Okay, maybe I didn’t hate her so much. Let’s see what she had to say.
“Do you mind if I’m direct?” she asked.
“I’d appreciate it,” I said, thinking that seemed like a very grown-up thing to say.
“Three days ago, Rafi asked me if I knew what a ‘faggot’ was.”
My nausea was replaced by a ball of ice in my stomach. “What did . . . how did that come up?”
She placed her hands on her knees, forcing herself even more erect. “He said that he heard his mother use the word when on the phone with one of her friends. According to Rafi, he heard her mention ‘Tony and that faggot he’s living with.’ Rafi said she sounded mean and scary.”
The thought of Rafi hearing such ugliness, and being hurt by it, broke my heart. Not to mention that I, however blamelessly, was somehow linked to it. I blinked back a tear.
“I don’t know who she was talking about,” Ms. Sally said, with kindness if not truthfulness, “but . . .”
“I’d be the ‘faggot’ in question,” I said, sparing her the discomfort. She grinned widely. I had the feeling she was probably pretty cool. “What did you say?”
“I asked him what he thought the word meant. He thought for a moment and I knew he was trying to reconcile what he’d overheard with what he’s observed and known to be true. Finally, he said, “I think it must mean ‘bestest friend.’ Because I know my daddy lives with his bestest friend, and that he loves him very much.’ ”
I was doing a lot of blinking now. I didn’t trust myself to say a thing.
“I told him I bet you were his dad’s best friend, but that ‘faggot’ wasn’t a polite word to use. Rafi said he could tell it was a ‘bad’ word from how his mom said it. He said it was the same tone she used when he took a cookie without asking.
“He’s a smart kid, you know. You could tell he was really thinking about what I’d said. Finally, he asked, ‘But why would my mom think it’s bad for my dad to have a special friend? Doesn’t she want him to be happy?’ ”
I didn’t envy Ms. Sally for having to come up with a diplomatic, kid-friendly answer to that question. The only one I could think of was “Because your mom’s a miserable bitch.” That fit neither criteria.
“What did you say?”
Ms. Sally gave a wry smile. “To be truthful, I punted. I told Rafi that it wouldn’t be fair for me to guess what his mom was feeling and that he should ask her.”
“That seems fair. I think you did a great job,” I said.
“I mentioned it to his mom when she picked him up that night.” She darted her eyes guiltily to the ground.
“Annndd . . .” I prompted.
“Annndd . . .” she mimicked me, “I really shouldn’t say any more.”
“I’ll bring you chocolate,” I offered.
“It’s an ethical thing,” she said. “Confidentiality.”
But she wouldn’t have mentioned it if she didn’t want to tell me. “Hand to god,” I said, raising my right palm. “I won’t tell a soul. But it would be helpful—to Rafi—if I knew what he was dealing with.”
“Can I have your word and the chocolate?”
“I’ll throw in a doughnut.”
Ms. Sally let out a long sigh. “She said ‘I suppose it’s just as well. Better he hear about his father from me than on the playground. ’ ”
“Ouch. Now, I’m totally withdrawing that Mother of the Year nomination I’d submitted for her.”
“So is it true? Are you and Mr. Rinaldi . . . more than roommates?” Her eyes glittered with the zeal of someone excited to hear some especially juicy gossip.
I didn’t know if Tony would want me to answer that question truthfully. Actually, that’s a lie. I knew he wouldn’t.
But, fuck it. He was the one in the closet, not me.
“Yeah,” I said, “we’re lovers. But Tony’s not entirely comfortable with it. I’m the first—well, the only guy he’s ever been with. So, please, don’t say anything to him about it.”
“Are you kidding?” she asked. “Mr. Rinaldi is always very nice, and I can see he’s a terrific father, but I’m no idiot. That’s a man who could intimidate a Tyrannosaurus rex and he carries a gun. I want to live.”
I laughed. “I really appreciate your sharing all this with me,” I told her. “I’ll talk to Tony. He hasn’t been open with Rafi about our relationship. I don’t think the secrecy is doing anyone any good.”
