Men on Men

by George Stambolian (ed)

  Marco in his white Keds and Levi jacket came treading stealthily around the corner, noble and balanced as a lion; he winked his approval and Ray felt his own pleasure spread over his whole body like the heat of the sun.

  Marco was obviously impressed by the palace—impressed by its grandeur and, Ray imagined, proud that foreigners had furnished it with old Cretan furniture and folk embroideries.

  Impressed? Nonsense, Ray thought, catching himself. Purest sentimental rubbish on my part. No doubt he’d prefer lavender Formica with embedded gold glitter.

  Ray, who liked Marco and wanted to show that he did, felt a new intimacy between them as he led him into his bedroom. He gently pushed him back on the bed and knelt to untie the Reds and take them off, then the smelly socks. Then he made Marco wriggle out of his jeans; he started to pull the T-shirt over his head but Marco stopped him, though he, too, was gentle. Every one of Marco’s concessions meant so much more to Ray than all the sexual extravagances of New York in the old preplague days—the slings and drugs and filthy raps.

  Ray undressed himself. He wondered what Marco thought of him, of this naked adult male body which he’d never seen before. How old does he think I am? Does he admire my muscles? Or does my role as poosti on parea keep him from seeing me?

  Ray worried that the whole routine—nakedness, a bed, privacy—might be getting a little too queer for Marco, so he was quick to kneel and start sucking him, back to the tried and true. But Ray, carried away in spite of himself, couldn’t resist adding a refinement. He licked the inside of Marco’s thighs and Marco jumped, as he did a moment later when Ray’s tongue explored his navel. Strange that his cock seems to be the least sensitive part of his body, Ray thought.

  When the time for the rubber arrived, Ray thought that surely tonight might make some difference, and indeed for the first time Marco gasped at the moment of his climax. Ray said, “You like?” and Marco nodded vigorously and smiled, and a young male intimacy really had come alive between them, glued as they were together, their naked bodies sweaty.

  Almost instantly Marco stood and dashed into the bathroom, pulled off the rubber, and washed while standing at the sink. Ray leaned against the door and watched him.

  In this bright light the boy looked startlingly young and Ray realized, yes, he was young enough to be his son. But his other feeling was less easy to account for. It was of the oddness that a body so simple, with so few features, should have provoked so much emotion in him, Ray. Clothes with their colors and cuts seemed more adequate to what he was feeling.

  Once again Ray noticed that he was feeling more, far more, than the occasion warranted. No objective correlative. Ray took Marco up to the roof to see the panorama of the sea, the harbor, the far-flung villages, a car burrowing up the mountain with its headlights like a luminous insect. But now that the transaction was over, the tension between them had been cut.

  The next night Marco came directly to the palace and Ray persuaded him to take off his T-shirt, too, so that now there was no membrane except the rubber between them. Before they got to the fucking part, Ray paused in his exertions and crept up beside Marco and rested his head on Marco’s thumping chest. Marco’s hand awkwardly grazed Ray’s hair. Ray could smell the rank, ingenuous odor of Marco’s underarm sweat—not old sweat or nervous sweat but the frank smell of a young summer body that had just walked halfway across town.

  On the third and last night they’d have alone in the palace, Marco came up the steps not looking up, not giving his hearty greeting. “Ti kanes? Kala?” He simply walked right into the bedroom, threw his clothes off, fell back on the bed, and with a sneering smile parodied the moans and squirmings of sex.

  “What’s wrong?” Ray asked. Marco turned moodily on his side and Ray was grateful for this glimpse into the boy’s discontent. When he sat down beside Marco he could smell beer on his breath and cigarette smoke in his hair, though Marco didn’t smoke. At last, after a few words and much miming, Marco was able to indicate that he had a friend who was leaving the next morning for Athens to begin his compulsory military service and the guy was waiting for him in a bar down below along the harbor.

  Ray pulled Marco to his feet, gave him double the usual thousand drachmas, helped him dress, set tomorrow’s date back in the schoolyard, and urged him to hurry off to his friend. He had a half-thought that Marco understood more English than he was letting on. For the first time Marco seemed to be looking at Ray not as a member of another race, sex, class, age, but as a friend.

