned to me. “So his name was Chad, huh?”

I nodded and I said, “Yeah, his name was Chad.”

Moments passed and the dark sky was now burnishing. You made a move and I explained that I was fine the way I was. That I didn’t need to come. That I just wanted to lie there and watch the light.

W
EARING HIS
Johnson and Dix Petroleum Marketeers
cap, Greg stood in the midst of a tangle of frolicking dogs in the dog run, throwing Casey his ball. I stood and watched our dog maneuvering among the others, the way he kept snarling at any animal who looked eager to wrench his ball away from him. The moment he spotted me, Casey dropped the ball, ran over and jumped up onto the fence, barking exultantly.

“You’re coming from the west,” Greg remarked as he walked over to me.

“This is true.”

“You’re just dying for me to know that you spent the night out with somebody.”

I frowned. “Oh, come on.”

“Then why would you pass this way, when you knew I’d be here with Casey?”

At the mention of his name, Casey sat down, perked up his ears and tilted his head sideways. “I love that dog,” I said. “And I’ve always liked walking through the park.”

“You’re so full of it, Will. Completely full of shit.”

“Let’s not argue about this.”

Casey dropped the ball at Greg’s feet. Grabbing it, Greg threw it fiercely. When it bounced twice and cleared the fence, he turned to me. “Would you mind getting that? Since you’re already outside.”

“Only if you’ll let up on me.”

“I’ll get it myself, then,” he said, stalking toward the gate.

“What’s
with
you today?” I called out, but Greg didn’t answer. Casey followed and whined when Greg prevented him from exiting at the gate, then let loose a cry that reminded me of that first night he bleated like a lamb in our kitchen.

“I’m coming back, okay? Just give me a minute.” Greg was all kindness and reassurance.

I tried to tell myself, Don’t care too much for either of them, because that will tether you to the past. I wanted to burn off these old feelings, to suffer extravagantly from the new poison that was in my blood. This was my moment to leave, yet I felt compelled to conclude the argument Greg had started.

I finally held the advantage over Greg that I’d been seeking for so long. My sudden, almost corrupt numbness toward him was part of the intoxication of having just shared a bed with someone else. Someone who had completely overridden my attention, like a computer program replacing one file with another. And in light of last summer, when I had been forced to wait for Greg to come to his senses about his affair, I couldn’t help but feel a great temptation to inflict my current infatuation on him.

Greg had sensed this change immediately, of course.

“So who is it, anyway?” he asked as he returned to the dog run and recommenced throwing Casey’s ball.

“I thought we weren’t going to discuss these activities.”

He looked at me shrewdly. “We’re not supposed to, but as far as I’m concerned, coming from the west at this hour is the very same thing as bringing up the topic. I can tell you’re just dying to tell me, and I don’t want to ruin your fun. Go ahead.”

“He would just be a name, anyway.”

“Perhaps I know him. Believe me, Will, I can take it.”

That last disclaimer enraged me. “Okay,” I said, “his name is Sean Paris.”

Greg shook his head and let loose a repellent chuckle. “I’m not going to know him, huh? I’m not going to know Sean Paris.”

A nauseating fear settled over me. “Don’t tell me you’ve … done it with him.”

“Doesn’t that rain on your parade?”

“Did you
?”

“That’s for me to know.”

“Come on, Greg, don’t fuck with me!” I cried.

He now glared at me. “Why are you getting involved with somebody like that, anyway?”

“Just tell me if you slept with him!”

“Is that all you care about? Mr. Depth-of-Soul who casts aspersions on the rest of us for being shallow fuck-wads.”

Greg’s face was contorted, blotches of color blooming on his pale cheeks. Casey was sitting at his feet, the muddy ball next to him. Greg then asked in his most didactic tone, “Did you happen to know that some guy who was dating Sean Paris did himself in? Did you hear about that?”

The news bounced off me. “No. And I’m sure it’s gossip. How did you hear about it?”

“How did
I
hear? Plenty of people are talking about it is how I heard.”

“It’s either ancient history or nasty rumors.”

“Guess again, Will.”

“What are you talking about?” I felt belligerent. “When?”

“Just recently!” Greg was looking at me with sudden recognition. “In fact, last Sunday. Remember you told me some guy threw himself in front of a train?”

But it couldn’t be the same guy. I felt dazed and oddly purposeful, remembering how much time I’d spent imagining who the suicide was. And to think that he actually knew you.

“Sean didn’t say anything,” I murmured.

“Sean had already dumped him. A while ago. In fact, Sean Paris has dumped a lot of people.”

“You certainly seem to know a lot about Sean for somebody who has never met him. Methinks you just might be a little jealous.”

“So what? So what if I’m jealous? I’ll probably always be jealous of anybody you end up with. But that doesn’t change the fact that this guy is bad news. And he has been keeping this from you.”

I forced myself to say, “Perhaps the news hasn’t reached him. He would’ve said something if he knew.”

“I’m glad you think you know him so well that you can predict this.”

“Okay, I’m
assuming
he would tell me.”

Hesitating a moment, Greg said softly, “Will, you’ve always been attracted to trouble, you know that.”

“So then you admit that
you
were trouble.”

Greg vehemently shook his head. “Only when I became unhappy. Only when I realized what you’d sacrifice: me—us—for your work.” His eyes clouded over. “I loved you as much as I was able to love anybody. And I still love you, okay? But now I’ve got to get away from this conversation.”

Quickly he left me, heading for Casey on the far side of the dog run. As I stood there watching him go, I noticed that Casey had his head down and was heaving. Casey was rather tall and slim, and whenever he threw up, his rib cage would expand and stretch his shiny black coat. I figured the vomiting fit would pass. When it continued, I hurried along the perimeter of the dog run and passed through the gate. Just as I reached the dog, he collapsed on the ground, his long, spindly legs convulsing as he lay there panting. I reached him first. Bending over him, I heard Greg running over.

