Marshall Thornton's Blog, page 2
May 24, 2013
Why I'll Never Be Post-Gay
Every so often, on the Internet or in discussion, the concept of post-gay comes up. Often it’s brought up by people who don’t even know the phrase but do know the concept. Post-gay is the idea that the queer community, even though we haven’t yet gotten our full civil rights, will soon be just like everyone else; that we will not need to define ourselves by our sexuality anymore than a heterosexual might.
Whenever this comes up it irks me to no end. Do people have their heads in the sand? Don’t they look around? Yes, some scholars have deemed that we’re in a post-feminist era, while others have declared a post-black era. However, I’m pretty sure if you ask women or African-Americans you’ll find that most do not agree that we live in a post anything. Every day women are fighting against the rollback of their reproductive rights, something that would be completely unnecessary in a truly post-feminist world. In a post-black world the invalidation of Affirmative Action laws would be a non-event, there’d be no press coverage, the NAACP would not object – in fact, they’d have no membership. On a more simplistic level, ask yourself this question, in a post-black world we would even know what the phrase driving-while-black means? These are just a few examples of why these concepts are complete fallacies.
One of the steps in obtaining full civil rights for all minorities is to convince the majority that you’re like them; that we’re all human and that at the end of the day we’re more similar than different. Certainly, there’s truth to this. It’s not simply a tactic to gain civil rights. But, I think we take it too far. While I believe we all deserve the same rights and should be treated the same under law, we are clearly not all the same.
Different does not mean unequal. I’ve had many close female friends. They think differently. They have different experiences of life. They have different choices to make. None of that makes them less than I am; or less deserving of equal rights. It just makes them different. And the same goes for my African-American friends. We have many similarities, common interests that allow us to be friends but I would never be so rude as to say my experience of this country is the same as theirs, because it’s not. We’re different.
To say that we’re in or about to be in a post-gay era is to ignore the minority groups that have come before us and to ignore that they continue to struggle with misogyny and racism. Yes, for both groups the fight for equal rights under the law is pretty nearly complete and you could say that they’ve each moved into another era. But it’s an era that would more appropriately be called post-equality. Women and African-Americans are both in a post-equality era where they continue to fight for acceptance and continue to fight those who would chip away a their equality.
And that, I think, is where we’re heading. The queer community is heading into a post-equality era. When we achieve our full civil rights that’s where we’ll be. Post- means after. After-equality. Not after-gay. That suggests that we’re somehow not going to be gay after we achieve our full civil rights. I find that offensive. Of course, we’re going to still be gay and some people are still going to hate it and we’ll experience the same kind of push back that women and African-Americans have experienced.
I’d also like to point out that the entire concept that in a post-gay world individuals will not define themselves by their sexuality presupposes that heterosexuals do not define themselves by their sexuality. Of course heterosexuals define themselves by their sexuality. It only appears that they don’t because heterosexuality is so woven into our society as to go unnoticed. Yes, when we reach a post-equality era the homosexual experience will become similar to the heterosexual experience. But similar is not the same. While they are listed as synonyms in my nifty Apple dictionary, “similar” means resembling without being identical while “same” means identical. I think this is where some of the problem comes from. I think we hear these words and don’t always apply the correct meanings. Heterosexuals hear that gays want equal rights. They translate that to mean we want to be the same. But that’s not entirely correct. We want the same legal rights. Who we choose to be and how we choose to live the parts of our lives not governed by law is and will always be different than heterosexuals.
So, why does this bother me so much? For one thing, I feel that the phrase post-gay diminishes the, admittedly small activism in my own life, and the much larger activism more heroic individuals have pursued. It’s as though what’s meant is “Okay, done with that, now let’s forget about it and we’ll all be the same.” The other thing that bothers me about the term, of course, is that it’s applied to fiction. Post-gay fiction. This is fiction where the main characters sexuality is not relevant. He or she is gay but it’s not important to the story. I’ve read books that might be classified this way. They can be enjoyable but mostly they just seem to me as though the characters have been de-sexed or, worse, hetero-sexualized in order to appeal to a wider audience. To me, writing post-gay fiction is more a marketing concept than a path to good writing.
As far as literature goes, what we will see, and may be seeing signs of it, in a post-equality world is what you see in woman’s fiction and African-American fiction: both have strong genre fiction written specifically for those audiences, and both also have books that crossover into the mainstream. Books that crossover will not have to fit a post-gay ideal anymore than women’s fiction or African-American fiction needs to. The best example I can think of is Toni Morrison. Many of her books have crossed over to mainstream success. I’ve read of couple of them and I would never describe them as post-black. You see, it’s the audience that will be changing. To get ahead of the audience and create characters who sexuality is irrelevant is not necessary. In fact, I believe it’s homophobic. We need to keep writing fiction where a character’s sexuality is relevant and trust that the audience will catch up.
I’ve titled this blog “Why I’ll Never Be Post-Gay” because I think the identity I’ve spent a lifetime building, just as so many others have, has merit. I think the differences I see in the queer community are worth recording in my characters. It’s precisely these differences that post-gay fiction would shove aside in favor of characters who aren’t noticeably different.
(Originally published on QueerMeUp)
Whenever this comes up it irks me to no end. Do people have their heads in the sand? Don’t they look around? Yes, some scholars have deemed that we’re in a post-feminist era, while others have declared a post-black era. However, I’m pretty sure if you ask women or African-Americans you’ll find that most do not agree that we live in a post anything. Every day women are fighting against the rollback of their reproductive rights, something that would be completely unnecessary in a truly post-feminist world. In a post-black world the invalidation of Affirmative Action laws would be a non-event, there’d be no press coverage, the NAACP would not object – in fact, they’d have no membership. On a more simplistic level, ask yourself this question, in a post-black world we would even know what the phrase driving-while-black means? These are just a few examples of why these concepts are complete fallacies.
One of the steps in obtaining full civil rights for all minorities is to convince the majority that you’re like them; that we’re all human and that at the end of the day we’re more similar than different. Certainly, there’s truth to this. It’s not simply a tactic to gain civil rights. But, I think we take it too far. While I believe we all deserve the same rights and should be treated the same under law, we are clearly not all the same.
Different does not mean unequal. I’ve had many close female friends. They think differently. They have different experiences of life. They have different choices to make. None of that makes them less than I am; or less deserving of equal rights. It just makes them different. And the same goes for my African-American friends. We have many similarities, common interests that allow us to be friends but I would never be so rude as to say my experience of this country is the same as theirs, because it’s not. We’re different.
To say that we’re in or about to be in a post-gay era is to ignore the minority groups that have come before us and to ignore that they continue to struggle with misogyny and racism. Yes, for both groups the fight for equal rights under the law is pretty nearly complete and you could say that they’ve each moved into another era. But it’s an era that would more appropriately be called post-equality. Women and African-Americans are both in a post-equality era where they continue to fight for acceptance and continue to fight those who would chip away a their equality.
And that, I think, is where we’re heading. The queer community is heading into a post-equality era. When we achieve our full civil rights that’s where we’ll be. Post- means after. After-equality. Not after-gay. That suggests that we’re somehow not going to be gay after we achieve our full civil rights. I find that offensive. Of course, we’re going to still be gay and some people are still going to hate it and we’ll experience the same kind of push back that women and African-Americans have experienced.
I’d also like to point out that the entire concept that in a post-gay world individuals will not define themselves by their sexuality presupposes that heterosexuals do not define themselves by their sexuality. Of course heterosexuals define themselves by their sexuality. It only appears that they don’t because heterosexuality is so woven into our society as to go unnoticed. Yes, when we reach a post-equality era the homosexual experience will become similar to the heterosexual experience. But similar is not the same. While they are listed as synonyms in my nifty Apple dictionary, “similar” means resembling without being identical while “same” means identical. I think this is where some of the problem comes from. I think we hear these words and don’t always apply the correct meanings. Heterosexuals hear that gays want equal rights. They translate that to mean we want to be the same. But that’s not entirely correct. We want the same legal rights. Who we choose to be and how we choose to live the parts of our lives not governed by law is and will always be different than heterosexuals.
So, why does this bother me so much? For one thing, I feel that the phrase post-gay diminishes the, admittedly small activism in my own life, and the much larger activism more heroic individuals have pursued. It’s as though what’s meant is “Okay, done with that, now let’s forget about it and we’ll all be the same.” The other thing that bothers me about the term, of course, is that it’s applied to fiction. Post-gay fiction. This is fiction where the main characters sexuality is not relevant. He or she is gay but it’s not important to the story. I’ve read books that might be classified this way. They can be enjoyable but mostly they just seem to me as though the characters have been de-sexed or, worse, hetero-sexualized in order to appeal to a wider audience. To me, writing post-gay fiction is more a marketing concept than a path to good writing.
As far as literature goes, what we will see, and may be seeing signs of it, in a post-equality world is what you see in woman’s fiction and African-American fiction: both have strong genre fiction written specifically for those audiences, and both also have books that crossover into the mainstream. Books that crossover will not have to fit a post-gay ideal anymore than women’s fiction or African-American fiction needs to. The best example I can think of is Toni Morrison. Many of her books have crossed over to mainstream success. I’ve read of couple of them and I would never describe them as post-black. You see, it’s the audience that will be changing. To get ahead of the audience and create characters who sexuality is irrelevant is not necessary. In fact, I believe it’s homophobic. We need to keep writing fiction where a character’s sexuality is relevant and trust that the audience will catch up.
I’ve titled this blog “Why I’ll Never Be Post-Gay” because I think the identity I’ve spent a lifetime building, just as so many others have, has merit. I think the differences I see in the queer community are worth recording in my characters. It’s precisely these differences that post-gay fiction would shove aside in favor of characters who aren’t noticeably different.
(Originally published on QueerMeUp)
April 20, 2013
Excerpt from Boystown 5: Murder Book
Chapter One
Former Chicago Police Detective Bertram Edgar Harker died sometime during the evening of September 28, 1982. It was a Tuesday. I wish I'd been with him when he died but that wasn't possible. He didn't die in a hospital or at home. My best guess is that he died in the back of a van parked in a dirty alley somewhere on the northwest side. He was the seventh victim of the Bughouse Slasher.
That night, I came home later than usual. I'd been working a case for Carolyn O'Hara, who ran a temp agency called Carolyn's Crew. One of her clients, an advertising wunderkind who'd started his own company a year before but was now going through a vicious divorce, was trying to claim bankruptcy. Carolyn was sure the owner had the money he owed her and was just hiding assets from his wife, and by extension Carolyn.
After I followed the twenty-nine-year-old business prodigy around for a few days, I was pretty sure she was right. Irwin Meier drove a brand new Jaguar XJS--sticker price roughly thirty-two thousand--and lived in a pretty brick house in Evanston right across from Lake Michigan. On paper, the house belonged to his eighteen-year-old, live-in girlfriend, and, upon further investigation, I discovered the recent high school senior also leased the Jaguar.
Shifting through the reams of paper Carolyn's lawyer provided, I attempted to find the path money had taken from Meier to his nubile girlfriend, where it had ended up, and exactly when the money had been moved. The closer the exchange to the bankruptcy, the more likely the creditors would be able to attach the funds. It was interesting work, something I hadn't done before, so I'd been enjoying myself and lost track of time.
Walking into my apartment around seven, I called out for Harker and was met by silence. I hurried down the entry hallway and into the four-room garden apartment that wound around itself. Spare room, living room, bedroom, kitchen. The rooms were dark and empty. I turned on lights and saw dust in the air, making the place seem like it had been abandoned for a very long time. Where was Harker? Lately, he hadn't been feeling well and had been sticking close to home. Well, lately as in the last nine months, but more so in the preceding weeks. He'd had an energetic spurt at the end of summer which had slowly faded.
That meant I had no idea where he might have gone. I thought about calling his mother, but she lived out in Edison Park and there was no way he'd have gone there unless... I considered the possibility that something had happened to her and he'd rushed to her side. But that didn't make sense. I'd been in my office, sitting next to a telephone, only a few blocks away. If something had happened to his mother, Harker would have called me to drive him wherever he needed to go. Wouldn't he?
I called her anyway. It took less than two seconds to find out Harker wasn't there.
"Mrs. Harker, it's Nick."
"What happened? Is Bertram all right?"
"Yeah, he's fine," I said reflexively as I scrambled for another reason for the call. "So, did you come by today?"
"No. Bertram was tired. But he call me. We have very nice, long talk."
"You're coming tomorrow?"
"Of course."
"Would you like me to come and get you?"
"No, I take bus like always."
I could hear suspicion growing in her voice. Neither of us relished the possibility of being in a car together. I covered by saying, "I was going to be out that way and Bert thought I could give you a ride."
"No. I take bus," she said and then hung up on me.
I was relieved she hadn't figured out something was wrong. I didn't want her at my doorstop dogging my every move. I sat down at my desk with the phone on my lap trying to think who else to call. Harker's life wasn't exactly a social whirlwind. Neither was mine for that matter.
There was the tiniest chance he was with his partner from the eighteenth, Frank Connors. But that didn't make sense. They talked on the phone or Connors came by. He knew how sick Harker was; I didn't think Connors would ask him to go anywhere. I could call him, but decided to hold out. Connors was the last call I should make. If I couldn't find Bert, if he were missing, I'd need Connors to pull strings and get the CPD moving as quickly as possible. I told myself I was being paranoid and tried to think of other calls I could make.
