Where the Boys Are

by William J. Mann

  “Too bad Brent’s parents didn’t allow a memorial service,” Lloyd says. “It might have offered closure.”

  “Yeah.” Brent’s body was whisked out of Boston and taken back to Providence for whatever burial ceremony the Whiteheads had in mind. All trace of him was simply gone from our lives.

  “You could still organize something,” Lloyd suggests. “Arrange a memorial service on your own. Get Brent’s friends together …”

  “He had no friends,” I say. “No one really knew Brent. Or liked him very much.”

  I watch Clara bark at a flock of seagulls. How much life in that little body. How much spirit.

  “I guess I never realized you and Brent were all that close,” Lloyd says.

  “We weren’t. That’s what’s so weird about all this. For most of the time I knew him, Brent bugged the shit out of me. He was flighty, self-centered, and could be nasty as shit. But …”

  Lloyd looks at me. “But …?”

  “He was my friend,” I say simply.

  Lloyd just nods.

  I hesitate a minute, then speak again. “Brent had HIV,” I tell Lloyd.

  He’s stunned.

  I look off at the bay. “His mother told me. Apparently, she hadn’t known, either. She was angry. She found me in his apartment, clearing out his porno collection. I was doing it for her, really, so she wouldn’t have to see it. But she was pissed. Accused me of giving it to him.”

  “Oh, God, Henry.” Lloyd takes my hand. “Did Brent know himself?”

  I feel the tears burn behind my eyes. “I have no idea. Whether he was on the cocktails or not, he never told me.”

  “Jesus,” Lloyd says.

  I think of Brent’s body, so full, so pumped, that trace of acne across his back. I don’t want to cry. Not again. I fight back the tears.

  “I can only think that all his partying was an escape of some sort. He did tell me he had a lover who died of AIDS. Right before he died, he told me that.” I look over at Lloyd. “Do you know Brent once said that dying of AIDS was preferable than ending up an old, lonely queen? He didn’t want to turn into some irrelevant old-timer whose only role was as background chorus to a group of kids. He wanted to go out while he was still on top.” I shake my fist up at the sky. “Well, you got your wish, you asshole!”

  Lloyd slips his arm around my shoulder.

  “I don’t want people to remember Brent just as some drugged-out party boy.” I laugh ruefully. “Even though that’s what he was. But he wanted what we all want. To find somebody. To fall in love.” I look at Lloyd and finally start blubbering.

  Lloyd just pulls me closer to him.

  “Before I came down here,” I say, wiping my nose with the back of my hand, “I went for an HIV test.”

  Lloyd lifts my chin. God, his eyes are beautiful. “Have you been putting yourself at risk?” he asks.

  I laugh. “Lloyd, I’ve been a goddamn escort. And not once did I ever think about AIDS.”

  Lloyd doesn’t know what to say.

  “Oh, sure. I thought of it in the abstract. I told clients I only practiced safe sex. If I guy asked me to bareback, I refused. So, no, I wasn’t really at risk. But it struck me, finding out about Brent, how I never really gave that much thought to AIDS—how nobody seems to, really. How so many in the circuit scene don’t ever talk about it. Everybody pretends that it’s over, that it doesn’t exist.”

  “And yet, as Brent proves, it’s still there.” Lloyd looks off at the waves. “How many guys out on the dance floor have HIV and either don’t know or don’t tell?”

  “I get my results when I go back to Boston.” I look at Lloyd and I’m sure the terror on my face is obvious. “I’ve never been tested before in my life.”

  Lloyd sighs. “What a difference a few years make. There was a time when everyone I knew was tested two, three, or more times.”

  I look down at Clara, who’s sniffing around the dried shell of a dead crab. “I don’t know anybody with AIDS,” I tell Lloyd. “I’ve never lost anyone.”

  Lloyd looks suddenly as if he might cry, too. I know he’s thinking about Javitz. He takes my hands and eases me down beside him on an old log. He kicks off his sandals and pushes his toes into the hot sand.

  “I’ve never known anyone who died of anything before,” I manage to say, the tears coming again, dripping down off my face. I feel ridiculous.

