by Lisa Daily
It burns all the way down, but I feel like an outlaw.
6
Michael returns from the bathroom looking like he’s just delivered the pope’s girlfriend’s demon baby with his bare hands or something. He drops the wedding band, ensconced in a wad of scratchy tissues, into my hand, and takes his seat next to me. I slip it onto my ring finger on my right hand, pull my sleep mask over my eyes, and enjoy the buzz of tequila. When I get home, I’m going to boil the ring for a half an hour and throw away the pot.
From LaGuardia, we rent a car and make the two-and-a-half-hour drive from New York to ESPN’s home office in Bristol, Connecticut.
My phone starts ringing the second we got off the plane. Samantha, my other best girlfriend. She’s a high-strung lunatic who owns the most popular yoga studio in town. I never go. She’s too intense.
“Ohmygod. Darcy just told me. Are you okay?” she asks.
“I’m on my way to ESPN to save Michael’s job,” I answer. “We’re in the car.”
“So that’s a no?” she asks.
“That’s a no,” I say.
“What happened?” she asks. Weirdly, my first instinct is to tell her I’ll call her later, so we can talk in private, but instead I decide to let it rip. Because, really, why shouldn’t I?
“Breaking news: Michael is gay, he slept with a born-again basketball player named Bobby Cavale, FOX Sports thinks I’m a man, and now we’re on our way to Connecticut to lie to his bosses. Also, I dropped my wedding ring in an airplane toilet. After this, I’ll need a lobotomy and advice on how to forge Michael’s handwriting for the suicide note. Not in that order.”
Michael does a double take on that one.
“Oh yeah, and we’re getting a divorce. That’s about it,” I say. “What’s new with you?”
“Holy hell. How are you holding up?” Sam asks me. “That lying, cheating jackass. I’ll bet you want to wring his neck. I mean, I knew he was probably gay, or bi, but I never thought he’d act on it.” I looked over at Michael, who was staring tersely ahead as he drove us to Connecticut.
“Jesus, you too? What tipped you off?”
“Britney, Madonna, Gaga. Not to mention his total obsession with boy bands—One Direction, R5, After Romeo, 5 Seconds of Summer. I mean, I love Michael’s taste in music. But it’s not exactly the playlist of a straight man. More like an eleven-year-old girl.”
“Yep, that’s a big red flag.” I sigh, humiliated by my cluelessness. “Listen, I’m shocked, devastated, furious, heartbroken, trying not to think about it right now, or I’ll curl into a ball. Which I can’t do because I’m on my way to fib to Michael’s bosses about how I’m totally cool with him screwing some college player.”
“You’re a saint. He has no idea how lucky he is that you’re doing this for him.”
“True!” I say into the phone, turning to glare at Michael. “He has no idea how freaking lucky he is that I’m doing this for him.” My call waiting beeps. “Crap, Sam—my mother is on the other line.”
“See? And you thought this day couldn’t get any worse,” she says.
“Would you please do me a huge favor? “I ask. “Would you please call everybody and let them know what’s going on?”
“Sure, sweetie, call me when you get back,” she says. “Love you.”
“Thanks,” I say. “Love you too, Sam.”
I click over to the other line.
“Hello, Mother,” I say. “How have you been?” Michael shoots me a look of pity.
“Michael’s father called us this morning,” she says tersely. “Have you spoken with an attorney?” Always her first solution to any problem. Professional habit, I guess.
“No, I haven’t. I’ve only known about this for a few hours,” I say. “And some of those were on a plane.”
“Where are you going?” she asks. “Are you coming here?” Because this day isn’t bad enough already.
“No, I’m going to ESPN headquarters to try to save Michael’s job,” I say.
“I’m writing up a contractual agreement for you. Before you talk to anybody at ESPN, you need to get Michael to sign it.”
“I think you may be getting ahead of yourself, Mother. What exactly will this agreement say?” I ask. Michael shoots me a look of panic.
