9.11 - 11. Chapter 11

July 6, 2001

“You will be alright?” Stef asked as the plane descended into Chesterfield, Missouri.

“I’ll be fine,” I said. I was self-sufficient, and I knew that if I had issues, I was a cab and an airplane ride away from home. “If things don’t work out here, I’ll just go back to Chicago and hang out at the bar.”

“I am not convinced that would be a responsible decision,” he said dubiously.

“You sound like Grand,” I said, teasing him. “We had fun last night, and I didn’t do anything to freak you out. What’s the big problem?”

“It is sometimes difficult to adapt my mind to the fact that you seem so mature, yet you are still so young.” It irritated me that he made me sound like a little kid, but I wasn’t going to argue about it.

“How about if I promise not to do anything that you wouldn’t do?” I asked, trying not to smile as I did. I failed. He gave me a dour look, which actually made me laugh.

“Up until this moment, you have been good company,” he said.

“I had fun with you too, Stef,” I said. The plane landed, and then taxied up to the Fixed Base Operator (FBO). I grabbed my bag, a smaller one with just the stuff I needed for my long weekend with Tony, and my backpack. I gave Stef a quick hug, and then walked down the steps to find Tony waiting for me.

“Welcome to St. Louis!” he said with a smile. He gave me a big hug, making me drop my backpack to return it, then took my bag and put it into his car.

I waved at Stef, and then we drove off. “It’s good to be here,” I said. “Where are we going?”

“First place we go is home. My mother wants to see you. Then we’re going to go see the city.” He was excited to show me this place he called home, and that made me excited to see it. “Good thing you got in early.” It was just turning 10am.

“Yeah, it is, but that was more Stef’s choice than mine. He wants to get back home.” It was muggy, but cool enough here in the morning, so Tony had put the top down. He spent most of our trip to his house talking about the area and pointing out insignificant suburban landmarks.

His mom had evidently grown to like me in Rome, because she gave me a massive hug when I got there. “Your nose looks better,” she said. The swelling and bruising were gone.

“Yeah, it’s good enough that I can do some light swimming,” I said, hoping that was the way Uncle Jack had meant it.

“I have to go to the store. I’ll let you boys get settled in,” she said.

“We’re gonna go see the town, Ma,” Tony said.

“Be back for dinner at seven,” she said. It looked like he was going to argue with her, but instead he just agreed. That was probably the best choice when it came to dealing with her. She grabbed her purse and keys, and was out the door.

“We’ve got the house to ourselves,” he said with a leer. He led me up to his bedroom with my stuff, and then we all but ripped off our clothes and fucked like we were drowning and that would save us. “Dude, it just doesn’t get better than that,” he said, grinning at me when we were done.

“Nope, doesn’t,” I said, smiling at him. We got dressed and went out to his car. He took me toward the city but exited on Kingshighway, an illustrious sounding street for what looked like a pretty dilapidated area. It really wasn’t dilapidated, it was just industrial, I decided. He drove south for a few blocks, and then went west.

        “This neighborhood is called The Hill,” he told me.  “See the fire hydrants? They’re all painted like Italian flags.  This is the original Italian section of town.” 

“Cool,” I said, and it was. The houses were small, and looked pretty much the same, but they were in good shape, and it looked like everyone kept them up really well. There seemed to be a bar or a restaurant on every corner, although a big Catholic church dominated the neighborhood.

“That’s where I lived when I was a little kid,” he said, pointing at a small house.

“Dude, all these houses are in such good shape,” I said.

Tony just shrugged. “People want to live here. They keep their houses up. Usually homes pass to a family member, or they’re sold to someone everyone knows.”

I was kind of amazed at what an insular community this was. We pulled up to a house and stopped. “What are we doing here?”

“We’re gonna say ‘hi’ to my grandmother,” Tony said with an evil smirk. “Brace yourself.”

“Alright,” I said, with apprehension. He led us up the walk to the door and went right in. “Nonna!” he shouted.

“Who’s here?” this little old Italian woman asked as she came out of what was presumably the kitchen, since she had an apron on. “Tony!” She gave him one of those big hugs I’d gotten so often in Rome. “And who are you?”

“Will Schluter, ma’am,” I said politely.

“Professor Crampton is his grandfather,” Tony said.

“How is he?” she asked me, then proceeded to ramble on about Grand, and what a good guy he was. “You look so thin! You come in here and have something to eat,” she told me when she was done talking about Grand, even as she reached up and pinched my cheek.

“We can’t, Nonna. We have to meet some people. But I wanted you to meet Will. He’s one of my best friends,” Tony told her.

