The following afternoon as I sat in the Student Union and waited for the Gaybor, I now realized maybe I had over-reacted last night. The Gaybor had e-mailed me back almost immediately last night to say ‘Great! What about coffee tomorrow?” and now I sat waiting on him, rather shame faced amd regretful.
I had called Thad this morning but he had not answered. I had not apologized, but I did leave a nice sounding message and a “Call me back.” He had not. So I had not spoken to him since he stomped out. At this point I knew just to let him call me. I had planned on cancelling this coffee if Thad and I had made up, but as that had not happened, the chess game that was our relationship continued: Queen takes Gaybor.
Sitting in a booth in the big empty Student Union Lounge, I thought about last night: it’s, not that I thought Thad would run out and cheat on me with Spandex Hair Mane the moment my back was turned, I mean, especially now that Thad was sober and in control of his sensibilities, it’s just I did not appreciate my emotions trifled with. And last night I felt Thad had poked at me just to be poking at me, mad that I was leaving. And thus he got my wrath. It was all his fault.
But now I was in a rather sticky wicket of a situation, feeling very weird about the upcoming coffee. I was not cheating, I mean the Gaybor was just a neighbor and colleague-but a handsome one. I mean, all clothes were going to stay on and all, and it was just coffee, but I still felt bad, like maybe I really was cheating. Maybe the cheating was more in the intent than the actuality. Whatever the case I wished that I had never e-mailed the Gaybor and I wish god-damn Thad had just answered my call this morning so I could have cancelled this whole damn thing and not be sitting waiting now.
In the midst of my mulling, the Gabor walked up.
“Hey…Steve,” I said rising.
“Hey there Micahel. Nice to see you. Glad you finally took me up on my offer.” We shook hands.
“Sure. Sure,” I said, flustered, as he was handsome as an Abercrombie and Fitch ad, except with a few more clothes on. He was in khakis shorts, a snug yellow polo and running shoes-a very collegiate summer look. His hair was sun dappled, and slightly windswept, like an early Robert Redford before the crinkly skin set in. Suddenly Thad and his messy phobias and alcoholism and bitchiness and raspberry streaked hair were not looking so good by comparison.
We walked over to one of the little restaurants and got drinks and went back to sit in a high-backed, dark wooden booth, just across from where Oliver and I had sat and fought about Bettina two months ago. Oliver and I had not had much to do with each other since: served him right.
Steve and I began by talking about our chosen professions: He being in architecture, talked about Frank Lloyd Wright and I being in Literature, spoke of Shakespeare. So we did our professions well, and got that out of the way. I watched him as he talked, his red lips, the way he laughed, the hand carefully drug through the hair, and pretended I had never heard of Thad, ‘Thad who?’ I asked myself. He really should have called me back: It was all his fault. He shouldn’t have provoked me.
“Your book?” The Gaybor repeated.
“Pardon?” I asked, pulling myself out of my reverie, even angrier at Thad for now ruing my coffee date with a cute guy.
“You had said you were working on a book?” he repeated.
“Oh, yes: Whores in Musicals.”
“Really?” he laughed.
“Yeah. I wrote a series of articles about whores and whorehouse imagery in Shakespeare-Mistress Quickly, “Get thee to a Nunnery” and all-and it got turned into my first book about two years ago.”
“That’s great.”
“Thanks. It sold a few hundred copies, like most academic titles, you know…”
“Yeah…”
“But it got me some acclaim in the Shakespearian world. So then I was watching RENT and it made me think about whores in Broadway plays, so I started researching that, and it’s really just crazy how many there are.” I stopped to take a breath, knowing I was just about to completely out myself, but better now than later.“Really?”
“Yeah,” I continued. “ I mean, if you think about it, musicals really developed out of opera, sort of an American happy bright opera, but the early gay Broadway writers-Cole Porter, Jule Styne, Jerry Herman-they couldn’t write what they wanted, love stories between men, so they put whores in instead.”
“And the gays are the whores?” I raised an eyebrow and continued, “Well, no. The whores are stand-ins for the gays, as the gays and the whores are similar because the only thing they are doing wrong is having sex society has deemed illegal, which then they are then persecuted for. But the sex hookers have is normal sex, it’s not bestiality or incest or something awful, it’s just illegal in the eyes of the law.” Stopping here, I attempted to judge his reaction. I was good as out now, but
what about him? Was this just another closeted guy like Oliver? Or was this one full fledged straight? I couldn’t imagine that, I mean, he had originally asked me to coffeeand all.“Really?” he said, apparently unphased.
So I continued. “The writers added prostitutes in the place of the gay guy, so they could relate to it. Think about it: Guys and Dolls, Oliver, Cabaret, Chicago, Best Little Whore House, even Gigi - Gigi for God’s sake! It’s the guy
falling in love with the whore, but then not being about to have her because of who she is. The whore is the number one represented profession for women in musical theatre. And that’s why gays love Broadway. Whores in Musicals. ” I smiled triumphantly. “That’s really great.” He smiled, shaking his head. “I never was much into musicals.”
“Oh,” I said. Maybe he was straight, or at least butch. “My Dad left me all of these Broadway albums of his, and I always just liked them.” And not to dip into histrionic remorse, or veer off into the maudlin fact that I had not heard back from my father yet, I changed course with, “So what’s your research about?”
He lectured about some architecture something or other-barrel vault, ancient Egypt, blah, blah, blah, and I continued to watch him and wonder what exactly he looked like under those clothes and what I was getting myself into. Was this a straight dude who suddenly was realizing he was chatting up a gay? Would he bash me with some sort of ancient building tool? A level? A lathe? Or was he a gay?
