Chapter Five

Caden had left no message. Bobby sat on his bed, the blinds drawn, staring at the screen of his iPhone, wondering if he should call him back. He didn’t leave a voice mail. If he’d wanted you to call him back, he would have said so. Bobby shook his head. Bobby had felt the strain of not having Caden in his life, since Caden had been his only true friend. He missed him like he would miss a limb. His longing for his friend was more intense than any sexual desire he’d ever had. Once again, he cursed himself for being so stupid.

He couldn’t blame Caden for deserting him. Bobby had, after all, tried to steal his boyfriend. The one Caden now lived with, in loving bliss.

But all Bobby had wanted was the same for himself. He just didn’t know how to go about it.

But he had called. Finally, after months of silence, he had called. It was something Bobby never allowed himself to dream would happen.

Bobby glanced over at the clock. It was now after seven, so that would mean it was after nine in Chicago. Don’t do it. Let Caden come to you.

Bobby couldn’t help himself. He had always had poor impulse control. Ha! As if that was news! He smiled, but there was only bitterness in it. That impulse control was what made him the world-class tramp he was today.

He pressed Caden’s name on his recent calls screen. Bobby rationalized calling him by the thought that if Caden really didn’t want to talk to him, he would see Bobby’s name on the caller ID and he could simply let it go to voice mail.

That’s what he told himself as he listened to the phone ring, halfway across the country, in the city of big shoulders.

“Hey.”

Bobby closed his eyes, and his lips lifted almost unconsciously into a smile. It had been so long since he had heard Caden’s voice that the simple one word utterance lifted his spirits, was like a balm on his tortured and traumatized psyche.

“It’s me,” Bobby said.

“I know.”

“You called?”

“Yeah.” Caden blew out a breath. “I didn’t leave a message because I wanted to talk to you personally, so I just thought I’d ring you back later. But here you are.”

“Here I am.” Was this it? The beginning of their reconciliation? Hope rose in Bobby’s soul like a bird taking flight.

“Listen, Bobby, I called because I heard about your father.”

“Yeah. He passed away. Heart attack.”

“And I just wanted to say how sorry I was to hear that. I know you and he weren’t close and that you had issues with him, but in the end, he was your dad, and I wanted to tell you that I know that must be rough. Kevin and me both send our condolences.”

Bobby wanted to weep. “That’s so nice of you. Thanks.”

“That’s all. I just wanted you to know you’re in my thoughts.”

Bobby clutched at a straw. “Maybe we can all get together when I get back to town? We have so much to talk about.”

There was a long silence on the other end, and Bobby’s spirits, soaring for a moment, crashed.

Caden finally broke the quiet with “We’ll see.”

“Just to talk. We need to clear the air.”

More silence, and at last Caden said, “Listen, I gotta run. I’m at work.”

“Thanks again for calling, Caden. It means a lot to me.”

“Sure. ’Bye.”

Bobby wanted to say ’bye too—and tell Caden to give his boyfriend, Kevin, his best—but Caden had already hung up.

Bobby slumped back on the bed, feeling like a starving man who had been given not a meal, but a crumb. The ache in his heart had only intensified with hearing his old best friend’s voice on the phone.

Would Caden ever be able to forgive him for what he’d done?

*

It seemed like only minutes had passed when Bobby awakened to the soft knock on his door.

“Sweetheart?” his mother called. “You better be getting up. We’re going to leave for the funeral home in about an hour to check everything out. Your sister and the kids are here.” She tapped again. “Bobby? You hear me?”

Bobby sat up and rubbed his eyes, feeling disoriented. The room was dark. “Yeah, Mom. I’ll grab a shower and dress and be out in a few.”

“You want me to fix you something to eat?”

“Don’t worry about it. I’m not hungry.”

“But you have to eat.”

Once a mom, always a mom… “Sure, anything will be fine. Maybe some scrambled eggs?”

He listened as his mother padded away.

Later that morning, he would see his father again. It had been ten years. Bobby forced himself to get out of bed, muscles aching from having had his legs in the air for extended periods, and ambled to the en suite bathroom for the shower he hoped would loosen up those same muscles. He felt like an old man.

And what would he feel when he saw his old man again?

*

Michelle urged him on. “Go on, take a look at your dad. Pay your respects.”

The casket stood in the middle of the main viewing room of the Swain Brothers Funeral Home in the Green Lake neighborhood. The room was overly appointed, with heavy damask draperies and sheers at the windows, plush beige carpeting, and muted walls of cream, along which had been arranged pewter sconces with frosted glass shades. The place looked like some grandma’s idea of wealth.

His father’s casket was no less ostentatious. Crafted from sleek cherry wood with brass handles, it gleamed, mirrorlike, under the parlor’s tasteful recessed lighting. He could see a bit of his father’s head from where he stood, but little else.

“You need to go say goodbye.” Michelle laid a hand on his arm. It was just him, his mother, and his sister, Dawn, and her family there right now. The other visitors weren’t due to show up for another hour, when official viewing hours began.