I raised my eyebrow at that, even as I smiled. “You’ve got ten minutes,” she insisted. “Come on.” She led us into the kitchen and stuffed food into us, until Tony finally managed to drag us away.

“Dude, she’s awesome,” I said, laughing, as we drove off.

He smiled at me. “She’s really important to me. I wanted you to meet her.” He drove back out onto Kingshighway then turned into a parking lot. “You still hungry?”

“I could eat,” I said.

“This place has the best cheeseburgers, at least in St. Louis,” he said.

“Sure they do,” I said skeptically.

        “They do,” he asserted.  “O’Connell’s.  It’s an Irish pub.”  We went in and I had to let my eyes adjust, as it was pretty dark.  We snagged a big wooden booth and ordered cheeseburgers.  I sat there bullshitting with Tony, waiting for quite a while for our food to arrive.  “They make them fresh,” he said to explain our long wait.

“No problem,” I said. It wasn’t, but we didn’t have to wait much longer after that until the food arrived. I looked at the thick burger the waitress put in front of me dubiously, but that only lasted until my first bite. Damn. This thing was good. I wolfed it down, even though I was pretty full after our appetizer at Nonna’s.

“So was it good?” he asked, taunting me.

        “Dude, that was the best cheeseburger I’ve ever had,” I agreed.  He smiled, and then took me downtown.  I pulled out a joint and we got high, really high.  He pointed out the hockey stadium, drove by the football stadium, and showed me Union Station, this refurbished old train station that was kind of cool.  We went to the Arch and bought tickets to go up to the top, then watched a movie about how it was built.  When we went to go up to the top of the Arch, they put us into these elevator cars that were like sideways Coke cans.  Tall dudes like Tony and me were wedged in there.  “Good thing I’m not claustrophobic,” I told him.  If I were, I would have freaked out.

“Yeah, and wait till it gets going,” he said. The other tourists looked at us nervously, even as it started moving. The car would travel up a bit then rotate to keep us on an even keel, but it was done in a clunky mechanical way that was pretty unnerving. We got to the top and climbed up a pretty steeply sloped floor to where there were windows looking out over the whole city. “That’s Illinois over there,” he said, pointing east.

“Looks pretty nasty,” I said.

“It is. Most people only go over there if they’re partying late or going to the strip clubs,” he said. We walked to the other side and looked out at St. Louis. He pointed out the City Hall building that was supposedly modeled after the Hotel de Ville in Paris, and gave me a brief overview of other areas. We stayed up there for a while, and then caught another one of those tin can elevators down to the bottom.

After we were done with that, he drove us down to the Brewery, with a capital ‘B’, home to Anheuser-Busch. We took a tour, saw how they made beer, saw the Clydesdales and a Dalmatian or two, then scored some free beer, courtesy of our fake IDs. “Dude, this is like a whirlwind,” I said. “I didn’t know this was such a cool city.”

“Parts of it are,” he said.

“Where are we going now?”

        “I thought we’d have a drink,” he said.  We drove through what did not look like a good neighborhood until he parked next to this strange looking place.  “This is the Venice Café.” 

“Looks kind of weird,” I said.

“Dude, everything in here is weird,” he said, laughing. And it was. If you looked up eclectic in the dictionary, you’d see a picture of the Venice Café. I loved all the mosaic tile work. We sat on this cool patio and downed a beer, enjoying this lull in our busy sightseeing day.

“So you going to tell me what happened last weekend?” I asked, finally bringing up the topic of Dana.

“Are you pissed at me?”

“Dude, I’m not pissed at you. She’s pretty pushy, so it’s not going to be easy. I’m just wondering if you’re actually going to do it.”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” he demanded, all angry.

“It means that I think every time you go to tell her, there’s going to be a reason to put it off,” I noted. He just shook his head, totally annoyed with me because I was right.

“I knew you’d bust my balls about this,” he bitched. “I was so looking forward to you coming to town, but I was dreading this part, because I knew this is what you’d do.”

I gave him a truly evil look, but managed to control my own temper. “Look, I’m not busting your balls. You and I don’t have anything exclusive, so you’re free to fuck her if you want to. I’m not mad at you about it; I’m worried about you. The only promise you had to make to me is to keep her the fuck away from me.” I watched him mellow in the face of my logic, and my sincerity.

“She’s not here, is she?” he asked, grinning at me. “I’m sorry I was a dick.”

“You’re feeling guilty and nervous about this, and you were taking it out on me,” I said to him bluntly. “Don’t do that anymore.”

