In the City by the Lake

by Taylor Saracen

  “I know why I’m here,” he replied, turning his head slightly to give me a smile I couldn’t comprehend. “Why are you?”

  I didn’t know how to answer, so I sat down, no longer trusting my trembling legs.

  Cal sat beside me but kept his eyes locked on the lake and the stone fruit sunset settling onto the horizon, dripping radiant reds and deep oranges into the water, ruby peaks swelling before they broke into a serene sea of sapphires capped with clusters of pearls.

  Unexpectedly, Cal placed his palm over my mouth, shaking his head in amazement. “You’re breathing.”

  Too flabbergasted to react, I exhaled a humid puff of air into his skin.

  “How do you breathe?” he asked, removing his hand as if he wanted an answer to the rhetorical question. “Have you become so used to the sunsets that they don’t rob you of your breath anymore?”

  “You’re speaking, so you're breathing,” I stated, knowing the statement was beside the point. “Have you?”

  He shook his head and grinned at me. “I refuse to become desensitized by them. When you gaze at something enough, you can get used to it if you don’t remind yourself that it’s extraordinary, so I use my breath to remind myself of that—that it’s special, beautiful.”

  He was too. I wanted to use my breath to tell him that, but I didn’t. I held it instead.

  “I slept on the banks of the Mississippi for a month,” Cal stated, lying back so his body was propped up by only his elbows. “Four full weeks sleeping by the water.”

  “Did you breathe?”

  “I would have died if I didn’t,” he laughed. “It wasn’t like this. I had to survive then.”

  “And you don’t have to now?”

  “No, my life is promised to me here. In a city like this …” Cal sighed, “You can enjoy being alive, thrive.”

  “Have you ever not enjoyed it?”

  “Chicago?”

  I shook my head. “Life.”

  He licked his lips as if he was cautiously considering the burden of a question “It’s been worse, but when it was, I knew it would get better because I would make it that way.”

  “Is that why you found Abraham? Were you looking for someone to make it better for you?” I ventured, using my fingertips to rake windblown hair off my forehead.

  “No,” Cal replied, his southern drawl giving the word an extra syllable. “That’s why he found me.”

  I didn’t doubt it. I tried to stop myself from pushing, but for some reason I needed to know if he’d felt low like I did sometimes, if he’d been disenchanted. “But you’ve been down? When you had to survive, sleep on the banks of the Mississippi and all that, you were sad then?”

  “I was already free,” he stated plainly.

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  “You can’t be bogged down if you’re free. Have you ever heard a wild bird sing a sad song?”

  “I don’t know if I’ve ever paid attention to birds singing at all,” I admitted, much to Cal’s chagrin.

  “I don’t understand you,” he said, looking at me as if I were an unidentified being and he was the scientist meant to discover me.

  “Do you want to?” I asked before I could stop myself. Something about him made my lips loose, an eager specimen.

  “Yes,” he nodded. “I want to.”

  I gazed at the sky again, attempting to see it through his eyes, to channel him, but I found myself looking for Cal in my peripheral vision to take in his warm colors instead.

  “What was the trip like, from Georgia to here?”

  “Long,” Cal answered. “It was an adventure. I have crazy stories.”

  “Tell them to me,” I suggested, admiring how the saffron hue of the setting sun gilded him from the crown of his head to the barely there cleft in his chin.

  “We’ll be here all night,” Cal chuckled, growing serious when he realized I was looking at him expectantly. “I have to get back to The Gallery and make sure everything’s ready to go for tonight,” he apologized, his regret making me feel exceedingly vulnerable in a way I despised.

  “You don’t really seem like management material,” I said, drawing an amused nod from him.

  “I’m probably not,” he relented, easily. “I’m better with numbers than anyone else who lives in The Studio and I’m doing a favor for someone I care about.”

  I grimaced at his admission of affection, and to my displeasure, he noticed.

  “Does that upset you? That I care about him?” Cal asked, his inquiry more earnest than accusatory.

  “Why would it?” I huffed, my response the polar opposite.