“It’s an agreement releasing you from paying any alimony should Michael lose his job. I’m sending you a list of attorneys, and I want you to start making calls as soon as we get off the phone.”
“Mother, I’m in the car with Michael. I’m having the worst shock of my life. It’s not exactly the best time to start calling divorce attorneys. I’m not asking him to sign anything right now.” I sigh.
“I’ll sign it,” Michael interjects.
“Don’t be an idiot,” I say to him. “You don’t even know what it says.”
“I’m emailing it to you,” she says. “Stop at a print shop before you set one foot inside the ESPN building and sign three copies of that document,” instructs my mother.
“I have to go,” I say. “I’ll think about it.”
“It may seem terrible now, but this public humiliation will be forgotten and the media will move on to something else.”
“It’s not so much the public humiliation as the private one. I’m still getting my head around the fact that Michael is gay.”
“I assumed you knew,” she says.
“What do you mean, you assumed I knew? Did you know?” I ask, aghast. What the hell? Am I the only person who didn’t know?
“Well, your father and I had our suspicions. Remember when he was in that college production of Wicked?”
“Yes,” I say.
“Well, there you are.”
I smack myself on the forehead.
“That’s it, Mom? A lot of people do theater in college.”
“Yes, but most men don’t try out for Elphaba. Also, he was always very neat. Straight men are pigs.”
“Holy stereotypes, Mother. That’s not even … I can’t even begin…”
I sigh deeply; it’s not even worth getting into with her. “Is Dad there?”
“He’s playing tennis. He sends his best. Alex, I’m just trying to protect your interests,” she says coldly. “That’s what mothers do.” That’s certainly what my mother does. Other people’s mothers probably send cookies and stay on the phone with you for hours consoling you about your rotten luck and your gay husband. Mine offers up stupid stereotypes and legally binding contracts. Sometimes, I wish I had someone else’s mother.
“Thanks,” I say. “Bye.”
“Goodbye, Alexandra.” The line goes dead.
I look at Michael and he shrugs his shoulders knowingly. He’s known my mother almost as long as I have: about twenty-five years too long.
My phone is constantly buzzing with texts, and at least a half dozen calls, most of which I ignore or send to voice mail.
Carter left a message while I was on the other line with my mother, and I call him back immediately. He’s one of our best friends, we’ve known him forever. Carter is the first openly gay person we ever met. He’s out, way out, whip-smart and hilarious, and kills at karaoke. If anybody saw this one coming, it had to be Carter.
“Did you know?” I ask. “Did you suspect, have an inkling?
“Sure, sweetie, everybody knew,” says Carter. Oh Jesus, was I blind or something?
“Oh my gawd, did you see my husband naked?” I ask, horrified. Michael, Carter, and I met our freshman year in college. If there was ever a time for sexual exploration … Not that I would know.
“I may be a slut, but I have my standards,” Carter says, “I don’t screw around with married men. Or men who happen to be in love with my best friends.”
“Aww, thanks. I believe the term you’re looking for is not slut, it’s sexually confident,” I say.
“I’m sexually confident that I don’t screw married guys,” says Carter.
I sigh. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Honestly, it n
ever occurred to me that you didn’t know. But I didn’t think he’d actually screw around on you. He’s always been deeply committed.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s just … most closeted gay men I know find some other way to fulfill their needs, they just do it anonymously—with a rent boy, or at a bathhouse or a park, or a glory hole in the airport bathroom in Minneapolis, or cruising gay bars when they’re in a different city. A guy may pretend he doesn’t want or need sex with another man, but his body and mind will betray the lie every time.”
My intestines lurch, my hands start shaking, I will myself not to vomit, or stroke out. Michael travels constantly for work, and now all I can picture is him, wearing a studded leather vest and matching chaps, cruising for dudes. Jesus, I need to get myself checked for STDs.
I shake with sobs, completely distraught. “I’m his best friend, how did I not know this about him?” Michael reaches over and grasps my hand; his eyes are fixed on the road ahead, but I can see they’re welling up with tears.
