Back Where He Started

by Jay Quinn

  “But you have,” I said. “Oh Jesus, but you have.”

  Zack released his grasp on my shoulders, gently squeezed my upper arms, and let me go. He reached into his back pocket, took out his wallet, and pulled out a business card. Handing it to me, he said, “This is an attorney I’ve been working with. Even though we’re not legally married, we are tied up in a lot of ways we’ll need to dissolve or restructure. You’ll be cared for as long as you live. He’s expecting your call.”

  “Just like that? That’s it?” I asked incredulously.

  Zack went toward the door. “Call him tomorrow, Chris. Don’t put it off.”

  “Zack—”

  “You’ll find I’ve been as generous as I can afford to be.”

  “Zack—”

  “Just go see the attorney, for God’s sake. Don’t turn this into a soap opera any worse than it is. Jesus, Chris! You’re ripping my fucking heart out!”

  “Zack—”

  “What? What, goddamnit!”

  “Have you told the kids?”

  Zack stopped, his shoulders slumped, and he ran his hand over his face tiredly. At last, he said, “No. I’m leaving that up to you. I’m trusting you to give it to them so they don’t despise me any worse than they’re going to when they get a load of that busted lip of yours. God damn it, Chris. How did it go so far that quickly?”

  “Wait … to hell with my lip. Let me get this straight. You’re delegating responsibility for your kids’ reactions over this … this divorce, to me?”

  “Oh hell yeah. It’s up to you.”

  “God no, Zack, please! I’m just being fair. We put them into this together, shouldn’t we get out of it together for their sake?”

  “You’re better with the feelings crap. The ‘kiss it and make it better’ stuff. They’re used to all that mom shit coming from you.”

  “That’s cold. I can’t believe you, Zack.”

  Zack laughed. “Why the hell not, Chris? They’re your fucking kids. I gave them to you a long time ago. You’ll figure it out.”

  Just then, Beau came out from under the table where he’d been hiding and whined at Zack. For Zack, it was the last straw.

  “And take care of my damn dog too. I gotta get out of here.” With that, he was out the door and down the steps. Halfway to his car, Schooner pulled up in the driveway. Sternly Zack stood with one arm outstretched, simply motioning for him to back out and stay out. When Schooner was safely in the street, he got in his car and left.

  I stooped to stroke and comfort Beau. As I stood to get his leash, Schooner strode in the back door. “Jesus! Where the fuck is Dad tearing off to in such a goddamn hurry?”

  Snapping the leash to Beau’s collar, I looked up at Schooner and said, “Straight to hell, I hope.”

  “Hey! What’s wrong with your lip, it’s bleeding!”

  “Schooner, do me two favors, okay? First, set the table in the dining room. Your beloved siblings and their spouses will be here soon, and I need your help. Second, don’t ask me about my mouth, please.”

  “Can I come with you to walk Beau?”

  “No, Schooner, please. I need some fresh air.”

  “Did that bastard hit you? I’ll fucking kill him!”

  “Schooner, don’t call your dad a bastard. Just please, for God’s sake, give me a little space right now. I’m big enough to fight my own battles. Just set the table for me and open the wine.” With that, I nudged Beau out the door and followed him.

  “He did hit you, didn’t he! I’ll cut his—”

  I closed the door and cut Schooner off before he could work up a good head of steam.

  Three times around the block, I collected my thoughts and walked in the cold wind and dying Saturday light. Finally, I put my own fear aside and rehearsed how to tell my kids the news.

  After awkward greetings and a confused dinner, I told them all, carefully as I could, over tiramisu and the last of the wine. I always sopped their bad spills and skinned knees with a little sugar, but never any saccharine. I made no plays for sympathy and tried to put their father in the best light I could, considering he wasn’t there to defend himself against his own decisions and my obviously painful lip.

