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The Miles

Page 17

by Robert Lennon


  “I see you’ve found your bevy of beauties, Gary. You must feel so much safer now!” The voice came from behind Liam. It was Richard Pollack, one of the founders of the club.

  “Let’s just move on, Rick,” Gary said in a defeated tone. “These guys represent the future of our club and of our race. Don’t blame them for any hard feelings you might have about the past—or the future.”

  “You guys don’t even know the history of this club.” Rick looked squarely at Liam as he spoke. “What we were founded on and fought through. This here tonight is a goddamn dance party. Our cause isn’t about bidding on some Italian jackets.”

  “A member donated those articles of clothing, Rick.” Gary’s eyes looked bloodshot, but he seemed determined to make his point. “The money that members spend tonight goes directly to the race—to your race. This isn’t 1983. This shit costs money, and we have to move with the times or else we get swept away by them.”

  “And so the ends don’t justify the means, Prince Gary. This race was ours and now it isn’t. Someone told me that 3,000 people signed up for the Pride Run this year because of some corporate promotional raffle that you dreamed up. Now people only care about getting extra points on their AmEx cards or some such.”

  “I can’t argue about this any longer. I paid my $50 to enjoy this party, and from here on in that’s exactly what I’m going to do!”

  “Don’t let him walk all over you, G.” Zane angled his shoulder between Gary and Rick. “We’re more respected than ever in the athletic community and that’s because of you. What more could the founders of the club want? That is what this club is all about.”

  “I’ll have you know I meet with Stephanie Reeves Bam-mer twice per year to discuss what this club is all about,” Rick retorted.

  “That fat lesbian who promotes all the cyclist events?” Zane asked, looking around for others to corroborate his disbelief.

  “The author of The Fast Track. It’s only the book that gave our club its name. Thanks for helping me prove my point.” Rick smirked at Gary. “All sizzle and no steak. That’s the usual for Gary’s acolytes. It’s good to know some things don’t change.”

  Gary walked away and headed to the little bar that was erected by the elevator. Rick followed suit, heading out of the apartment with three other older gentlemen who had been watching the melee at near distance, wearing scowls on their faces. Liam’s head swirled from all the action; he had, after all, arrived just a half hour ago.

  “So, I’ve waited long enough, Sir Sex-a-Lot. Give me the dish on Didier,” Zane demanded. “I promise not to judge you.”

  “Judge him for what?” Ben swooped into the conversation like a crow that spotted something shiny. “I would say there is no judgment in a place where they’re hawking cosmopolitans like it’s still the year 2000. But at least the bartender is hot.”

  Liam turned to take notice of the broad-backed man serving drinks just ten feet from where he stood and realized he was thirsty for a drink. As he approached the bar to order a drink, Liam battled aphasia, mumbling for a moment before the meaty bartender.

  “To drink,” the man said in the accent of some newly liberated Eastern Bloc country. “Sir, I am asking you what you want to drink.”

  After managing to stutter the words “Seven and Seven,” Liam watched the exquisite and fine muscles of the bartender’s back rise and fall, pop and fade, bulge and recede as he fixed the drink. At about six-foot, four-inches tall and 220 pounds, the man managed somehow to appear statuesque and not oafish. His body had been issued by good genes and a blue collar living; he did not have the trim waist and volcanic veins sported by the twinks working out in David Barton gyms across Chelsea. As he turned to face Liam again, the bartender topped off the glass with some Seagram’s and slid the drink along the countertop without saying a word. Liam noticed the thick bridge of the man’s nose and the fat curve of his lips and felt himself instantly turn rock hard. He wondered how all men could be classified within the same species when the genetic pool churned out people of such unfairly different type and proportion.

  As he walked dreamily away from the bar sipping the bittersweet mix of whiskey and ginger ale, Liam again felt Zane’s insistent tug. This time Zane demanded to hear the details of what happened with Didier immediately. Liam dreaded that now there had been too much lead-up to the story. And he still felt that things were too new and too uncertain with Didier to have recent events served up as club gossip.