“What the hell is wrong with him?” I cried.

“Jesus Christ, let’s just get him to the vet!”

Lying on his side, Casey retched again and yellow foam bubbled out of his mouth. “I’m going to lift him,” Greg announced.

The moment those words were spoken, Casey managed to get up. He stood there, legs bowed and trembling. “Let’s see if he can walk,” Greg suggested, attaching the leash.

As we slowly led him out of the dog run, Casey seemed to recover but then began dry-retching once we reached the boundary of Washington Square Park. Greg picked him up and carried him the rest of the way to Sixth Avenue.

At that relatively early hour of the morning there were plenty of vacant taxis swarming up Sixth Avenue. However, as soon as the drivers spotted Casey, we could actually see them shaking their heads, hear them gunning their engines to pass us quickly. Finally one stopped. I leaned down to see a portly Arabic man with mutton-chop sideburns shrewdly evaluating Greg and me and our obviously sick dog as though something might be wrong with the three of us. We dutifully waited for him to make up his mind whether or not he wanted our fare, and finally, speaking to me, he agreed to take us if we kept the dog on the floor and off the seat. Still cradling Casey to his chest, Greg began approaching the taxi, but I’d been made to feel so marginalized by the naked appraisal that I had to confront the driver. “Look,” I said, angrily, “either you take us or you don’t. He’s obviously going to ride on our laps.”

While Greg rolled his eyes at my inability to contain myself, the driver made up his mind and swiveled his attention back to the traffic, and just as the taxi was rolling away, I said venomously, “Don’t you have any fucking compassion?” The guy slammed on the brakes and invited us to get in.

“I would’ve been so pissed off at you,” Greg told me once we’d driven off.

“I would’ve been pissed off at me, too,” I said.

Although I explained that we needed to rush to the animal hospital, the man drove as if he were bringing us to a picnic in Central Park. Greg took over from me, wielding charm to hurry him along. However, as soon as we hit a set of red lights, the driver turned around and snorted, “I will not drive fast.”

I looked down at Casey, who lay still and panting on Greg’s lap, his head spilling over into mine. “Somebody tried to poison our dog, okay?” I said. “And we’re afraid he’s going to die before we get to the hospital.”

That seemed to work. The driver obviously didn’t want a dead dog in his car and suddenly picked up the pace, weaving erratically around other cars. I ran my hand slowly along Casey’s flank, then bent down and stroked his head, and when I straightened up again I could see that Greg had turned toward his window, toward the East Side where the sunlight, still low to the horizon, was sending out spokes of light through the streets. He was trying to keep his composure. And I sat there battling two fronts of anxiety: whether or not you’d purposely withheld the fact that you once dated the guy who threw himself in front of the train, and, of course, the more immediate concern, Casey’s well-being.

A day or two after Greg and I had adopted him, Casey stopped eating altogether, the result of a virus that he’d contracted before his short stay at the North Shore Animal League. After we’d brought him to the vet and he’d been given a shot, we were told that turkey breast would jump-start his appetite. And so on the way home, we stopped off at a delicatessen and ordered some thinly sliced meat, and when we got back to the apartment and put it before Casey, he inhaled it. But no sooner did he finish eating than he promptly threw up everything he’d just devoured. Then, without missing a beat, he immediately consumed what he’d just thrown up, sending both Greg and me into great gales of laughter. The dog weighed a mere five pounds back then. Now he tipped the scales at seventy.

“I just hope it isn’t some kind of poison,” I whispered to Greg.

“I don’t see how. I walked him from home right to the dog run.”

“Well, I wouldn’t put it past one of those nuts around there to put poison out,” I said. People who lived adjacent to the dog run had always complained about the barking.

We both looked down at Casey.

“By the way, I’m sorry I got on your case earlier,” Greg said. “About Sean Paris.”

I told the vet’s receptionist that I thought Casey might have been poisoned. She picked up the telephone, spoke to someone and after a few moments led us into a cubicle-like room that reeked of antiseptic and was crowded with tall glass-fronted cabinets whose shelves stocked vials of medicines and glimmering metal instruments. When Greg lifted Casey and put him on the metal examining table, his spindly legs began trembling.

“That’s what he did when he first collapsed,” Greg told a woman with bluntly cut salt-and-pepper hair who strode into the room wearing a starched white lab coat. The veterinarian introduced herself, then took Casey’s temperature rectally and began palpating him. “His temperature is normal,” she said. “How much has he been throwing up?”

“Just one bout, really,” Greg said. “But he collapsed.”

The vet listened to Casey with a stethoscope and then gracefully extricated the apparatus from her ears. “Well, I don’t think it’s poison,” she announced. “His stomach doesn’t sound like it’s in trauma, but I’ll pump it anyway. I don’t see any immediate danger, however. Nevertheless, I’m going to sedate him,” she explained, turning to the display case. “Could you hold him while I do it?” She began to fill a needle with pinkish fluid.

Casey received his shot with a short, resigned whimper. Once the vet had disposed of the syringe, she glanced at each of us and said, “He lives with both of you, I presume.”

“Well, not exactly,” I said.

She looked puzzled.

“I mean, he used to,” Greg explained. “Live with both of us. But lately we’ve been sharing him.”

“Well, really,
he
has custody,” I said, glancing sharply at Greg.

The vet smiled and shook her head. “Would you please just tell me where the dog lives.”

“He lives with me,” Greg said.

“I’m not prying,” she told us. “I just need to know who is going to be giving the medication.”

Greg said that it all depended upon how many times a day the medication was supposed to be administered, explaining that he worked from 5 P.M. straight until midnight managing data systems at a corporate law firm.