KEVIN HAD GONE INTO work early and came home at noon. When he opened the front door, the house was quiet, too quiet. Marco always had music on during the day—jazz, rock, tango, blues.
“Hello?” he called out.
Merciless quiet enveloped him.
He found Marco in bed, eyes closed, breathing normally.
“Wake up,” he shouted.
Marco didn’t respond. Kevin screamed in his ear. Marco still didn’t respond. He pinched the flesh between Marco’s thumb and forefinger. Marco lay flaccid. He pressed his knuckles into Marco’s sternum, twisting downward with more and more force until Marco moaned feebly and lifted his right arm.
Kevin curled himself into a ball on the floor and rocked in a futile attempt to repel the facts pummeling him. Marco couldn’t speak. He couldn’t move half his body. It was unlikely he would ever do either again. Kevin’s only escape route was to think rationally. He ticked through a checklist he knew by rote. Marco must have had a stroke, or a mass was growing in the right side of his brain. There was one treatable possibility, Toxoplasma infection. If it was anything else, Marco would survive a week, two at most. Even if this opportunistic parasite was the cause, it was probably too late for any meaningful recovery.
Kevin phoned in two prescriptions to a pharmacy on Castro Street and ran to his car. On returning, he placed a pill on the back of Marco’s tongue, added a teaspoon of water, massaged the sides of his throat to make him swallow, and repeated the process.
He hadn’t called an ambulance. Marco had consistently been clear about not wanting extreme measures. Taking him to the hospital is pointless, he had thought at first. Now he wasn’t so certain. He put the internal debate on hold. Herb would be here soon. He could decide.
Kevin went to his desk and composed a to-do list—call Mexico City, cancel everything at work for the next two weeks, find Marco’s signed will. Nothing else came to mind. He gave up and sat beside Marco, who lay inert except for the rise and fall of his chest.
Herb drove to Diamond Heights after ICU sign-out rounds. He stopped on the way at a gourmet deli to buy garlic roast chicken, roasted bell peppers, a baguette, and a bottle of Sauvignon Blanc.
He had been to their apartment the previous summer. Marco had been in good spirits that evening, but his sunken frame and the anemic pallor of his lips and nails were unmistakable signs he was nearing the end of life. The idea of Kevin witnessing his lover’s daily deterioration had distressed Herb, though he was uplifted by seeing how competently Kevin dealt with Marco’s many needs, parsing them into smaller components, each having a practical solution—a minor medication change, setting alarms and posting reminder notes for Marco, hiring help for whenever he had to be away.
The last time he was here, the upstairs glass wall of their apartment had been ablaze, reflecting an ocher sunset. Tonight, the windows were black. He wondered if anyone was home, but within seconds of pressing the buzzer, Kevin opened the door.
“Thanks,” Kevin said in a flat, numb monotone, his bloodshot eyes fixed on the bag of food Herb carried. “I should eat.”
Almost as an afterthought, he said, “Marco’s in a coma.”
He led Herb to the only source of light, a reading lamp at the far end of the apartment. Standing by the bed, they watched Marco breathe.
“Would you examine him? I can’t trust my judgment.”
He gave Herb his stethoscope and rubber reflex hammer and retreated into the darkness.
Herb left the bedroom navigating blindly until his eyes adjusted. He found Kevin in the living room, staring out the window. Herb coughed politely.
“What do you think?” Kevin asked in the same monotone.
“A right hemisphere lesion,” Herb said uneasily, “Could be an infection, tumor, maybe an infarct or a bleed?”
“That’s what I thought.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Kevin’s attention was directed at the waxing crescent moon setting in the western sky.
“It might be toxo,” Herb suggested.
“I know. I already started him on sulfa and pyrimethamine. Not that it matters. It’s better for him to stay here, isn’t it?”
“Did he say he wants to die at home?”
Kevin nodded.
“Can you…?”
“It’s the least I can do.”
“He could be made comfortable in a hospice.”
Kevin’s face hardened.
“Herb, do you have any personal experience with hospice?”
“I do. Remember Sister Anna? She spent the end of her life in a hospice. I thought the staff was incredibly attentive. She had a little tape deck playing Gregorian chants. It was…serene.”
“Sorry, Herb, but an impression based on a cameo appearance you made there is not a persuasive testimonial.”
“Kevin, I was there a lot, daily during her last week. I was very fond of her. It was more than a doctor-patient relationship for me.”
“Herb, no way! Don’t tell me you had an affair with a nun.”
Kevin laughed until tears blurred his vision. He arose, stumbled into the kitchen, switched on the lights, and opened two beers.
“Let’s eat,” he called out.
They each succeeded in swallowing a few bites of food. Kevin opened two more beers.
Halfway through the third round, Kevin asked, “Were you ever in Boy Scouts?”
“I was. Why?”
“Just curious. They have scouts in Mexico, but Marco never joined. Probably his parents thought it was beneath him. I belonged for a while. Why were you a scout? Because your friends were, or did your parents make you do it?”
Bewildered, Herb answered, “Actually, it was my idea.”
Raindrops began spattering against the kitchen windows, and Herb recalled a wet, autumn evening, standing at attention in a damp church basement. The smell of mildew was nauseating. He concentrated on the freshly laundered khaki scent of his uniform and the bright merit badges he was proud to have on his sash. The boys were clustered by patrol. His was the troop’s smallest with only four members—Herb, two boys whose parents were from Latin America, and a kid who rarely spoke or looked anyone in the eye. None of them had been invited to join other patrols. Herb hadn’t minded. He was grateful to be allowed to wear the uniform.
Herb saw Kevin was waiting for an explanation.
“I must have believed being a Boy Scout would make me a real American boy.”
“That’s great!” Kevin roared, “You wanted to be a real American boy. So did I, Herb. So did I.”
Turning reflective, he added, “Boy Scouts didn’t help.”
Herb imagined coming of age in the early1960s, knowing you were gay. Had that fear of being discovered been worse than his own childhood nightmares of Japanese soldiers invading the United States to exterminate every Chinese who had escaped the war?
Kevin interrupted this train of thought.
“Do you remember any of the Boy Scout Law?”
“I think so.”
The third beer kicked in, and Herb automatically recited, “A scout is trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.”
“Amazing! How did you do that? You are the last person I would have expected to know all twelve Scout virtues, and in the right order, too.”
“I didn’t realize you had such a low opinion of me.”
“Touché,” Kevin laughed.
He immediately became serious again.
“Did you believe in the code? You must have if you still remember it.”
“I guess so. The Scout Law did embody the ethos of the times.”
“Was there a hierarchy? I mean, were some of those virtues more important to you than others?”
Herb was mystified, but he could hardly begrudge Kevin.
“Let me think…trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, and kind. Those all fit with what I thought Americans were supposed to stand for. I’m not sure about the rest. I do remember the oath we had to recite made me nervous. ‘On my honor I will do my best to do my duty to God and my country and to obey the Scout Law.’ I worried I’d be putting myself in jeopardy if I ever broke one of the rules. I even asked my mother if swearing to obey the law was OK.”
“What’d she say?”
“She told me not to take it so literally. She was all for assimilation.”
“Interesting,” said Kevin as he gazed off into space.
Afterwards, parked in his driveway, Herb sat in the car mulling over what he had wanted to ask Kevin but of course never would. Last summer, when Marco told him how the two had met, Herb deduced they must have become lovers before anyone would have known that gay men who didn’t use condoms might be transmitting a fatal disease. On hearing Marco was sick, Herb had commiserated with Gwen, but she revealed nothing. Maybe she knew no more than he did. He clutched the steering wheel in frustration. He couldn’t think of any way to help Kevin.