  “It’s so strange to me,” Lloyd says, his voice low and thoughtful, “how there’s a whole new crop of gay men today who can say the same thing.” He reaches over, wiping the tears from my face tenderly with the back of his hand. “I guess the few years between us are enough to make that true. Jeff and I know so many people who have died. Our lives are littered with the corpses of dead people. They’ve become part of the landscape for us. They’re part of the way we see the world.”

  I face him imploringly. “How do you go on when somebody you know is no longer here? Somebody who was so alive and now they’re just gone? You can’t finish the conversations you were having. You can’t do anything.”

  He shakes his head. “There’s no answer to that, Henry. You just go on.”

  “I guess I just never got death before. How final it is. I mean, of course, I knew that. But to feel it …” I shudder. “The only other person I ever knew who died was my grandfather, and I was eleven. We weren’t all that close, but I remember thinking he was just away, that he’d come back. I think in some ways I convinced myself he wasn’t really dead. But I’m not eleven anymore. I can’t think like that now.” My voice chokes up. “I used to dread seeing Brent’s name appear on my caller ID. Now I’d give anything for it to show up again.”

  Lloyd is looking out at the waves. “One way to go on, Henry, is to see death as not being final, as not being the end.”

  I frown. “Lloyd, I know you believe that, but I’m just not sure about it. We Jews are kind of vague on the idea of an afterlife, you know. I want to believe that life goes on, but I just don’t know.…”

  “Javitz once said that it’s the embrace of ambiguity that finally sets us free.” He smiles over at me. “Accepting that we can never know anything for certain. That it’s not about knowing, but feeling.”

  I like that. That much I can accept, take in. We sit there watching the waves inch inexorably closer as the tide rises. Clara’s getting braver, allowing her front paws to get wet. Overhead, the great dome of bright-blue sky is broken only occasionally by the flight of a gull.

  “It’s so peaceful here,” I say. “I wish Brent had known about this part of Ptown.”

  “Maybe he does. Maybe that’s why you and Clara came down.”

  I smile over at him. “How did you get to be so smart? Was it Javitz who taught you?”

  “Javitz taught me a lot,” Lloyd says.

  “You had an amazing friendship. I envy you.”

  “That we did.”

  “What was that like? You know, Jeff has never talked to me much about Javitz.”

  “Never?”

  I shake my head. “Not in any detail. He’ll just go quiet when his name comes up, and I can see him thinking, but he won’t talk about him.”

  Lloyd sighs. “It’s been hard for Jeff. It’s been hard for all of us who loved him, who took care of him at the end. You see, Javitz had always taken care of us, and then, when he got sick, it was us taking care of him. Feeding him. Cleaning him. Just sitting there and being with him.”

  “You were with him when he died.”

  Lloyd nods. “The greatest gift of my life.”

  “It’s so awesome. That you did all that.”

  Lloyd smiles. “It wasn’t just me. I have this image in my mind of Jeff sitting there, combing Javitz’s hair, singing to him. ‘Good morning, heartache.’ Billie Holliday. It was Javitz’s favorite.” Lloyd laughs. “And believe me, while Jeff has many talents, singing is not one of them.”

  It’s a very different image than I’ve ever had of Jeff. Sitting there, combing somebody’s hair
, singing to them …

  “Why has Jeff never talked about Javitz to me?” I ask Lloyd.

  He pauses. “Jeff carries some guilt. He wasn’t there the night Javitz died.” He looks at me gently, then reaches over and touches my face. “You’re part of the guilt he feels, too, Henry. You see, Javitz taught us the meaning of friendship. What you do for friends. Real friends. How to be there—really be there for each other. And I think Jeff feels he’s failed you, Henry.”

  I just look at him.

  “Your distance hurts him,” Lloyd tells me.

  I’m torn, as ever, when it comes to Jeff. I want to melt, to feel compassion. But my back stiffens, my defenses go up. Yes, yes indeed, Jeff has failed me. All the times I was there for him, but our friendship remained a one-way street. I can’t imagine that was the kind of friendship Javitz had taught him about.

  “If it means anything,” Lloyd says, “I’d like to be friends with you. I like you, Henry. I’m very glad we’ve had this chance to connect with each other.”