  Liam flashed back to that first night in the cab and the sensation of Didier’s tongue coming impossibly close while never touching the nape of Liam’s neck. Liam had initially decided not to have sex with Didier when he felt the cold tremble of Didier in his arms, near tears saying that he could never tell his wife about their encounter on the evening of the fund-raiser. On that night, Didier had shown himself to have boyfriend potential, waiting like a saint for Liam during his work snafu.

  Since then they had several real dates. This afternoon they had strolled through the West Village and were lingering by a construction site on Jane Street when Liam reached over and ran his hands through Didier’s thick black curls. After kissing on the sidewalk for a minute, Liam led Didier around the edge of the foundation of a new apartment building and settled in behind some rafters. Liam dropped to his knees and unbuckled Didier’s thick cowboy-style belt and unbuttoned the fly on his indigo blue jeans. Didier mumbled some words of protest as his cock stiffened inside Liam’s mouth. Almost instantly, Didier pressed past his fears and dug into Liam’s body desperately, and Liam could not stop. He loved sex too much. It sounded strange to say, he knew, being that everyone enjoyed having sex, but Liam had a wide-eyed wonder about how someone new might feel, sound, and look, where their hairlines were, how their hands might grope and grasp and grab.

  “So start at the beginning and talk fast, already.” Zane had walked Liam into Ferdinand’s bedroom and plunked himself down on the king-sized mattress when all of a sudden a shriek rose from inside the closet.

  “Someone call an ambulance!” screamed Ferdinand as he pulled Riser through the closet door. Ferdinand leaned over Riser’s limp, alabaster body and stuck a small mirror under his chin. A look of relief registered on Ferdinand’s panicked face as fog spread across the bottom of the glass.

  “One glass of Chardonnay would throw this 110-pound kid into a coma, Ferd. What were you thinking? … Now, Riser will be just fine, but we need to be smart about dealing with him from here on out,” Zane said. “He is on a diet of no carbs, no meat, no dairy, no eggs. You can’t go from snacking on raw okra to knocking back alcohol.”

  “I know, I know, I know. Shit! He could die, Zane. He could die in my apartment. That would be awful and messy and really, really bad karma!”

  “I think we need to move for just one second away from what this is doing to your fine leopard skin rugs or porcelain toilet bowls,” Zane continued. “Our response right now will define us as his friends … As a club … Mark my words.”

  Liam decided that Zane had been able to focus on what was important when the chips were down—despite any leftover irritation he had over not hearing the whole story about the hookup with Didier.

  Matthew flew into the bedroom with a cold cloth in one hand and a lit cigarette in the other.

  “This always works,” he said. “The cold rouses him enough to open his mouth and take a nice drag. The nicotine handles the rest.”

  Sure enough, within sixty seconds Riser was sitting on the mattress rubbing his hollow raccoon eyes with his long, bony fingers. As he sucked on the cigarette, Riser’s cheeks looked as though they might be swallowed into his frail body.

  “You need help,” Ferdinand said, flatly. “You scared the life out of me. You can drain every drop of vitality from yourself, but you sure as hell ain’t taking me with you.”

  Matthew wrapped his arm around Riser’s shoulder and mouthed the words “shut up” to Ferdinand.

  “Alcohol on an empty stomach … I should kno
w better by now,” Riser said, in the crackle of someone eking words through a breathing tube.

  “We should all know better,” said Zane, mirroring Matthew by placing his arm around Liam. “But we don’t. But we will always, always, always have one another.”

  “Jesus H. Christ, Zane!” Riser said with a smile. “I think you have gone and turned into Gary!”

  MILE 18

  “Liam! Oh thank God you got here early. I swear, you are a godsend. I’m going berserk. Come help me hang the club’s banner.”

  “Sure thing, G-Lo. Where would you like it to go?”

  Gary answered the question by dashing off in the direction of the finish line and gunning through the litany of tasks he needed to accomplish in the hour and a half before the start of the race. The medic had to be briefed on the details of the course, the announcers needed to be informed of the sponsors of the event, and the club’s volunteers needed to line up to marshal all the runners as they arrived. Liam may have missed an item or two in Gary’s breathless rundown.