  Zack was right. They were my kids, and they made me proud. My in-laws—or “out-laws,” as we teasingly called ourselves when we were together—made me proud as well. Trey was concerned about my financial future—solemn, hard-thinking, realistic banker that he was. Andrea, in her second year of practice as a licensed clinical social worker, had much to say about spousal abuse and threatened to drag me kicking and screaming to the hospital, primarily to have my lip sewn up and also to encourage me to file a police report against her father. With the help of her sweet husband David, we convinced her that was a little extreme. Schooner radiated a dangerous anger that kept him quiet. When pushed, he didn’t talk; he acted. It was Schooner who slipped away to call the kids’ pediatrician, to talk him into paying a house call to take care of a “very personal matter.”

  I was abashed when Dr. Ericsson showed up with a black bag to stitch up my lip that refused to quit bleeding, but I was glad he did. My kids trusted him to keep all this to himself. God only knew what secrets they had told him over the years, but I didn’t have a clue. His practice included many upper middle-class families; most likely, he was no stranger to sewing up many dirty little secrets. Wise and patient, the good doctor was a calming influence for all the kids and me. By the time he left, they were all ready to take this sudden family drama home to sort out on their own. All but Schooner—he would not be dissuaded from staying at the house that night and not returning to his apartment in Greenville.

  In the calm that comes both before and after any kind of storm, Schooner wordlessly helped me clear away the dishes and clean up the kitchen. After I was done wiping off the counters with a wet dishrag and he was out with Beau, I sat down at the kitchen table, heavily. Dr. Ericsson had given me a shot “to ease the pain,” but I thought it was also intended to keep me calm and ensure that Schooner wouldn’t further disturb his Saturday night. Relaxed and woozy, I felt secure at home in my kitchen despite the hot flashes of anger and hurt that lingered like heat lightning flashing after a deluge.

  I dragged my copy of Reading Lolita in Tehran from where it had rested unmolested since Zack had asked me to sit before he proceeded to dismantle our lives, and tried to pick up the thread of the story to distract myself. Still, I couldn’t distract myself from the ache of a deeper kind of pain that crept around the edges of the shot’s warm fog. In a way, I’d always known this day would come. As good a fuck as I could be, as good a mom as I could play, I wasn’t a woman. If that was what Zack really needed, it didn’t have anything to do with me. I had nothing to be ashamed of and three grown kids to be pretty proud of. I decided to feel pretty good about myself just then. I talked myself into believing I didn’t have any hurts I couldn’t handle. As far as the future was concerned, if it didn’t turn out to include Zack, it might include somebody else, or it might just be me. I really didn’t care.

  Schooner and Beau returned, each of them shaking off the cold. The familiar sounds of sneakers and dog’s claws on the old wood floors made me smile—then wince from the pain of my newly stitched lip.

  “Are you okay, Mom?” Schooner asked.

  “Baby, sit down.” I said as I patted the chair at a spot next to me.

  Schooner eased himself into the chair and gave me a look of real concern.

  “You’re going to have to stop calling me Mom. If nothing else, today’s … uh, news, has reminded me I’m a man and made me see you as a man too. I appreciate you taking charge of the situation and calling Dr. Ericsson. I never would have done that myself.”

  “S’okay.” Schooner said. “No big deal. I know you would have never done it yourself, and that fucker was bleeding all during dinner. It was disgusting.”

  I reached across the small space between us and took his hand. He responded by turning my hand so he could hold
it in his instead. His grasp was warm and strong and I was grateful for it.

  He squeezed my hand and tugged at it until I looked at him and smiled. Quietly he said, “I don’t understand why you’re making me stop calling you Mom.”

  “It’s time isn’t it, Schooner? You’re grown, and I’m … I’m …”

  “You’re what?”

  “It looks as if I’m not going to be with your father anymore. I’m just going to be Chris Thayer. Single man. Single middle-aged gay man.”

  “But that has nothing to do with me and Trey and Andrea,” Schooner said. “Fuck Dad. He’s nothing but a checkbook to me. Besides the money, what did he ever do to be there for me? All my life, since I was a baby, I’d look up and it was you that was there. If you aren’t a mom, if you aren’t my mom anymore, where does that leave me?”

  I was stunned by the depth of his feelings. I had no answer for him. The fact of his father’s leaving was just beginning to register with me; I hadn’t fully grasped how it would affect the kids. I struggled to say something, but I had nothing to say.