  “If it means anything?” I repeat, smiling broadly over at him. “Lloyd, it means the world!” I hug him.

  He takes my face in his hands. “Henry, I believe Brent’s in a better place. But that doesn’t make the tragedy of his death any less. Particularly not for those of us left behind, who still have lives to live, heartaches to heal. If you ever need to talk, please know that I’m here.”

  I look at him. Sitting there, profiled against the blue sky, Lloyd seems a revelation to me. How have I never managed to realize what a deep person he is? Or, for that matter, how very, very handsome?

  “I was such a fool,” I say, all at once, not even aware of the words until I hear them myself.

  Lloyd’s brows pull together. “What do you mean?”

  “I’ve been doing everything but facing up to what was really bothering me.”

  Lloyd smiles, as if he’s been waiting for that little insight. “And what was that, Henry?” he asks, looking into my eyes. “What was really bothering you?”

  I laugh a little. “Now that you ask, of course, I’m not quite sure.”

  He runs a hand through my hair. It feels awesome to have him touch me. My whole body tingles. “Why did you start escorting?” he asks.

  I shrug. “Because it gave me one hell of a frigging ego boost.”

  “A boost you apparently needed.”

  “Yeah, I guess I did. And it was fun for a while. Even hot. But … then it started to change.”

  “How so?” Lloyd asks.

  “Well, in retrospect, I think the reason I really got into the escorting wasn’t so much the boost to my ego. That faded out pretty fast. What made it so—so fulfilling—was meeting these guys. Feeling a part of their lives. Connected to them, in a way. Making them happy. Seeing their secret dreams and fantasies come true. I felt like I was really giving them something.”

  “You were.” Lloyd smiles. “Yourself.”

  “Yeah.” I laugh, struck by the simplicity of it all. “I guess I was.”

  “That kind of thrill is far more lasting than any ego boost,” Lloyd explains. “So what happened to change that? Why did you stop escorting?”

  I shake my head. “Because … well, I had some bad experiences. People who hired me not for me, but for the act. Not for the fantasy, not for any kind of connection, but for the mechanics of sex. Blow jobs. Hand jobs. You know. ‘Fuck me in this position hard.’” I whistle over to Clara, who’s running off too far down the beach. She comes racing back to me. It makes me happy to watch her. “I guess escorting just started to make me feel so empty.”

  Lloyd nods. “Maybe because your clients had taught you something. Something about what you wanted yourself, in our own life. Your wanted your own fantasy fulfilled.”

  I grin over at him. “You must have made one very excellent psychologist.”

  He laughs. “I think most people can understand what this is all about, Henry. You said it yourself. It’s about connection.”

  “Connection,” I echo.

  “Javitz used to say that life is only about connection,” Lloyd says. “It’s about people loving each other, learning from each other, helping each other. That’s all.” He laughs. “There was a time when I truly thought what I wanted most in this life was to become a contemplative monk living in some ashram. But I know now I couldn’t live without the connection to other people. It’s what keeps me going.”

  “Yeah,” I agree. “I think that’s the problem for me right now. I feel disconnected. Especially from sex. I feel so disconnected from sex.”

  “I can understand.” Lloyd suddenly smiles, as if an idea occurs to him. “You know what you would enjoy, Henry? Have you ever heard of a sacred-sex workshop? There are all sorts of these things, held all over the country, where gay men get in touch with the sacred erotic. Do you know what I’m talking about?”

  I do. Brent used to make sport of such workshops, claiming they were just a bunch of horny, desperate guys who got together and called sex “sacred” because it was the only way they could actually get any. Which, I’m suddenly certain, is a crock of shit.

  “I’ve heard of them,” I tell Lloyd. “And yes, I think a sacred-sex workshop might be exactly what I need.”

  He smiles. “There’s actually a workshop being held here in Province-town on Halloween weekend. I know the organizer. I can probably get us both in. Do you want to go?”

  “Yes!” I say passionately. “Yes, I do!”

  “Well, you’re sure an easy one to convince,” Lloyd says, laughing, just as Clara comes bounding up on both of us, knocking us over backward into the sand.