  The way he regarded me with boundless empathy in his algae green eyes placated the defender who rose inside me, making the moment so serene it became nearly obscene and caused prickles of heat to spread across my cheeks. I was wearing more layers of clothing than I had ever worn on the beach, yet I was thoroughly exposed, naked under his gentle gaze.

  “I care about a lot of people,” Cal stated. “I’d like to care about you too, even if you don’t.”

  “Even if I don’t want you to?” I attempted to clarify, as he stood up and brushed granules of sand off his grey slacks.

  “Even if you don’t care about yourself.”

  “Who said I don’t care about myself?” I bristled, shifting onto my knees, palms clenching into mounds of the beach below them.

  “You did, the first time we met a few years ago,” Cal replied, smiling sadly before he did something I hadn’t expected, never thinking he remembered me or that night. Repeating the words I’d said to him, he forced me to ingest them and grow sick as they festered in my stomach. “I don’t know why you think I’m like you …” He moved closer to me, placing his hand on my cheek. “But you are like me, aren’t you?”

  “I am,” I whispered back, closing my eyes as he gave my face a pat.

  “And you’re okay,” he stated, as if he really believed it.

  I watched as he walked away, taking the rest of the daylight with him. Overcome by my admission, I laid supine in the sand, recalling the heat of his hand as the cold lake air shrouded me.

  9

  December 1931

  There was something to be said for belles who owned who they were, even though they were bitches. Chicago was crawling with fakes and phonies, but the faggots of Towertown were neither. Abraham, Cal, and even the droopy drag queen, Rosie, lived in their skin instead of shedding it like the smarmy snakes surrounding me.

  Take Igor for instance, he had spent his whole life buying into my father’s single-man, brotherhood bullshit until the one day a busty broad batted her Bette Davis eyes at him. All of a sudden, he was a changed bird, peacocking around proudly thanks to the pussy he was pulling. Worse yet was the fact that my father, the rejecter of romance, was supportive of his eldest son’s new status, making me wonder how dedicated good old dad really was to his belief in bachelorhood. The more I thought about it, the surer I was that Aunt Yekaterina and Uncle Grygoriy’s relationship had fucked my father up, and my mother’s death had driven the final nail in his coffin of hope. I had accepted his dumbass dogmas as truth because it was easier for me that way, but everything was shifting and somehow Taros the staunch skeptic was softening. It made me wonder if he was developing something with a dame of his own. Though December in the city was a blustering blizzard, I could already feel the heat of the questions, people wondering why I was the only Mikhailov who didn’t desire a doll. Assholes.

  Since my own family was full of hypocrites, it shouldn’t have surprised me that the rest of the charlatans in Chicago were perpetually pulling antics, but their audacity astounded me nonetheless. Though Al Capone was filing appeals in an attempt to wiggle out of his conviction for tax evasion, he had somehow become the city’s latest headline hero. News of Capone’s South State Street soup kitchen emblazoned the front page of Chicago Tribune. Citizens didn’t seem concerned with his blatant play to clean up his image, not when he was filling
the bellies of starving men and women who stood in lines outside the building three times a day. The most dangerous gangster in the metropolis was shaking hands and kissing babies, while Herbert Hoover hid in the White House.

  And just when I thought shit could not possibly get more bizarre, it did. The streets were becoming unsafe for guys affiliated with outfits, thanks to a group of collegiate cretins who were making their clams kidnapping low-level gangsters and holding them for ransom. While nobody had been snatched from Vlad’s crew, I worried that with my luck, I would be the first one nabbed. I was one of the highest earners in the group, and guys from other gangs were getting desperate, doing more talking than they ever had years before, trying to find out who held what. So I was looking over my shoulder more than usual and keeping my pistol loaded. I had never killed anyone, but I wasn't opposed to putting a few bullets through a brainiac who was trying to get dough for my dome.