Viewing. It sounded so tasteless. So macabre. Why did anyone need to “view” a dead body?

Maybe, as his mother had just told him, to say goodbye.

Bobby could see no way he would get out of looking down at his dad, maybe even, God forbid, touching him one final time. So, even though every impulse was urging him to flee, to simply turn tail and run from the funeral home, get in his rental and head right back to Capitol Hill, where he could drown his sorrows and fears in alcohol and a stranger’s passionate embrace, he moved cautiously forward.

There he was. The man who had fathered him. Bobby stared down at an almost serene face, a face that wore a bit of blush and some foundation. Bobby let out a snort of laughter, bordering on hysteria, when he thought that his father would have never been caught dead in makeup. He glanced nervously behind him and saw his mother standing there, watching him. He hoped she interpreted his laughter as a sob, as grief.

He returned his gaze to his dad in repose.

It was strange, and now Bobby did want to cry, because if he felt anything at all, it was relief. The man was gone. No longer would he be able to cause Bobby’s face to redden at the dinner table as he once had when a little Bobby asked him to please pass the salad. His father had smiled, holding the teak salad bowl aloft, and Bobby had smiled back. Then his father had said, “I don’t know what it is, but something about you reminds me of a girl.”

Bobby could still feel the sudden rush of shame and how he had wanted to push back his chair and run from the kitchen.

No longer would his father be able to laugh off Bobby’s starring role as Tony in his high school’s production of West Side Story and refuse to be in the audience because, as he had put it, “Musical theater is for fairies. You a fairy, son?” He had pretended to be kidding, but they both knew he wasn’t. In spite of this, Bobby still caught himself hopefully parting the curtains before they opened, then dejectedly scanning the audience each night of the performance for his father’s face.

No longer would they have strained holiday conversations.

No longer would he treat his mother like a servant.

No longer would he live to find fault, to ridicule, to ensure that nothing, nothing Bobby did would ever be good enough for his standards.

Bobby bent over the man and planted a kiss on his cold cheek. He whispered, “You can’t hurt me anymore.”

He turned and walked back to his mother and sister. Michelle grabbed his arm. “See? Didn’t that make you feel better? To say goodbye and tell him just how much you loved him?”

“Sure it did, Mom.” He glanced over at Dawn, who was also smiling at him as if he had just accomplished some great feat, which, he supposed, he had. Bobby lied to them both. “Doesn’t he look great? Just like he’s sleeping.”

And he drew his mother and then his sister, into a hug.

But he didn’t cry.

*

Later, there was a lunch at Ray’s Boathouse in Ballard. The windows of the restaurant looked out on Puget Sound, which today was a churning mass of gray and silver, as if the restless waters were reaching up to touch the dark, low-hanging clouds. Drizzle pelted the windows of the restaurant, blurring the seascape outside.

Bobby stood near one of those windows, a vodka and cranberry (his third) in hand, simply watching the restless ebb and flow of the water. A lot of people had showed up at the funeral home, and then here, to pay their respects to his dear departed daddy. Many more than Bobby would have thought.

Behind him, the chattering of the wake guests sounded like a party in full swing. There was a lot of laughter, clinking glasses, animated talk. Bobby had expected something more, well, funereal.

As he stared outside, setting himself apart from the guests, he remembered the church service and all the kind words the priest had said, painting a picture of a man who was a stranger to Bobby. The priest had praised Bobby’s father’s generosity, his kindness, his good works, his devotion to Christ and most of all, to his family.

Bobby couldn’t help but wonder if the priest had gotten his funerals mixed up and was talking about another man.

As he was pondering this, seated next to his sniffling mother, his stone-faced sister, her bored-looking husband, and their restless children, something odd happened, something unexpected, something that took Bobby totally by surprise.

He bowed his head and began to weep. He didn’t shed a couple of tears, which until the moment the crying jag had begun would have been the most he would have expected from himself, but launched from silence to sobbing just like that. His shoulders heaved, his nose ran, the tears flowed freely. He could barely breathe.

His mother patted his shoulder comfortingly, her own tears ramping up to join his. He could barely get himself under control, and he wondered why. He had, more than once, wished his father dead, thought how much better his and his family’s life would be without the self-centered, perfectionist bastard around.

What did Bobby have to cry about?

And then it hit him: he wasn’t crying for what was, but for what might have been. For the promise that was never realized, for a connection that would never be made, no matter how hungrily Bobby longed for it.

Now, the possibility of the love of the one man that the little boy in Bobby thought could redeem him was removed, snatched from the realm of possibility forever.

He had covered his face with his hand and cried until his mother had nudged him, urging him to get up. The pallbearers were carrying the casket, now closed, out of the church.

“Stand up. Pull yourself together, honey,” Michelle had whispered. “Your father’s passing.”

Now, Bobby shook his head, took another sip of his cocktail, and emptied the glass. He sucked an ice cube into his mouth, then felt its cold burn as it slid down his throat.