“OK,” he said, and grinned at me, making me melt. “Come on. Time to go.”

“Where to now?”

“Home. Time to clean up for dinner. Hope you’re hungry,” he said.

“Dude, how come everyone in your family isn’t fat?”

He laughed as we walked out to the car. “Now you know why I exercise all the fucking time.” We hit the remnants of rush hour traffic as we headed west. “Fucking traffic.”

I laughed at him. “Dude, this isn’t shit.” LA and the Bay Area were so much worse than this. He looked at the clock on his car with a purpose.

        “We have time.  I want to show you something else,” he said.  We were close to his house, but he took us out to this sort of obscure place called the Laumeier Sculpture Park.  “You got another J?”

“Yeah,” I said, but it sounded more like ‘of course’.

“Light it up,” he said. We smoked a joint, and now thoroughly stoned, we wandered up on this plain where there was this cool orange sculpture. “This is supposed to represent ruins, like the ones you can see in Italy,” he told me. He led me to some woods, where we wandered around, occasionally coming upon a sculpture placed there for no apparent reason. Most of them were cool, but it did help that I was stoned.

“This place is pretty beast,” I said.

We got to a secluded part of the park, and he led me off the path. He shocked the shit out of me when he started kissing me, and shocked me even more when I felt his tongue force its way into my mouth. He spun me around and ran his hand across my ass. “I want to fuck you, right here, right now.” It wasn’t a request, it was a demand. I undid my pants enough to lower them down enough to expose my ass and take my own dick out, then handed him some lube. While he worked me open, which didn’t take much when I was with him, I kept a lookout. I moaned when he entered me, and then focused on enjoying the fuck while making sure no one else saw us. The chance that we could get caught by someone exploring the woods made it that much hotter. I stroked my cock while he fucked me. He blew first, with his primal grunts telling me he was blowing as effectively as the way he jammed his dick so far up my ass it should have been popping out of my mouth. I wasn’t far behind him, blasting my wad all over the ground. Fertilizer, I thought, and giggled as I enjoyed my post-orgasm euphoria.

“I like this place,” I told him as we walked back to the car. He smiled. We drove back to his house, just enjoying our time together. We didn’t talk on the short ride, which was good because it gave me a chance to think about my day. Everything had been great except for Dana, or our discussion about her. It would have been easy to credit myself with being all composed, and not freaking out, but if Tony had been fucking around with another dude, I wouldn’t have been nearly as calm. I chided myself for thinking I was so cool, when in fact the reason I didn’t freak out is because I knew he was gay, and that long-term, he wouldn’t be with her. She was just a fuck to him, a good friend that he got off with.

It had been hot and muggy, and I smelled like it, so I was glad to get back to his house and take a shower. We put on casual clothes for dinner and went downstairs to eat. The smell of amazing food permeated the whole house, and fueled my appetite even before I got to the table. Tonight, we had pasta with cream sauce, with chicken and some vegetables mixed in. It was good, really good, and I told Mrs. Carbone that. It was so cool to see her beam with pleasure at flattery over her cooking, but I’d learned in Italy that talk was cheap, and the best way to compliment her was to eat a lot, so I did.

After dinner, Tony drove down this street called Lindbergh Boulevard, which reminded me of the El Camino in Paly, both because it was crowded with a bunch of stoplights, and because there were a lot of people cruising. We ended up at this theater in the southern part of the county called Ronnie’s, not to see a movie, but to hang in their parking lot. A bunch of Tony’s friends were there; they seemed like nice enough dudes.

“Alright, I got one more place to take you, then we’re going home,” he said as we got back into his Camaro.

“Where?”

“You like ice cream?”

“Yeah,” I said. It was my favorite desert.

        “We got this place called Ted Drewes here, and they sell frozen custard.  You will love it,” he promised. 

“If you say so, then I probably will,” I said, winking at him. It was apparently on the old Route 66.

“If you drive that way on this road,” Tony said, pointing to the west, “you’ll end up in LA.” We drove up to this place that was packed, with cars parked all around it, and people lined up out front either waiting in line or just congregating. It was on a four lane road with a center turn lane, but the crowds had expanded out into the street so the cops had to close one of the lanes. I’d never seen anything quite like this. We stood in line and ordered this thing called a concrete, but I’d learned earlier not to doubt Tony’s advice to me on food, so I planned for it to be good. It was. Real good. We hung out and bullshitted with a couple of people he knew from high school, and then headed back to his house. “Hope you don’t mind an early night.”

“I’ve had a long day. It’s been a blast, but I’m kind of tired anyway.”

