by Rick R. Reed
“Well, you’re certainly welcome to join us if you change your mind. Your day doesn’t sound half bad either. Surprisingly, I don’t do that often enough.”
Milt dutifully took the empty box and bottles from Dane and placed them into the bin he’d set up for recycling. When he was done, he gave Dane another hug, planting a kiss on his sandpapery cheek. “I’m so glad you’re here. I only wish Seth could have come too.”
Dane nearly squeezed the air out of him and then let go, laughing. “Ah, it’s good for us to have a little time apart. Good for couples in general.”
“Everything okay?”
Dane waved the question away. “Everything’s great. Me being away for a few will only make him miss me. And when he misses me, I know I can count on a great homecoming, if you get my drift.” He winked.
“Well, give him my love. Not that kind of love! But you know what I mean.”
“I will. This trip is also a little vetting. Next time I’ll bring him and we can stay longer—maybe at one of those clothing-optional gay resorts I read about.”
Milt shook his head. “You took a long time to come out, buddy, but when you did, you came crashing out.”
Dane had been married to a woman for many years, deep in the closet. He and his new husband, Seth, were now raising Dane’s two teenage kids together, a girl and boy, Clarissa and Joey. They were the kind of family everyone aspired to be—easy, close, always there for one another.
“I had a lot of lost time to make up for. Good thing Seth’s younger than I am.” Dane laughed. “I look forward to meeting this Billy.”
“He’ll be over in the morning.”
“Is he, uh, just a friend? Or is there something more?”
Oh, there’s something more, all right. But if ever the phrase “it’s complicated” applied to a situation, this is it. Milt was simply too tired to get into everything tonight—his being on the fence, Billy’s issues…. “Let’s just say there might be some potential. I don’t know.” Milt yawned. He contemplated asking Dane if it was too soon but held back. What difference did it make what Dane thought? This was his life, for heaven’s sakes. He shouldn’t let himself be swayed by someone else’s opinion, no matter which side Dane came down on. “The bed’s calling. I’ll get you some sheets and a pillow so you can make up the couch. Feel free to watch TV. I have a Roku, so in addition to regular TV, there’s Netflix and Hulu. The sound won’t bother me. Or Ruby. We both sleep like rocks.”
Dane turned Milt and pushed him gently toward his bedroom. “I’ll figure it out. You just go get some sleep.”
“You sure? Linens are in—”
“The hall closet. I’ll find stuff. Don’t worry.”
They hugged once more before Milt and Ruby headed into his room.
Milt plopped down on the bed after kicking off his flip-flops. Life’s certainly full of surprises. He smiled to himself. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was for old connections.
The fact that Dane was someone with whom he could talk about Corky was special. Someone who knew Corky made Milt feel even closer to him again.
Maybe I should just cancel the hike? Hang out with Dane at the pool. I can take him for Vietnamese. Milt lay down, rearranging his legs so Ruby could get comfortable against him. Now, now, that’s not progressive thinking. And maybe Dane’s making his own way tomorrow because he wants to allow you the freedom to be alone with Billy.
But how could Dane know Milt wanted—needed—to be alone with Billy? That tomorrow marked the beginning, maybe, of something.
Milt turned over, punching the pillow under his head to make it conform. He heard the TV click on in the other room and fell asleep to the opening theme of the old Bea Arthur sitcom, Maude. His last thought before drifting off to sleep was that one could find anything on TV these days. It was all there.
WHEN MILT awakened the next morning, Ruby already waited by the door, anxious. Her body was tense, and she stared at him with a kind of pleading in her brown eyes. He glanced at the clock and saw it was already six. He was usually up earlier, five at the latest, to take her outside. The poor thing’s bladder was probably ready to burst. Bless her heart, though, for having mastered how to hold it.
Milt hopped from the bed and took her out. He passed Dane, snoring on the couch, as they slipped out the door. The morning air was chilly, and Milt brought up the weather on his phone. Fifty-three degrees.
He looked over at Billy’s trailer, but it was all dark. And he realized he couldn’t wait to see him.