He was startled by a voice close behind him. “Beautiful view, isn’t it? I think I like it better like this, all dark and stormy, than sunshine and blue skies. More dramatic.”

Bobby turned. Standing behind him was a very handsome man, whom he estimated to be about his own age. He was taller than Bobby, with raven-black hair and eyes so dark it was impossible to distinguish pupil from iris. The dark hair was brushed back away from his face, and when he smiled, he revealed perfect white teeth. There was a sharp cleft in his chin that Bobby had a very irrational and very wrong urge to explore with his tongue. Bobby couldn’t help himself as he looked the guy up and down, admiring the way his trim form filled out what looked like a very expensive charcoal-gray suit.

There was something familiar about the man, and the wheels in Bobby’s mind began to turn, trying to recall where he had seen him before.

Wherever it was, Bobby couldn’t help but be enchanted by the guy, who was simply stunning to look at. Inappropriate as it was, Bobby found it hard to tear his eyes away.

Bobby smiled. “I like it too. The grays, the waves… You can almost hear the rush of the wind outside, the patter of the rain on the ground.”

“You’re a poet.”

“Who, me?” Bobby laughed. “Just a marketing manager. Nothing poetic about that.”

“Well, that’s some very poetic imagery.”

Bobby cast his gaze downward, feeling somehow embarrassed by the man’s words. Poetry was the province of “fairies.” Isn’t that what Dad would have said?

“You don’t remember me, do you?”

For a split second, Bobby wondered if he could fake it. But he was simply too exhausted by the events of the day and the emotional toll they had taken to even try. He shook his head. “I’m sorry, I don’t. Remind me?”

“Wade.” The man smiled and locked eyes with Bobby, causing him, for just a second, to forget everyone else in the room. “Wade Carlisle. We went to high school together.”

Bobby drew a blank. Once he had graduated from Cascade High School, he had never looked back. There were no class reunions for him. He thought such gatherings were the province of the desperate, of those whose glory days were far in the past.

Wade? Bobby rifled through mental images of linoleum-tiled corridors lined with lockers, of classrooms with combination seats and desks, of a shiny, waxed gymnasium floor, of a red-velvet-curtained auditorium, and he came up with nothing. Bobby couldn’t understand. Surely he would remember a hottie like this, who would have stood out from the crowd, who would have certainly caught Bobby’s eye and perhaps taken part in the secret masturbatory fantasies he indulged in late at night in his boyhood bedroom. But no memory registered.

Bobby shook his head. “I’m sorry, Wade. I don’t remember.”

Wade didn’t look disappointed. He laughed. “You probably don’t remember me because I looked quite different back in the day. Had a little more meat on my bones. Well, a lot more meat. Wade Carlisle? Fatty Fatty Two-by-Four?”

And it clicked. Bobby swallowed hard. And he remembered Wade, although it was hard to believe this drop-dead-gorgeous morsel of masculinity standing before him was he. Wade had been the fattest kid in his class, the very big butt of a million jokes, the kid who sat alone at lunch, looking out at everyone else with dark, brooding eyes.

Bobby had never been one to tease him. Not because he was so kind back then, but because the fat kid simply didn’t register on his radar. He vaguely remembered sitting next to him in an American literature class, and then it came back to him—his clearest memory of Wade.

“You read that poem in class once? Everyone was floored.”

Wade smiled. “You remember that?”

Bobby nodded. He did. There was such passion in the fat boy’s voice as he read; it had touched Bobby’s heart. He couldn’t recall what the poem was, but remembered the effect it had on him. “Sure I do.” Bobby cocked his head. “Something about being an outsider?”

Wade moved closer, and Bobby picked up on a citrus scent mixed with a little musk that went straight to his groin.

Wade said, “That poem is one of my favorites. So simple, but it says so much. It spoke to me then, and it still does, even though I’ve changed on the outside.”

“What was it?”

“Emily Dickinson. ‘I’m Nobody.’ Wanna hear it?” He grinned and glanced behind him in an attempt, Bobby assumed, to make sure no one was looking. Wade began to recite the poem.

I’m nobody! Who are you?

Are you nobody, too?

Then there’s a pair of us—don’t tell!

They’d banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!

How public, like a frog

To tell your name the livelong day

To an admiring bog!

Bobby said, “That’s awesome that you remember it after all this time.”

“Some things stick with you.”

Bobby remembered the day in class clearly now. Their assignment had been to read aloud a poem that had meant something to them. It had been an autumn day, and their classroom windows revealed leaves in fiery shades of orange, red, and yellow. A few people had snickered as Wade stood to read from their Survey of American Literature textbook, his hand trembling, his voice barely above a whisper.

By the time he had finished, though, no one was snickering. He sat back down to silence, and a full minute passed before their teacher had called on someone else.

“It must have taken a lot of courage to stand up and read that.”