  Friend? Ray laughed at his own naivete. The boy’s a hooker, he told himself. Don’t get all moony over your beautiful budding friendship with the hooker.

  After Marco had run down the steps, the thuds rattling the whole house, Ray was alone. Definitely alone. He walked to the balcony and looked down at the harbor, most of its lights extinguished, the last waiters hosing down the boardwalk. He put on his headphones and listened to George’s telephone messages to Betty. “Hi, doll, this is Darleen, now a stylishly anorectic 135 pounds. The Duchess of Windsor was wrong. You can be too thin.” Oh yes, four months before the end. “Hi, doll, I know you’re there with the machine on watching The Guiding Light. Can you believe that bitch Vanessa? Hi!” and a sudden happy duet of overlapping voices, since just then Betty picked up and confessed she had indeed been pigging out on the soaps and a pound of Godivas.

  Ray snapped it off. “You must look out for yourself,” George had said, and just now the best way seemed to be to forget George, at least for a while, to forget the atmosphere of dread, the midnight visits to the hospital, the horrifying outbreak of disease after disease—fungus in the throat, a bug in the brain, bleeding in the gut, herpes ringing the ass, every inch of the dwindling body explored by fiber optics, brain scanner, X-rays, the final agonies buried under blankets of morphine.

  Ray received a call from Helen, his boss, and her tinny, crackling tirade sounded as remote as the final, angry emission from a dead star. He had no desire to leave Xania. With Homer as his translator he looked at a house for sale in the Turkish quarter and had a nearly plausible daydream of converting it into a guest house that he and Marco would run.

  He started writing a story about Marco—his first story in fifteen years. He wondered if he could support himself by his pen. He talked to an Irish guy who made a meager living by teaching English at the prison nearby in their rehabilitation program. If he sold George’s loft he could afford to live in Greece several years without working. He could even finance that guest house.

  When he’d first arrived in Crete he’d had the vague feeling that this holiday was merely a detour and that when he rejoined his path George would be waiting for him. George or thoughts of George or the life George had custom-built for him, he wasn’t quite sure which he meant. And yet now there was a real possibility that he might escape, start something new or transpose his old boyhood goals and values into a new key, the Dorian mode, say. Everything here seemed to be conspiring to reorient him, repatriate him, even the way he’d become in Greece the pursuer rather than the pursued.

  One hot, sticky afternoon as he sat in a cafe with a milky ouzo and a dozing cat for company, a blond foreigner—a man, about twenty-five, in shorts and shirtless, barefoot—came walking along beside the harbor playing a soprano recorder. A chubby girl in a muumuu and with almost microscopic freckles dusted over her well-padded cheeks was following this ringleted Pan and staring at him devotedly.

  Ray hated the guy’s evident self-love and the way his head dropped to one side and he hated the complicity of the woman, hated even more that a grown-up man should still be pushing such an over-ripe version of the eternal boy. He really did look over-ripe. Even his lips, puckered for the recorder, looked too pulpy. Ray realized that he himself had played the boy for years and years. To be sure not when he’d chronologically been a boy, for then he’d been too studious for such posturing. But later, in his twenties and thirties. He saw that all those years of self-absorption had confused him. He had always
been looking around to discover if older men were noticing him and he’d been distressed if they were or weren’t. He hadn’t read or written anything because he hadn’t had the calm to submit to other people’s thoughts or to summon his own. George had urged him to buy more and more clothes, always in the latest youthful style, and he’d fussed over Ray’s workout, dentistry, haircut, even the state of his fingernails. When they’d doze in the sun on Fire Island, hour after hour George would stroke Ray’s oiled back or legs. Ray had been the sultan’s favorite.

  Now he’d changed. Now he was like a straight man. He was the one who admired someone else. He wooed, he paid. At the same time he was the kneeling handmaiden to the Cretan youth, the slim-waisted matador. This funny complication suited him.

  A journalist came down from Athens to Xania to interview Ralph for an Athens art magazine or maybe it was the paper.