Ruby finished up and trotted over to him, sat, and looked up. She might as well have spoken. “Daddy, feed me.”
They went inside. Dane was still snoring softly on the couch, one leg on the floor, blankets and sheet in a heap next to him. He made the couch look like a tiny love seat. Milt thought maybe he should give him his bed. It would be a good-host thing to do.
But for now all that was necessary was this: lifting the bedding from the floor and gently covering Dane with it. He snorted in thanks and turned, facing the back of the couch. Milt envied him his easy slumber.
He got Ruby her breakfast, tiptoeing around the kitchen, trying to make as little noise as possible.
He returned to the bedroom and plopped down on the bed. The memory of his dream came to him all at once, not in scattered images, unconnected, but whole. He was surprised he hadn’t recalled it upon waking. It was as though sitting on the bed caused it to rise up in memory.
CORKY SITS on the bank of the Ohio River, back turned to him. The sky is overcast, a mix of pale gray and white, with an opening in the clouds here and there that allows the blue to come through, like a promise. With the passage of the clouds, the water’s surface goes alternately muddy, then sparkling, then back to dullness again.
Milt watches him for a moment, seeing only the back of Corky’s head as he stares out at the sluggish brown/green water and the island far off on the horizon that splits the flow. Corky wears an old fishing cap that Milt had once dared to try to throw away. It was ragged, worn to a color that nearly defied description, and tattered around the edges. But Corky loved it, Milt supposed, because it reminded him of his youth and fishing for bluegill from these very shores with his father, now long departed.
He can’t see Corky’s face, and there’s a curious silence to everything. Shouldn’t there be birds singing? Insects humming? The relentless lap of the water at the pebbled shoreline? There’s nothing. It’s as though Milt has gone deaf.
Milt takes a few steps toward Corky, a smile flickering on his lips as he anticipates surprising him. Even in a dream, he wonders if this is a figment of his subconscious or if Corky is paying him a visit.
“Sweetie?” he tries to say, but even though he opens his mouth, no sound emerges. His hands flutter uselessly before him.
He plods across the beach, stepping over a piece of driftwood that reminds him of palm tree bark, and ends up just in front of Corky, ostensibly blocking his view of the water and the island.
But here’s the horror. It sends a jolt of electricity through Milt.
When he steps in front of Corky, he doesn’t see his face, but only the back of his head. Again. He moves around to the other side and is once again confronted with the back of Corky.
He circles around him, feeling a fluttering terror in his gut. No matter from which angle he stands, Corky remains resolutely facing away.
MILT SHOOK his head, feeling a little of the shock and fear the dream had inspired.
What does it mean? he wondered. And a voice, familiar, yet unlike his own, answered him back. “You know what it means. You just don’t understand it yet.”
Disturbed, Milt rose from the bed. He’d heard the toilet flush. Dane was up. To take his mind off things, he’d make them both a big breakfast.
As he left the bedroom, he glanced behind himself, almost expecting to see Corky sitting on the bed, facing away.
But the room was empty.
Dane was just coming out of the bathroom. He eyed Milt. “You�
�ve firmed up a bit. You look good.”
Heat rose to Milt’s cheeks. He realized he was standing there in only his pajama bottoms. He was used to not caring about what he did or didn’t wear around the trailer. After all, there was usually no one to see him, save for Ruby. “Thanks.”
“You working out?”
“Lots of hiking.”
“Well, it looks great on you.”
“Ah….” Milt waved the remark away. He noted that Dane was clad only in a T-shirt and boxers, and if anything, his friend had actually put on a few pounds. But when you had a big frame like Dane’s, it was very forgiving. He still looked good.
Milt debated whether to go in and put a little more on, but why? They were old friends. They were like brothers. It didn’t matter.
“What do you want for breakfast?”
“Oh, you don’t have to go to any trouble. I usually just have toast and coffee.”
“Please. I’m thrilled you’re here. Let me spoil you a little.”
“Well, if I remember right, you did make some awesome scrambled eggs.”