  Within the next half hour the East Side Drive and the meadow flanking the 102nd Street transverse were transformed. A group of Fast Tracker men in sequin gowns and stilettos offered people the goody bags for the race behind large tables arched by rainbows of balloons. A squadron of muscle-bound cheerleaders pranced across the start line in a flurry of kicks and jazz hands, shouting: “We are proud of you! Yes, we are proud of you!”

  The morning unfolded as though scripted for a race. The sun hid behind a fringe of clouds keeping the intensity of the late June day at bay, and a light breeze sifted through the park. Groups of runners warmed up along the dirt trails that twisted around the reservoir. Erasure pleaded for a little respect from the stadium speakers as Gary buzzed around from person to person, making sure that the final touches for the Pride Run were going off without a hitch.

  At 8:30 A.M., Cosimo Villanueva, an injured runner who had become the de facto club photographer in the last month, corralled the team under a canopy of trees. Almost everyone Liam had met during the past eight months was there—all the avid racers, the men of the infamous “judging circle,” and several groups of women who had been attending more and more events of late—and many whom he had never before seen. Cosimo clicked away capturing image upon image as he directed the runners in a series of ridiculous poses and faux-candid groupings.

  “Gary! Where is that Gary Loblonicki?” A short man with a face runneled by age or disease raced all around the hilltop looking for Gary. “We’ve got business to settle, Gary. Rick cued me into the mockery you’ve made of this event.”

  From the innermost nucleus of the photograph-readied herd, Gary emerged in a fluster. His hands offered the conciliatory gestures of one who has just learned unfortunate news for which there was no recourse. The raisin-faced man pushed away Gary’s attempt at an embrace and shouted loudly enough for pedestrians as far away as Fifth Avenue to hear: “That quilt tells our story. You want everyone to forget our fucking story! Well, we can’t let people forget … We can’t.”

  As the old man trailed off into tears, Gary pulled him in close for a generous bear hug. The man allowed himself the offer of comfort, but roused again after a few seconds to shove Gary into the assembled crowd. Zane materialized from out of nowhere and stood beside Gary in a show of solidarity; Mitch and Ben followed in quick succession. The soldiers were lining up to protect their leader. By the time that Liam pressed his hand firmly against Gary’s shoulder in support, Gary had moved off by himself so that he could explain to those gathered what had sparked this conflagration.

  The teeny man with the deep wrinkles had founded the Pride Run with Richard Pollack decades ago, and he came back every year to present the AIDS quilt to the runners at the end of the race. In 1984, a coterie of about a dozen runners had found themselves on the losing end of the fight against full-blown AIDS infections. It was long before the days of quick cocktail fixes and protease inhibitors, and many people were just learning that their sexual liberation would levy a heavy price tag. To celebrate their club experiences and friendships, these Fast Trackers knitted little squares that depicted their plight. One Midwesterner who had never seen the beach before traveling to New York City for fashion school made a large square of a white wave against a blue background. An older man who fancied himself a theater aficionado—a lover of Tony-award winning performances as well as the back-row pleasures of Times Square theaters of the past—wove the fragments of old ticket stubs and playbills into a beautiful gray mosaic. Throughout the eighties, those who succumbed to the virus added their stories to the growing quilt. Henry Duvall, who stood now before Gary with the tired agitation known only by those who have fought long for lost causes, had watched his lover die of AIDS and vowed to make the quilt an integral part of this annual event.

  Many in the group of gay men and women clustered around Gary listened intently, hanging on each detail of the story. A few of the older members had begun to weep. Someone interrupted to ask if he could see the quilt.

  “Some other time. Anyone who hasn’t seen the quilt before can view it on some other occasion.” Gary spoke with compassion but also with a quickness that would not allow for challenge. “This day is a celebration. I want us to look to the future and not get bogged down in the past. Now we all have a race to run. The gun is going off at nine whether we like it or not so trot-trot, people! Trot-trot!”

