And This Too Shall Pass

by E. Lynn Harris

  “How did he die?” Sean asked.

  “If you ask my father, or anyone else close to my family except my grandmother, they will tell you Zachary died of cancer. And in some ways that’s true. He did have some type of cancer along with several other diseases. But the truth is my brother died of AIDS,” Zurich said.

  “So you’re an identical twin. It must have been difficult losing him so young,” Sean said. He was trying to balance his reporter’s instinct to ask all the right questions with his personal feelings for Zurich, who he felt was in a lot of pain answering those same questions. He suddenly regretted bringing it up. What purpose did it serve, Sean thought, but then, he wanted to know.

  Zurich had ignored Sean’s comment and just started talking, dreamlike, as if he were in a trance.

  “When we were around sixteen, Zach lost interest in sports and started taking dance. My father went crazy and made him stop. But Zach … that Zach, he didn’t stop. He would sneak and take classes down at the local YMCA in Temple Terrace, which was right outside of Tampa. I was playing football there, and Zach had my dad thinking he was playing football, too. I was the only one who knew. Well, not exactly. MamaCee knew. She would send Zach the money to pay for classes and the things he needed. You know, shoes and tights. At first, I didn’t understand his love for dance. I was mad at him, too, ’cause I thought only sissies took dance. I tried to talk him out of it all the time, especially when my older brothers started teasing him. Sometimes they would tease me, too, saying Zach and I were exactly alike and sooner or later I’d be taking dance lessons, too. But Zach didn’t let that stop him, despite my pleas. He would say all the time, ‘You, my brother, will be playing for the Green Bay Packers.’ Then he would stop and say, ‘No, you can play for the New York Jets, so we can be close together, since I’ll be dancing with the New York City Ballet. That way we can always be together. Zach and Zuri,’ he would say.”

  Zurich took a sip of his now-cold coffee and just stared out the window. His face looked peaceful.

  “All of my life it has been we, never me. Long before my mother or father held me, I’m sure Zach and I held each other as we wrestled in my mother’s womb, long before we played football, or learned about things like love … hate. Before we knew about life … AIDS … pain and grief.” His voice was soft and hesitant, as if he were choking out the words, but then it became stronger. “Even though we were different in many ways I always felt safe with Zachary. When he died, I think I went into shock, and I don’t think I’ve ever come out,” Zurich said, his voice thick with emotion. “He kept all the pain he was suffering to himself. Didn’t tell me he had AIDS until MamaCee convinced him he should tell me. I think she knew something was wrong before Zach knew, kept saying something about her legs. I was living in Canada at the time, but the moment he called me I was on a plane to New York, but … but …” Zurich paused. “It was just too late … too late. I wondered why he didn’t tell me the moment he found out. My father and MamaCee didn’t handle it well. I mean, I know they loved Zachary as much as I did, at least I think they did. They loved him as much as they were able to. MamaCee had this prayer cloth she was depending on and all these homemade remedies that Zach never bothered to take. He didn’t want to hurt MamaCee’s feelings. They didn’t come to New York to see him and then when he died, they didn’t want to follow his wishes to be cremated and have his ashes spread over the field behind MamaCee’s house. I became so angry at them, my father tried to explain, but I made them follow his wishes. They were not going to ignore what Zachary wanted,” Zurich said. Sean now realized why Zurich didn’t want to talk about his family when they first met. He was beginning to feel that maybe his own family wasn’t that screwed up. After all, he was confident that if he ever got sick, both his parents, his brother, and Anja would be at his side.

  “I still sometimes don’t know if I can make something of this football career without my brother. Sometimes I wonder if playing football even matters. I mean I can throw a ball, I can run fast, but I can’t cure cancer. I can’t stop AIDS,” he said.

  “But look how well you’re doing with your career,” Sean said. “Don’t you think Zach would be proud of you?” he asked as he tried to comfort Zurich’s fears.