“Don’t beat yourself up, sweetie,” Carter says. “He just jammed your gaydar. We all see what we want to see when it comes to the people we love.”
By the time Carter and I hang up, I’m ready to turn my phone off and hurl it out the car window, but I need to call my grandma Leona first. There’s no way my mother hadn’t called her the second she hung up with me. Grandma Leona is the kindest, funniest, most loving relative I have who doesn’t belong to Michael.
I hit her number and she answers on the first ring.
“Hi, Grandma,” I say. “So … I’m assuming that Mother told you what’s going on with Michael and me.”
“Oh, dear,” she says soothingly. “Of course, it was bound to happen sooner or later.”
Et tu, Grandma?
7
The sky is as gray and stormy as my mind feels right now, and Michael and I haven’t spoken for most of the car ride. My brain is so juiced up with stress hormones I can’t even think straight. Apparently I’m not the only one.
“Why did you lie all those years?” I screech, like some kind of wild animal. I’m trying to be calm. I’m trying.
“Most of it wasn’t a lie,” he says.
I roll my eyes.
“Give me a freaking break. It was all a lie.”
He takes a deep breath and continues, “Okay.” Another deep breath. “You and I have been together for our entire lives. There’s no one more important to me than you. And one of the things I’ve always loved most about you is how you’ve always known exactly what you wanted to do, even when we were kids. And it was so easy to get caught up in the excitement of your ideas and your plans.”
“Our plans,” I correct him.
“Yes, our plans,” he says. “But sometimes they were just your plans, and you’d get so unbelievably excited and get out your little notebook and map everything out and we’d both get swept away in the enthusiasm of it all. You’d be so excited and I didn’t want to say anything. And please don’t get me wrong, I owe some of the best things in my life to your plans—I know I never would have had the guts to pursue my dream career on my own. I was all set to get my MBA and do my forty years at some big corporation, but you insisted that I should do the thing I loved most. You figured out the path that would get me there. You believed in me, in what I could do, even more than I dared to believe in myself. But sometimes I just went along with it all and you were so certain, or so excited about something, I just felt like I couldn’t say anything.”
This just pisses me off. “How is that my fault if you don’t tell me when you want something different? Why is it always the fault of the person who knows what they want when the passive person doesn’t say one freaking thing? Why does the person who doesn’t want to be in charge, who won’t take responsibility, always blame the person who does?”
“You know, sometimes I didn’t speak up because I didn’t have a better idea, so I thought it was better to just go along.”
“And then complain about it later,” I snap.
A dozen arguments, from tiffs to blowouts, over our years together zip through my mind. Me asking Michael if he wanted to go on vacation to Arizona. He’d said that sounded good, and then once we got there he said he really didn’t like the desert and that we never went where he wanted to go. When we found our house, he acted like he loved it as much as I did. And then a year into the renovation he tells me he never really thought it was a good idea. A million times when I’d ask him if he wanted to go to a certain movie or restaurant and he’d say “fine” or “sure.” And then afterward he’d act like at best I’d never asked him in the first place, or at worst, like I’d dragged him out of the house by his hair and forced him to eat linguini and watch a romantic comedy.
“I was afraid of losing you,” he says. “I was afraid I’d lose my job or never get promoted again. I love you, I love our life together, I love to make you happy. I wanted it all to be true, and I thought if I tried hard enough, I could somehow make it all true. What you don’t seem to understand is that I wanted the happily-ever-after with you as much as you did. More, maybe. And I was afraid, I am afraid, of losing you.”
I’m so angry I can feel my pulse pounding in my neck. My face burns. “Don’t ‘oh Alex’ me. You’re afraid of losing me? Are you insane? You ruined my whole life because you were too chickenshit to admit you’re gay before you married me!” I yell.
“I didn’t think you’d be so upset,” he says, shaking his head. “You have a lot of gay friends, we had that fundraiser for gay rights at the house last year. I don’t understand, you love gay people…”
“Please tell me you’re not that dense,” I say.