  Since he was gay, spoke English, and was congenial, Ralph invited him to stay on for the weekend. The day before Ray was due to fly back to New York, he asked the journalist to translate a letter for him into Greek, something he could give Marco along with the gold necklace he’d bought him, the sort of sleazy bauble all the kids here were wearing. Delighted to be part of the adventure and impressed by the ardor of the letter, the journalist readily accepted the commission. Ralph arranged to be away for a couple of hours on Ray’s last night and insisted he bring Marco up to the palace for a farewell between sheets. Covering his friendliness with queenliness, Ralph said, “How else can you hold on to your nickname, La Grande Horizontale?”

  In the palace bedroom that night, just as Marco was about to untie his laces and get down to work, Ray handed him the package and the letter. Before opening the package, Marco read the letter. It said: “I’ve asked a visitor from Athens to translate this for me because I have to tell you several things. Tomorrow I’m going back to New York, but I hope to sell my belongings there quickly. I’ll be back in Xania within a month. I’ve already found a house I’d like to buy on Theotocopoulos Street. Perhaps you and I could live there someday or fix it up and run it as a guest house.

  “I don’t know what you feel for me if anything. For my part, I feel something very deep for you. Nor is it just sexual; the only reason we have so much sex is because we can’t speak to each other. But don’t worry. When I come back I’ll study Greek and, if you like. I’ll teach you English.

  “Here’s a present. If you don’t like it you can exchange it.”

  After Marco finished reading the letter (he was sitting on the edge of the bed and Ray had snapped on the overhead light), he hung his head for a full minute. Ray had no idea what he’d say, but the very silence, the full stop, awed him. Then Marco looked at Ray and said in English, in a very quiet voice, “I know you love me and I love you. But Xania is no good for you. Too small. Do not rest here. You must go.”

  Although Ray felt so dizzy he sank into a chair, he summoned up the wit to ask, “And you? Will you leave Xania one day?” for he was already imagining their life together in New York.

  “Yes, one day.” Marco handed the unopened package back to Ray. “I won’t see you again. You must look out for yourself.”

  And then he stood, left the room, thudded down the front steps, causing the whole house to rattle, and let himself out the front door. Ray felt blown back in a wind-tunnel of grief and joy. He felt his hair streaming, his face pressed back, the fabric of his pants fluttering. In pop-song phrases he thought this guy had walked out on him, done him wrong, broken his heart—a heart he was happy to feel thumping again with sharp, wounded life. He was blown back onto the bed and he smiled and cried as he’d never yet allowed himself to cry over George, who’d just spoken to him once again through the least likely oracle.

  ABOUT THE AUTHORS

  GEORGE STAMBOLIAN is professor of French and Interdisciplinary Studies at Wellesley College. His most recent books are Homesexualities and French Literature (co-edited with Elaine Marks) and Male Fantasies / Gay Realities: Interviews with Ten Men. His essays, interviews, and stories have been published in Christopher Street and The Advocate, and his column, “First Person,” has appeared in The Hew York Native. Born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he lives in New York City, Boston, and Amagansett, Long Island.

  BRUCE BOONE has published a collection of stories, My Walk with Bob, a novel, Century of Clouds, and a collection of altered translations, La Fontaine (with Robert Gluck). He was born in Portland, Oregon, did graduate work at the University of California (Berkeley), and lives in San Francisco where he is completing a translation of Georges Bataille’s Le Coupable. His novel, Carmen, from which “David’s Charm” is drawn, will be published in 1987.

  C. F. BORGMAN was born in Cincinnati and lives in Staten Island, New York. He attended Long Island University and is currently writing a novel, River Road. “A Queer Red Spirit” is his first published work.

  DENNIS COOPER is the author of a novel, Safe, three volumes of poems and prose pieces, The Tenderness of Wolves, The Missing Men, He Cried, and two collections of poetry, Tiger Beat and Idols. His prose and poetry have appeared in Semiotext(e), Bomb, Mandate, Blueboy, Tag Rag, and Gay Sunshine. He was born in Pasadena, California, and founded Little Caesar magazine and the Little Caesar Press. He now lives in Amsterdam where he is completing his second novel, Closer, which contains the narrative, “The Outsiders.”