  “He was always proud of me and me of him. We always supported each other even when no one else understood. I mean his death was so unfair. Things were starting to happen for both of us. NFL scouts were starting to pay attention to how well I was playing in Canada; Zach had been promoted to the main company at Alvin Ailey and was even doing some dancing in shows and videos. He was talking about going to school, you know college, so that he could teach dance one day maybe on a college level. And then just out of the blue … bam … bam,” Zurich said as he slammed his palm down on the Formica table. He was silent for a few moments and then he looked at Sean. “Do you know what was the hardest part of losing my brother?”

  “No, Zurich. Tell me.” The waiter came over and poured water in their glasses and asked if they needed anything else and Sean mouthed, “No.” And Zurich began talking again:

  “Zach was living up here in New York,” Zurich said as he looked out the window of the restaurant again. “Close to this place,” he said. “I think he lived near here. A couple of days before he died, I was sitting beside his bed, rubbing his body with ice, because he was sweating a lot. He asked me to shave his head, so that he could look like me. You know it’s funny ’cause Zach shaved his head first when he moved to New York. It was like he didn’t want to be a twin anymore. But we were twins, so I shaved my head right away but only told MamaCee. And I think he was happy when I did tell him, ’cause, you know, we looked like each other again, although toward the end he didn’t look like me anymore. He weighed less than a hundred pounds and there were sores all over his body. The only way I really knew it was my brother was when I looked in his eyes. The eyes were still the same. I shaved his head anyway, very slowly ’cause I didn’t want to hurt him, and when I finished, we looked in the mirror and said something corny like ‘twins till the end.’ And then he looked at me with tears in his eyes and he said, ‘Make me well, Zurich. Make me well.’ ”

  “What did you say?”

  “I told him how I wished that I could, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t make him well. And he said ‘Yes, you can, Zuri. You can do anything. Make me well.’ But all I could do was hold him. I wanted to say, ‘Tell me who did this to you, Zach. Tell me who did this to you.’ But I didn’t. I just held him.”

  “Zurich, you realize no one was to blame. Not Zachary, not you,” Sean said.

  “Yeah, I’ve learned a lot about AIDS since then, I know,” Zurich said sadly. After a few moments of silence Zurich said, “Two forty-three A.M.”

  “Two forty-three A.M.? What’s that, Zurich?”

  “It’s the time Zachary died,” he said in melancholy tone.

  Sean wanted to grab Zurich and hold him or just touch his hands in support, but he didn’t. He knew some men were bothered by affection, no matter how it was offered. He wanted to ask how Zachary contracted AIDS. Was he gay? And if his identical twin was gay, was Zurich also? But he didn’t. This was not the place or time, he thought. He simply motioned the waiter to leave them alone when he saw him heading toward the table. He felt Zurich needed to savor the silence, and so did he.

  After leaving the coffee shop, Zurich and Sean stood outside on Forty-fourth between Broadway and Eighth Avenue, preparing to say good-bye. While dusk took over the city, Zurich looked at Sean and asked, “Will you go somewhere with me? It should only take about thirty minutes.”

  “Sure,” Sean replied quickly. He did not want the day to end. Sean thought Zurich was one of most sensitive men he had ever met. He had gotten the answers to the questions he had, but they only gave way to more questions, and feelings for Zurich that Sean himself didn’t understand.

  “I want to go where my brother lived. I think it’s close by.”

  “Do you know the address?”
r />   “Yes. It was 300 West Fifty-fifth. I think it’s near Columbus Circle,” Zurich said.

  “Yes, it is,” Sean said as he turned and pointed toward Eighth Avenue. As the two of them started walking, Sean turned the conversation again toward Zurich’s problem in Chicago.

  “Are you worried about what this lady said you did to her?”

  “No, not really,” Zurich said confidently.

  “Why do you think she’s doing this?”