Wade shrugged. “I had nothing to lose. When you’re the least popular, most teased kid in class, where’s the risk in identifying yourself with a poem called ‘I’m Nobody’? The worst that could happen was that they would laugh at me.”

“But we didn’t.”

“No. And that’s why I’ll always remember that day.”

Bobby looked around him, at the assembled throng of people here to pay their respects to his father, and was struck again by how much this felt like a party. Perhaps they were just as happy as he that the guy was gone. He turned back to Wade. “So how did you do it?”

“What?”

“This.” Bobby gestured at Wade’s broad-shouldered, flat-stomached frame with his hands.

“When my doctor wanted to put me on high blood pressure medicine and told me I was heading rapidly down the road toward diabetes—and this was at the ripe old age of twenty-two—I knew I had to do something. I tried a bunch of fad diets and just yo-yoed, you know? Lose a few, gain a lot more back. Then I just said ‘Fuck it’ and decided to change my life—for good. It wasn’t easy at first, but I thought I’d see if I could just stick to eating whole foods, nothing processed, nothing out of a box or a can or frozen. Man, it costs a lot more to eat like that! But I did it. I ate a lot, honestly, but kept to fresh fruits and vegetables, lean meats, nuts, beans and learned how to use lots of spices and onions and garlic. For a while I missed the chips and doughnuts, but after a while, they just seemed gross to me. Now, I can’t imagine eating that shit.

“And I began to work out—weights and bicycling—every day. I’ve since added kayaking and power walking to my repertoire, and what was once hard is now a pleasure. I get antsy if I can’t do something physical.”

I’d like to do something physical with you. Bobby immediately banished the thought from his mind, shaming himself with the reminder he was at his father’s funeral. Can’t you get your mind off sex even for an occasion like this? What are you, some kind of man whore who can’t control himself?

Bobby decided not to answer those questions. Instead, he smiled at Wade. “Well, you look amazing. I have to be honest, I would have never recognized you.”

“Thanks.” Wade laughed. “Not to sound vain or anything, but I was always fat. I didn’t know that an okay-looking guy was hiding inside, not until I lost all the weight. It was a bonus.”

“Okay-looking? Jesus, guy, you’re way beyond okay. You’re fuckin’ hot.” And immediately Bobby could feel a scorching surge of heat rise to his face, knowing that crimson was spreading up from his collar to envelop him. He was so used to being around gay men that he didn’t stop to think the man standing before him could be straight. The odds were for it! He tried to backpedal. “I mean, you’re a good-looking man, very handsome.”

Wade grinned at him, a playful light dancing in his chocolate eyes. “You seem embarrassed.” He scratched the back of his neck. “This should be the part where I embarrass you even more by pulling out my phone and showing you a picture of my gorgeous redhead wife and our two tots, smiling on the front lawn of our Bellevue McMansion.”

“I’m sorry, man. I’m gay. No problems with it. Well, maybe a few, but…” Bobby’s voice trailed off, and he looked everywhere but at Wade. Finally, he forced himself to look back. “I need to remind myself that we homos are in the minority. I do find you attractive, but I also know most straight guys don’t want to hear that from another dude.”

Wade winked at him. “Who said I was straight?”

“You’re gay?”

Wade chuckled. “As a goose. As a handbasket adorned with ribbons and bows. As the love child of Rip Taylor and Liberace. My blood is rainbow-colored. My middle initial is a Lambda. I eat quiche. And yes, Bobby, I suck dick.” He said the last three words in a whisper.

Bobby leaned his head in toward Wade’s, and they had a private moment, laughing together.

When they pulled away, Bobby realized his mother was staring at him from across the room. He knew she wanted him by her side, and as much as he didn’t like to end this conversation, he realized his mother needed him more. She had surprised him with the depth of feelings she had for his father, feelings he just had assumed didn’t exist.

“I need to get back to my mom. She’s sending me eye signals that she wants me by her.”

“I understand.”

“I just wondered, though, what brought you here? I mean, you and I weren’t really close.” Bobby was flustered and felt like sticking his foot in his mouth again. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I’m really grateful you came.”

“It’s okay. I understand. I just saw the obituary in the paper and remembered you—remembered you fondly—from high school, and I don’t have classes today, so I thought I could come by and pay my respects. I was at the funeral, but I don’t think you saw me.”

No. And if I had, I would have certainly remembered.

Wade went on. “When I laid eyes on you at the funeral, I wanted a chance to talk to you, so I followed the crowd out here. I hope that’s okay.”

“It’s better than okay. I’m really glad you decided to make the effort. I wasn’t expecting to meet a hot guy at my dad’s funeral.”

Wade, for just a moment, looked uncomfortable, making Bobby wish he’d learn to keep his mouth shut, or at least slow down and consider what was coming out of it.

“You were one of the nice ones,” Wade said. “You never teased me or bullied me. You could have. You were one of the popular guys.”