“I still do. My secret is low and slow.” He grinned. “It’ll take a while. If you want to grab a shower while I get things started, go ahead. You need time-lapse photography to see my eggs go from liquid to curds, but that’s just what makes them so creamy.”
“Okay. Done. I know you don’t want me spying on your secret technique.”
“Right. That’s it. Get out of here.”
Milt watched him walk away. When he heard the water running, he pulled eggs and half-and-half out of the fridge, along with a block of sharp cheddar and some green onions. Company eggs this morning. He’d make a whole dozen, in case Billy showed up with an appetite.
Just as he was cracking eggs into the pale blue bowl he’d had forever, Dane slipped back into the room. He spun Milt around and engulfed him in a big bear hug. “God, man, I sure have missed you. I keep imagining you’ll give up on this California dream and come home to us.” He squeezed him tighter, and Milt realized maybe Dane was crying, just a little bit. “But now that I see how beautiful it is here and the potential you have for a new life, well….” He let the phrase trail off as he pulled back to hold Milt at arm’s length, to look him in the eye. “Well, brother, I’m happy for you.”
Milt wasn’t sure what to say. He wondered internally Do I have a new life? Is there really potential? He smiled at his friend because he realized, quite suddenly, that he did and there was. “Yeah, I moved to paradise. But that doesn’t mean I miss you any less. Nor does it mean,” Milt hastened to add, “that I forgot about Corky.”
Dane drew him close again, practically squeezing the life out of him, but it was wonderful anyway. In Milt’s ear Dane said, “No one thinks that. We’ll always know how much you loved Corky. We all did. Moving on, loving again? Sorry, man, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t love Corky. Do you really think he’d want you to throw away your life just because he’s gone?”
And Milt squeezed him back, knowing that Dane had said exactly the right words. True words.
Chapter 16
BILLY STOOD outside Cinq, one of the trendy restaurants lining Palm Canyon Drive in Palm Springs’ downtown. He’d been debating whether he should go inside or not for the last fifteen minutes.
Why debate? Because, for one, he knew he was standing Milt up. He pictured him looking out his window, waiting for Billy to come up the walkway. Checking the time. Again. Wondering why his friend had not shown up.
And then he’d see him in the arms of that guy and get furious all over again, even though he knew he had no right. But jealousy, as Billy had learned again and again over the course of his relatively short life, was not reasonable. One could never “talk through” jealousy. That green-eyed emotion always had its own agenda and was as stubborn as all get-out.
The other reason for his internal debate—and standing out here on the sidewalk like some derelict—was he knew what was inside. Temptation. Ruination. Turning away from his higher power.
Vodka.
Once upon a time, Billy had loved nothing more than a good Bloody Mary. He’d been something of an aficionado, before he’d gotten to the point where drinking became all about the quickness and ease of administration over minor details like taste. But back before drinking became a problem (and if he was being honest, he knew deep down that drinking was always a problem), he’d reveled in concocting the perfect one—rich with a good tomato juice (Spicy V8 was his favorite) and amped up with fresh horseradish, Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco, celery salt, and lots of fresh-ground black pepper on the rim. A celery stick and maybe an olive or a pickled vegetable rounded things out—perfection.
Billy knew, anecdotally, that Cinq, a Palm Springs institution with its hip midcentury modern décor in orange and silver, served the best Bloody in town.
And Billy had gotten the idea in his head to drown his sorrows and jealousy in just one perfect Bloody Mary.
The reason he didn’t go inside, sit himself down, and order what he was certain would be delicious and horribly overpriced, was one of the AA slogans he’d learned in recovery, one he’d committed to memory.
One is too many, a thousand is never enough.
In his heart of hearts, he knew himself well enough to know he wouldn’t, couldn’t, stop at one. Or two, or even three. No, he’d keep going until he became ugly, angry, maudlin, and was asked, politely—at least at first—to leave the premises.
He’d seen this particular movie so many times, he knew its plot and ending by heart.