  The Next Evening, Nirvana

  Lloyd

  It’s hard saying good-bye. I can see why Jeff loves Henry: he’s thoughtful, introspective, kind. I watch him walk down the front steps, turning twice to wave good-bye.

  Please, God, I pray. Don’t let him test positive.

  I close my eyes. It’s an old prayer, one uttered too many times in my life, about too many, and not one always granted. I watch Henry unlock the door to his Jeep, lifting the dog crate that contains Clara and settling it gently onto the passenger seat.

  Let him be okay, God. Please.

  It’s funny, my praying. I don’t believe in the old God, the one you pray to for things to happen—or not—or to ask favors. I believe in a God, a higher power, a collective soul of consciousness, for whom there are reasons for everything. If Henry tests positive, then there is some greater purpose it can serve, some unknown path to enlightenment. Even Javitz came to see his HIV as an ironic gift, as a means by which he could transform. But still, in this moment, the God I’m praying to is indeed my old Lutheran god, the one my father taught me about in his Sunday sermons, a God of not only compassion but retribution. A God who was both merciful and angry, for whom divine intervention remained possible. It’s to that God I find myself praying now, imploring Him to please, please not let Henry test positive.

  I shut the front door after he’s driven off. I can still smell him on my clothes. I’d kissed him as he got ready to leave: just reached over and kissed him, full on the mouth, after he’d said something that particularly touched me. It was about finding himself, his deepest truth, holding a frightened little man in a motel room one afternoon. He didn’t use those words, but that’s what he meant. His words moved me, and I’d just reached over as we sat there on the couch, and kissed him. He seemed surprised at first, but kissed me back. Afterward we laughed. It had been a lovely, spontaneous kiss.

  I’m filled with him right now: his scent, his words, the memory of our talks. If I close my eyes I can see him clearly. Henry is a revelation. I’ve always liked him but never really knew him. It’s odd, really, this feeling of connection: our worldviews, our experiences, are so different. Henry’s like so many young gay men today who’ve never lost anyone, who often don’t even know anyone who is HIV-positive. How different from just a decade ago. Who his age could have said the same thing then? Je
ff and I have lost so many, even beyond Javitz: old friends like Paul and Roger and of course Tommy, our friend from our ACT UP days. Tommy’s death had been especially hard, coming so soon after Javitz’s. There had been issues between Jeff and Tommy, but at Tommy’s memorial service Jeff had cried even harder than he had for Javitz.

  “I guess,” Henry had said just before he left, “I understand why it’s so difficult for Jeff to talk about it. It’s like coming through a war.”

  “A war where the truce is merely a mirage, a ploy of the enemy.” I knew I sounded like Javitz, but there it was, right on the front page of Bay Windows: YOUNG GAY MEN SPREADING HIV IN ALARMING NUMBERS.

  Not having known the initial devastation, lulled into complacency by the new drugs, people Henry’s age and younger are repeating all of our old mistakes. Because everyone looks so healthy, no one is forced into talking about the truth of AIDS. The fear is gone. Maybe reintroducing a little fear wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

  “Be careful,” I pleaded with Henry. “Please be careful.”

  He smiled at me. “Lloyd,” he asked, seeming to think of something, “would you be interested in coming with me to the Russian River next week?”

  I looked at him strangely.

  He laughed. “I know it’s last-minute, but I’ve been totally dreading going. See, Shane bought us tickets a long time ago and I promised—but if you came, we could balance out some of the mindless party stuff with talks like these.”

  I was dumbfounded. “Henry, are you asking me to go to a circuit party?”

  “This one’s different. I promise. It’s outside. The Russian River is beautiful—”

  “I know. I love Guerneville. I love all of Northern California. Maybe we could spend a few days in San Francisco—”

  Henry’s face lit up. “So you’ll come?”

  “If I can still get a ticket.” A trip would definitely do me good. I haven’t had a vacation since we opened Nirvana. And a week away from Eva would give us both some time off from each other.

  I climb the stairs to my room planning to call a travel agent. Maybe I’ll even take Henry up to the Harbin hot springs. Suddenly I’m excited about something for the first time in weeks. I’m glad the last of our guests have left, and none are due in for a few days. I need to stop thinking, to just turn off my brain for a while.