“I was?” And then Bobby mentally kicked himself once more. Of course he was, and false modesty wasn’t becoming. He knew that. It just seemed, though, he had been so closeted when he was in high school, so fearful that someone would discover his deep, dark secret that he spent all of his time trying to be some faux ladies’ man—and the girls did love it. But the real Bobby, the one he faced alone in his bedroom mirror, recognized the truth and realized everyone would hate him if they knew what he was.

Especially his dad.

So he wore a mask through those years and had a vague, almost subconscious realization during all that time that, although many people seemed to like him, no one really did. Not him. They liked an image he projected, not the real Bobby. The real person, he hid from and hoped and prayed no one else would ever spy what lurked beneath his “popular” exterior.

God, that was a long time ago.

“You should probably go see your mom.” Wade reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out his wallet, from which he extracted a business card. He held it out to Bobby. “I don’t know how long you’re here for, but if you have time for coffee, I’d love to talk some more.”

Bobby glanced down at the card and saw that Wade was an assistant professor of English at Olympic Community College. He looked back up at Wade.

“Still lovin’ the poetry.” Wade winked. “I overheard you were in Chicago now but hope you’ll have a chance to call before you go back. My cell is on my card. I’m easy like that with my students.”

“Oh, I’ll call.” Bobby reached out and clutched Wade’s hand, squeezing it in a gesture that could not quite be described as a handshake, but more like a small caress.

Their gazes met and locked. The connection was finally broken by his sister, Dawn, who came up to him and hissed in his ear, “Mom really needs you.”

Reluctantly, Bobby walked away from Wade, casting regretful looks back at him. Wade smiled and turned toward the windows once more, where outside the wind continued to toss the waves and force the clouds quickly across the sky.

*

Bobby waited until the day before he was scheduled to go back home to Chicago to call Wade. He didn’t want to wait that long or cut it that close, but family obligations, which included comforting a mother who seemed to believe that her life had died along with her husband, superseded Bobby’s desire to get to know this unexpected blast from the past.

As he listened to the ringing, he prayed Wade would be available. It would be good to have a break from mourning, to talk to someone who wasn’t so intimately connected to his family. If he was horrible for thinking that way, so be it.

No one answered the phone for four rings, and Bobby had just begun to think he had blown it and would probably never see Wade again when he picked up.

“Wade Carlisle.”

“Thank God I didn’t miss you,” Bobby gushed. “I’m leaving tomorrow, and I was really hoping we could get together for coffee, a drink, or even dinner before I have to head out.”

“Who is this?”

Bobby wanted to do the classic smack to the forehead. “I’m sorry. Let me start over. This is Bobby Nelson. How are you?”

Wade chuckled. “Actually, my powers of deduction are so great that I did know who was calling. I just wanted to give you shit.”

“Well, thank you for that.” Bobby paced the guest room, looking out at the Eastlake neighborhood across Lake Union and how the houseboats, regular boats, and buildings and trees rising up the bluff from the water reminded him of an Alaskan fishing village. “Anyway, as I was trying to say before I made an ass of myself, I was wondering if you’d have some time to get together today or this evening. I enjoyed talking with you at Ray’s and was hoping we could connect again before I go home.”

“Actually, my evening is wide open. Would your family mind if I stole you away for dinner? We could meet on the Hill at the Honey Hole.”

Bobby rolled his eyes. “Seriously? The Honey Hole?”

Wade laughed. “I know. I know. Not exactly the most appealing moniker for a couple of homos, but the sandwiches are the best, and the place has a laid-back, kinda funky vibe that I like. We can talk.”

“Okay, then. It’s a date. Should I just meet you there?”

“Hey, no worries. I can pick you up.”

“Okay; thanks.” Bobby gave Wade his mom’s address. “See you at what? Seven?”

“It’s a plan.”

*

They ended up not staying at the Honey Hole after they had their sandwiches and beer. The place was jam-packed with students, some of whom knew Wade. Things were just a bit too noisy and not private enough for them to actually talk.

So the pair of them ended up back in Wade’s car—the Seattle staple, a Subaru—taking it up to the neighborhood’s Volunteer Park. They parked on a drive that ran in front of the Asian Art Museum. Opposite the museum, the iconic Space Needle rose up, almost glowing, in the distance.

The park was quiet this midweek night in March, and Bobby ended up talking to Wade for almost two hours. He shared how dissatisfied he had been with his father growing up, how he longed for a more meaningful connection with the man.

“Sometimes,” Bobby said, “I wonder if that’s what made me gay.”

“What?” Wade asked, a disbelieving tone in his voice.

“You know, missing out on the love of my dad. Maybe it made me want to go seeking it elsewhere. Maybe all my promiscuity is rooted in that affection denied.”

Wade shook his head, and his dark eyes met Bobby’s across the car’s seat. “Bobby, I don’t think it works like that. I mean, maybe some 1960’s therapist might think that way, but we live in the age of Lady Gaga.”

“Huh?”

Wade grinned. “Baby, you were born this way. I think it’s pretty true.”