  Schooner pulled me toward him and wrapped his arms around me awkwardly. “Chris … I know you’re a guy and everything. But to me, you’re more than that. You’re the only warm … you’re … you’re my mom, goddamn it. I don’t know how else to say that.” He gently pushed me away so he could look at my face.

  His worried scowl was both endearing and heartrending. At this point, I was grateful and proud to call him my kid, and not for one minute did I regret having spent most of my adult life raising him to this point. “It’s okay, sugar. Other than ‘my baby,’ I don’t what else to call you either. You can call me whatever you want.”

  “It’s settled then?” he asked.

  I nodded and he let me go.

  “Did I really pee on him the first time you came here?”

  “Yep, you peed on me too, not 10 minutes later.”

  Schooner snickered. “Equal opportunity pisser, huh?”

  “Schooner, you’re the best gift your father ever gave me. It was an awesome amount of trust, considering how difficult he knew it was going to be on all of us.”

  “I took a lot of beatings because of it.”

  I couldn’t look at him; I looked down at my book instead. “I figured you did. Are you ever sorry? Do you wish it had been easier for you?”

  Schooner took and squeezed my hand again, then stood up and tugged me to my feet along with him. “Nope. You’re the mom I got, Chris. I wouldn’t trade you for anybody or do anything different. I don’t blame you.”

  “Don’t blame your dad either, okay?”

  “I don’t want to talk about him anymore. I want to just watch some TV and chill. Can we sleep on the sofas in the family room, you know … a good old-timey indoor campout and watch Saturday Night Live? I’ll make popcorn!”

  “The thought of salt on this lip is enough to make me throw up, but make yourself some, okay?”

  “When I see that bast … when I see Dad, he’ll be lucky if I don’t beat the shit of him for that.”

  I smiled to let him know I appreciated his self-correction. “Schooner, your dad and I said some pretty hurtful things to each other, and I pushed him pretty hard. A busted lip is no big thing. I’m pretty sure he’s doing a good enough job of beating himself up for the whole deal. He’s not a bastard—he’s just a sad, scared middle-aged man chasing what’s left of his dreams. Give him a break.”

  Schooner shrugged and said, “You’re going way too easy on him. But, I’ll be civil if you say so. I’m only doing it for you, okay?

  “Promise?”

  “Spit-swear.” He spat into his palm and held it out.

  “I’ll pass,” I said, good-naturedly.

  “Okay,” he said cheerfully. “Why don’t you go in the family room and turn on the TV. Get comfortable. I could bring you some tiramisu—”

  “I’m pretty messed up from the shot and a really long day, baby.”

  “It’s okay, Mom. I’ll cover you up if you fall asleep, okay?”

  That’s how we left it, Schooner and I. In the days, weeks, and months that followed, Trey and Andrea showed me in their own ways that their attitudes and hearts echoed Schooner’s absolute commitment to me. When push came to shove, their Dad could push me aside in favor of a whole new life, but nothing could shove the kids from my side.

  Those were deep memories to swim up and out of. Beau was huddled at my feet, and I felt the chill of tears on my cheeks as they dried in the cold wind. Sitting in the backyard swing, I regarded my kitchen and my past. My back ached from the effort of clearing out, but I knew what I’d borne on it, and felt some satisfaction along with the ache.

  I stood and stretched—I still had Christmas ornaments and pots and pans to haul out and load into the Expedition. And I had Beau to feed.

  “Want a hamburger, boy?” I asked my tired old dog. “Want us to stop and get Beau a Hardee burger on the way home? Does my Beau-dog want a Bojangles chicken biscuit on the way home?”

  Beau struggled and stood, tail wagging happily despite his cold, aching joints. I could kick myself for getting lost in the past and causing the old dog pain. It was time to get him warm, fed, and home.

  There—I’d said it. Home, which obviously didn’t mean the house I’d shucked like a husk and left standing mostly dark and empty in front of me. It was time. This was the real end of Chris Thayer, act two. It was time to clear the hell out and head home to the beach. Hello Emerald Isle. Hello Chris Thayer, act three.