“I’m glad you had fun. I wanted to show you my town. There’s so much you didn’t get to see. One of my favorite places is Forest Park. I don’t know if we’ll have time to go there tomorrow.”

“Then we’ll go there next time,” I said, all but promising to come back. His mom was already in bed when we got home. Her bedroom was on the first floor, and it was appropriately enough next to the kitchen. We went up the stairs quietly.

“She hears everything,” Tony whispered, “but I try to be quiet anyway.” We went straight to his room and he locked the door behind us. “I love spending time with you.”

“Today was the bomb,” I said. “I feel like by getting to know your hometown, I got to know you a little better.”

“It’s part of me,” he said, reminding me of Gathan, with his devotion to Claremont. Must be how Midwestern boys are.

We lay in one of the beds in his room together. “When you get out of school, you think you’ll move back here?”

He shrugged. “Guess that depends on where I get a job. I’d like to, but I don’t have to.” I could feel him opening up to me, and I was pretty excited about that. I loved it when he shared his hopes and dreams with me, because I knew how rare that was. Just as he was about to say something else, there was a loud knock on his door.

“Tony, you got company,” Julia said.

“Who is it?” he asked.

“Just get your ass downstairs,” she said, being bitchy, and reminding me of JJ when he was in one of his moods.

He pulled on the shorts and T-shirt he’d just stripped off and I did the same thing, and followed him down to the great room. There, waiting for him with her smug smile, was Dana. “Hi! I missed you so much I decided to drive out and see you,” she said cheerfully.

“Hey,” Tony said unenthusiastically, and gave her a quick kiss. “You picked a bad weekend. I’m leaving tomorrow.”

“I figured I’d go with you,” she said, inviting herself along. She suddenly seemed to notice me, although I wondered if she’d known I was going to be here. “What are you doing here?” she asked in a really bitchy way.

“Tony asked me to come to St. Louis to see the town and to go floating with him and his friends,” I said. “I mean, it’s not like I’d just drop in on someone without being invited. That would be pretty rude.”

“Not if you’re dating,” she snapped. This wasn’t the first time we’d squared off with our claws out, so it didn’t matter to either one of us, but Tony was pretty uncomfortable.

“If you’re dating,” I said, emphasizing the ‘if’ and pissing both of them off.

“Look Dana, you can hang out with us tonight and tomorrow, but then we’re going floating,” Tony said.

“So. There’s not an extra canoe?”

“You can’t float alone,” he said. “That’s a lot of work.”

“I wasn’t talking about a canoe for me, I was talking about a canoe for Will,” she said, gesturing at me. I laughed at her and her arrogance.

“Come on,” Tony said. “I’ll get you set up in the guest room. We can work it out in the morning.” It wasn’t late by any of our standards, but he just didn’t want to deal with this issue. He led her up to the guest room; while I stayed in the hall, listening to them argue.

“She’s such a bitch,” Julia said, scaring the shit out of me since I hadn’t seen her there.

“True that,” I agreed. “Dude, if she’s gonna be here, I’m bailing.”

“You bail and leave her here instead, and I’ll track you down and cut your dick off,” she threatened, cracking me up. We heard the arguing stop, so we both scampered back to our respective rooms.

Tony came in a few minutes after I’d gotten all settled in, so I acted like I hadn’t been outside trying to eavesdrop. “Dude, I am so sorry about this.”

“What do you want me to say to that?” I asked him, only I wasn’t being nice about it. “I could point out that I told you to dump her, and say this is exactly why.” He frowned at me. “You promised me she wouldn’t be around. She’s around. One of us is leaving. Who’s it gonna be?”

“I’ll deal with it in the morning,” he said. I should have probably really given him shit about that, and extracted some major concession from him about jilting her, but then we’d have this tense evening, and I was still sharing his bedroom while she wasn’t.

“Alright,” I agreed. I wrapped my hands around his neck and forced his head to meet mine, forced our lips to connect. He resisted at first, not because he didn’t want me, but because he was all uptight about Dana being here. I’d just gotten him beyond that, just gotten him into it, when there was a soft knock on his door.

“Tony?” I heard Dana ask. She tried to open the door but it was locked. “Tony!”

I got back into my bed, and he made sure his erection went down, and then he went and opened the door. “What?”

“I was thinking that Will and I could trade rooms so you and I could spend some time together.” She was trying to use sex to control him, which was laughable.

“Guess again,” I said. “I’m comfortable right here.”

She gave me her evil look. “Then you can come back and spend some time with me in my room,” she told Tony.

“I can’t do that,” he said.