Bobby stared out at the night. If all his fucking and sucking couldn’t be tied to the affection he was starving for from his dad, what could all the endless hookups be tied to? Was he just naturally a libertine, a bottomless bottom who could never be completely filled? It was easier to think there was some rationale behind his promiscuity so he could understand himself, maybe even excuse himself. If, as Wade (and Lady Gaga) claimed, he was truly born this way, what did that say? That he had no scruples, no standards?

That he could do sex, but not love?

“Look,” Wade said, “I’m no shrink, but I think it makes sense that your unfulfilling relationship with your father might connect to your behavior today, but not for the reason you think.”

“I’m not sure I follow.”

Wade put up a placating hand. “I may be just blowing smoke here, because as I said, my education revolved around stories and poems and not how the mind works, but it makes sense to me that a little gay boy might fixate on his father’s love even more than a straight one. The fact that you didn’t get the love you deserved, that you needed, maybe even made you fixate on it all the more.

“And maybe that’s why you act out. Maybe that’s why you let yourself be used so indiscriminately.”

The words stung, and Bobby felt a sudden tightness in his chest. He wanted to bolt from the car. “What do you know about it?” he said softly.

A long silence followed. At last, Wade said, “I saw you.”

“You saw me? Saw me where?”

“The other night. At the Stallion. You didn’t notice me, but then you were pretty occupied.”

Bobby felt a wave of nausea overtake him. He opened the car door, hurried outside, where the cool night air felt marginally calming against the heat that had risen up to burn his face. Droplets of sweat were forming at his hairline. He remembered the crowd gathering around to watch him blow that one guy. How another crowd had lined up, practically, outside his room to watch him get noisily fucked on the narrow bed.

Suddenly, he didn’t want to see Wade ever again. He began walking rapidly away from the car, heading downhill, toward a copse of trees. He hoped to disappear into their shadows. He tasted the acid of bile at the back of his throat.

Wade caught up to him, gently touching his arm. Bobby yanked it away.

“I’m sorry. Are you okay?”

Bobby turned and stared at Wade. Even in the darkness, he could see the concern and sympathy radiating from Wade’s handsome face. Wade hadn’t said what he did to cause Bobby shame. Bobby knew that, but it didn’t lessen his remorse and embarrassment.

Staring at the stalwart pine trees before him, Bobby didn’t look at Wade as he asked, “So what were you doing there?” He couldn’t contain the bitterness in his voice. “I mean, you were trolling for dick too. Right?” Bobby spat out the question.

Wade took a second to respond. “Actually, I was there as a volunteer with Lifelong AIDS Alliance. One night a week, I go with some of the other guys to hand out condoms, lube, and safe-sex literature at the different bathhouses. I’ve been doing it for years. Most guys don’t want to make eye contact, but a few take what I’m handing out, and even fewer actually listen to what I have to say, but if I can prevent just one guy from getting infected with something that might be incurable, I can feel my time isn’t wasted.”

“So you watched me? What kind of sick shit is that? Did you get off on it?” Even though Bobby knew he was out of bounds, knew that voyeurism was not Wade’s purpose in going to the baths, he couldn’t stop the words, like bullets, from shooting out of his mouth, bitter. He felt violated, ashamed, defensive, and backed into a corner, all at once.

He remembered suddenly when he’d lived in Seattle and how this very park had been nicknamed Volunqueer Park because of all the lewd acts that took place in bushes, copses of trees, and even the old observation tower. He wondered if anything was going on right now and if he could join in, dropping wordlessly, facelessly to his knees, taking cock after cock into his mouth, obliterating the shame and embarrassment Wade had caused him to feel.

Bobby stared helplessly into the darkness, searching for figures moving in the trees.

There was no one, save for Wade, who had laid a hand on his arm. “Bobby. I do apologize. Really. I never meant to even bring this up to you, but the conversation sort of just led me there. I couldn’t have handled things worse. What you do is your business. I saw you the other night and recognized you from high school.” Wade stopped suddenly, as if it were hard for him to speak. He moved his hand away and put both hands on Bobby’s shoulders, seeking out his eyes with his own.

Wade spoke softly. “It’s none of my business, but I have to say it. What I saw made me sad. Because I think you’re better than that.”

“Oh, what do you know?” Bobby spat. “I was having a good time. I enjoy sex, okay?”

“That’s just it, sweetheart. I didn’t see you having a good time. Not on your face. I didn’t see any joy.”

Bobby shrugged so Wade’s grip on his shoulders would fall away. He stared down, hard, at the ground, digging the toe of his shoe into the grass. “So, what did you see?” He knew he was pretending not to care, but he did. Oh yes, he did.

Wade seemed to think about it for a moment. “I saw—and you’re not going to like this, but we’ve come this far—desperation.”

Bobby sighed.