  I disembarked the L and hurried down West Huron Street, my pace brisk not only because it was freezing, but also due to the thick sheets of snow hindering my vision, a strike to my senses I couldn’t afford. Though I could barely see my hand in front of me, I noticed how dim the streets were compared to years prior. With so many businesses shut down, there weren’t as many strings of lights lining the windows, the festive season finally seeming as bleak as the fall had.

  Walking through the doors of The Gallery on State, I felt a swell of anticipation I still hadn’t grown used to blooming in my belly. After speaking with Cal in October, I made a habit of showing up at Abe’s speakeasy at least once a week, if only just for the proximity to him. To my surprise, every time I had come around, Cal had made an effort to speak with me, whether he sat beside me at the bar or found me in Abraham’s office. None of our discussions were as revealing as our conversation on the beach had been, but when I talked to Cal, I remembered how that day had felt. The memories reverberated through my body, making every muscle ache for his attention. His presence was comforting to me in some odd way I didn’t understand. It was as though he saw who I wanted to be and didn’t fault me for the fact that I wasn’t that guy yet and may never be.

  Though I’d spoken to Cal a handful of times, I couldn’t help but be nervous around him, partially because of how attractive I found him, but mostly because I never knew what would come out of his mouth next. The questions he asked challenged me in ways I never expected, forcing me to think of things that I would readily push away and ignore if it hadn’t been for him. I wondered why he continued to engage with me, knowing I didn’t bring much more than an eager ear and longing gazes to the table. If Cal recognized my infatuation with him, he never acknowledged it, rendering our relationship a loose friendship at the most. Even an acquaintanceship was out of the ordinary for me, yet I valued mine and Cal’s.

  I was far from his only companion. Not only did Cal have whatever the fuck was going on between him and Abraham, he also had a gaggle of girly-boys who followed him around as though he was their messiah. They hung on his every word, and I was desperate to knock them off and keep every softly enunciated syllable for myself.

  “You’re here,” Cal said, approaching me with a smile. He reached his hand out to shake mine and I fought the urge to intertwine our fingers, to keep him.

  “I always come here for New Year’s. Abe pours more generously on holidays.”

  “He pours liberally for you every time you’re here,” Cal noted.

  “Are you keeping tabs on my consumption?”

  “More on his wastefulness,” he replied. “You never finish the fourth drink. He should only give you a half.”

  “Have you told him that he should only give me a half?” I asked, raising my eyebrows. The idea of Cal bringing me up to Abraham gave me a thrill. I wanted my name on his lips, especially when they were opening for Abe.

  “I haven’t,” he answered, his eyes only showing a slice of their irises. “I drink it.”

  “You drink the rest of my drink?”

  Cal nodded. “Every time.”

  “Why?” I glanced around the room, the presence of the drag queens dressed in their best, and the men who lusted for them, instantly irritating me. I wanted to be on the beach with Abe’s Peach, or anywhere we could be alone.

  “Because I wondered what you tasted like,” Cal admitted, sending shockwaves through my system. “Even the remnants.”

  Not knowing how to reply, I stood in awe of him as I’m sure I often did.

  “Rosie’s singing soon,” he said, running a hand through his brick-red hair. “I like to listen to him perform.”

  “I don’t,” I confessed, perpetually uneasy around Cal’s friend.

  Cal sighed and gave me a sultry smile. “When he’s done.”

  “When he’s done?” I questioned, wondering if he purposely omitted the rest of his sentence.

  From the look on his face, he had.

  I sat down at the bar when Cal turned away and headed toward the stage. He was drunk. I could see it on his face and it made sense. It was a half hour until midnight on New Year’s Eve and everyone was feeling no pain, everyone but me. My heart clenched in my chest and my hands cramped, rigid with the fear that they’d never hold his.

  As a succession of singers took the stage, I worked on getting properly pissed, finishing the full fourth, knowing I needed every ounce of liquid courage I could summon.

  When Cal passed by me, dragging his fingertips across the small of my back, I rose from my stool, steadying myself as the alcohol hit me hard. I followed him outside and into the night, not knowing where we were headed, but looking forward to it just the same.