I only came up with one call, a call I didn't want to make. Over the summer, Harker had befriended a wannabe journalist named Christian Baylor who was interested in the Bughouse Slasher. Since the killings had originally been Bert's cases, Christian was all over him for information in hopes of writing an article for Chicago magazine. In the process, they'd become close. Closer than I liked, actually. Biting the bullet, I dialed Christian's number. It rang several times, and I wondered if he hadn't gotten home from his new job out in Downer's Grove, or if maybe he was actually with Harker. Finally, he snapped up the phone, out of breath. "Hello."
"It's Nick. Have you seen Bert?"
"What? No. He's not at home?"
"No, he's not."
"Then where is he?" Panic already infected his voice.
"I don't know," I said. "All right, thanks--"
"Wait, should I come over?"
"No. Don't."
"But...will you have him call me when he gets home? I'm going to worry."
"Yeah, whatever."
I hung up and tried to think what to do next. The only constructive thing that came to mind was walking my neighborhood. It was possible he'd needed something and had gone out to the store to get it. Maybe he'd wanted aspirin or had a craving for ice cream.
I was out the door in less than a minute and heading down Roscoe. The street was quiet, my neighbors settling in for an evening of television. When I got to Broadway, I headed up to Addison to stick my head into the White Hen Pantry to see if he'd needed some...well some anything. He wasn't there. I headed down Broadway, peeked into The Closet, knowing he wouldn't be in there having a drink but needing to check anyway. I walked through the Melrose, Unabridged Books, and Walgreens. He wasn't in any of those places. I walked down Belmont until I got to Halsted then did the same kind of search over there. Nothing. I walked the alleys in between, figuring there was only so far he could go. And if he'd had to vomit or had had a sudden bout of diarrhea...but again, nothing.
When I got back to the apartment it was just after nine. I walked by my front door and let myself into the main building. I climbed the carpeted stairs to the second floor and knocked on the apartment right above mine. A young lesbian named Sue lived there and I hoped against hope that she'd seen something. She worked during the day, something to do with the big computers FirstChicago needed to keep track of their money. She probably hadn't even been home when Harker left.
I knocked again and waited. I could smell the polish used on the wooden banister, mildew in the carpet, and a touch of charred meat from someone's dinner. I heard a television playing on the floor above me. Sue didn't come to the door. I gave up.
On the floor above, I discovered the television was playing in the back apartment that faced the courtyard on one side and the pass-through on the other. They were unlikely to have seen Bert coming or going so I didn't bother knocking. In the apartment above Sue's there didn't seem to be anyone home. I tried to put a face on the tenant but couldn't. In fact, I wasn't even sure anyone lived there at the moment.
When I went back downstairs, I called three nearby hospitals and asked if Harker had been admitted. They'd never heard of him. So, finally, at nearly ten o'clock I called Connors at home, having found his number in the address book Harker kept in the top drawer of our bedroom dresser.
Connors was annoyed to be hearing from me.
"Harker's missing," I told him before he could cuss me out too badly. I quickly went over everything I'd done to find him.
"Stay there in case he comes home," he said. "I'll do some nosing around and call if I find anything."
He hung up and I began to wait in earnest. Helpless. Alone. Time crawled like it had just been slammed in the knees with a baseball bat. I found myself glancing at the VCR every few minutes. 11:01; 11:05; 11:07; 11:08. God, it was excruciating. I knew, I just knew, something bad had happened and, sitting there, smoking cigarette after cigarette in my living room, I waited to find out exactly what it was. It was like the moment before the nurse stuck you with a needle, or the one before the dentist pulled out the decayed tooth, except it went on hour after hour.
I couldn't even wonder if he was dead. I didn't have the nerve. I did wonder if, someday, when Harker died, would I know it? Even if I wasn't with him? Was our bond that strong? Would he reach out across time and space and touch me, just to let me know he was no longer in this world? Probably not, I decided.
The call came at eight twenty-three the next morning. I hadn't slept all night except for a few fuzzy minutes here and there. I snatched up the phone before the first ring finished.
"Connors?"
"It's bad, Nick," I heard him say. "He's gone."
"What hospital?" I asked.
"He wasn't at a hospital."
"Where was he?"
"We found his body beside the Chicago River, near Hooker Street. His throat was slashed."
"No," I said. "That can't be."
Connors was wrong; he'd made a mistake. I knew how Harker would die. He would die in a hospital of this new disease, AIDS. That was how things were going to play out. We knew it wasn't going to be pleasant, but the sheets would be clean, the nurses would be friendly but concerned, and I would be there next to him.
"The Bughouse Slasher got him," Connors said.
I felt like I might puke so I walked into the bathroom, and as soon as I got in there I felt an uncontrollable desire to lie on the floor, quickly. I managed to do it without hitting my head on any of the porcelain fixtures. My eyes shut of their own accord and maybe fifteen, twenty seconds later, I came to staring at the phone receiver I'd dragged into the bathroom with me and which now lay a few feet from my face. The cord straggled back to the base, sitting by the bathroom door, beyond that the phone line wiggled through the apartment.
The receiver squawked, "Nick? Nick, are you all right?"
I grabbed it. "Yeah, I'm here," I said. "I needed a moment."
"Yeah. I know."
"I guess I should call his mother."
"I already called her," Connors said. "Legally, I had to call her first. Hell, legally I'm probably not even supposed to call you."
He was probably right, so I kept my mouth shut. There were surprisingly few things going on in my head at that particular moment. It was as though someone had poured in a bucket of tar. Things had slowed down to a near stop.
"Well, thank you for calling me," I said, because that's what you say.
"We're going to need to search your place, Nick. You know, because Bert lived there."
"Do you have a warrant?"
"I could get one," Connors said, his voice instantly stiff and professional. "I'd rather not."
I left a long pause. "Give me two hours."
"What do you need two hours for?"
"I'd like to put my pants on. Or do you want me sitting around buck naked when you search the place?" I wasn't buck naked, I was still wearing the clothes I'd worn the day before. I waited for him to say that it wouldn't take two hours to put my pants on, since of course it wouldn't. But he didn't. He knew it would take at least twenty-four hours to get a warrant; he was getting a break.
"Two hours," he said and hung up.
As much as I wanted to lie back down on the bathroom floor, I knew there was something more important I had to do. Sitting on the old desk shoved into a corner of my living room was the murder book Harker had been working on since he got sick. I assumed there was one like it at the eighteenth, probably sitting on Connors desk. A three-hole binder, five inches thick, blue; it was filled with six inches of paper: autopsies, arrest reports, tip sheets, computer runs. It had been there, growing, for months and months, and I'd never looked inside.
Now I did, and was surprised by what I found. I'd thought Harker had been playing at the book. I'd thought it was barely real. But there was so much more in it than I'd expected. He'd given me the impression he was reconstructing the book from his memory of the original murder book, but there were copies of...well, pretty much everything. It looked like he had every piece of paper the police had. Piece by piece, Connors had brought him copies of everything on the Bughouse Slasher cases. Things Harker never should have had as a disabled police officer.
This was what Connors was coming to get. I wasn't entirely sure how, but the book was important. Had Harker followed the clues in the book until he got too close to the Slasher? Had it gotten him killed? At that moment, it barely made sense. I hoped it would soon.
Former Chicago Police Detective Bertram Edgar Harker died sometime during the evening of September 28, 1982. It was a Tuesday. I wish I'd been with him when he died but that wasn't possible. He didn't die in a hospital or at home. My best guess is that he died in the back of a van parked in a dirty alley somewhere on the northwest side. He was the seventh victim of the Bughouse Slasher.
That night, I came home later than usual. I'd been working a case for Carolyn O'Hara, who ran a temp agency called Carolyn's Crew. One of her clients, an advertising wunderkind who'd started his own company a year before but was now going through a vicious divorce, was trying to claim bankruptcy. Carolyn was sure the owner had the money he owed her and was just hiding assets from his wife, and by extension Carolyn.
After I followed the twenty-nine-year-old business prodigy around for a few days, I was pretty sure she was right. Irwin Meier drove a brand new Jaguar XJS--sticker price roughly thirty-two thousand--and lived in a pretty brick house in Evanston right across from Lake Michigan. On paper, the house belonged to his eighteen-year-old, live-in girlfriend, and, upon further investigation, I discovered the recent high school senior also leased the Jaguar.
Shifting through the reams of paper Carolyn's lawyer provided, I attempted to find the path money had taken from Meier to his nubile girlfriend, where it had ended up, and exactly when the money had been moved. The closer the exchange to the bankruptcy, the more likely the creditors would be able to attach the funds. It was interesting work, something I hadn't done before, so I'd been enjoying myself and lost track of time.
Walking into my apartment around seven, I called out for Harker and was met by silence. I hurried down the entry hallway and into the four-room garden apartment that wound around itself. Spare room, living room, bedroom, kitchen. The rooms were dark and empty. I turned on lights and saw dust in the air, making the place seem like it had been abandoned for a very long time. Where was Harker? Lately, he hadn't been feeling well and had been sticking close to home. Well, lately as in the last nine months, but more so in the preceding weeks. He'd had an energetic spurt at the end of summer which had slowly faded.
That meant I had no idea where he might have gone. I thought about calling his mother, but she lived out in Edison Park and there was no way he'd have gone there unless... I considered the possibility that something had happened to her and he'd rushed to her side. But that didn't make sense. I'd been in my office, sitting next to a telephone, only a few blocks away. If something had happened to his mother, Harker would have called me to drive him wherever he needed to go. Wouldn't he?
I called her anyway. It took less than two seconds to find out Harker wasn't there.
"Mrs. Harker, it's Nick."
"What happened? Is Bertram all right?"
"Yeah, he's fine," I said reflexively as I scrambled for another reason for the call. "So, did you come by today?"
"No. Bertram was tired. But he call me. We have very nice, long talk."
"You're coming tomorrow?"
"Of course."
"Would you like me to come and get you?"
"No, I take bus like always."
I could hear suspicion growing in her voice. Neither of us relished the possibility of being in a car together. I covered by saying, "I was going to be out that way and Bert thought I could give you a ride."
"No. I take bus," she said and then hung up on me.
I was relieved she hadn't figured out something was wrong. I didn't want her at my doorstop dogging my every move. I sat down at my desk with the phone on my lap trying to think who else to call. Harker's life wasn't exactly a social whirlwind. Neither was mine for that matter.
There was the tiniest chance he was with his partner from the eighteenth, Frank Connors. But that didn't make sense. They talked on the phone or Connors came by. He knew how sick Harker was; I didn't think Connors would ask him to go anywhere. I could call him, but decided to hold out. Connors was the last call I should make. If I couldn't find Bert, if he were missing, I'd need Connors to pull strings and get the CPD moving as quickly as possible. I told myself I was being paranoid and tried to think of other calls I could make.
I only came up with one call, a call I didn't want to make. Over the summer, Harker had befriended a wannabe journalist named Christian Baylor who was interested in the Bughouse Slasher. Since the killings had originally been Bert's cases, Christian was all over him for information in hopes of writing an article for Chicago magazine. In the process, they'd become close. Closer than I liked, actually. Biting the bullet, I dialed Christian's number. It rang several times, and I wondered if he hadn't gotten home from his new job out in Downer's Grove, or if maybe he was actually with Harker. Finally, he snapped up the phone, out of breath. "Hello."
"It's Nick. Have you seen Bert?"
"What? No. He's not at home?"
"No, he's not."
"Then where is he?" Panic already infected his voice.
"I don't know," I said. "All right, thanks--"
"Wait, should I come over?"
"No. Don't."
"But...will you have him call me when he gets home? I'm going to worry."
"Yeah, whatever."
I hung up and tried to think what to do next. The only constructive thing that came to mind was walking my neighborhood. It was possible he'd needed something and had gone out to the store to get it. Maybe he'd wanted aspirin or had a craving for ice cream.
I was out the door in less than a minute and heading down Roscoe. The street was quiet, my neighbors settling in for an evening of television. When I got to Broadway, I headed up to Addison to stick my head into the White Hen Pantry to see if he'd needed some...well some anything. He wasn't there. I headed down Broadway, peeked into The Closet, knowing he wouldn't be in there having a drink but needing to check anyway. I walked through the Melrose, Unabridged Books, and Walgreens. He wasn't in any of those places. I walked down Belmont until I got to Halsted then did the same kind of search over there. Nothing. I walked the alleys in between, figuring there was only so far he could go. And if he'd had to vomit or had had a sudden bout of diarrhea...but again, nothing.
When I got back to the apartment it was just after nine. I walked by my front door and let myself into the main building. I climbed the carpeted stairs to the second floor and knocked on the apartment right above mine. A young lesbian named Sue lived there and I hoped against hope that she'd seen something. She worked during the day, something to do with the big computers FirstChicago needed to keep track of their money. She probably hadn't even been home when Harker left.
I knocked again and waited. I could smell the polish used on the wooden banister, mildew in the carpet, and a touch of charred meat from someone's dinner. I heard a television playing on the floor above me. Sue didn't come to the door. I gave up.
On the floor above, I discovered the television was playing in the back apartment that faced the courtyard on one side and the pass-through on the other. They were unlikely to have seen Bert coming or going so I didn't bother knocking. In the apartment above Sue's there didn't seem to be anyone home. I tried to put a face on the tenant but couldn't. In fact, I wasn't even sure anyone lived there at the moment.