  “You know, Sean, I really don’t know. But I’m not afraid. I know what will happen will happen. MamaCee used to always tell me where there is fear … faith cannot exist. And the one thing I’m confident of is my faith,” Zurich said. Sean simply nodded.

  “What about you, Sean, have you found a good church here in New York?” Zurich asked.

  “No,” Sean said quickly.

  “You do believe in God, don’t you?”

  “Of course, I’m just hiding from Him right now,” Sean said.

  “What? Hiding? I don’t understand,” Zurich said.

  “It’s too long a story. Maybe one day I’ll tell you what I mean by that. I think we’ve opened up enough today. Don’t you?” He hoped Zurich wouldn’t pursue this topic. He was afraid talking about religion would spoil his otherwise perfect day.

  “Yeah, maybe you’re right. But I’m not going to let you off the hook. You can’t run from God,” Zurich said firmly. Sean liked the way Zurich seemed concerned about his soul.

  The evening sun was going down, casting long shadows on the streets as they walked in silence. When they came up on Fifty-fourth and Eighth, Sean and Zurich waited for the light to change.

  Sean looked at Zurich, whose face suddenly seemed somber as he gazed at a yellow brick high-rise across the street and said, “That’s it. That’s the building.”

  When the light flashed Walk Zurich and Sean crossed the street to the building where Zachary had taken his last steps.

  Monday afternoon a rainstorm surprised Hyde Park, but by evening the rain had ended and the sky blossomed with a quiet pink color. The dark clouds hovering over the neighborhood had cleared to allow a pale evening light, while Tamela and her mother enjoyed wine coolers on the terrace of her parents’ home.

  “So this new man, you like?” Blanche asked.

  Tamela smiled briefly. “Yeah, Mama, I think I like.”

  “So who are his people?”

  “He’s from down South, a place called Pine Bluff, Arkansas,” Tamela said.

  “Oh, Pine Bluff. They used to have a black college down there. AM&N they called it. We used to play them in football when your father and I went to Southern,” Blanche said.

  “Caliph said something about there being a black college down there, but he called it UAPB.”

  “That’s AM&N. They had a good teaching program,” Blanche said. Tamela didn’t respond to her mother’s last statement but just continued to gaze out on the neighborhood where she grew up.

  “Now tell your mama what’s the problem,” Blanche said.

  “Now who said I had a problem?” Tamela asked.

  “Darling, you know I love seeing you, but when you call me at work on a Monday and say you’ve got something you need to talk to me about and ask if your daddy has any wine coolers in the box, then something is wrong. Besides, I can see it on your face,” she said.

  Tamela took a sip of her wine cooler and took off her watch and laid it on the patio table. She took a deep breath and knew it was time to share a secret she had held for years.

  “Well, you know I’m working on this new case. You know the one with this football player, right?”

  “Yes. I’m glad to see that firm of yours has finally realized what they have in you. Is that your problem?” Blanche wondered aloud.

  “Sorta. You see, Mama, I’m wondering if I should really be handling this case, especially if it goes to trial,” Tamela said.

  “Why, darling? Isn’t this what you’ve been waiting on? A high-profile case that will help you when you break out on your own?”

  “Yes, I know. But without going into a lot of details, my client is a suspect in a rape and beating. A horrible rape and beating. I saw some pictures this morning of the victim and it made me sick,” Tamela said.

  “Do you think he did it?”

  “That I don’t know. He’s somewhat of a mystery. I mean he seems like a nice guy, but some of the evidence the police have collected makes me wonder. Now I know as a defense attorney I am under an obligation to defend my clients to the best of my ability. That I must put my personal feelings aside,” Tamela said.

  “Have you talked to your police friend about this?”

  “No.”

  “But something else is bothering you, right?” Blanche asked softly and touched her daughter’s hand. Her dark eyes were full of concern, as she prepared herself to handle whatever Tamela was about to reveal. It couldn’t be that bad, she thought. Her daughter shared almost everything with her. Even things she didn’t want to talk about, like romance.