“I’ve spent most of my waking hours with kids for a few years now,” Ms. Sally said. “The thing about keeping secrets from them is that it doesn’t work. Most parents who think their children don’t know what’s really going on are deluding themselves. Even if it happens behind closed doors, kids have a way of knowing the truth.
“Plus, lying to children sets a bad precedent. When those kids turn into adolescents and start telling their own lies, the parents are always surprised and defensive, asking ‘Where did they learn that from? We’ve always encouraged openness in our home.’
“Yeah, sure. Keep telling yourself that. Better yet, get a mirror, honey.”
That settled it. I liked Ms. Sally. A lot. I totally agreed with her whole honesty-is-the-best-policy spiel. But she was right about something else, too: If she talked to Tony like that, he’d shoot her.
“I should let you go,” I said, observing that the kids had begun to look a little glazed-over as Rafi tried to read them Where the Wild Things Are for the third time. “Again, thank you. I’ll talk to both of them. I’d never want to see Rafi get hurt.”
Ms. Sally leaned closer to me. Almost nose to nose, she whispered, “Were you really his first guy?”
“Guilty as charged.”
“I don’t want you to think I’m a homophobe or anything,” she said. “It’s just . . . I do not get the ‘gay’ vibe off him at all.”
“Don’t worry about it,” I consoled her. “He doesn’t get it, either.”
Ms. Sally giggled like a teenage girl seeing a Playgirl centerfold. “And what about you? Was he your first, too?”
“He was the first I’d been with that evening,” I answered, winking.
Another naughty-girl giggle. “I’m glad we talked. I think you’re going to make a great second dad for Rafi.”
I was? I hadn’t thought of myself in that role.
I hadn’t dared.
26
Daddy’s Secret
“Can we go to the park?” Rafi asked, holding my hand as we walked home from his school.
It’s kind of a miracle how a kid’s hand settles into yours. As if it were made to fit there. When holding a boyfriend’s hand, you feel his strength and tenderness matching yours. A union of equals. But a child’s hand is so small. Precious. The moment it’s in yours, you feel a primal protectiveness that gives you a superhuman sense of power. You imagine there’s nothing you wouldn’t—couldn’t—do to save him from pain.
Yet, I couldn’t find any words to open the subject of what he’d heard his mother say. Tony had put boundaries between us. I could break them, but I’d risk losing him.
Is he worth waiting for? Mrs. Cherry had asked me.
Maybe for me, I answered in my head. But suffused with tenderness and caring for the charge by my side, I worried Is Tony’s guilt, confusion, and ambivalence hurting Rafi?
I could stand getting hurt. But I couldn’t be part of hurting a child.
“Sure,” I said, giving Rafi what little joy I could, “let’s go hit the slides.”
Rafi squeezed my fingers. “I love you, Kebbin.”
I squeezed back. “Me too, Rafsters.”
“That miserable bitch,” Tony said later that night.
My thoughts exactly.
Rafi had fallen asleep with Tony ten minutes ago on my bed. Tony’d snuck back out and lay with me on the sofa bed as I snuggled against his rocklike yet still comfortable chest. I’d just filled him in on what Ms. Sally had told me at Rafi’s school.
“To let Rafi hear that—what the fuck i
s wrong with her?”
“I know,” I said. “Faggot is such an ugly word.”
“Still,” Tony said, ruffling my hair, “Rafi was right. You are my ‘bestest friend,’ you know.”
I crooked my neck and playfully bit one of his nipples.
“Ouch,” he said. “And, uh, yum.”
Like many men who’d primarily had sex with women, Tony had no idea his nipples were erogenous zones until I introduced him to their usefulness a few months ago. Now, he was a bit of suckle slut.
“It’s not funny,” I said. “You have to talk to Raf. And you have to figure out what you’re going to say.” I told him Ms. Sally’s thoughts on kids knowing the score even when their parents thought they didn’t.