When I went back downstairs, I called three nearby hospitals and asked if Harker had been admitted. They'd never heard of him. So, finally, at nearly ten o'clock I called Connors at home, having found his number in the address book Harker kept in the top drawer of our bedroom dresser.
Connors was annoyed to be hearing from me.
"Harker's missing," I told him before he could cuss me out too badly. I quickly went over everything I'd done to find him.
"Stay there in case he comes home," he said. "I'll do some nosing around and call if I find anything."
He hung up and I began to wait in earnest. Helpless. Alone. Time crawled like it had just been slammed in the knees with a baseball bat. I found myself glancing at the VCR every few minutes. 11:01; 11:05; 11:07; 11:08. God, it was excruciating. I knew, I just knew, something bad had happened and, sitting there, smoking cigarette after cigarette in my living room, I waited to find out exactly what it was. It was like the moment before the nurse stuck you with a needle, or the one before the dentist pulled out the decayed tooth, except it went on hour after hour.
I couldn't even wonder if he was dead. I didn't have the nerve. I did wonder if, someday, when Harker died, would I know it? Even if I wasn't with him? Was our bond that strong? Would he reach out across time and space and touch me, just to let me know he was no longer in this world? Probably not, I decided.
The call came at eight twenty-three the next morning. I hadn't slept all night except for a few fuzzy minutes here and there. I snatched up the phone before the first ring finished.
"Connors?"
"It's bad, Nick," I heard him say. "He's gone."
"What hospital?" I asked.
"He wasn't at a hospital."
"Where was he?"
"We found his body beside the Chicago River, near Hooker Street. His throat was slashed."
"No," I said. "That can't be."
Connors was wrong; he'd made a mistake. I knew how Harker would die. He would die in a hospital of this new disease, AIDS. That was how things were going to play out. We knew it wasn't going to be pleasant, but the sheets would be clean, the nurses would be friendly but concerned, and I would be there next to him.
"The Bughouse Slasher got him," Connors said.
I felt like I might puke so I walked into the bathroom, and as soon as I got in there I felt an uncontrollable desire to lie on the floor, quickly. I managed to do it without hitting my head on any of the porcelain fixtures. My eyes shut of their own accord and maybe fifteen, twenty seconds later, I came to staring at the phone receiver I'd dragged into the bathroom with me and which now lay a few feet from my face. The cord straggled back to the base, sitting by the bathroom door, beyond that the phone line wiggled through the apartment.
The receiver squawked, "Nick? Nick, are you all right?"
I grabbed it. "Yeah, I'm here," I said. "I needed a moment."
"Yeah. I know."
"I guess I should call his mother."
"I already called her," Connors said. "Legally, I had to call her first. Hell, legally I'm probably not even supposed to call you."
He was probably right, so I kept my mouth shut. There were surprisingly few things going on in my head at that particular moment. It was as though someone had poured in a bucket of tar. Things had slowed down to a near stop.
"Well, thank you for calling me," I said, because that's what you say.
"We're going to need to search your place, Nick. You know, because Bert lived there."
"Do you have a warrant?"
"I could get one," Connors said, his voice instantly stiff and professional. "I'd rather not."
I left a long pause. "Give me two hours."
"What do you need two hours for?"
"I'd like to put my pants on. Or do you want me sitting around buck naked when you search the place?" I wasn't buck naked, I was still wearing the clothes I'd worn the day before. I waited for him to say that it wouldn't take two hours to put my pants on, since of course it wouldn't. But he didn't. He knew it would take at least twenty-four hours to get a warrant; he was getting a break.
"Two hours," he said and hung up.
As much as I wanted to lie back down on the bathroom floor, I knew there was something more important I had to do. Sitting on the old desk shoved into a corner of my living room was the murder book Harker had been working on since he got sick. I assumed there was one like it at the eighteenth, probably sitting on Connors desk. A three-hole binder, five inches thick, blue; it was filled with six inches of paper: autopsies, arrest reports, tip sheets, computer runs. It had been there, growing, for months and months, and I'd never looked inside.
Now I did, and was surprised by what I found. I'd thought Harker had been playing at the book. I'd thought it was barely real. But there was so much more in it than I'd expected. He'd given me the impression he was reconstructing the book from his memory of the original murder book, but there were copies of...well, pretty much everything. It looked like he had every piece of paper the police had. Piece by piece, Connors had brought him copies of everything on the Bughouse Slasher cases. Things Harker never should have had as a disabled police officer.
This was what Connors was coming to get. I wasn't entirely sure how, but the book was important. Had Harker followed the clues in the book until he got too close to the Slasher? Had it gotten him killed? At that moment, it barely made sense. I hoped it would soon.
March 15, 2012
Except from Boystown 4: A Time For Secrets just released by MLR Press
Chapter One
“You owe me five pounds of potatoes,” the man said, and I had no idea what he was talking about. His name was Ronald Meek, and he’d shown up at my office unannounced. He was in his mid-sixties, far too thin, with a hawk’s nose and a few tufts of tea-colored hair.
He arrived while I was in the middle of packing my files into some beat-up cardboard boxes I’d gotten from behind the Jewel. My landlord had finally decided to tear down the south Loop building, where my office had been located for a couple of years, and put up a building twice as big. They sent me a flyer inviting me to rent from them again in fall 1984 when the building would be finished. Of course, I’d have to win the Pick Three or marry some fat old heiress to do it. So I figured chances were slim I’d be back.
I’d rented a new office up on Clark Street a few blocks from my apartment in a neighborhood that was sometimes called Boystown and sometimes called New Town, depending generally on which team you batted for. Of course, I had no idea how I’d get all my crap up there but figured I’d manage. I had three days left before I had to be out, so I kept packing while I talked to Meek.
“Five pounds of potatoes?” I asked. “Do you want to explain that?”
“You don’t remember me? I’m crushed.” He put on a face that mocked sadness.
I stopped what I was doing and took a closer look at him. The summer sun was bouncing off the building across LaSalle Street, so I got a little more light than usual. Otherwise, I might not have noticed that Meek was wearing makeup, subtly applied and covered with a light dusting of powder. On another man it might have seemed odd, but it went well with Meek’s green velvet blazer and paisley ascot. He sat in my guest chair with his legs crossed and a hand tucked under his chin. He reminded me of an overdressed praying mantis. None of this was familiar, though. I was sure I didn’t know him.
“You’re going to have to give me a clue,” I said, opening the bottom drawer of my desk and finding a two-year-old reverse phone book, back issues of Crain’s Chicago Business, and a company directory for First Chicago, something I was not supposed to have. I put everything into a box.
“I’m your knight in shining armor,” Meek said.
All his coyness began to piss me off. “Look, whatever this is about, just come out and say it.”
He took a deep breath and began. “One night about five years ago, I heard a commotion outside my window. I opened my window and looked down to find some young ruffians attacking a nice gay couple on the sidewalk below. Soooo…I got a bag of potatoes and started dropping them on the goons. A few minutes later they ran away.” He leaned over to make this point, “I saved your ass, Mr. Nowak. Though you hardly seemed grateful.”
Now I remembered him. I didn’t want to, but I did. My ex-lover, Daniel, and I had been coming home drunk from a bar when the kids jumped us. I wasn’t hurt, but Daniel ended up having a couple of surgeries to rebuild his cheekbone after getting hit square in the face by a baseball bat. I imagine all that surgery must have been extremely unpleasant. I wouldn’t know because we broke up that night, and I never got around to asking when our relationship had briefly rekindled the previous winter. By then his face looked good, too good, and we were, well, occupied.
“Other than receiving my undying thanks, is there a reason you stopped by?” I asked, giving up on packing and sitting back in my chair.
“You’re a private investigator?”
“It says so on the door.” Aside from the door with my name on it, my office boasted a desk, some filing cabinets, the guest chair Meek sat in, a half-dozen, half-filled cardboard boxes, and a dead plant I was considering moving to my new office solely for sentimental reasons. None of the stuff was any good; I could probably have just thrown it all away and started over.
“There’s someone I’d like to find. I thought you’d be right for the job.” He shifted in the chair as I waited for him to continue, his bravado fading. “He’s someone I once loved. We had a brief but quite intense affair. I suppose you’d say he’s the one who got away. I’m not getting any younger and I thought, if not now when?”
“What’s his name?”
“Vernon.”
“Does Vernon have a last name?” I was already afraid of the answer.
“I think it began with an S. Or maybe an M,” he said, naming the two largest sections of the phone book. “The last time I saw Vernon, he was throwing a party in his apartment at the Edgewater Arms. It was April 22, 1959.”
“Twenty-three years ago?”
“Yes.”
I sighed. “What was the apartment number?”
He shrugged.
“You know the exact date, but you don’t know Vernon’s last name or his apartment number? That doesn’t make sense.”
“I keep a journal. On April 22, 1959 I wrote ‘went to a divine party at Vernon’s apartment in the Edgewater Arms. The view was amazing. Vernon was delightful. We all drank too much, and Vernon was very witty. We kissed on the roof under the stars.’ Well, we more than kissed, but discretion forbids.”
“Why didn’t you ever see him again?”
He sighed. “I’m not sure someone your age can understand. In the fifties, we were degenerates. Perverts. Sickos. To many of us, the idea of forming a relationship, having a real lover, well it barely entered our minds. We were told we couldn’t have that, that it wasn’t in our nature. We didn’t dare contradict that. Nowadays things are so different. If I were your age and I met Vernon today, well...I would make different choices, let me tell you.” He smiled in what he thought was a demure way. “Can’t you help me, please?”
“Is that all you know about Vernon? He was good kisser who lived at the Edgewater Arms?”
“No, not all. I know lots of things.”
“Like?”
“He’d been in the Navy. He was a Republican. He worked as a hairdresser on Oak Street, and the ladies called him Mr. Vernon. He was quite popular.”
“Have you tried to find him yourself?” I asked.
“Oh, I couldn’t. I’d have no idea where to start.”
“Detective work isn’t rocket science. It’s mostly paperwork.” And the occasional gunfight, I thought but didn’t mention.
“I don’t just want to find him,” he admitted. “I’m hoping you’ll give him a message for me. Tell him that I’d like to see him, that I’d like to talk over old times. If he’s willing.”
“And if he says no?”
“Then that’s all you have to tell me.”
Something was a little off about the whole thing and I had a bad feeling, or maybe the grilled ham and cheese sandwich I’d had for lunch wasn’t sitting well. I couldn’t be sure. Given the few scraps of information he’d provided, I didn’t think I’d be able to do a lot for him. I didn’t want to rip him off. No, it wasn’t the sandwich. My gut said not to take the case. On the other hand, my bank account said I was about to start bouncing checks.
I dug around in a cardboard box and found an index card. I slid it across my now empty desk. “Write down the message,” I said. “Write it down exactly as you want me to say it.”
While he did that I told him my rates. He swallowed hard when I asked for a two hundred and fifty dollar retainer, but he handed me the message and took a checkbook out of his inside jacket pocket. He wrote me a check.
“I hope you’ll get started as soon as you can,” he said, sliding the check across my desk.
I glanced at it; his bank was on the other side of the Loop. As soon as I walked over and cashed the check, I’d get started.
“Sure thing,” I said.
He said his goodbyes and rose to leave. Before he got to the door, I asked, “How did you find me?”
“You’re listed in the phone book.”
“My name is, yes, but I don’t remember introducing myself the night we met.”
“Oh.” He blushed. “There was a police investigation afterward. Don’t you remember?”
“Yeah, I remember.”
“The policeman who came by my apartment asked if I knew you, and not very nicely. I think he was hoping that the three of us knew one another and were
somehow trying to con four nice kids from the suburbs.”
That didn’t sound far off. I was a cop then myself. It wasn’t just that cops didn’t like fags. Some cops didn’t like victims much either and seemed to delight in turning things around and making them guilty. If you were a fag and a victim you didn’t stand a chance. It was no surprise the CPD never bothered to find those four nice kids from the suburbs, which at the time didn’t bother me much. There were a couple of days when I even thought the whole thing might blow over and I’d get to hold onto my job. I stonewalled in the two interviews they tried to have with me. But then copies of the police report and Daniel’s statement made the rounds of the department.
“And, of course, I met Daniel,” Meek said.
“You did?”
“I went to see him in the hospital. He’s a nice young man.”
“Yes. He is a very nice young man.”
“He was grateful for my help.”
I nodded.
“Are the two of you still...?” Meek asked with a raised eyebrow.
“No. I’m with someone else now.”
“I guess that’s the way of the world,” he said, and floated out of my office.
“You owe me five pounds of potatoes,” the man said, and I had no idea what he was talking about. His name was Ronald Meek, and he’d shown up at my office unannounced. He was in his mid-sixties, far too thin, with a hawk’s nose and a few tufts of tea-colored hair.
He arrived while I was in the middle of packing my files into some beat-up cardboard boxes I’d gotten from behind the Jewel. My landlord had finally decided to tear down the south Loop building, where my office had been located for a couple of years, and put up a building twice as big. They sent me a flyer inviting me to rent from them again in fall 1984 when the building would be finished. Of course, I’d have to win the Pick Three or marry some fat old heiress to do it. So I figured chances were slim I’d be back.
I’d rented a new office up on Clark Street a few blocks from my apartment in a neighborhood that was sometimes called Boystown and sometimes called New Town, depending generally on which team you batted for. Of course, I had no idea how I’d get all my crap up there but figured I’d manage. I had three days left before I had to be out, so I kept packing while I talked to Meek.
