Between Boyfriends. Michael Salvatore
Dolittle reference; he was still under Carrie’s musical spell.
“We as a community—and I am not including lesbians, bisexuals or transgendered peoples because they need to stop piggybacking and create their own community ’cause they’re sucking the life force out of ours—must take a cue from Mr. King and Michael Gore, the wildly misunderstood composer of Carrie, and explore the psycho-sexual-socioreligious dogma that we have allowed to dictate our framework before that framework ruptures and traps us within our own fear.”
Flynn was finally finished. He took a gulp of his coffee to refuel and waited to see if his didactic words had any effect on his pupils.
“So what you’re saying,” I started, “is that Piper Laurie really wanted to fuck the shit out of Sissy Spacek and then knife her to death so she didn’t have to deal with her emotionally anymore.”
“My insight is wasted on you people!” Flynn shouted.
“Give it one more day,” Gus said rationally. “Then if Frank still hasn’t called you back you can call him again.”
“I have a better idea,” I said. “Why don’t one of you call Frank right now to see if he’s around? That way I’ll know if he’s busy or just uninterested.”
“Even if Frank answers, it won’t tell you anything,” Gus rationalized. “It’ll just tell you that he’s home.”
“And not interested in calling me back!” I said, sounding as pathetic as I knew I would.
“Is this about Jack?” Lindsay asked.
The silence this question stirred was deafening. If this were a scene from ITNC the end credits would roll or we’d at least cut to a commercial. Everyone at the table knew that my ex-partner Jack DiRenza had told me to leave his apartment and his life four years ago on July fourth (forever ruining for me a day that to the rest of the country is a cause for celebration) and everyone at the table had shared their advice as to how best to move on, as well as their shoulders for me to cry on when I didn’t think moving on was an option. But everyone at the table also knew that Jack was more than just an ex-partner. He was the love of my life and the man I thought I would grow old and happy with. No one at the table, including myself, ever thought he was the person who would push me from his life because he felt tied down, or as he so eloquently put it, “too bored with the whole commitment thing.” So like most fragile elements of a person’s past, Jack had been carefully packaged and stored somewhere just out of reach. Now Lindsay had ripped him thoughtlessly from the distant emotional shelf I had placed him on and the result was shocking.
“Lindsay!” Flynn scolded. “Don’t say the J-word.”
“Steven, I’m sorry,” Lindsay said. “But it has to be said. This is not the first time you’ve freaked out since Jack broke up with you. It’s becoming a pattern. So before it gets out of hand and you waste any more time hurting yourself you have to admit if your reaction to Frank’s tardy response is a result of your split with Jack.”
An odd thing happened when Lindsay spoke sense; it caused those listening to pause. But within that pause was quite a bit of action. First the listener had to remind himself that it was indeed Lindsay speaking. Then he had to repeat his comment silently, ignore the surprise that his comment included not one figure skating term, process his comment, ignore the surprise that his comment actually contained sense, and articulate a response. After a few moments the pause was over.
“This isn’t about Jack,” I said.
“Are you sure, hon?” Flynn asked.
I looked at my three closest friends—Flynn, Lindsay, and Gus—and realized I had to be honest. And I knew there was no reason why I shouldn’t be. They chose to be in my life and I chose to let them stay. They had to take the good with the bad, since they knew that I had done and would continue to do the same for them.
“It’s not about Jack, it’s about me,” I said. “I’m really tired of looking for someone, but I’m not ready to give up. I’m scared that I don’t know the difference between some jerk who throws his number at me just so he can get laid and a nice guy who would like to get to know me on a deeper level.”
I could tell from the looks on their faces that such honesty was not what they’d thought they’d hear when they were summoned to Starbucks. But I could also tell from their expressions that I had hit upon a shared truth. They understood me, which is exactly what friends are supposed to do.
“You have to let go and let gay,” Lindsay said.
“What?” I responded.
“Let go of everything that is holding you down and be your gay self,” Lindsay explained. “Let go of your impatience to find your soul mate, your preconceived notion that every new guy you meet will be your soul mate….”
“And Jack,” Flynn finished. “You have to let him go too, Steve. Not only Jack himself, but what the two of you shared. For a while you had perfect. And now you don’t. That doesn’t mean you’re never going to have perfect again. It just means that perfect now means something a little bit different than it did when you were with Jack and now you have to figure out what perfect means to you.”
I looked at my friends again, closer this time and without the Pity Party eyes. It was then that the light dawned on me.
“Did you all swallow Dr. Phil pills with your Viagra this morning?” I queried.
“A bit too sappy?” Flynn asked.
“It was fine up until the perfect part,” I said.
“I thought that was a bit over the top myself,” Gus remarked. “But I’m British. ‘Thank you’ is considered over the top in some parts of the U.K.”
“I stand by everything I said,” Lindsay declared. “You’re handsome, you’re hot, Flynn tells me you’re hung. If I were you I’d be freaking out why loser boy didn’t return my phone call. But remember, I saw him too and I don’t think he’s worth pining over.”
“That’s ’cause you were on a Dick Button rampage,” I said, reminding Lindsay.
“Again?” asked Flynn and Gus, once again in unison.
Lindsay’s face scrunched up the way it did when he was about to do some incredibly difficult jump on the ice. He looked like he was going to do a triple-triple combination, but instead he just banged his fist on the table.
“That man just annoys the shit out of me! I’d love to take his two Olympic medals and shove ’em—”
“Thanks, guys,” I said politely, shutting Lindsay up.
“For what?” Flynn asked as a representative for the group.
“For reminding me that when a crisis arises I should simply”—I paused for effect—“let go and let gay.”
“To letting go,” Flynn said, raising his cup.
“And letting gay,” we all responded.
So for the second time that day I found myself raising my coffee in honor of some intangible notion. And for the second time that day while I sat with my arm outstretched, my coffee raised, and a fake smile plastered on my face, I was consumed with the same persistent thought: why hasn’t Frank called me back? And then another thought popped into my head: why can’t I just let him go?
I answered my questions almost immediately thanks to Lindsay’s earlier advice. Like some people just can’t be anything other than gay, other people just don’t want to be let go.
Chapter Four
The next day was as chaotic and poorly choreographed as a Bollywood musical. It was so haphazard that by noon I was actually considering changing my name to Kumar “Steven” Patel, but I reeled myself in knowing my mother would have a coronary if I turned my back on my Sicilian heritage, even if she was developing a taste for