  SAM D’ALLESANDRO has published a book of poems, Slippery Sins, and his stories have appeared in No Apologies, Mirage, and Appearances. He was born in New Orleans, attended the University of California (Santa Cruz), and lives in San Francisco where he is completing a book of short fiction.

  ROBERT FERRO divides his time between homes in New York City and Sea Girt, New Jersey. He is the author of three novels, The Others, The Family of Max Desir, The Blue Star, and a work of nonfiction, Atlantis: The Autobiography of a Search (with Michael Grumley). His stories and articles have appeared in Christopher Street, The Advocate, and the anthology, A True Likeness. Born in Cranford, New Jersey, he attended Rutgers University and the University of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop. He has received an Ingram-Merrill Award, and his new novel, Second Son, which contains his narrative of the same title, will be published in 1987 by Macmillan.

  JOHN FOX was born in the Bronx and lives in Manhattan. He is the author of a novel, The Boys on the Rock, and his stories have appeared in Christopher Street and Central Park. He holds an MFA in writing from Columbia University and is the recipient of a Yaddo Fellowship. He is currently writing a second novel and several short stories.

  ROBERT GLUCK is the author of a narrative poem, Andy, three volumes of poems and prose pieces, Family Poems, Metaphysics, Reader, a collection of altered translations. La Fontaine (with Bruce Boone), a collection of stories, Elements of a Coffee Service, and a novel, Jack the Modernist. His poems, stories, and articles have appeared in Ironwood, Poetics Journal, Social Text, Christopher Street, and The Advocate. Born in Cleveland, he holds an MFA in writing from San Francisco State University. He has received an Academy of American Poets Award and a Browning Award and lives in San Francisco where he is writing a novel.

  BRAD GOOCH holds a Ph.D. in English Literature from Columbia University and is the recipient of a CAPS Fiction Grant. He is the author of a book of poetry, The Daily News, and a collection of stories, Jailbait and Other Stories, which received a Writer’s Choice Award. His poems, stories, and articles have appeared in The Paris Review, The Partisan Review, Christopher Street, Bomb, The Nation, Vanity Fair, and The New York Native. Born in Kingston, Pennsylvania, he lives in New York City where he is working on a novel, Scary Kisses.

  MICHAEL GRUMLEY has published four works of nonfiction, Atlantis: The Autobiography of a Search (with Robert Ferro), There Are Giants in the Earth, Hard Corps, and After Midnight. His articles and essays have appeared in New York, New Vest, The Chicago Tribune, Grit, The New York Native, and Christopher Street, and his fiction in the anthology, A True Likeness. He was born in Iowa and attended the Universit
y of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop and the School of Visual Arts. He lives in New York City where he also works as a graphic artist and illustrator. His narrative, “Life Drawing,” is part of a forthcoming novel of the same title.

  RICHARD HALL is the author of a novel, The Butterscotch Prince, a volume of plays, Three Plays for a Gay Theater, and two collections of stories, Couplings and Letter from a Great-Uncle. A graduate of Harvard and New York University, his articles have appeared in The New Republic, The New York Times, The Village Voice, The Saturday Review, and The Advocate. Born in New York City, he lives in Oakland where he is writing a new collection of tales, Story-Time.

  PATRICK HOCTEL was born in New Orleans, studied writing at the University of Arizona, and lives in San Francisco. His stories have been published in The New Laurel Review, Pierian Spring, Sun Dog, The Tulane Literary Magazine, and Mirage. He received a Breadloaf Writers’ Conference scholarship and is currently writing a novella and a script for a rock video.

  ANDREW HOLLERAN is the author of two novels, Dancer From the Dance and Nights in Aruba. His “New York Notebook” column in Christopher Street received a Gay Press Association Award, and his stories and articles have appeared in New York, The New York Native, and Christopher Street. Born in Aruba, N.A., he attended Harvard and the University of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop. He divides his time between New York City and Florida where he is writing a novel.