“Five pounds of potatoes?” I asked. “Do you want to explain that?”
“You don’t remember me? I’m crushed.” He put on a face that mocked sadness.
I stopped what I was doing and took a closer look at him. The summer sun was bouncing off the building across LaSalle Street, so I got a little more light than usual. Otherwise, I might not have noticed that Meek was wearing makeup, subtly applied and covered with a light dusting of powder. On another man it might have seemed odd, but it went well with Meek’s green velvet blazer and paisley ascot. He sat in my guest chair with his legs crossed and a hand tucked under his chin. He reminded me of an overdressed praying mantis. None of this was familiar, though. I was sure I didn’t know him.
“You’re going to have to give me a clue,” I said, opening the bottom drawer of my desk and finding a two-year-old reverse phone book, back issues of Crain’s Chicago Business, and a company directory for First Chicago, something I was not supposed to have. I put everything into a box.
“I’m your knight in shining armor,” Meek said.
All his coyness began to piss me off. “Look, whatever this is about, just come out and say it.”
He took a deep breath and began. “One night about five years ago, I heard a commotion outside my window. I opened my window and looked down to find some young ruffians attacking a nice gay couple on the sidewalk below. Soooo…I got a bag of potatoes and started dropping them on the goons. A few minutes later they ran away.” He leaned over to make this point, “I saved your ass, Mr. Nowak. Though you hardly seemed grateful.”
Now I remembered him. I didn’t want to, but I did. My ex-lover, Daniel, and I had been coming home drunk from a bar when the kids jumped us. I wasn’t hurt, but Daniel ended up having a couple of surgeries to rebuild his cheekbone after getting hit square in the face by a baseball bat. I imagine all that surgery must have been extremely unpleasant. I wouldn’t know because we broke up that night, and I never got around to asking when our relationship had briefly rekindled the previous winter. By then his face looked good, too good, and we were, well, occupied.
“Other than receiving my undying thanks, is there a reason you stopped by?” I asked, giving up on packing and sitting back in my chair.
“You’re a private investigator?”
“It says so on the door.” Aside from the door with my name on it, my office boasted a desk, some filing cabinets, the guest chair Meek sat in, a half-dozen, half-filled cardboard boxes, and a dead plant I was considering moving to my new office solely for sentimental reasons. None of the stuff was any good; I could probably have just thrown it all away and started over.
“There’s someone I’d like to find. I thought you’d be right for the job.” He shifted in the chair as I waited for him to continue, his bravado fading. “He’s someone I once loved. We had a brief but quite intense affair. I suppose you’d say he’s the one who got away. I’m not getting any younger and I thought, if not now when?”
“What’s his name?”
“Vernon.”
“Does Vernon have a last name?” I was already afraid of the answer.
“I think it began with an S. Or maybe an M,” he said, naming the two largest sections of the phone book. “The last time I saw Vernon, he was throwing a party in his apartment at the Edgewater Arms. It was April 22, 1959.”
“Twenty-three years ago?”
“Yes.”
I sighed. “What was the apartment number?”
He shrugged.
“You know the exact date, but you don’t know Vernon’s last name or his apartment number? That doesn’t make sense.”
“I keep a journal. On April 22, 1959 I wrote ‘went to a divine party at Vernon’s apartment in the Edgewater Arms. The view was amazing. Vernon was delightful. We all drank too much, and Vernon was very witty. We kissed on the roof under the stars.’ Well, we more than kissed, but discretion forbids.”
“Why didn’t you ever see him again?”
He sighed. “I’m not sure someone your age can understand. In the fifties, we were degenerates. Perverts. Sickos. To many of us, the idea of forming a relationship, having a real lover, well it barely entered our minds. We were told we couldn’t have that, that it wasn’t in our nature. We didn’t dare contradict that. Nowadays things are so different. If I were your age and I met Vernon today, well...I would make different choices, let me tell you.” He smiled in what he thought was a demure way. “Can’t you help me, please?”
“Is that all you know about Vernon? He was good kisser who lived at the Edgewater Arms?”
“No, not all. I know lots of things.”
“Like?”
“He’d been in the Navy. He was a Republican. He worked as a hairdresser on Oak Street, and the ladies called him Mr. Vernon. He was quite popular.”
“Have you tried to find him yourself?” I asked.
“Oh, I couldn’t. I’d have no idea where to start.”
“Detective work isn’t rocket science. It’s mostly paperwork.” And the occasional gunfight, I thought but didn’t mention.
“I don’t just want to find him,” he admitted. “I’m hoping you’ll give him a message for me. Tell him that I’d like to see him, that I’d like to talk over old times. If he’s willing.”
“And if he says no?”
“Then that’s all you have to tell me.”
Something was a little off about the whole thing and I had a bad feeling, or maybe the grilled ham and cheese sandwich I’d had for lunch wasn’t sitting well. I couldn’t be sure. Given the few scraps of information he’d provided, I didn’t think I’d be able to do a lot for him. I didn’t want to rip him off. No, it wasn’t the sandwich. My gut said not to take the case. On the other hand, my bank account said I was about to start bouncing checks.
I dug around in a cardboard box and found an index card. I slid it across my now empty desk. “Write down the message,” I said. “Write it down exactly as you want me to say it.”
While he did that I told him my rates. He swallowed hard when I asked for a two hundred and fifty dollar retainer, but he handed me the message and took a checkbook out of his inside jacket pocket. He wrote me a check.
“I hope you’ll get started as soon as you can,” he said, sliding the check across my desk.
I glanced at it; his bank was on the other side of the Loop. As soon as I walked over and cashed the check, I’d get started.
“Sure thing,” I said.
He said his goodbyes and rose to leave. Before he got to the door, I asked, “How did you find me?”
“You’re listed in the phone book.”
“My name is, yes, but I don’t remember introducing myself the night we met.”
“Oh.” He blushed. “There was a police investigation afterward. Don’t you remember?”
“Yeah, I remember.”
“The policeman who came by my apartment asked if I knew you, and not very nicely. I think he was hoping that the three of us knew one another and were
somehow trying to con four nice kids from the suburbs.”
That didn’t sound far off. I was a cop then myself. It wasn’t just that cops didn’t like fags. Some cops didn’t like victims much either and seemed to delight in turning things around and making them guilty. If you were a fag and a victim you didn’t stand a chance. It was no surprise the CPD never bothered to find those four nice kids from the suburbs, which at the time didn’t bother me much. There were a couple of days when I even thought the whole thing might blow over and I’d get to hold onto my job. I stonewalled in the two interviews they tried to have with me. But then copies of the police report and Daniel’s statement made the rounds of the department.
“And, of course, I met Daniel,” Meek said.
“You did?”
“I went to see him in the hospital. He’s a nice young man.”
“Yes. He is a very nice young man.”
“He was grateful for my help.”
I nodded.
“Are the two of you still...?” Meek asked with a raised eyebrow.
“No. I’m with someone else now.”
“I guess that’s the way of the world,” he said, and floated out of my office.
February 7, 2012
Excerpt from Little Boy Dead, a Boystown Prequel coming soon!
They say nice guys finish last. I think that’s crap. Nice guys don’t even get to finish. At least, that’s what I was thinking about as I drove down to the north Loop to interview for a job with Film Fest Chicago. I had the FM radio in my Plymouth Duster turned on and they were talking about some American hostages who’d been taken in Iran and how things weren’t looking so hot for the peanut farmer. Other than a bad habit of telling Americans things they didn’t want to hear, the peanut farmer seemed like a nice guy—I figured that meant he was bound to finish last.
My detective’s license had arrived in the mail from Springfield the week before. It was ridiculously easy to get. The requirements were: filling out an application, scoring seventy or above on an examination that was only slightly harder than a driver’s test, and completing fifteen hundred hours of investigative work either under the supervision of an investigator or as a sworn peace officer. I’d spent nearly six years with the CPD, so I was given time served. Of course, the kicker was that I needed liability insurance. Once I’d paid for that, I was tempted to file for bankruptcy.
It would have been nice to sit around and wait for clients to start showing up, but I didn’t have that luxury. My ad in the yellow pages wouldn’t be out until May of 1980. So, I scanned the Reader for possible employment and found a short-term job as a driver for Film Fest Chicago. Two hundred bucks a week for two weeks. It wouldn’t solve my problems, but it would postpone them.
The Film Fest Chicago offices were on Wells above a Walgreen’s smack next to the El. So close in fact, you could reach out and touch the subway cars as they went by. When you walked into their lobby you were greeted by a half dozen posters of sexy young men and women shot provocatively in shadows while wearing the festival’s signature, logo-emblazoned T-shirts and nothing else. The logo was the word CHICAGO done up like the Hollywood sign with klieg lights behind it and shooting stars above. I doubt if too many people noticed it with the naked models stealing focus.
There was a desk for a receptionist, but that morning there was no receptionist. I assumed that was also a temporary position. I stood there a minute, uncomfortable in my beige corduroy suit. Well, half-suit. I only liked to wear the jacket and the vest. I substituted a pair of 501s for the pants since I didn’t like wearing them. The pants fit all right, but at six three, I thought dressing in all that beige made me look like a giant, naked Ken doll. I also wore a pair of Frye square-toed boots, a denim shirt with pearl snaps and, for sentimental reasons, a 9mm Sig Sauer tucked under my arm in a leather holster. I got a little bored waiting there, so I peeked around a corner looking for signs of life. I found a short hallway, with a couple of doors, presumably leading to offices, and at the end, a small reception area. The place was painted a glossy gray with a maroon strip running down the hallway at hip height, ending in an arrowhead right before the reception area.
It seemed as dead as a graveyard.
“Hello,” I called out.
A guy in his early twenties came out of one of the offices. He wore blue jeans folded up at the cuff, a red polo shirt, a pair of rainbow suspenders, and a wool, blue plaid blazer that was too small. He looked like he was having trouble deciding whether he was Richie Cunningham or Annie Hall.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
“I’m here to see Robert Butska,” I replied. “About the driver position. My name is Nick Nowak.” A flush might have come to my cheek. I found it a faintly humiliating position to apply for. In my last job I’d carried a gun and had been able to arrest people. Now, I just carried a gun.
The kid nodded, held up a finger, and walked further down the hallway. He popped his head into the corner office. I couldn’t hear what was said, but it was curt and possibly unpleasant. Then, I was waved down the hall and ushered in. Robert Butska sat in front of an enormous glass desk in a room full of leather furniture. There were two large windows on each of the outside walls. The windows looked out onto the El. Every so often a train would go by, sneaking up behind us when it came from one direction, barreling down on us when it came from the other.
Robert was a thin man with blond hair, a black turtleneck and a superior attitude. When I introduced myself I leaned over his desk and offered my hand. He ignored it, busying himself with some paper clips instead.
“The job is very simple. We’ll give you a list of people to pick up and places to take them. We have a lot of famous people coming into town this year, though I guess we always do. I hope you’re not starstruck, are you? Famous people love being drooled over when they love it and they hate it when they hate it. When you deal with them you have to figure out which mood is which. Can you do that?”
“Sure,” I said, even though it sounded annoying as hell.
“You have experience driving?”
The El went by and I had to wait so long for the sound to die down that I almost forgot the question. When it was quiet again I said, “I drove a squad for the CPD. Six years.”
“Oh my, I’m not even sure what you just said.”
“A squad car. Patrol. For the Chicago police. You got my resume, right?”
“Oh yes, that’s here somewhere. Now, why did you leave the police department?”
There was a lump in my stomach. It had been a year and I should have been used to telling my story. But I wasn’t. “They found out I’m gay. It wasn’t a very comfortable place after that.”
Robert looked up at me. Really, for the first time during the interview. “Well, you won’t have that problem here. Of course, I’m not going to hire you just because you’re gay.” Which I took to mean I had the job.
“Is that what you plan to do with yourself now? Drive?”
“No, I just got a private investigator’s license.”
“But that’s fabulous. I need a security director much more than I need a driver.”
“How much does that pay?”
“Oh, the same. We don’t have a lot of money around here.”
I shrugged and said, “Sure. Why not? Beats driving around all day.”
“Oh, we’d still need you to drive. We can’t afford security and a driver.”
I might have complained about now having two jobs and one salary, but another train went by, which gave me enough time to remember that my bank account was as empty as a politician’s promise.
When the noise died down I said, “So, I guess I’m your security guy.”
My detective’s license had arrived in the mail from Springfield the week before. It was ridiculously easy to get. The requirements were: filling out an application, scoring seventy or above on an examination that was only slightly harder than a driver’s test, and completing fifteen hundred hours of investigative work either under the supervision of an investigator or as a sworn peace officer. I’d spent nearly six years with the CPD, so I was given time served. Of course, the kicker was that I needed liability insurance. Once I’d paid for that, I was tempted to file for bankruptcy.
It would have been nice to sit around and wait for clients to start showing up, but I didn’t have that luxury. My ad in the yellow pages wouldn’t be out until May of 1980. So, I scanned the Reader for possible employment and found a short-term job as a driver for Film Fest Chicago. Two hundred bucks a week for two weeks. It wouldn’t solve my problems, but it would postpone them.