  “It’s strange how the past somehow shows up in the present,” Tamela said as she looked out at the city.

  “What are you talking about, baby? You know you can tell me anything,” Blanche said. Tamela was silent for a few moments and then she turned to look at her mother, whose smooth brown face was unmarked by the passage of time.

  “I know that, Mama,” Tamela said as she took another deep breath and started to speak. “You remember Jason? The guy I dated while I was at Southern,” Tamela asked gingerly.

  “Yeah, baby. I remember him. He really hurt you,” Blanche said as she remembered the muscular, light-skinned boy her daughter had fallen in love with during her freshman year. She had brought him home and insisted they were not sleeping together even though Blanche knew the glow on her daughter’s face was not from her studies. She also remembered how depressed her daughter had been when she and Jason broke up, after her first year of law school. But both parents thought Tamela handled the breakup without much emotion. She simply put all her energies into law school.

  “Yeah, he did. Well, one night during my senior year, I was over at Jason’s apartment, studying,” Tamela said. She looked at her mother to see if she was going to ask how late it was or had she spent the night, but she didn’t say a word. “Anyhow, late that night I heard all this screaming and loud noise coming from his housemate’s room. That wasn’t so strange since they were always partying, especially after football games when they won or after greek step shows. They were a pretty wild bunch,” Tamela said as she paused and took another sip of her drink. “But this night I could have sworn that I heard several male voices and this one woman’s voice. She was crying and yelling, ‘Stop … stop … stop it.’ I woke Jason up and told him what I heard and he basically told me to mind my business and go back to sleep.” Tamela looked at her mother to gauge her reaction but it remained the same, sort of passive, yet openly concerned. She started talking again: “I couldn’t go back to sleep ’cause they were making all this racket, so I got up and pretended like I was going to the bathroom, which was in the middle of the apartment, separating Jason and his housemate’s bedroom. When I walked out, I saw about four guys, all naked, standing in line, drinking beer, and shouting, ‘Hurry up, man, hurry up before we have to take that bitch back to the dorm.’ I could hear this female voice just saying, ‘Stop, please stop,’ and when all of those guys went back into the room, the door opened wide and for a second, I saw this girl’s face,” Tamela said as she paused. “Mama, she looked scared to death and for a brief minute our eyes met. But then one of the big guys in the room pushed her down when he saw me and told one of his friends to shut the door. I couldn’t sleep that night and the cries and the noise stopped about an hour later. I heard them leave early that morning. When I mentioned what I saw to Jason, what I heard, he again told me to mind my own business, that the young lady was probably some local whore who liked to get with football players. So that’s what I did, I just ass
umed that she knew what she was doing,” Tamela said. She took her hands to her lips and was quiet for a few moments, just looking straight ahead, when her mother touched her arm and said, “Then what? What happened?”

  “About a week later, there was a report on television and talk all over campus about this young girl, who I had met once when she came to one of our rush parties, who had been raped and beaten by several football players. She was a real pretty girl, light-skinned with long black hair. We started to pledge her, but some of the sisters from her hometown said she was real fast and would be trouble when it came to boyfriends, so we passed on her, but she pledged another sorority,” Tamela said.

  “Were the boys ever arrested?” Blanche asked.

  “No, Mama, they weren’t. I heard there wasn’t enough evidence. The guys all said that she agreed to have sex with them and nothing happened to them. A couple of days later I heard at a sorority meeting that the young lady withdrew from school and I never heard what happened after that. And nobody seemed to care. I heard people on campus talking about it, saying the bitch deserved it for going over to some guy’s apartment that late at night … that she probably enjoyed it. But, Mama, I never said anything to anybody but Jason and after a while, even he wouldn’t listen to me. I kept telling him we should go to the police and tell them what happened, but he said if I did that I would be going alone and that he would never, ever speak to me again,” Tamela said as tears began to fill her eyes. “He said he would say I was lying … that nobody was going to tell on his boys.”