The Men from the Boys (48 page)

“But if you really loved him ...”

He laughs. “Oh, Jeff. How wonderfully romantic you are. Don't change.”

“Do you ever think he might be dead? Is that why you don't try to find him?”

Javitz considers. “Yes, I suspect he might be dead at that.” He smiles. “Don't get me going asking about people who are dead.”

“Right.” I take away the tray. “How silly of me.”

In the kitchen, Chanel and I stack the dishes in the dishwasher. “What did you think of Kathryn when you met her?” she asks.

“She was nice,” I say, trying to mask my lack of impression. “It was so quick, we were at the bar, I didn't have time to—”

“It's not like with Wendy. With Wendy we were mad for each other, always wet, always hot and horny for each other.”

“So call her. It's not too late.”

She brushes me away. “Jeff, stop. It is too late.”

“Passion tells the truth,” I remind her.

Lloyd has just woken up. He stumbles over to us, rubbing his eyes. “Can I hitch a ride back with you?” he asks Chanel. “I'm so beat.”

“Sure,” she says.

I tell them I'll take the T back after Javitz falls asleep. Lloyd goes in to kiss him good-bye.

Chanel pulls on her coat. She calls in good night to Javitz. He thanks her for the meal. I walk with her to the door, and she looks up at me. “I know you and Lloyd are having a rough time right now,” she says. “I'm not really sure what's going on for you, but I know you guys will get through it.”

I smile, but it pisses me off. Then Lloyd comes out, gives me a kiss. “I'll be waiting in the breathing position when you get home,” he whispers.

After they're gone, I stand there for a few minutes wondering why I feel pissed. Then I return to Javitz's bedroom.

“I admit it was hard,” he says when I walk in. What's he talking about? Oh, right: Reginald. “I will admit that. It was hard leaving him. Thinking he didn't care enough to come with me, to fight for me. I'll admit it took a while to get over him.”

“But you did.”

He nods. “Oh, yes. We always do. You get over one struggle only to start the next.”

“Do you know what Chanel just said to me about Lloyd? That we'd ‘get through' it.”

“Don't you hate that?” Javitz says.

“I can't stand that!”

“Of course we'll get through it,” Javitz says, with one of his patented long sighs. “People can get through
anything.”
He gestures to himself spread out in the bed. “Take this fucking virus; for example.” He pauses.
“Please!”
I laugh. “I went back into the hospital. Sure, I got better. That's the damn problem! It's not a question of survival. I've been surviving so long with this thing they'll have to write a book about me. It just sucks that we have to keep going through it over and over and over again.”

“And just when you think, Okay, I've been through the fire—”

“Something else flares up and you've got to get through it again,” he finishes.

“But we do,” I add.

“And you will.”

I look at him. “He said he missed the limerance.”

Javitz has lit up a cigarette. Whenever he gets agitated he reaches for those damn things.

“Hey, I told you—” I start, but he ignores me.

“Limerance,” he spits, as he exhales into my face. And he tells me to go read a paperback with Fabio on the cover if I want limerance.

He stubs the cigarette out in the ashtray on the side of the bed. “I'm sorry. I just get angry. Angry at the both of you. I'll tell you what passion is. It's what makes the two of you rush home to each other. It's what sets your heart racing when you hear his key in the lock. It's how he laughs when you do Bette Davis. It's how the two of you can get into the car and head off into western Massachusetts and find pumpkin stands as if by instinct. And Big Boy restaurants and cider mills and old musty bookstores and come home telling me what a marvelous day you had.” He pauses. “Maybe you're not fucking on the kitchen table, but you're doing something far more important.”

“And what's that?”

“Don't ask questions you already know the answer to.” He settles back into his pillows. “But I'll tell you one thing. When the three of us are together, when we're sitting around the wood stove at your place, or up on the deck in Provincetown, and we're talking, talking about the world and what it means and how we could make it better—when we're like that, and Lloyd settles back into my arms and you come out with hot chocolates for all of us, when we get so tired we begin to fall asleep on each other's shoulders—in those moments I have the greatest passion of my life. And sometimes it's hard—I'll admit it's hard—when the two of you then stagger off to your room, and fall asleep in each other's arms, and I go back to my room, and fall asleep alone.”

“Javitz—”

“Don't say anything. There's nothing to say. Nothing that should be said.”

I just look at him.

“Go on. Get out of here. I'm tired and need to sleep. And Lloyd will be home soon. Don't make him wait.”

I kiss him.

“I love you, you know.” I don't often say it, but it's always there, close to my lips.

“I know, darling.” He smiles up at me. “I know.”

Provincetown, June 1995

We're out in the dunes, where once we made love, where once I lost the star he gave to me on a chain. It's a spot far away from the center of town, far away from tourists and the make-believe of summer. It takes a good hour to walk to this spot, but it's worth it. Here, the sun beats warm against your skin and the only sound is the steady rush of waves far below you. I come here quite a bit these days. I meditate, sitting on top of the highest dune I can find, and I go places I never imagined I could go.

“I'm glad you came down this weekend,” I tell Eduardo.

“Are you?”

“Yes.” I give him a grin, but no smile. “Even if you did come with Tommy.”

“I told him I wanted to spend some time with you.”

I raise my eyebrows. “And what did he say about that?”

“I can't say he was happy.”

“Does he know about the other day, at Javitz's?”

Eduardo looks up at the sun. “I can't tell him that. It would hurt him too much. If he asks, I won't lie. But ...” His words trail off.

“Do what you need to do. Just be honest with yourself about what it is you need.”

He frowns at me. “You're sounding more like Javitz all the time.”

“Ah,” I sigh, “youth is only a moment in time when we are—when we—when—” I can't remember how it goes. “Damn it. The point is, you've got to find your own way, but there are other people who can help you when they can.”