The Film Fest Chicago offices were on Wells above a Walgreen’s smack next to the El. So close in fact, you could reach out and touch the subway cars as they went by. When you walked into their lobby you were greeted by a half dozen posters of sexy young men and women shot provocatively in shadows while wearing the festival’s signature, logo-emblazoned T-shirts and nothing else. The logo was the word CHICAGO done up like the Hollywood sign with klieg lights behind it and shooting stars above. I doubt if too many people noticed it with the naked models stealing focus.
There was a desk for a receptionist, but that morning there was no receptionist. I assumed that was also a temporary position. I stood there a minute, uncomfortable in my beige corduroy suit. Well, half-suit. I only liked to wear the jacket and the vest. I substituted a pair of 501s for the pants since I didn’t like wearing them. The pants fit all right, but at six three, I thought dressing in all that beige made me look like a giant, naked Ken doll. I also wore a pair of Frye square-toed boots, a denim shirt with pearl snaps and, for sentimental reasons, a 9mm Sig Sauer tucked under my arm in a leather holster. I got a little bored waiting there, so I peeked around a corner looking for signs of life. I found a short hallway, with a couple of doors, presumably leading to offices, and at the end, a small reception area. The place was painted a glossy gray with a maroon strip running down the hallway at hip height, ending in an arrowhead right before the reception area.
It seemed as dead as a graveyard.
“Hello,” I called out.
A guy in his early twenties came out of one of the offices. He wore blue jeans folded up at the cuff, a red polo shirt, a pair of rainbow suspenders, and a wool, blue plaid blazer that was too small. He looked like he was having trouble deciding whether he was Richie Cunningham or Annie Hall.
“Can I help you?” he asked.
“I’m here to see Robert Butska,” I replied. “About the driver position. My name is Nick Nowak.” A flush might have come to my cheek. I found it a faintly humiliating position to apply for. In my last job I’d carried a gun and had been able to arrest people. Now, I just carried a gun.
The kid nodded, held up a finger, and walked further down the hallway. He popped his head into the corner office. I couldn’t hear what was said, but it was curt and possibly unpleasant. Then, I was waved down the hall and ushered in. Robert Butska sat in front of an enormous glass desk in a room full of leather furniture. There were two large windows on each of the outside walls. The windows looked out onto the El. Every so often a train would go by, sneaking up behind us when it came from one direction, barreling down on us when it came from the other.
Robert was a thin man with blond hair, a black turtleneck and a superior attitude. When I introduced myself I leaned over his desk and offered my hand. He ignored it, busying himself with some paper clips instead.
“The job is very simple. We’ll give you a list of people to pick up and places to take them. We have a lot of famous people coming into town this year, though I guess we always do. I hope you’re not starstruck, are you? Famous people love being drooled over when they love it and they hate it when they hate it. When you deal with them you have to figure out which mood is which. Can you do that?”
“Sure,” I said, even though it sounded annoying as hell.
“You have experience driving?”
The El went by and I had to wait so long for the sound to die down that I almost forgot the question. When it was quiet again I said, “I drove a squad for the CPD. Six years.”
“Oh my, I’m not even sure what you just said.”
“A squad car. Patrol. For the Chicago police. You got my resume, right?”
“Oh yes, that’s here somewhere. Now, why did you leave the police department?”
There was a lump in my stomach. It had been a year and I should have been used to telling my story. But I wasn’t. “They found out I’m gay. It wasn’t a very comfortable place after that.”
Robert looked up at me. Really, for the first time during the interview. “Well, you won’t have that problem here. Of course, I’m not going to hire you just because you’re gay.” Which I took to mean I had the job.
“Is that what you plan to do with yourself now? Drive?”
“No, I just got a private investigator’s license.”
“But that’s fabulous. I need a security director much more than I need a driver.”
“How much does that pay?”
“Oh, the same. We don’t have a lot of money around here.”
I shrugged and said, “Sure. Why not? Beats driving around all day.”
“Oh, we’d still need you to drive. We can’t afford security and a driver.”
I might have complained about now having two jobs and one salary, but another train went by, which gave me enough time to remember that my bank account was as empty as a politician’s promise.
When the noise died down I said, “So, I guess I’m your security guy.”
January 5, 2012
My Gay Fiction Reading List, Part Three
Mid ’90s to ’00s
Paul Monette – I read three of his non-fiction books in the early to mid ‘90s: Borrowed Time, Becoming a Man, and Afterlife. While I remember Borrowed Time most, I think that Becoming a Man was the best of the three. Though at this point, I don’t recall why. The books are AIDS memoirs written almost as things happened. They have a journalistic immediacy – or they did at the time – that made them incredibly compelling. I keep intending to reread these books, but I keep not getting around to it. They’re worth more than one read.
Maurice, E.M. Forster – When I went back to college for my English degree in the mid ‘90s, I read most of Forster. I love his books. Eventually, I came to Maurice. Of course, I’d seen the Merchant Ivory film (1987), which is wonderful. It’s a lovely book, though I think not quite as good as his others. It’s interesting to note that he was still a virgin when he wrote it, so it’s much more a gay romantic fantasy than an exploration of gay relationships at the time. I did a paper on this when I was in college and learned that Forster gave a copy of the book to D.H. Lawrence prior to Lawrence’s writing Lady Chatterley’s Lover. Though I think each book is unique there are a great many similarities and it’s interesting to think of these two great writers influencing each other. Though I would not classify this as m/m romance – since it predates the emergence of the genre by nearly a century – I do think m/m readers would really enjoy it.
And the Band Played On – I think I read this around the time it was made into an HBO special (1993). I have it on my shelf and refer to it quite a bit for the Boystown series. Of course, most of us in Chicago were in the dark about what was happening, many of us willingly. So, this is an important document since it brings you right into the epicenter of AIDS as our understanding of it unfolded.
David Leavitt – Leavitt is an excellent, talented writer but for some reason not one I connect with. I have most of his books and have tried them. I think I only got all the way through one. He did, however, write a short story that I think is truly amazing. It’s called Gravity. It’s very short but manages to convey two lives completely. And it’s heart-wrenching. The story was collected in an anthology for one of my classes in college. I’ve seen it in a couple other anthologies. If you can find it, read it. Also, give his books a try. As I said, he’s a good writer and he might appeal to you more than he does to me.
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde – I read this as part of a Gay and Lesbian fiction class at Cal State Long Beach. I think it was the first time they ever offered the class, taught by Clifton Snider. It’s a very creepy book in many ways, and only hints at queerness. If you bring to it an understanding of Wilde and his life it’s very easy to see the ways that a writer of his time – and indeed all gay writers until just a few decades ago – had to code work to make it acceptable for publication.
Robert Rodi – I think I’ve read all of Rodi’s books with one exception. They’re really, really fun. His first book, Fag Hag, came out in 1991. They’re fast past and funny and at the time a much needed respite from all the AIDS literature that was coming out. Not as funny as Joe Keenan but if you like funny books he’s worth reading.
Frank O’Hara – In general, I don’t like poetry outside of the classroom. I think poems are quite interesting when assigned for a literature class and then discussed. Reading poems on my own is something that just doesn’t happen. I do remember going over O’Hara’s poems in a class and finding them quite appealing. His life is every bit as interesting as his poetry and led me to read the excellent biography City Poet by Brad Gooch. I also read Larry River’s book What Did I Do? The unauthorized autobiography of Larry Rivers. Rivers and O’Hara had a long, intense relationship even though Rivers was heterosexual. Theirs is one of the very few real life “gay-for-you” relationships I’m personally aware. If you read River’s autobiography he’s clearly straight – and yet he speaks very honestly about his sexual and emotional relationship with O’Hara. A really fascinating friendship. I also have three of Rivers prints on my walls and enjoy his art.
Paul Monette – I read three of his non-fiction books in the early to mid ‘90s: Borrowed Time, Becoming a Man, and Afterlife. While I remember Borrowed Time most, I think that Becoming a Man was the best of the three. Though at this point, I don’t recall why. The books are AIDS memoirs written almost as things happened. They have a journalistic immediacy – or they did at the time – that made them incredibly compelling. I keep intending to reread these books, but I keep not getting around to it. They’re worth more than one read.
Maurice, E.M. Forster – When I went back to college for my English degree in the mid ‘90s, I read most of Forster. I love his books. Eventually, I came to Maurice. Of course, I’d seen the Merchant Ivory film (1987), which is wonderful. It’s a lovely book, though I think not quite as good as his others. It’s interesting to note that he was still a virgin when he wrote it, so it’s much more a gay romantic fantasy than an exploration of gay relationships at the time. I did a paper on this when I was in college and learned that Forster gave a copy of the book to D.H. Lawrence prior to Lawrence’s writing Lady Chatterley’s Lover. Though I think each book is unique there are a great many similarities and it’s interesting to think of these two great writers influencing each other. Though I would not classify this as m/m romance – since it predates the emergence of the genre by nearly a century – I do think m/m readers would really enjoy it.
And the Band Played On – I think I read this around the time it was made into an HBO special (1993). I have it on my shelf and refer to it quite a bit for the Boystown series. Of course, most of us in Chicago were in the dark about what was happening, many of us willingly. So, this is an important document since it brings you right into the epicenter of AIDS as our understanding of it unfolded.
David Leavitt – Leavitt is an excellent, talented writer but for some reason not one I connect with. I have most of his books and have tried them. I think I only got all the way through one. He did, however, write a short story that I think is truly amazing. It’s called Gravity. It’s very short but manages to convey two lives completely. And it’s heart-wrenching. The story was collected in an anthology for one of my classes in college. I’ve seen it in a couple other anthologies. If you can find it, read it. Also, give his books a try. As I said, he’s a good writer and he might appeal to you more than he does to me.
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Oscar Wilde – I read this as part of a Gay and Lesbian fiction class at Cal State Long Beach. I think it was the first time they ever offered the class, taught by Clifton Snider. It’s a very creepy book in many ways, and only hints at queerness. If you bring to it an understanding of Wilde and his life it’s very easy to see the ways that a writer of his time – and indeed all gay writers until just a few decades ago – had to code work to make it acceptable for publication.
Robert Rodi – I think I’ve read all of Rodi’s books with one exception. They’re really, really fun. His first book, Fag Hag, came out in 1991. They’re fast past and funny and at the time a much needed respite from all the AIDS literature that was coming out. Not as funny as Joe Keenan but if you like funny books he’s worth reading.
Frank O’Hara – In general, I don’t like poetry outside of the classroom. I think poems are quite interesting when assigned for a literature class and then discussed. Reading poems on my own is something that just doesn’t happen. I do remember going over O’Hara’s poems in a class and finding them quite appealing. His life is every bit as interesting as his poetry and led me to read the excellent biography City Poet by Brad Gooch. I also read Larry River’s book What Did I Do? The unauthorized autobiography of Larry Rivers. Rivers and O’Hara had a long, intense relationship even though Rivers was heterosexual. Theirs is one of the very few real life “gay-for-you” relationships I’m personally aware. If you read River’s autobiography he’s clearly straight – and yet he speaks very honestly about his sexual and emotional relationship with O’Hara. A really fascinating friendship. I also have three of Rivers prints on my walls and enjoy his art.
December 30, 2011
My Gay Fiction Reading List, Part Two
LATE 80s and Early 90s
Dancer from the Dance, Andrew Holleran – I can’t really remember the first time I read, or at least tried to read, this book. It must have been sometime in the 80s. It was published in 1978 and I know I didn’t try it until it had been out for a while. I don’t think I liked it. A few years ago, I tried it again and simply loved it. I’m an enormous fan of The Great Gatsby and have read that three times. The two books bear a number of similarities and would be terrific read back to back or taught together in a class (yes, I am that big a book geek)…
Joseph Hansen – I’ve read all of the Dave Brandsetter mysteries at least once. It’s a terrific series and definitely an influence on my Boystown mystery series. Anyone interested in gay fiction or mysteries or both should be reading these books. There’s a recent omnibus, which I’ve purchased. My copy fell apart, though. The original hard covers are still available from used booksellers on Amazon or Ebay and are often quite cheap. (I just noticed, there are some new editions out, very exciting.) Highly recommend this series.
Prick Up Your Ears, John Lahr – I’ve always had an interest in true crime and have read many, many books in that genre. After seeing the movie, I couldn’t help but pick this up and give it a read. Playwright Joe Orton had quite the life and the book deals with it frankly. There’s a lot of information on what it was like to be gay in London during the 50s and 60s which in itself is fascinating. And certainly the dynamic between Orton and his lover (and eventual killer) is very compelling.
What the Butler Saw, Joe Orton – After seeing Prick Up Your Ears I had to check out Orton’s plays. They’re hysterical. While I like Loot quite a lot, I think What the Butler Saw is really his masterpiece. Though he owes a huge debt to Oscar Wilde, Orton’s farces are much more gender bending and take huge risks, even in the much freer environment of the 60s. I always re-read Orton whenever I’m thinking of writing a comedy.
Christopher Bram – I think I’ve read everything by Christopher Bram except for his first book, Surprising Myself. I don’t know why I haven’t gotten around to it, I just haven’t. My favorites are Hold Tight (which takes place in a male brothel during World War II) and Almost History. I also liked The Father of Frankenstein, which became the film Gods and Monsters. Bram is always worth reading and if you haven’t read him you should check him out.
Blue Heaven, Joe Keenan – A wonderfully funny book with two lesser, but enjoyable sequels. In the 80s, my ex always made jokes about wanting to marry a woman for the wedding gifts. Obviously, Keenan had the same idea, he just decided to write a book about it. Keenan went on to write for Frasier; which is great for television viewing but not so great for gay fiction.