  The freezing air slapped my cheeks as I bowed my head to the snow-saturated wind, walking quickly toward the beach. My feet slid over slick cement before breaking glass on the sand, shoes crushing the white peaks as the lake roared like an avalanche in front of us.

  “It’s cold,” I said, blowing out a cloud of aquamarine air as I admired the moonbeams, silver slivers capping the breaks.

  I felt him before I saw him, a wave of warmth closing in on me, heat on my lips and strong arms wrapped around my back. It was difficult to come to terms with the fact that Cal was kissing me. It was a moment I’d tried not to think about for years, and it was happening, on an arctic beach under a starless sky.

  “What about Abe?” I whispered, pulling back enough for my breath to waft visibly into his mouth.

  “He doesn’t own me,” Cal said, swallowing it down. “Nobody does.”

  “That’s what scares me,” I admitted, tangling my frigid fingers through his fiery hair as I tugged him back into me, holding on as tightly as anyone could to something so free.

  If I wasn’t already intoxicated, I would have gotten drunk on his lips. My heart spun as my brain went numb, his embrace not allowing me to think of anything but him.

  We kissed until I could no longer bear the daggers of ice that sliced through my muscles, demanding attention.

  “I’ve wanted that for a while,” I admitted to myself, and to Cal, as I sank my hands deep into the pockets of my coat. It was the first time I had shown affection to a man without expecting it to be followed by some sort of sexual gratification. Looking at him knowing his mouth was on mine moments before was as awkward and unnerving as it was enticing. And beyond my confession, I was unsure what to say as we stood on the frostbitten lakefront.

  “Why didn’t you then?” Cal asked, the question hanging heavy in the air between us.

  “I don’t know,” I replied, but that was a lie. I knew precisely why. It was the reason I would run once I gained the wherewithal to turn away from him. I was scared, terrified of what Cal made me feel, nervous a kiss would make whatever we had more real.

  “Yes you do,” he disagreed, never one to let me slink out of a statement. Long fingers cradled my skull as Cal brushed his lips against mine and said, “Come on.”

  We shared a cigarette and walked down dark blocks in silence, until we reached the soft glow of State
Street, light streaming from the narrow windows of unassuming buildings, full of life beyond the bricks.

  “I should go,” I said as Cal opened the door to The Gallery, allowing heat and music to blast into the night.

  He didn’t ask why this time, instead he nodded, waved and, from the sound of the music still dancing through the dense winter air, watched as I went on my way.

  There were so many odd things happening in city in those days, but the strangest of all was learning I had the propensity to fall for a fruit who wasn’t mine.

  10

  March 1932

  My self-loathing was neither here nor there; it was everywhere because that’s where he was, though I tried like hell to escape him. It had been almost four months since I had seen Cal in the flesh, yet his flesh was all I could think about. Memories of the minutes spent against his lips crashed over me like waves, inundating my mind despite the passage of time, and I hated myself for my inability to move past the moment. He lived behind my eyelids when I went to sleep and on my palm when I woke up thinking of him.

  I did everything I could to banish him from my brain, including having Maksim take Abe’s alcohol orders. If I had to face him, I would be unable to forsake him, and just like that I’d be another sad sack sweet on the precocious Peach. I wondered if he thought of me, or if I was only a fading flame, a series of seconds strung together, left smothered by my feelings while he burned the acres between us, or perhaps I was the one scorching the space.

  I should have been able to go back to The Gallery, to be in his presence, to act like a man, but I hid instead, a fearful faggot, everything I didn’t want to be. Kissing him was a mistake, one I was desperate to make again and again, unremittingly. Without thought, I’d run my thumb over my lower lip, recalling the feeling of his tongue sliding past it and tangling with mine like taffy, all sugar and spice, and four times as nice as any kiss I’d had before. I wondered if it was possible to get addicted to a memory, crave the consciousness you’d committed to your brain, fiend for the flashbacks you played over and over, the ones that settled and stirred you. Was it possible to move on from something that sought to freeze you in time and hold you there, on a blustery beach at midnight? Did I want to know?