“I thought we agreed you weren’t going to push me on this,” Tony growled.
“I’m not saying you have to take out a full page in the New York Times announcing your involvement with me,” I said. “But you have to think about your son. Eventually, someone is going to tell him about you—about us. Would you rather you be the one to do it, or leave it to his mother or his friends?”
“I don’t think I need to tell my five-year-old son about my sexuality,” he said icily.
I pulled myself away from him and sat up. “Is that all this is about to you? Sex?”
Tony looked tired. “You know that isn’t true. Don’t play word games, Kevvy.”
“It seems to me,” I said, getting up. “You’re the one who’s playing games. The worst kind, Tony. The kind where no one wins.”
“Kevvy, don’t be mad at me.” I wasn’t used to seeing Tony so vulnerable. “I don’t know what to do, all right? I don’t have a . . . map for this.”
“So, trust me. Talk to your son. Tell him how you feel about me. How we feel about each other. Let him know that what he knows to be true, is.”
“He’s a kid, Kevvy. He doesn’t need to know about . . . homosexuality.”
Tony had been raised a strict Catholic. I wasn’t sure what he’d known about homosexuality himself before I’d sucked his dick at the age of sixteen. Even afterward, I think he thought it was some kind of fluke or wrestling move.
“You don’t have to explain the intricacies of anal intercourse to him, Tone. He just needs to know he’s in a place with two adults who love each other and who love him, too. That we’re both there for him. He’s just been through your separation with your wife, Tony. He needs stability. He needs to feel secure.
“He also deserves to know that not everyone thinks it’s okay for two men to have that kind of special love. That people might say mean things. Even his mother. But he needs to hear from you that all love is good and to be celebrated.
“He’s young enough that you still have the chance to shape his moral center. If he senses shame and secretiveness from you, he’ll be anxious and think what you’re doing is wrong. But if you’re open and honest, he’ll feel safe and strong.”
In my head, Stephen Sondheim’s seminal “Children Will Listen” played. As sung by Barbra, natch.
“But that window won’t be open forever,” I continued. “Eventually, someone is going to define our relationship for him. Wouldn’t it be better coming from you?”
Tony rubbed his temples, wincing.
“Let me do that,” I said. I sat beside him and dug in, rotating my index fingers in small circles just behind his eyes.
“Mmmm, that’s good,” Tony moaned. He was quiet for a few minutes while I worked the tension out of his forehead.
“I want to do the right thing,” he said eventually.
“I know.”
“I do love you.”
“I know that, too.”
“Let me think about it, okay?”
“Okay.”
I massaged deeper, using my thumbs to press the top of the bridge of his nose, another acupressure point for relieving stress.
Tony was quiet, his eyes closed. For ten minutes, he said nothing.
I cherished his silence. In the past, he’d avoided this conversation. I was touched by how much consideration he was giving it now. I knew his stillness meant he was really thinking about what I’d said.
Until he started to snore and I realized he’d fallen asleep. Probably nine minutes ago.
Gently, I cupped his face between my hands.
Why did loving me have to cause this good man so much torment? I wished there was something I could do to take away his pain. To make this all easier for him.
I realized my thoughts walking Rafi to the park earlier today were wrong.
It wasn’t children that brought out our protectiveness.
It was love.
On his other visits with Rafi, Tony was always careful to return to my room before he fell asleep, so that his son wouldn’t see us in bed together.
I considered waking Tony so he could make his usual retreat but decided against it.
If Rafi saw us together, maybe it would save a lot of discussion. And we could all move on.
Unfortunately, one of us was about to move on a lot sooner than I’d hoped for.
I squinted at the digital clock across the room as if by squeezing my eyes together the numbers would make more sense. 3:15? In the morning?
So why was Tony getting dressed?
“Is the apartment on fire?” I croaked.
“Sorry, babe.” He sat on the sofabed and kissed my forehead. Now that he was closer to me in the darkness, I could see he was dressed for work. “We have another floater. I gotta go.”