Billy sighed and walked down the street a bit. He fished his phone out of his hip pocket. He had a sponsor here in town, a woman named Eliza, who was great, strict, and loving all at once, with years of her own drunken binges to make her both compassionate and forgiving. And no-bullshit. She knew all the lies. All the deception. All the rationalization.
And she tolerated none of it.
But this morning called for someone else—his old sponsor, Jon, back in Chicago.
Jon picked up on the first ring. “What’s going on?” No hello. No long time no hear. No easy pleasantries. That was his Jon McGregor, always direct. Always to the point. It’s what Billy both loved and hated about him.
And Billy knew no how do you dos were needed here, even though it had been over two years since he’d spoken to Jon. “Thinkin’ about having a Bloody Mary this fine Southern California morning.”
“Hang on.”
Billy heard him lighting a cigarette, the friction of the lighter, the snap of it closing—the long exhalation after. He could almost smell the smoke. It made him long for one. Hey! There’s a gas station just a couple blocks north. You can grab a pack there. Smoke a couple and then throw the pack away. Nobody has to know. Billy let the thought ricochet around a bit, a silly grin pulling up the corners of his lips. And then he thought Shut up! He’d given up the smokes along with the drinking a long time ago, but sometimes a craving could hit him with the same intensity as though he’d just quit yesterday. Now was one of those times. The addict in him never really left.
He knew cigarettes were a trigger, a big one. Lighting up was almost always followed by pouring alcohol down his throat. His was not to question why, only to avoid it.
On another exhale, Jon asked, “You are?”
“Yeah.” Billy could already feel the urge, so fierce only a second ago, begin to evaporate like a cloud of smoke. Amazing what simply reaching out could do.
“Why?”
And Billy told him the truth—how he’d fallen for Milt, their uneasy dance of attraction and friendship, the hot guy in Milt’s arms this morning.
“And you think pouring some vodka and tomato juice down your gullet will solve your problem? Make that jealousy disappear just like that?” Jon snapped his fingers.
“For the time being.” Billy’s answer, he thought, was honest.
“Uh-huh.” Jon drew in on his cigarette, blew out smoke, and Billy wondered if he was actually trying t
o drive him crazy. If he was, he was succeeding. Jon said, “Maybe it will. For a bit. Vodka can blot out a lot. But hey, gotta ask you, brother—you think those problems will still be there after you get one, two, three, or more bloodies in you?”
Billy watched a couple of guys in a vintage teal Corvette convertible cruise by, sunglasses in place, top down even though it was too cold for it. He knew the answer, knew he didn’t even need to say it.
Instead he said, “No matter what,” another AA slogan. “Don’t drink—no matter what.”
“Right.”
“Right.” Billy laughed, started adding more distance between himself and the restaurant. “Why do you have to spoil all my fun, Jon?”
“Because I can.” Jon’s chuckle was deep, throaty, and it ended in a cough.
Billy knew better than to suggest he quit smoking. AA was rife with smokers; it seemed to be the one addiction most of them couldn’t give up. If Billy thought for a minute he could still smoke and not drink, he’d do it. Lungs and singing voice be damned.
“And because you know I want you to,” Billy confessed.
“That too. So, other than this current crisis, how you doin’?”
WHEN BILLY got home, he felt relieved. Relieved he didn’t drink. Didn’t smoke. Didn’t throw away years of sobriety with one swallow. Man, what a brain-dead move that would have been. He actually got down on his knees in a shaft of sunlight next to his bed to thank his higher power, who he believed showed up in the form of Jon, for saving him once again. One thing he knew, even if he didn’t quite understand who or what his higher power was—it was always there for him; he only needed to accept its help.
That knowledge was a saving grace of Billy’s life.
Yet he still didn’t feel better about Milt. He stood and glanced out his window and was ticked that the guy was still there, sitting on the patio, drinking a goddamn beer. He was big. Good-looking too, the kind of beefy man that once upon a time had graced movies and magazines Billy had seen from Colt Studio. In a second of low self-esteem, Billy thought there was no competing with the hunk across the way, sitting there with his shirt off.