“I saw determination, a kind of grim determination. Like you were making yourself go through the motions, like you were doing something you had to do, not something you really wanted to do. Your body was making all the right moves, but your face looked like someone working away at a job he hated.” Wade drew in a breath. “If I had seen you looking happy, looking like this was what you really wanted, I swear to God, Bobby, I never would have said a word to you.”

Bobby didn’t know what to say, probably because every word Wade had spoken was the truth. He could accept them on some deep, subconscious level. But Bobby didn’t know if he was ready to admit that to anyone, especially himself. It was as though Wade had thrown up a mirror, and that mirror revealed things to Bobby he simply did not want to see.

He felt like crying, but he wasn’t about to let that much weakness show. So he, as he always did, shoved his emotions deep down inside himself and blew out a big sigh. He gestured with his head to a row of benches behind them. “I appreciate your saying what you did. I know it must have been hard to get up the courage to talk to me like that, but can we start over? Can we just go over there and sit down on one of those benches and talk about, oh, the weather, or movies, or music? With all I’ve been through this week, I don’t really want the spotlight on me. And I don’t really want to psychoanalyze myself. I have someone I pay for that,” Bobby said, thinking of Camille D’Amico, back in Chicago.

Wade walked over to one of the benches and sat down. Bobby sat beside him. Wade said, “I apologize. I should never have thrown that stuff at you, not with your father just passing away and all. It was insensitive.”

Bobby simply nodded, staring straight ahead as the hill sloped down before him, revealing the glow of the Space Needle rising up into the night. He did not want to tell Wade it was okay. Because it wasn’t. Whether it needed to be said or not—well, that was something Bobby had a feeling he would be mulling over through the course of a long, sleepless night.

Once they sat down, though, silence hung in the air between them. The night had taken a cold turn, with a wind out of the north that brought a light drizzle. Bobby leaned into Wade so their shoulders touched, and he could feel the other man’s warmth.

“Can you just hold me?” Bobby finally said softly, his voice plaintive.

In response, Wade slid his arm around Bobby’s shoulders. They sat like that for a long while, the mist and chill seeping into their pores, invading their clothes, until at last the two of them shivered.

“We should get back to the car, maybe get you home,” Wade said.

In the car, Wade started the ignition, turned the heater on, the fan to high, but did not pull out of the parking space. In the darkness of the car, he asked, “We okay?”

“Oh yeah. I’m really glad you made the effort to reconnect with me. It was an unexpected bonus.”

“Me too. I wasn’t sure I’d even talk to you when I came to the funeral, but I couldn’t help myself.” Wade paused and then said, “I always admired you from afar back in high school. I couldn’t help it. You were the best-looking boy in class.”

“And now I pale, standing next to you.”

“Not at all, not at all. You’re still gorgeous. Probably even better looking than you were back then.”

Bobby took the compliment as an invitation. He leaned over and kissed Wade. The kiss was tender at first, and Wade didn’t pull away, as Bobby feared he might when he first inclined his head toward him. Bobby put a hand on the back of his neck, drawing him closer. Tentatively, he snaked his tongue inside Wade’s mouth, forgetting everything as his erection caused his pants to tighten.

Forgetting everything…

He used his tongue to part Wade’s lips, then his teeth, exploring the man’s open mouth, which tasted of the beer he had drunk, an echo that was both tart and sweet.

Wade let out a little moan, lifting his tongue to meet Bobby’s.

And then Bobby reached down between Wade’s legs, unable to help himself, to see if the kiss was having the same effect on Wade as it was on him. It was. He squeezed the column of flesh he could feel pressing against the denim. He moved his hand up to tug at Wade’s zipper.

And just like that, it was over.

Wade pulled away suddenly. Even in the dark, Bobby cringed because he could see Wade’s eyes flash with outrage. “What are you doing?” he asked.

Bobby grinned, but suddenly his stomach felt like there was a rat inside, gnawing with razor sharp teeth, trying to get out. “I was just taking things to the next logical step.”

“That’s not the next logical step for me.” Wade stared out the window, shifting his weight restlessly in his seat. He pulled his zipper back up.

“You were excited,” Bobby said softly.

“Yeah, so? You’re a hot guy. Nature took its course, but that doesn’t give you license to just grab my dick. The kiss was nice. Why did you have to go and ruin it?”

“What are you, some kind of prude?”

“No.” Wade shifted the car into gear and began driving, hands taut on the steering wheel, eyes sharply focused on the road.

He wouldn’t look at Bobby, certainly wouldn’t talk to him. They headed in silence, west down John Avenue to where it turned into Olive Way and finally Denny Way, which would intersect with Dexter Avenue. Bobby knew he was taking him home.

Because it had grown later in the evening, the traffic was sparse and the ride home took fewer than ten minutes. But the journey seemed longer, with an almost palpable sense of tension in the car, as if there was a third presence riding with them.

Wade pulled up quickly in front of Bobby’s mother’s condo building. Bobby didn’t dare venture a word. He opened the car door to exit, and Wade grabbed his arm.

“Wait. Don’t go. I don’t want to leave things like this.”