There were downsides to being in love with a cop. “S’okay,” I said, already drifting back off to dreamland.
“Listen,” he said, apparently unfazed by my looming unconsciousness. “Rafi’s only been here a couple of times now. If he wakes up there alone, he’s going to be scared. Do you think you could go lie with him in your room?”
“I don’t know if I’d get any sleep. Is it like being in bed with you?”
Tony looked mildly scandalized.
“I mean, does he also hog all the blankets, dummy?” I hit him with a pillow.
Tony grinned, his hair mussed by my attack, making him look extra scrumptious. “I’m afraid it’s in the Rinaldi genes. Sheet-stealing, chocolate-loving, heartbreaking scoundrels, we are.”
I reached out my hand and Tony helped pull me to standing. Then, before I knew it, he swept me into his arms and carried me into my bedroom. He laid me gently next to Rafi. Sure enough, the kid was cocooned in every blanket on the bed. Tony saw me notice and shrugged.
“I’ll get you one,” Tony whispered, reaching out to unravel his son.
“Just grab one from the sofabed,” I whispered back.
“Good idea. And, listen, I hate to take advantage of you, babe, but if I get hung up, can you bring him to school in the morning?”
I didn’t know if I should be touched that Tony trusted me with all this parental responsibility, or pissed that I was only entrusted with it when it was convenient for him. “Sure,” I said, slurring slightly with sleepiness.
Tony kissed me again. “I’ll get the blanket.”
I was dead to the world before he returned with it.
27
Sleep Over
I crashed quickly but it was a restless, shallow slumber. Two hours after Tony left, I didn’t so much wake as admit defeat. Too wired to go back to sleep, but too tired to bother with the lights, I stumbled from bedroom to bathroom, peed for what felt like three hours, and made my way into the kitchen.
Daylight was just starting to muscle its way through my blinds. Speaking of muscle, when was the last time I’d gone to the gym? True, I no longer depended on a tight body to make a living, but that didn’t mean I was willing to let myself go all Kirstie Alley, either. Bleary as I was, I knew a good workout would make me feel better.
I chugged a glass of milk and rinsed out the glass. Invigorated by the prospect of getting my exercise done for the day, I headed to the bedroom to throw on some sweatpants and a T-shirt. My gym was
just down the block, so I wouldn’t even bother with a jacket. If it was cold, I could walk faster.
I flicked on the light. The gym was one place where I paid no attention to fashion. If my clothes fit and were clean, they’d be good enough for me. I was putting on my tee when I heard a cat mewling from my fire escape. It wouldn’t be the first time a stray had found its way up there, only to complain to find itself so unexpectedly far from the ground.
This one was loud, though. He sounded like he was right inside the apartment.
Now that I was paying attention, I realized he was also speaking English.
“Daddy?”
I was pretty sure that ruled out a cat. Or a bird. Or even a parrot.
That was definitely a human being.
Holy shit.
Rafi.
I had totally forgotten Rafi.
Oh. My. God.
Tony wasn’t back, and I was about to leave a five-year-old in the apartment alone.
Worst. Parental. Substitute. Ever.
I briefly wondered if I should just strangle myself with my T-shirt right now. It was already conveniently placed around my neck.
“Da—” Rafi began again, his voice rising higher. A slight note of hysteria was creeping into his tone.
Okay, Kevin, stop thinking about yourself. This kid needs you.
“Hey, buddy,” I said, moving to sit next to him on the bed. I tousled his hair in the same way Tony did mine.
“Hi, Kebbin!” he said with relief, remembering where he was. “I didn’t see my daddy.” He didn’t have to add how that made him feel.
“He had to go out and help some people who needed him,” I said. Rafi’s known his daddy as “one of the good guys” his whole life. “But he made sure I was here to keep you company.” I lay next to him.
“It’s a good thing he did,” I added, in a whispery, just-between-us confession. “He knows I get scared being by myself.”
Third You Die (Kevin Connor Mystery) Page 20