He shakes his head, and even as I’m saying it, I can see why he wouldn’t want his job to know. Michael is a basketball announcer for ESPN, and the world of sports isn’t always exactly gay-friendly. He’s the biggest sports fanatic I’ve ever known. He loves basketball and hockey and football and tennis, and pretty much anything that involves physical skill and competition. The guy knows ice-skating competition statistics. Caber tossing. Curling. Roller derby. Seriously, ESPN has been his dream job for as long as I can remember.
But I’m not ESPN. And I sure as hell shouldn’t have to sacrifice my entire life at the altar of the broadcast desk.
I’m absolutely furious. It’s not like I forced him to marry me or lie to me all these years. “Why didn’t you say anything?”
“You were so happy,” he says. “I love making you happy. I didn’t want to disappoint you. I love you. And I thought I could love you all the way.” He sighs deeply, and for a second I wonder if it’s manufactured. I can’t believe anything anymore—even his sighs ring false.
“I was afraid,” he says. “I was afraid of losing everything.”
“That’s bull. Carter is gay. My hairstylist is gay. Our accountant is a lesbian. Grandma Leona hasn’t missed Drag Queen Bingo in seven years. Our families would have accepted you, I would have accepted you, the world would have accepted you, but you were so freaking worried that the boys at ESPN might not love you that you were willing to let me spend the best years of my life living a lie while you screw around on the side.”
“That’s not what happened,” he stammers.
“That’s exactly what happened. We were supposed to be best friends, and you didn’t even care enough about me, about yourself, to be honest with me. You would rather pretend to enjoy having sex with me for the last fifteen years than admit who you are. No wonder I always had to be the one to initiate sex! It’s not like you ever did! You let me feel like I was completely undesirable! I’ve been on a diet for fifteen years because of you! You care more about yourself and protecting your stupid, fragile ego and your career than you do about me.”
Jesus, I need a cheeseburger.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, looking out the side window to avoid eye contact. Wuss. “I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I can’t apologize any more than I already have. It’s done!
I can’t go back. You’re still my best friend. I can’t change who I am,” he says defiantly. I hate that excuse. It’s already done so there’s no point in apologizing or even having a discussion about the thing you’re upset about.
“No one was asking you to change who you were. You want me to be all cool about it—well, too late for that, buddy,” I yell.
“You know what’s really shitty about all this?” I ask. “All our friends are going to rally around and support you, of course, because not one of them wants to be seen as homophobic. But what’s really shitty is that I have to support you too, or everyone is going to see me as some bitch. They probably will anyway. Everyone will hate me like I’m the next Kris Jenner or something, because I must have known, or I must have chained you up in the freaking closet. You come out, and somehow it’s my fault. You decimate my life, and yet you deserve all the love and support.”
I can barely breathe. “If you just decided after five years of marriage that you wanted to screw around with other women, nobody would be calling you brave or patting you on your stupid back. They’d call you what you are, a lying, selfish, cheating bastard. We wouldn’t even be having this conversation. And what if I were the one who came out as a lesbian? Once again, everyone would support you!” I say bitterly. “They’d say I’d emasculated you, or ruined your life, and poor you. But once again, I’d somehow be the villain and you’d be the poor little victim. You know what? Can you even think of a single word that means the female equivalent to emasculate? I’ll bet you can’t. I had to look it up on my phone because I couldn’t think of one. You know what it is? It’s defeminize, a word that hasn’t been used since 1907, when some misogynist wrote a newspaper article about the reasons why women shouldn’t be allowed to vote,” I scream. “That’s just fucking wrong!”
“Alex—”
“I’m not done,” I shriek, completely out of control. “You know what, I’m going to bring back that word, and use it every time some troll says a female comic isn’t funny because she doesn’t also look like a supermodel, or calls a woman a bitch or a dyke just because she’s powerful.”