  CHAPTER TWO,

  ADVENT

  There wasn’t a stick of furniture in the beach house. My cabinets were full of pots, pans, small appliances, dishes, and flatware, but the beach house itself was empty until my new things could be delivered. My sole remaining friend from the days when I ran with the savvy salon crowd was Wade Lee Roylston. He’d moved to Norfolk and eventually became an interior designer. Thanks to him, my new life would be furnished sparely with some well-chosen but pricey contemporary pieces and a few antiques. After a couple of nights of surprisingly good sleep bundled on the living room floor, the day arrived when I was to welcome the trappings of my new life.

  I got up early, made coffee, and surveyed the beach house with fresh eyes. Until I left the house in Raleigh, I’d only been there twice before: once alone and once with Wade Lee.

  I’d come alone the first time at the urging of Trey after I’d spoken with Evan Strickland, the attorney Zack had sent me to in order to gently extract me out of his life. While all across the nation that winter the great debate over gay marriage raged, I went through the ugly process of dissolving a de facto one. Twenty-two years of making a very real marriage—despite its illegality—out of bits and pieces of dreams and obligations took only an hour to dismantle.

  Evan Strickland was solicitous when he explained that Zack had released me from the various powers of attorney that we’d signed to protect ourselves and the kids against any unforeseen calamity and subsequent legal hurdles. Without them—and explicit instructions in Zack’s will—the kids and I would have been in a legal and financial quagmire had anything happened to him. With the stroke of a pen, Zack had taken away all the meager lawful entitlements and responsibilities he’d signed over to me years before. Of course, the kids were grown, so there was no worry about their custody. But, I realized, with Zack’s dissolution of my powers of attorney, my documents were still signed over to him to act for me if I was non compos mentis.

  It took almost no thought to ask the attorney to transfer all my powers of attorney to Trey. I knew Trey would take care of me and my wishes. It was easy to transfer all my erstwhile trust in Zack to my oldest son. If I were in a coma, I trusted him to pull the plug, for instance, with some remorse. I resentfully doubted Zack would bat an eye at that point.

  Anticipating my next questions, Evan gently explained, unnecessarily, that under the present laws I had no claim against Zack for any compensation for our years together. He quickly went on to
tell me that Zack was not unfeeling. He recognized our mutual support of each other over the years and had made certain provisions for me, which I could have if I agreed to sign a legal document that guaranteed I would take no immediate or future legal action against him for any or all of his assets.

  Bitterly, I realized that by signing that document I would help Zack, who hoped to avoid a North Carolina version of the drama aging twinks had caused the estates of Liberace and Rock Hudson. Zack was scared I wouldn’t wait until he was dead, and he was worried about the headlines my legal battle would inspire: AD EXEC IN GAY DIVORCE COURT. This proved either he didn’t know me at all or Alicia had demanded it. I swallowed hard and asked what those provisions were. My surprise must have been obvious; I had no idea Zack was well-off enough to give me the settlement he did.

  The attorney told me Zack was prepared to hand over the proceeds of the sale of the Oakwood house, which was paid off. With part of the proceeds, he encouraged me to buy another, smaller place, and he’d have the rest placed in an annuity he’d set up for me. How much the annuity would amount to ultimately would depend on what sort of place I bought for myself. In addition to that, Zack had been contributing to an IRA for me for years that I had never been aware of. Of course, any further contributions to that would cease immediately. Separate from the sale of the house, he would pay off my Expedition, transfer the title to my name, and pay the car’s insurance for one year.

  I signed the “no-sue” contract with no further urging from Evan, which left the next obvious question: Where the hell was I going to go? The upkeep on the house in Oakwood was tremendous. I knew exactly what it cost; I had managed that end of the check-writing for years. Still, that house was the only home I had.

  “I see the sense of this, Evan,” I said. “But I have no idea of where to look or where to go.” He looked a bit uncomfortable for the moment, as if I had given him way more information than he needed. Then he grew thoughtful and concerned.