Michael Nava – Another favorite mystery series. I’ve read most of it, and have been thinking of going back and re-reading it – mainly because I haven’t read the last in the series Rag and Bone and it will have more impact if I pick up the thread again. I loved the way he incorporates the AIDS epidemic in these books. I recall they’re a little more personal than many detective series and benefit from that.
Alan Hollinghurst – While I recommend all of his books, my favorites are The Swimming Pool Library, which I’ve read twice, The Line of Beauty, and his most recent book The Stranger’s Child. If you read my earlier post on gay fiction you’ll remember that I was upset about The Stranger’s Child being marketed as historical fiction rather than gay fiction. After reading the book, I’m still bothered. It’s a very gay book. Certainly, it is less sexual than his earlier work, which presumably makes it more accessible to straights, though I hope that’s not why he made that choice. In my reading, I’ve read many, many very explicit heterosexual love scenes, hopefully we’ll get to the point where publishers and writers will be willing to expect the same from a straight audience.
Dancer from the Dance, Andrew Holleran – I can’t really remember the first time I read, or at least tried to read, this book. It must have been sometime in the 80s. It was published in 1978 and I know I didn’t try it until it had been out for a while. I don’t think I liked it. A few years ago, I tried it again and simply loved it. I’m an enormous fan of The Great Gatsby and have read that three times. The two books bear a number of similarities and would be terrific read back to back or taught together in a class (yes, I am that big a book geek)…
Joseph Hansen – I’ve read all of the Dave Brandsetter mysteries at least once. It’s a terrific series and definitely an influence on my Boystown mystery series. Anyone interested in gay fiction or mysteries or both should be reading these books. There’s a recent omnibus, which I’ve purchased. My copy fell apart, though. The original hard covers are still available from used booksellers on Amazon or Ebay and are often quite cheap. (I just noticed, there are some new editions out, very exciting.) Highly recommend this series.
Prick Up Your Ears, John Lahr – I’ve always had an interest in true crime and have read many, many books in that genre. After seeing the movie, I couldn’t help but pick this up and give it a read. Playwright Joe Orton had quite the life and the book deals with it frankly. There’s a lot of information on what it was like to be gay in London during the 50s and 60s which in itself is fascinating. And certainly the dynamic between Orton and his lover (and eventual killer) is very compelling.
What the Butler Saw, Joe Orton – After seeing Prick Up Your Ears I had to check out Orton’s plays. They’re hysterical. While I like Loot quite a lot, I think What the Butler Saw is really his masterpiece. Though he owes a huge debt to Oscar Wilde, Orton’s farces are much more gender bending and take huge risks, even in the much freer environment of the 60s. I always re-read Orton whenever I’m thinking of writing a comedy.
Christopher Bram – I think I’ve read everything by Christopher Bram except for his first book, Surprising Myself. I don’t know why I haven’t gotten around to it, I just haven’t. My favorites are Hold Tight (which takes place in a male brothel during World War II) and Almost History. I also liked The Father of Frankenstein, which became the film Gods and Monsters. Bram is always worth reading and if you haven’t read him you should check him out.
Blue Heaven, Joe Keenan – A wonderfully funny book with two lesser, but enjoyable sequels. In the 80s, my ex always made jokes about wanting to marry a woman for the wedding gifts. Obviously, Keenan had the same idea, he just decided to write a book about it. Keenan went on to write for Frasier; which is great for television viewing but not so great for gay fiction.
Michael Nava – Another favorite mystery series. I’ve read most of it, and have been thinking of going back and re-reading it – mainly because I haven’t read the last in the series Rag and Bone and it will have more impact if I pick up the thread again. I loved the way he incorporates the AIDS epidemic in these books. I recall they’re a little more personal than many detective series and benefit from that.
Alan Hollinghurst – While I recommend all of his books, my favorites are The Swimming Pool Library, which I’ve read twice, The Line of Beauty, and his most recent book The Stranger’s Child. If you read my earlier post on gay fiction you’ll remember that I was upset about The Stranger’s Child being marketed as historical fiction rather than gay fiction. After reading the book, I’m still bothered. It’s a very gay book. Certainly, it is less sexual than his earlier work, which presumably makes it more accessible to straights, though I hope that’s not why he made that choice. In my reading, I’ve read many, many very explicit heterosexual love scenes, hopefully we’ll get to the point where publishers and writers will be willing to expect the same from a straight audience.
December 26, 2011
My Gay Fiction Reading List, Part One
This is a list of gay fiction I’ve read over the years. Particularly books and writers who’ve influenced me. The list is not intended to be comprehensive and I know there are likely to be huge holes in it. Around the house I have twenty or, perhaps even thirty books, which should probably be on the list but I haven’t read yet. As I get to them, I’ll do an update. The list is presented in roughly the order I discovered the books.
LATE 70s/EARLY 80s
The Front Runner, Patricia Nell Warren – I should probably reread this book. I read it in paperback shortly after it’s original publication in 1976 and my memory of it is dim. What I do remember is the book being a bit melodramatic and the ending very exciting. Don’t take the word melodramatic as a negative. Melodrama is an important element of popular books and this was certainly popular. Like the next few books it was purchased at a mainstream mall bookstore. I was living in a small town in upstate New York and only those books that “crossed over” were available to us.
The Persian Boy, Mary Renault – My mother was a great fan of historical fiction and read this book when it came out in paperback sometime in 1973 or 1974. I was about sixteen at the time and was not out to my parents. When I asked to read the book, she had to think about it and then said, “Well, the way to get through it is to think of the Persian boy as a girl and then the romantic scenes will be easier to read. That’s what I did.” I however did not. I remember the book as being tremendously sexy, though in retrospect it was probably not. I was sixteen and finding anything remotely gay was a huge turn-on.
Rubyfruit Jungle, Rita Mae Brown – Most of the books on this list will be gay, rather than lesbian, however I wanted to include this because coming-of-age or coming-out books are pretty similar and important regardless of sexuality. As a young gay man a book like this was every bit as valuable regardless of the fact that it’s about girls who like girls. During this period I also read a lot of women’s books. They were very popular at the time. Fear of Flying, Kinflicks, The Women’s Room, et al. Given the realities of the period, women’s fiction, with it’s focus on acceptance of self and sexual expression was appealing to me as a gay man – who had much fewer reading options.
The Lure, Felice Picano – I remember reading this in a mass-market edition sometime around 1979/1980. I re-read it last year. There are a lot of elements in the book that are very good. At times, it’s a little murky and I prefer a crisper writing style but it’s definitely worth a read. It covers some of the same territory as the movie Cruising but is far, far superior.
The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde – I know I read this sometime during my first college career as a theatre major, and it may seem an odd choice for this list. One could argue that this is not a gay play at all. Certainly, none of the characters are gay. The humor however is distinctly camp and for that reason I include it. We covered The Picture of Dorian Gray in a GLBT fiction class I took in the ‘90s. Arguably that is the more queer of Wilde’s acknowledged works. However, I just adore this play and it’s hard to imagine that anyone could have written it without being somewhat set outside of society. Obviously, it pre-dates Wilde’s fall but simply knowing you’re gay sets you outside society whether it’s literally happened or not. Wilde’s vision is distinctly queer, even when sexuality is not his subject matter.
James Kirkwood – Recently, somewhere, I saw Kirkwood referred to as a cult novelist. If that’s true, it’s a shame, since the word cult implies a small readership. I’ve read all his books and people should be reading him. Recently, I re-read my favorite P.S. Your Cat is Dead and, though it was written almost forty years ago (1972), it holds up very well. In today’s market, the book would be called Gay-For-You, though I doubt that’s the way Kirkwood intended it. It is, however, a must read for anyone approaching that subgenre and was a strong influence on my book Desert Run. There is also an excellent play based on the book.
Tales of the City, Armistead Maupin – When I was twenty-two I took a train from Chicago back to upstate New York to direct a play. At the train station, a friend gave me the first two Tales of the City books to read on the twenty-two hour trip, probably one of the nicest gifts anyone’s given me – certainly one I remember (which probably says more about my relationship with books than the lovely people who’ve given me gifts over the years.) I’ve worked my way through the series a couple of times. I’ve had many copies over the years. I recommend the omnibus. It’s big, it’s heavy, but it’s all there.
LATE 70s/EARLY 80s
The Front Runner, Patricia Nell Warren – I should probably reread this book. I read it in paperback shortly after it’s original publication in 1976 and my memory of it is dim. What I do remember is the book being a bit melodramatic and the ending very exciting. Don’t take the word melodramatic as a negative. Melodrama is an important element of popular books and this was certainly popular. Like the next few books it was purchased at a mainstream mall bookstore. I was living in a small town in upstate New York and only those books that “crossed over” were available to us.
The Persian Boy, Mary Renault – My mother was a great fan of historical fiction and read this book when it came out in paperback sometime in 1973 or 1974. I was about sixteen at the time and was not out to my parents. When I asked to read the book, she had to think about it and then said, “Well, the way to get through it is to think of the Persian boy as a girl and then the romantic scenes will be easier to read. That’s what I did.” I however did not. I remember the book as being tremendously sexy, though in retrospect it was probably not. I was sixteen and finding anything remotely gay was a huge turn-on.
Rubyfruit Jungle, Rita Mae Brown – Most of the books on this list will be gay, rather than lesbian, however I wanted to include this because coming-of-age or coming-out books are pretty similar and important regardless of sexuality. As a young gay man a book like this was every bit as valuable regardless of the fact that it’s about girls who like girls. During this period I also read a lot of women’s books. They were very popular at the time. Fear of Flying, Kinflicks, The Women’s Room, et al. Given the realities of the period, women’s fiction, with it’s focus on acceptance of self and sexual expression was appealing to me as a gay man – who had much fewer reading options.
The Lure, Felice Picano – I remember reading this in a mass-market edition sometime around 1979/1980. I re-read it last year. There are a lot of elements in the book that are very good. At times, it’s a little murky and I prefer a crisper writing style but it’s definitely worth a read. It covers some of the same territory as the movie Cruising but is far, far superior.
The Importance of Being Earnest, Oscar Wilde – I know I read this sometime during my first college career as a theatre major, and it may seem an odd choice for this list. One could argue that this is not a gay play at all. Certainly, none of the characters are gay. The humor however is distinctly camp and for that reason I include it. We covered The Picture of Dorian Gray in a GLBT fiction class I took in the ‘90s. Arguably that is the more queer of Wilde’s acknowledged works. However, I just adore this play and it’s hard to imagine that anyone could have written it without being somewhat set outside of society. Obviously, it pre-dates Wilde’s fall but simply knowing you’re gay sets you outside society whether it’s literally happened or not. Wilde’s vision is distinctly queer, even when sexuality is not his subject matter.
James Kirkwood – Recently, somewhere, I saw Kirkwood referred to as a cult novelist. If that’s true, it’s a shame, since the word cult implies a small readership. I’ve read all his books and people should be reading him. Recently, I re-read my favorite P.S. Your Cat is Dead and, though it was written almost forty years ago (1972), it holds up very well. In today’s market, the book would be called Gay-For-You, though I doubt that’s the way Kirkwood intended it. It is, however, a must read for anyone approaching that subgenre and was a strong influence on my book Desert Run. There is also an excellent play based on the book.
Tales of the City, Armistead Maupin – When I was twenty-two I took a train from Chicago back to upstate New York to direct a play. At the train station, a friend gave me the first two Tales of the City books to read on the twenty-two hour trip, probably one of the nicest gifts anyone’s given me – certainly one I remember (which probably says more about my relationship with books than the lovely people who’ve given me gifts over the years.) I’ve worked my way through the series a couple of times. I’ve had many copies over the years. I recommend the omnibus. It’s big, it’s heavy, but it’s all there.
September 13, 2011
M/M Romance Vs. Gay Fiction
Recently Ann Somerville at Outlaw Reviews said of my book Boystown: Three Nick Nowak Mysteries “this is not m/m…it’s not even romance…it’s gay fiction, with male readers in mind” (see review here) and I have to say, I agree with her. I do write gay fiction. With a romantic, sexy edge certainly. And I do write for men, or rather, I don’t make any allowances for, or cater to, a female audience. I’m happy to have female readers, but I think my readers are looking for a window into a gay man’s world rather than an idealized gay romance. At least, the ones who like my work.
I imagine Ann’s opinion may confuse a lot of people writing and reading m/m today. Many of them are using the terms m/m and gay fiction synonymously. I’ve seen a number of m/m writers call themselves gay fiction writers. And, I’ve seen readers say things on boards and blogs like “Maurice by E.M. Forester was the first m/m novel I’ve ever read an I just love it!” and “My first m/m book was Patricia Nell Warren’s The Front Runner.” While both books are romantic, that’s true, neither is m/m romance. The genre didn’t exist when they were written, each has structural differences, and neither were claimed by the romance community until now.
To be fair, it’s important to note that on Amazon, the go-to spot for books, the categories for books with gay content are limited – there is no category for m/m romance or even gay romance. There is also no category for m/m or gay romance under romance. And, when you get to the Kindle side things get worse – everything there is lumped under the all inclusive title of Gay & Lesbian. It’s easy to see how someone younger or new to either genre, would have no clue that m/m romance and gay fiction are not the same thing.