Bobby reclosed the door, slumping into his seat. “Look, I apologize if I stepped out of line. Most guys I know wouldn’t have minded me grabbing their junk. Sometimes that happens before we even exchange names.” Bobby laughed, but there was no mirth in it. “I misinterpreted or misjudged or something.”

“I’m not most guys, Bobby.”

“I know.”

“This might sound silly in this day and age, when everybody’s hooking up online, making easy connections, changing lovers as frequently as they change their designer drawers.” He snickered. “But me? I’m a romantic.” He drew in a big breath. “You know what?”

“What?”

“Once upon a time, I was just like you. See, back when I lost all the weight, then had the surgery to get rid of all the excess skin left over, I was left with this hot guy I didn’t even recognize in the mirror.”

“That must have been exciting.”

“I don’t know if it was. Because I still had that fat, insecure guy living inside me. That guy never got any admiring glances. That guy never got cruised. And, sadly, that guy believed he didn’t deserve those things.

“So when guys began to notice me, began to hit on me, it was unreal. And I went a little crazy. Every guy—and there were many, too many to count—became a validation for me. That I was hot. That I was desirable. That I was not that fat guy no one wanted. The sex became like a drug for me. If I wasn’t hooking up, the old insecurities crept right back in. The fat guy showed up in the mirror again.”

Bobby heard what sounded like himself in Wade’s words, and it shook him. He longed to bolt from the car, hide away in his room, and contemplate what Wade had said. “What did you do? How did you get to be this romantic?” Bobby really wanted to know.

“I did a lot of hard thinking. When I got diagnosed as HIV positive, that was a wake-up call, and I started seeing a shrink. What I just told you? About validating myself in sex? In the arms of dozens of different strangers? That wasn’t an easy realization. Like you, I just told myself I was having fun, making the most of my new bod. But I came to understand what I was doing. And I came to realize no matter how many times I hooked up, no matter how many loads I took, that didn’t make me any more lovable.” He snorted. “That fat guy, I came to find out, was just as lovable as the new thin one. And I think it took my realization of that truth for me to understand what I really wanted.”

“Which was?”

“Don’t you know, Bobby?” Wade stared at him through the darkness of the car’s interior.

Bobby knew. “I think I do.”

“What I really wanted, Mr. Nelson, was love. And I learned that I was good enough to wait for it, to not settle for less than hot sex and romance, all in one package.” Wade laughed. “I’m not saying I’m some saint. We have bodies; we have needs. But I no longer hook up indiscriminately. I want to know the guy before we have sex. I want to know if there’s even a small chance we might have a connection.” He grabbed Bobby’s hand and squeezed it. “I want to feel a spark.”

Bobby took his hand away. “And you didn’t feel a spark with me?”

Wade snatched Bobby’s hand back, brought it to his lips, and kissed it. “Not yet. But I don’t do blowjobs in cars anymore. At least not with a guy I just reconnected with and, really, hardly knew before tonight. It’s not my style.”

Bobby sank back into the upholstery, his mind a jumble of thoughts. “So where does this leave us? I get on a plane tomorrow, bound for Chicago.”

“Maybe I’ll come see you. That is, if I get an invite.” Wade grinned.

“You’d do that?”

“Come see you? In a heartbeat! I’ve never been to Chicago.”

“Well, maybe you could look into flights for next weekend?” Bobby asked hopefully.

Wade shook his head. “Let’s give it a little time, Bobby. Everything I told you tonight, I told you because I suspect we have some of the same issues. You just haven’t dealt with yours yet. When you do, then maybe we can get together. Maybe then, we can even feel a spark.” Wade grinned.

Bobby said, “Maybe I should just move back here to Seattle.” Bobby thought of what he had in Chicago—a sterile, high-tech apartment, a job that paid him very well yet gave him nothing in the way of personal satisfaction, a bunch of sex partners who never once had led to a “spark,” and worst, a best friend who had turned his back on Bobby. The turning away was justifiable, he knew that, but it didn’t lessen the pain. He missed Caden every day.

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but the fact that you would say that tells me you’re not ready,” Wade said. “No, you go home. You see that therapist you mentioned in the park, you work on loving yourself first, then we can plan a weekend.” Wade gnawed at his lower lip.

“You’d wait for me?” Bobby was all childish hope.

“I can’t promise that. But right now, I’d like to see you again. Like to see where this might go. I’m not saying I won’t wait. I’m not saying I will. But that’s not the point. You need to work on yourself for Bobby, not for Wade.”

Bobby stared down at the floor, knowing in some part deep inside that Wade was right. Finally, he raised his head to look at Wade. “One last kiss?”

Wade came across the seat and kissed Bobby tenderly, one hand stroking his cheek, but there was no tongue. When they pulled away, Wade stared into Bobby’s eyes, and the look turned his insides to jelly. “Go. Find you. And then call me.”

“I will.”

Bobby got out of the car and headed up the walk. He turned to wave at Wade, but he was already gone.