After a few minutes the topic changed to our neighborhood and how he liked his house and gardening and how much his dog Ennis liked the yard.
“So you and your partner live there?” he asked with a big white smile.
“Well, no, but we did for just over two years. He-Thad- moved out a few months ago and moved in with a friend…”
“Oh…” he said with a pause.
“No, no.” I cautioned. “We’re still together. He moved in with a female friend to help her out. They live just east of here, and it’s actually not too bad. I thought it would be awful, but it’s really working out. I see him every day and he spends the weekends. It’s very mature seeming.” I kinda lied, kinda not. So we were absolutely on the gay strand now, so I looked at him with a John Waters' ‘Your turn, Mary’ look.
“Yeah,” He began. “My ex- and I had the same thing for years. He was in the military and kept a house up in Tulsa, and I was there most of the time, but I still had my own apartment. It worked out for the most part, I mean, until it didn’t work out any more.”
“Oh. Well, that’s too bad.” I said understandably. So we had contact: He was gay! I smiled broadly, relieved that I would not be bashed with a T-square.
And as he told me briefly about how he and the sergeant had met, and then dated for ten years, but then broke up, and that’s why he left Tulsa and moved to Norman, I just thought: Did he want this coffee to be more than just about coffee? Was he hoping I was single? Was he already in love with me, from afar? How would I break it to Thad? Or would I have to, since he never god-damn called me back!
The Gaybor’s cell phone rang and he whipped it out, “Sorry. Hold on.”
“Sure, sure.”
“Hey!” He said into his phone, launching into a stilted conversation
I sat and mused over his good looks and how I just wished Thad would call. And I realized, this guy was handsome and all, but I just wanted Thad. Thad: my messed-up, broken little puzzle piece that fit with my messed-up broken little puzzle piece. That’s all I ever wanted, idiot bastard. I should not have thrown such a fit last night, but this coffee was a mistake. I needed to call and apologize, and tell him that I trusted him and that he could hang out with whoever he wanted, even though I did not believe that.
And then I looked back at the Gaybor and wondered if I was going to have to break his heart, like his older military Ex-. But I would let him down easy. Tell him how long Thad and I had been together, and about how much Thad meant to me. I’m sure the Gaybor would understand. He seemed strong. He would move on.
The Gaybor hung up and said, “Sorry about that. That was Matt, one of the wrestling coaches. He finally called me back and we’re going out later this week.”
“Oh,” I said completely surprised.
“Have you met him? Little burly guy? Beard and buzzed head. Hot.”
“Yeah,” I said, having seen him around campus. “He’s gay?”
“Sure. I met him at this party up in the city a few weeks ago, and we’ve been texting back and forth since, and now we’re finally going out!”
“Yeah.” I said, suddenly deflated, not liking this Gaybor at all. So if he wasn’t in love with me from afar, what was this coffee all about? Huh? Did he just want to be friends? Gross. Was he one of those gays who collected other gays, in some sort of kumbaya, sort of we should stick together kind of way? Eugh. How offensive. How common.
“He lives out on 6 acres near the lake,” the Gaybor continued in a rather unappealing falsetto tone. “I’ve heard he’s got horses and a hot tub…”
As the Gaybor went on to describe what sounded like the beginnings of a 1970’s porno, I just became more and more uncomfortable. What was I even doing here? Why would I jeopardize my perfect relationship with Thad for something so stupid as a coffee with some random dumb guy? And I felt so stupid for thinking he was interested! I just wanted to go. I needed to call Thad and make sure everything was okay, that he still loved me, as apparently Mr. Dumbass Gaybor didn’t.
“So this has been very nice…” I said, interrupting his ramblings on the hunky wrestling coach. “But, gosh, I’ve got a lot of work to do on my book…”
“Oh, yeah, yeah,” the Gaybor said, “This has been nice.”
We made a few pleasantries as I gathered my stuff, then he, “Well, if I don’t see you around here, maybe I’ll see you around the neighborhood.”
“Yeah, that would be great,” I said with no passion in my voice at all.
As we stood he said, “Oh, hey! One more question: Have you had anything stolen around your house lately?”
I stopped to stare at him, “Yes. I had a terra cotta chicken planter full of ivy stolen in April, why?”
“Really? Well, that doesn’t surprise me. I had some patio furniture stolen from the back of my house last month, and I talked to my neighbors to the north, and they said they had some nice concrete urns stolen in June, and they found them at this trashy rent house around the corner, so they just went and took them back. And I went over there, and it looks like college kids, and I peered over their fence and didn’t see my furniture, but they had a lot of other random yard stuff just piled up back there, like they had a collection going or something. So just be careful. It just looks like they probably get drunk and just go out looting. ”
“You are kidding!!” I exclaimed and then briefly told him the story of the Garden Rapist and my talking to the Police before Lady Gaga and ended with the story of me bawling out the Garden Rapist out at the Farmer’s Market two weeks ago.
“Huh. Well, if it wasn’t her, I bet it was these kids. You ought to go check out their yard.”
“I’ll be damned,” I said suddenly realizing what a terrible person I was. “I’ll see you around Steve.”
“Okay, bye. We should do this again…”
“Yeah,” I called as I stomped off, suddenly aware of all of my sins: I had implicated the Garden Rapist to the Police and then humiliated her in public, in front of her peers and husband, all on no solid evidence. And I had done the same to Thad. I was a terrible, terrible, crazy person.
I took off, running across campus, through the horrid heat and hot wind, to try and escape myself. I was a terrible, terrible person. I had to call Thad and apologize. I had to.
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