So, what are they? And how are they different? There are very few absolutes to hold onto and a lot of “I know it when I see it.” Certainly publication date is one of the few absolutes. Since m/m sprang out of slash fiction, an Internet phenomenon, any work written before the advent of the Internet is almost certainly gay fiction. If a book is written with a gay male audience in mind, it is gay fiction. Especially, if it lacks a strong element of romance and ignores the rules of the romance genre entirely. If a book is written with a heterosexual female audience in mind and adheres to the rules of the romance genre it is m/m romance.
Gay fiction at its core is about the formation of an individual identity (the basic coming out story) or the formation of a chosen-family focused on adults (Tales of the City). M/M at its core is about the formation of a committed relationship (Suzanne Brockmann’s series is a good example) or the formation of a family focused on child rearing, and the children are often already related (see the current top-selling Bear, Otter and the Kid).
Another determiner of genre would be the sexual behavior of the characters. Typically, gay men have the ability to separate love and sex. They can pursue both at the same time and in completely different directions. Typically, straight women view sex and love as intermingled. Gross generalizations, I know, but they do explain the preferences of the bulk of readers. I’m a fan of James Lear’s books. Though his books contain many of the elements you’d find in an m/m novel, he definitely falls on the gay fiction side of the fence (sub genre erotica, certainly), since his characters typically have a ton of sex as they pursue a romantic ideal, or at least acknowledge they have those feelings. Romance readers have a distinct preference for two men developing a relationship through sex. These books often only feature the protagonists having sex, many times certainly, but just the two men. (The Tin Star by J.L. Langley is a good example of this.)
Theoretically, you could write a book that is both gay fiction and still follows the rules of the romance genre. A cross-genre novel, as it were. And, I’d guess that a lot of writers are attempting to stand on this tiny scrape of real estate. In my opinion, the act of bending gay characters to the romance genre makes it a nearly impossible task to write much of anything with the authenticity necessary to gay fiction.
You’ll note I don’t mention the sex of the author anywhere. While it’s true that gay fiction is largely written by men and m/m romance is largely written by women, there are a significant number of exceptions — enough exceptions to make the sex of the author a poor determiner of genre.
Now, you could argue that anything with gay content should be labeled Gay & Lesbian and we’ll just let the readers sort it out. And I imagine this would be Amazon’s defense if they were called out on the lack of detailed categories. You could also say this discussion is little more than an academic exercise. I don’t believe that it is, though. I believe the distinction between gay fiction and m/m is vitally important.
Why do I think that? Because readers don’t sort it out. A hardcore romance junkie gets her hands on a piece of gay fiction and she’s angry and often very vocal. She gets on Goodreads or Amazon and she bashes the book strictly on the basis that it was an m/m romance. It doesn’t help the author, it doesn’t help the publisher and it doesn’t help other readers who might not pick up on why the book is being bashed and just think it’s bad. (To be fair, this reader may have gotten a gay fiction book from an m/m publisher. These publishers are, commendably I think, putting out a small amount of gay fiction. Typically, though, they’re not distinguishing it well from their other product.)
On the other end of the spectrum you have your gay fiction reader who goes to Amazon looking for something to read and finds that most of the top twenty books are romance novels. Now, the bulk of gay readers do not like romance novels – yes, I know there are exceptions and you may be one – but seriously, as a rule, gay men do not read romance novels. So, when that’s all they see they just think ‘Wow, gay fiction must have died” and go off to buy the latest mainstream bestseller. And then they don’t look again for a very long time. Of course, if a gay fiction reader actually gets a hold of an m/m novel there’s a lot of cussing and writing of catty comments in the margins.
Notably, well known gay fiction writer Alan Hollinghurst has a book coming out soon, The Stranger’s Child. From the synopsis it’s obvious the book is gay fiction, just like his other work, but his publisher will only list the book as historical and literary. Now, did they do this because they wanted to get a more mainstream heterosexual audience? Or, did they just not want to associate the book with the romance novels that rule the gay fiction category? Either way, I find it concerning to see gay fiction not labeled as such.
I’ve been reading gay fiction since I was a teenager in the seventies. At first, there was very little I could get my hands on, but then, as time went on I found more and more on the shelves. Over time the genre has grown, and contracted, stumbled and gotten up again. And through all that it has shaped and informed the lives of gay men. The romance genre has an enormous readership and the speed with which readers and writers have rushed into m/m is a demonstration of its power. It’s great that m/m writers are making money and making readers happy. It’s also terrific that these writers and their audience are such staunch supporters of the gay community. It would be terrible though to watch m/m romance choke off the growth of gay fiction
So, what to do about all this? Obviously, it’s not going to sort itself out overnight. But, I think if writers and publishers become aware of the problem and begin to correctly identify themselves and their product things will slowly improve. In the past, I’ve called myself an m/m romance writer. I’m really not. And this is definitely my first step in removing that label. Hopefully, at least some, m/m romance writers will follow my lead and stop calling themselves gay fiction writers when they’re clearly not. Ultimately, I think it’s beneficial for everyone.
I imagine Ann’s opinion may confuse a lot of people writing and reading m/m today. Many of them are using the terms m/m and gay fiction synonymously. I’ve seen a number of m/m writers call themselves gay fiction writers. And, I’ve seen readers say things on boards and blogs like “Maurice by E.M. Forester was the first m/m novel I’ve ever read an I just love it!” and “My first m/m book was Patricia Nell Warren’s The Front Runner.” While both books are romantic, that’s true, neither is m/m romance. The genre didn’t exist when they were written, each has structural differences, and neither were claimed by the romance community until now.
To be fair, it’s important to note that on Amazon, the go-to spot for books, the categories for books with gay content are limited – there is no category for m/m romance or even gay romance. There is also no category for m/m or gay romance under romance. And, when you get to the Kindle side things get worse – everything there is lumped under the all inclusive title of Gay & Lesbian. It’s easy to see how someone younger or new to either genre, would have no clue that m/m romance and gay fiction are not the same thing.
So, what are they? And how are they different? There are very few absolutes to hold onto and a lot of “I know it when I see it.” Certainly publication date is one of the few absolutes. Since m/m sprang out of slash fiction, an Internet phenomenon, any work written before the advent of the Internet is almost certainly gay fiction. If a book is written with a gay male audience in mind, it is gay fiction. Especially, if it lacks a strong element of romance and ignores the rules of the romance genre entirely. If a book is written with a heterosexual female audience in mind and adheres to the rules of the romance genre it is m/m romance.
Gay fiction at its core is about the formation of an individual identity (the basic coming out story) or the formation of a chosen-family focused on adults (Tales of the City). M/M at its core is about the formation of a committed relationship (Suzanne Brockmann’s series is a good example) or the formation of a family focused on child rearing, and the children are often already related (see the current top-selling Bear, Otter and the Kid).
Another determiner of genre would be the sexual behavior of the characters. Typically, gay men have the ability to separate love and sex. They can pursue both at the same time and in completely different directions. Typically, straight women view sex and love as intermingled. Gross generalizations, I know, but they do explain the preferences of the bulk of readers. I’m a fan of James Lear’s books. Though his books contain many of the elements you’d find in an m/m novel, he definitely falls on the gay fiction side of the fence (sub genre erotica, certainly), since his characters typically have a ton of sex as they pursue a romantic ideal, or at least acknowledge they have those feelings. Romance readers have a distinct preference for two men developing a relationship through sex. These books often only feature the protagonists having sex, many times certainly, but just the two men. (The Tin Star by J.L. Langley is a good example of this.)
Theoretically, you could write a book that is both gay fiction and still follows the rules of the romance genre. A cross-genre novel, as it were. And, I’d guess that a lot of writers are attempting to stand on this tiny scrape of real estate. In my opinion, the act of bending gay characters to the romance genre makes it a nearly impossible task to write much of anything with the authenticity necessary to gay fiction.
You’ll note I don’t mention the sex of the author anywhere. While it’s true that gay fiction is largely written by men and m/m romance is largely written by women, there are a significant number of exceptions — enough exceptions to make the sex of the author a poor determiner of genre.
Now, you could argue that anything with gay content should be labeled Gay & Lesbian and we’ll just let the readers sort it out. And I imagine this would be Amazon’s defense if they were called out on the lack of detailed categories. You could also say this discussion is little more than an academic exercise. I don’t believe that it is, though. I believe the distinction between gay fiction and m/m is vitally important.
Why do I think that? Because readers don’t sort it out. A hardcore romance junkie gets her hands on a piece of gay fiction and she’s angry and often very vocal. She gets on Goodreads or Amazon and she bashes the book strictly on the basis that it was an m/m romance. It doesn’t help the author, it doesn’t help the publisher and it doesn’t help other readers who might not pick up on why the book is being bashed and just think it’s bad. (To be fair, this reader may have gotten a gay fiction book from an m/m publisher. These publishers are, commendably I think, putting out a small amount of gay fiction. Typically, though, they’re not distinguishing it well from their other product.)
On the other end of the spectrum you have your gay fiction reader who goes to Amazon looking for something to read and finds that most of the top twenty books are romance novels. Now, the bulk of gay readers do not like romance novels – yes, I know there are exceptions and you may be one – but seriously, as a rule, gay men do not read romance novels. So, when that’s all they see they just think ‘Wow, gay fiction must have died” and go off to buy the latest mainstream bestseller. And then they don’t look again for a very long time. Of course, if a gay fiction reader actually gets a hold of an m/m novel there’s a lot of cussing and writing of catty comments in the margins.
Notably, well known gay fiction writer Alan Hollinghurst has a book coming out soon, The Stranger’s Child. From the synopsis it’s obvious the book is gay fiction, just like his other work, but his publisher will only list the book as historical and literary. Now, did they do this because they wanted to get a more mainstream heterosexual audience? Or, did they just not want to associate the book with the romance novels that rule the gay fiction category? Either way, I find it concerning to see gay fiction not labeled as such.
I’ve been reading gay fiction since I was a teenager in the seventies. At first, there was very little I could get my hands on, but then, as time went on I found more and more on the shelves. Over time the genre has grown, and contracted, stumbled and gotten up again. And through all that it has shaped and informed the lives of gay men. The romance genre has an enormous readership and the speed with which readers and writers have rushed into m/m is a demonstration of its power. It’s great that m/m writers are making money and making readers happy. It’s also terrific that these writers and their audience are such staunch supporters of the gay community. It would be terrible though to watch m/m romance choke off the growth of gay fiction
So, what to do about all this? Obviously, it’s not going to sort itself out overnight. But, I think if writers and publishers become aware of the problem and begin to correctly identify themselves and their product things will slowly improve. In the past, I’ve called myself an m/m romance writer. I’m really not. And this is definitely my first step in removing that label. Hopefully, at least some, m/m romance writers will follow my lead and stop calling themselves gay fiction writers when they’re clearly not. Ultimately, I think it’s beneficial for everyone.
June 1, 2011
Excerpt from Boystown 3: Two Nick Nowak Novellas Coming out June 8th
Everyone lies. They lie to the people they love; they lie to themselves. Once you admit it, it’s not such a hard thing to live with. What is hard to live with is how far people will go to keep their lies alive.
Reverend Edward Pepper was a fussy little man. He sat uncomfortably in the guest chair across from my desk, looking around my office as though he wanted to take a rag to it and wipe up all the dust. Of course, I wouldn’t allow that. I was fond of the dust.
He was dressed in a black shirt with a clerical collar. Over that, he wore a short woolen jacket that was now making him sweat. It was May and the weather was hot one day, cold the next. That day had begun cold and quickly heated up. I’d asked if he wanted to hang the coat on the hook behind my door but he’d declined. He was a small man, wiry and tight. He seemed on the verge of shaking. With his white blond hair and his anxious blood-shot eyes he reminded me of a rabbit. A pretty rabbit, maybe, but a rabbit all the same. Even his nose was pink. He’d been in my office for ten minutes and I hadn’t been able to find out why he was there.
“How did you find me, Reverend Pepper?” I asked.
“We have a choir. They’re good. Quite good. They perform every Sunday morning on The Towering Hour. Have you seen it?”
“The Towering Hour? No, I generally sleep in on Sunday mornings.”
“Oh. Of course,” he said. He’d already identified me as a heathen. I hoped he wouldn’t try to change that. I liked being a heathen.
He hadn’t answered my question, so I asked it in a different way. “Did someone in the choir recommend me?”
“Yes, I mean, no. I mean they called around until they found someone who could recommend some like you.”
“Someone like me?” I suspected I knew what he meant but I wanted him to say it. “Why were you looking for someone like me?”
“Gregory was shot, you see. Gregory Dane. Outside his apartment building. About a month ago.” I kept an expectant look on my face, hoping he’d give me more details. It worked. He went on, “Gregory had the most beautiful voice. When he sang it was like listening to an angel. Everyone liked him. We can’t figure out why--”
“I still don’t understand why you came to me.”
“You’re uniquely qualified to find Gregory’s killer.”
I took pity on him finally and guessed, “Gregory was gay.”
“Yes,” he said, sitting back in his chair as though relieved he wasn’t going to have to use the word himself.
“And you think something about Gregory’s being gay is what got him killed?”
“It must have.”
There was something about the good Reverend I didn’t like. It might have been his nervous little rabbit ways. Or, his unwillingness to come out and say what he meant. Or, his assumption that being gay got Gregory Dane killed, I don’t know. But I didn’t like him so I said something that was a little on the untruthful side, “I’m sure the Chicago police can handle the case.”