  As Liam did his final sprint stride-outs toward the starting line of the race, he bumped into Monroe stretching on the side of the course. An immediate look of relief beamed from Monroe. Despite the fact that Monroe had vowed to come out and run, Liam doubted his friend’s ability to get up and out of the house before 9 A.M. on a Saturday. With surprising lightness, Monroe sprang up from his calf stretches and bounded over to Liam.

  “Sweetie, I have been wilting here, worried that I would not recognize a soul,” he said.

  “Oh, please stop the drama queen routine. If you don’t see people you know today, then you’re standing around with your head up your ass. I’m not indulging the woe-is-me Monroe this morning.”

  “It’s gay pride weekend, Liam. Show a little love—with a capital L! I have a fun suggestion … Let’s you and me run this thing together. We never get to run together.”

  The vagaries of Monroe’s ironic humor made it impossible to tell whether he was kidding or speaking in earnest. Liam knew the consequence of not taking his friend seriously; he also knew that his competitive nature and the contest with the Bobcats mandated that he race his heart out today. But the idea of just jogging easily and enjoying the scenery with his best friend enticed Liam. He could never admit to any of his Fast Tracker teammates the dread he had each and every race day, the unalloyed fear that overcame him as he waited for the gun to go off, the sense that he would disappoint everyone—especially himself—with every performance. What would it be like to slip off the radar, to put the loyalties of his friendship with Monroe above the endless demands that Fast Trackers put on him? Liam knew the pointlessness of pretending he had any choice in the matter.

  “Don’t worry, sexy,” Monroe spoke as if in answer to Liam’s interior monologue. “I won’t put you on the spot. I know you’re in a pickle … what with your club reputation as the hot, fast young thing.”

  “I have to get to the start. Check the histrionics, Miss Marilyn. We’ll brunch after … Promise!”

  “You and me—or ‘the club’?”

  “I’ll meet you at baggage check after the race. Good luck.” Why did there always need to be so much ado over racing? The essence of running could not be more pure or simple. That’s what Liam loved about the sport. When removed from ego dramas and pettiness, running was one person testing the limits of his body in concert with his fellow competitors. Everything else fell away. But lately so much other nonsense had been getting in the way.

  Runners had already jammed the starting corral by the time Liam arrived. Zane waved to Liam, urging him with frantic hand mo
tions to move up toward the lead pack. Hip-high metal gates blocked Liam from the corral with the local elite runners. The officials refused to let Liam hop over the barrier and instead directed him to the back of the long line of competitors now assembled. Liam scanned the first few rows of runners to see what the Bobcat presence looked like. The day belonged to Fast Trackers, and it was all blue and orange pageantry. The team was well represented at the front of the race, even if Liam had been relegated to the back of the pack. Pace signs from five-minute down to eleven-minute miles instructed runners as to where they should line up, but casual racers blatantly disregarded them. Liam snuck into the pack by the eight-minute pace marker and began to wiggle his way through the forest of men and women stretching and doing their last-minute race preparations. As the national anthem began, a surly man about sixty-five years of age scowled at Liam and told him to show a little respect for the country and for his fellow runners and stand still. Liam’s blood boiled as he focused on weaving through the next cluster of runners; he was still about fifty rows back from the lead pack.

  As he feverishly maneuvered through a trio of women wearing headphones, Liam heard the gun sound and he assumed running motion. His knee immediately collided into the back of the short middle-aged woman in front of him. He moved toward the extreme right to pass people along the edge, but the barricades made movement nearly impossible. Everyone inched along. It was like a monstrous traffic jam, and there were no openings in the hordes of people. Liam felt trapped and claustrophobic. After about thirty seconds, enough people had begun jogging that Liam could begin to speed through the masses to reach those who were actually running his pace. He wondered how the back of the pack runners dealt with this chaos each week. Why wake up at 7 A.M. on a weekend to be stuck in a dense, hot mass of people?

  Liam crested Harlem Hill, where the first mile marker was, in 6 minutes 50 seconds. The bad start had added about a minute to his pace—that might as well have been an hour in a five-mile race. And he expended more energy than usual in the frustrating fits and starts of skirting around people. There was no way that he could now make up fifteen seconds in each of the four miles that remained.

 

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