We laugh. Today his soul bewitches me. His eyes reveal more truth than any spoken words he might have said.

“Passion tells the truth,” he whispers to me. “Isn't that what you told me once?”

“Yes,” I say. “And now you're telling me.”

“I keep thinking about that,” he says. “Jeff, I don't know where you think all this might lead....”

“Maybe nowhere.”

He nods, as if that were the answer he hoped for. “Yes. Maybe nowhere. Maybe that's the best.” But he's unsure. “Still, passion—”

“—tells the truth.” I touch his cheek. “And that's as good a starting place as any. The best, actually.”

“Starting place for what?” Eduardo asks, suspicious.

“To move forward. To grow. To take chances.” I smile at him. “I assume you want to grow, take risks, reap rewards.”

“I suppose.” But he seems reluctant.

“Every time we make love—and I don't necessarily mean just you and I, I mean the ‘we' of the world—we're taking a chance on life. In the end, that's all we can do. If I've learned anything, that's it.” I grin. “Sometimes things can get just a little too comfortable.”

“How can anything be too comfortable?” he says.

“Don't sell yourself short, Eduardo. Get as much out of this life as you can, because it goes so fast, and nothing lasts forever.”

We lean against each other as the sun reaches midday.

“I'm not sure when we'll see each other again,” he says.

“Then I should give this to you now.” I pull my backpack through the sand, unzip the top, fish around inside. “Here,” I say, presenting him with a scroll of paper, tied with a bright purple ribbon.

“What's this?” he asks, taking it from me.

“A belated birthday gift. A very belated birthday gift.”

“Jeff—”

“Unroll it,” I say.

He does. “It's a
story,”
he says.

“From me to you. Happy birthday.”

He's touched. He hugs me. “That is so sweet. What's it about?”

“Actually, it's part of the novel I'm writing. It's a dream sequence—kind of. I haven't figured that out yet. But it can stand on its own as a story. It's about this guy who has a dream about a magician. And this magician gives him a star, a magic star that grants three wishes.”

“Oh, yeah?” Eduardo says, smiling. “And did this magic star happen to have four points?”

“How'd you
know?”
I ask in mock disbelief. “Anyway, that's the story.”

“Well, what are the three wishes?”

“I'm not going to ruin the story for you,” I say coyly. “Read it.”

He grins. “Thank you. This is one of the nicest gifts I've ever been given.”

I smile over at him. “How did you ever come to be so important to me?”

“I don't know.”

“I do. You just started loving me. I wasn't looking for it, wasn't even particularly open for it. You just did. Despite everything.”

He brushes my hair back from my face. I'm letting it grow longer now, no matter if the length does expose how thin it's gotten in front. “Oh, Jeff,” Eduardo says, “you talk as if no one else has ever loved you, as if there has never been any other love in your life.”

“Oh, no, no, not at all,” I protest. “I've had great love in my life. Great passion.” I smile, looking out over the sea. “More than I ever knew was possible.”

I lean back into the sand, and my hands find their way into the softness beneath me. The sand is warm, comforting, enveloping. “Jeff,” Eduardo says, “I wanted to see you for a reason. What happened the other day—”

The fingers on my right hand suddenly catch something: a twig maybe, or a piece of dried seaweed. Or—a chain. Yes, it feels like a chain—

“—it can't happen again. Jeff, do you understand?”

A chain. I follow it along under the sand.

“Jeff,” Eduardo whispers intently, “do you
understand
?”

“No,” I say, looking at him. “I'm not sure I do.” I pull the chain through the sand. Something's attached at the end—

“Jeff, you've got to understand. Please try. It's just too difficult—I'm not you, Jeff. Oh, maybe I will be, ten years from now, but sitting here today, I can't do what you do. I can't take the risk of Tommy finding out. I know you say taking risks is how we should live our lives, but things are good with Tommy, don't you understand? I just can't—”

He seems near tears. It's at that moment—just as my fingers settle around a piece of metal attached to the chain—that it all makes sense. “Of course,” I say, touching his face with my free hand. “Of course. We can only be in one place at a time, the place we're supposed to be. You'll get to where you need to go.” I smile. “I do understand, Eduardo. I'm sorry that I didn't before.”

He stands, brushes the sand off his shorts. “I'll call you,” he promises. “Or you can call me....”

I smile up at him. “We'll call each other.”

“Yes,” he agrees. “We'll call each other.”

Our eyes hold.

At last I say, “I love you, Eduardo.”

And he doesn't even need to say it back, because it's there, it's there in the way he hears me say the words, it's there in the way his lips close and his hands move, it's there as he turns gently from me and walks away, heading back to town. He's got a long walk ahead of him. I watch him until he rounds the top of the farthest dune and passes out of sight.

Only then do I decide not to pull the chain from the sand. I sit there by myself for more than an hour, holding whatever it is that I've found in the palm of my hand, letting the sun wash over me, the sound of the waves in my ears. Maybe it really is the star that I lost so long ago, and maybe it's nothing more than a dried coil of seaweed and an old bottle cap. Whatever its truth, it doesn't matter. I push it back far down into the sand, as deep as I can. Standing, I stretch, and start my own walk home.

Boston, December 1994

It's Javitz's second time in the hospital in two months. The pneumonia came back, as we feared it would. He's better now, slightly, and they may let him go home tomorrow. That would be good. It's almost Christmas. Almost a new year, with the calendar spread out before us blankly, awaiting whatever marks we will make upon it.

“Jeff?” Javitz asks.

“Yeah?”

“What was the name of the guy we met in the hospital last month? He had AIDS. We met him in the hallway. He was short, chubby, black.”

“That was Alfred.”

“Is he ... ?”

“Javitz, I'm happy to report he's still alive.”