“I don’t think so,” the Reverend said. “They’re already making mistakes.”
“Yeah? What mistakes have they made?” I asked.
“They found a gun in a trash bin about three blocks from where Gregory lived. They say it’s the gun that killed him. The gun is registered to me.”
“Gregory was killed with a gun you own?”
“No, that’s not what I said. It’s not what I said at all.”
It certainly sounded like what he’d said.
“You see what I mean?” he went on. “The police aren’t doing a good job.”
“I’m afraid, I don’t see,” I said honestly.
“I’ve never owned a gun in my life.”
Reverend Edward Pepper was a fussy little man. He sat uncomfortably in the guest chair across from my desk, looking around my office as though he wanted to take a rag to it and wipe up all the dust. Of course, I wouldn’t allow that. I was fond of the dust.
He was dressed in a black shirt with a clerical collar. Over that, he wore a short woolen jacket that was now making him sweat. It was May and the weather was hot one day, cold the next. That day had begun cold and quickly heated up. I’d asked if he wanted to hang the coat on the hook behind my door but he’d declined. He was a small man, wiry and tight. He seemed on the verge of shaking. With his white blond hair and his anxious blood-shot eyes he reminded me of a rabbit. A pretty rabbit, maybe, but a rabbit all the same. Even his nose was pink. He’d been in my office for ten minutes and I hadn’t been able to find out why he was there.
“How did you find me, Reverend Pepper?” I asked.
“We have a choir. They’re good. Quite good. They perform every Sunday morning on The Towering Hour. Have you seen it?”
“The Towering Hour? No, I generally sleep in on Sunday mornings.”
“Oh. Of course,” he said. He’d already identified me as a heathen. I hoped he wouldn’t try to change that. I liked being a heathen.
He hadn’t answered my question, so I asked it in a different way. “Did someone in the choir recommend me?”
“Yes, I mean, no. I mean they called around until they found someone who could recommend some like you.”
“Someone like me?” I suspected I knew what he meant but I wanted him to say it. “Why were you looking for someone like me?”
“Gregory was shot, you see. Gregory Dane. Outside his apartment building. About a month ago.” I kept an expectant look on my face, hoping he’d give me more details. It worked. He went on, “Gregory had the most beautiful voice. When he sang it was like listening to an angel. Everyone liked him. We can’t figure out why--”
“I still don’t understand why you came to me.”
“You’re uniquely qualified to find Gregory’s killer.”
I took pity on him finally and guessed, “Gregory was gay.”
“Yes,” he said, sitting back in his chair as though relieved he wasn’t going to have to use the word himself.
“And you think something about Gregory’s being gay is what got him killed?”
“It must have.”
There was something about the good Reverend I didn’t like. It might have been his nervous little rabbit ways. Or, his unwillingness to come out and say what he meant. Or, his assumption that being gay got Gregory Dane killed, I don’t know. But I didn’t like him so I said something that was a little on the untruthful side, “I’m sure the Chicago police can handle the case.”
“I don’t think so,” the Reverend said. “They’re already making mistakes.”
“Yeah? What mistakes have they made?” I asked.
“They found a gun in a trash bin about three blocks from where Gregory lived. They say it’s the gun that killed him. The gun is registered to me.”
“Gregory was killed with a gun you own?”
“No, that’s not what I said. It’s not what I said at all.”
It certainly sounded like what he’d said.
“You see what I mean?” he went on. “The police aren’t doing a good job.”
“I’m afraid, I don’t see,” I said honestly.
“I’ve never owned a gun in my life.”
April 6, 2011
An Excerpt and Blurb From Full Release Available at Torquere Press
BLURB:
When studio accountant, Matt Latowski orders an erotic massage on the one-year anniversary of a bad break-up, he’s surprised to find the masseur calling him two weeks later for a date. Unable to say no, Matt begins a journey that leads to his becoming a murder suspect, and eventually an erotic masseur himself!
EXCERPT:
Eddie gave me his crooked smile, except this time it was different. It was shy, almost nervous. Like he was afraid I wouldn’t even let him in. He looked pretty much the same. Maybe a little tired. He wore a tight pair of Levi’s and a thin brown turtle neck sweater. He hadn’t shaved and the dark stubble made him sexier.
“You gonna invite me in?” he asked.
“Oh, sorry,” I said, quickly stepping out of his way. “Come on in, please.”
He set the table and his bag near the front door, then grabbed my collar and pulled me down for a quick friendly kiss. His tongue slipped into my mouth and explored. I allowed myself to enjoy this for a moment then pushed him away. A date should have some kind of other activity before the sex starts. As I led him into the house, he hooked a finger into my belt loop. I glanced back at him and laughed.
“You’re nervous,” he said. “So am I.”
He didn’t seem nervous. In fact, he seemed completely in control. But why would he feel like he was in control? This wasn’t--Wait, I was over-thinking this, just like Peter said. I needed to relax and go with it.
“How about some wine?” I asked.
“Yum.”
I pulled together the bottle of wine, a corkscrew and a couple glasses. Eddie was inches away as I did. I led him into the living room. Aside from the disruption of the construction, the room looked pretty much as it had since Jeremy and I moved in. Early on we’d spent an entire day on furniture row in West L.A. in order to find the least expensive, most comfortable black leather sofa the city had to offer. I complemented the sofa with a couple of wooden, vaguely Chinese chairs I’d found at an import shop for a very low price. Beneath, the chairs and the sofa was an area rug with a geometric pattern. A glass coffee table and two Jackson Pollack prints on the walls finished off the room. Trespassing slightly into the room was a Danish modern dining table found at a garage sale. Jeremy and I had spent an entire weekend recovering the chairs (with a fair amount of fighting) in a pattern similar to the living room’s area rug.
"What happened to your kitchen?" Eddie asked, as I opened the wine.
Nervously, I dumped out the story of my thieving ex. I knew better than talk about Jeremy, and not just because I’d just read it on the Internet, I’d watched as previous dates had mentally stamped BAGGAGE across my forehead in big red letters. Strangely, Eddie didn’t seem to care.
When I finished my story of woe, he said, "Wow, that sucks." Then he licked his lips.
I focused enough to say, "Yeah, it does."
There was an awkward silence. I remembered to maintain eye contact. His eyes were a pretty blue. A pretty blue distracting enough that I couldn’t think of a single question to ask him. Finally, he said, "You’re staring."
"Oh sorry," I said, looking away.
“You want to kiss me, don’t you?”
I did. But not yet. I changed the subject by asking the first question that popped into my head. "So, why did you call me? Honestly."
"Necessity," he said. "Some times I need to see someone who’s not going to pay me. It keeps me honest." Then he smiled. "Don’t worry. I won’t go all Glenn Close on you."
I laughed at his joke, something the Internet had recommended. My laugh was a little strangled though. I hadn’t been worried about him getting stalker-ish until he’d said that. Should I worry? Oh, God, I should worry. To cover my discomfort, I went into what remained of the kitchen and sent our dinners for their final spin round the microwave. Eddie followed me like I had him on a tether.
“Sixty more seconds,” I said as I hit start on the microwave.
“What can we do for sixty seconds?” He asked. “Oh, I know.”
He pulled me into a kiss. I was a sweet kiss, made sexy by the stubble roughing up my face. I was hard by the time the microwave beeped. We took our plates over to the table and sat down. He sat next to me and rested his left hand on my thigh.
As we ate we chatted about the food, which wasn’t great but Eddie pretended it was. I tried to find out more about him but he wouldn’t say much. Grew up in the valley. Left home early, possibly under less than ideal circumstances. When I tried to get specifics he turned the conversation back to me, and my life.
Over the course of the evening, he found out a lot about me.
"What made you become a masseur?" I asked after I took the dishes into the kitchen and set them on the standing butcher’s block that was my only counter. I’d leave them there until I got around to washing them in the bathroom sink.
He answered with a question. "What made you become an accountant?"
"I like numbers."
Eddie flashed his pretty eyes at me and said, "I like men." He’d been making that obvious since I answered the door.
"I’ll bet there’s more to it than that."
"There is," he said simply but didn’t elaborate. He changed the subject slightly by saying, "I see all sorts of men. Important men. Successful men. Rich men. But when they climb on my table they’re all the same. Naked. Vulnerable. Needing the...relief I have to offer."
"So you’re a humanitarian?" I suggested.
"Something like that," he said.
"You must have your share of bad experiences."
He didn’t answer. Instead, he smiled and kissed me again. "Let’s go play."
When studio accountant, Matt Latowski orders an erotic massage on the one-year anniversary of a bad break-up, he’s surprised to find the masseur calling him two weeks later for a date. Unable to say no, Matt begins a journey that leads to his becoming a murder suspect, and eventually an erotic masseur himself!
EXCERPT:
Eddie gave me his crooked smile, except this time it was different. It was shy, almost nervous. Like he was afraid I wouldn’t even let him in. He looked pretty much the same. Maybe a little tired. He wore a tight pair of Levi’s and a thin brown turtle neck sweater. He hadn’t shaved and the dark stubble made him sexier.
“You gonna invite me in?” he asked.
“Oh, sorry,” I said, quickly stepping out of his way. “Come on in, please.”
He set the table and his bag near the front door, then grabbed my collar and pulled me down for a quick friendly kiss. His tongue slipped into my mouth and explored. I allowed myself to enjoy this for a moment then pushed him away. A date should have some kind of other activity before the sex starts. As I led him into the house, he hooked a finger into my belt loop. I glanced back at him and laughed.
“You’re nervous,” he said. “So am I.”
He didn’t seem nervous. In fact, he seemed completely in control. But why would he feel like he was in control? This wasn’t--Wait, I was over-thinking this, just like Peter said. I needed to relax and go with it.
“How about some wine?” I asked.
“Yum.”
I pulled together the bottle of wine, a corkscrew and a couple glasses. Eddie was inches away as I did. I led him into the living room. Aside from the disruption of the construction, the room looked pretty much as it had since Jeremy and I moved in. Early on we’d spent an entire day on furniture row in West L.A. in order to find the least expensive, most comfortable black leather sofa the city had to offer. I complemented the sofa with a couple of wooden, vaguely Chinese chairs I’d found at an import shop for a very low price. Beneath, the chairs and the sofa was an area rug with a geometric pattern. A glass coffee table and two Jackson Pollack prints on the walls finished off the room. Trespassing slightly into the room was a Danish modern dining table found at a garage sale. Jeremy and I had spent an entire weekend recovering the chairs (with a fair amount of fighting) in a pattern similar to the living room’s area rug.
"What happened to your kitchen?" Eddie asked, as I opened the wine.
Nervously, I dumped out the story of my thieving ex. I knew better than talk about Jeremy, and not just because I’d just read it on the Internet, I’d watched as previous dates had mentally stamped BAGGAGE across my forehead in big red letters. Strangely, Eddie didn’t seem to care.
When I finished my story of woe, he said, "Wow, that sucks." Then he licked his lips.
I focused enough to say, "Yeah, it does."
There was an awkward silence. I remembered to maintain eye contact. His eyes were a pretty blue. A pretty blue distracting enough that I couldn’t think of a single question to ask him. Finally, he said, "You’re staring."
"Oh sorry," I said, looking away.
“You want to kiss me, don’t you?”
I did. But not yet. I changed the subject by asking the first question that popped into my head. "So, why did you call me? Honestly."
"Necessity," he said. "Some times I need to see someone who’s not going to pay me. It keeps me honest." Then he smiled. "Don’t worry. I won’t go all Glenn Close on you."
I laughed at his joke, something the Internet had recommended. My laugh was a little strangled though. I hadn’t been worried about him getting stalker-ish until he’d said that. Should I worry? Oh, God, I should worry. To cover my discomfort, I went into what remained of the kitchen and sent our dinners for their final spin round the microwave. Eddie followed me like I had him on a tether.
“Sixty more seconds,” I said as I hit start on the microwave.
“What can we do for sixty seconds?” He asked. “Oh, I know.”
He pulled me into a kiss. I was a sweet kiss, made sexy by the stubble roughing up my face. I was hard by the time the microwave beeped. We took our plates over to the table and sat down. He sat next to me and rested his left hand on my thigh.
As we ate we chatted about the food, which wasn’t great but Eddie pretended it was. I tried to find out more about him but he wouldn’t say much. Grew up in the valley. Left home early, possibly under less than ideal circumstances. When I tried to get specifics he turned the conversation back to me, and my life.
Over the course of the evening, he found out a lot about me.
"What made you become a masseur?" I asked after I took the dishes into the kitchen and set them on the standing butcher’s block that was my only counter. I’d leave them there until I got around to washing them in the bathroom sink.
He answered with a question. "What made you become an accountant?"
"I like numbers."
Eddie flashed his pretty eyes at me and said, "I like men." He’d been making that obvious since I answered the door.
"I’ll bet there’s more to it than that."
"There is," he said simply but didn’t elaborate. He changed the subject slightly by saying, "I see all sorts of men. Important men. Successful men. Rich men. But when they climb on my table they’re all the same. Naked. Vulnerable. Needing the...relief I have to offer."
"So you’re a humanitarian?" I suggested.
"Something like that," he said.
"You must have your share of bad experiences."
He didn’t answer. Instead, he smiled and kissed me again. "Let’s go play."