“Sure you can,” she replied. She took his hand and all but dragged him out of the room. He looked back at me sheepishly, but turned away quickly when he saw how pissed off I was.

For some reason I was hungry, so I went down to the kitchen to rummage up something to eat. I tried to be quiet, but it’s hard to do in a strange kitchen. I was just about to make myself some Pop Tarts when Tony’s mom came in, wiping her eyes. “What are you doing?”

“I’m so sorry,” I told her. “I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

“You’re hungry?” she asked.

“Yeah. I just thought I’d grab a snack.”

“Why didn’t Tony help you?” she asked, her brows narrowing.

I could have been really nice, really classy, and come up with some story to explain this, but I decided to put a spoke in both Dana and Tony’s wheels. “He wasn’t in the room,” I told her.

“Where is he?”

“Dana showed up. He’s probably hanging out with her,” I said, like it was no big deal.

“Make your Pop Tarts,” she said, and then stormed up the stairs. I heard banging on a door, then yelling, loud yelling, all of it coming from Mrs. Carbone. I’d just sat down to eat my Pop Tarts when she came back. “You want something else?”

“No, this should work,” I said. “I’m sorry I bothered you.”

“You’re not the one bothering me,” she said, and went back to bed. When I got upstairs to Tony’s room, he was lying in bed staring at the ceiling.

“Did you send her up here to yell at me?” he asked me abruptly.

“No, I was hungry, and went to grab some Pop Tarts. I tried to be quiet, but next thing I know, she’s there.”

He relented. “I should have told you. You can’t go into the kitchen without her hearing you. I think she rigged some floorboards to creak so she’d hear us.” I pulled out my laptop and fired it up. “What are you doing?”

“Finding out when the next flight back to Cali leaves,” I said.

“Will, can’t you wait until the morning and let me work this out?” he asked.

“Dude, you were going to blow me off to go fuck her,” I said. “She’s a skank. The rest of us see that even if you don’t. No way I’m letting you blow me off for someone like that.”

“She’s just pissed off that you’re here,” he said.

“No, she’s a fucking bitch. Let her spend some time with your friends, and you won’t have any friends left,” I spat. “And none of this makes a damn bit of difference. You invited me here and promised me she wouldn’t be here. So here I am, and she shows up. This is your problem. Handle it.” I rolled over onto my side, facing away from him, and forced my breathing to go down, so he’d think I was sleeping. I was way too pissed off to sleep. It took me a good hour to finally crash, and I could tell by his breathing that he wasn’t sleeping either.

July 7, 2001

Yesterday had been a long day, with highs and lows, and I guess all of the drama had just exhausted me. I didn’t wake up until almost 11:00, and by the time I took a shower, got ready, and packed up all my stuff, it was 11:30. I went downstairs to find Tony, Dana, and Mrs. Carbone sitting around the kitchen table. They all looked like they were in bad moods.

“Morning,” Tony said, trying to be friendly.

“Morning,” I said, forcing myself to be pleasant.

“It’s almost afternoon,” Dana said.

“Someone kept me up late last night, so I decided to sleep in,” I said, and only after I did I remembered that Mrs. Carbone was there. She didn’t look any happier than I did.

I ate in silence after that, ignoring their conversation and just focusing on the excellent lunch Tony’s mom made for us. If I stayed here for a week, I’d probably gain at least fifteen pounds, I decided. I’d just finished eating and was about to ask Tony to take me to the airport when there was a knock on the back door, followed by the sound of the door opening. I looked up to see a guy walk in, a really handsome guy. Based on the way he let himself in, and the way Tony’s mom greeted him, this guy must be a good friend of Tony’s.

“Rick, this is a Will Schluter, a friend of mine from California,” Tony said, introducing us. “This is Rick O’Meara. He’s one of my best friends.”

“Nice to meet you,” I said, being more formal since Mrs. Carbone was here. I shook his hand and took a good look at him. He was tall, like Tony and me, but heftier. He had the body of a guy who lifted weights and played sports, but ate and drank an awful lot, so he was probably toting around an extra fifteen to twenty pounds. On some guys, it would have landed on his chest, giving him man-boobs, or around his waist, but on this guy, it was more spread out, making him seem bigger and stronger. He had light brown hair with hazel eyes, neither of which was exceptional, but they adorned a really handsome face. He was frowning when he came in, but when he met me, he shot me his smile, and that turned him from a handsome guy into a really hot dude, one throwing out some major charisma.

“You know Dana,” Tony said.

“Hey,” Rick said, and did it pretty curtly. Tony’s mom chose that moment to get up and head back to her room, leaving the four of us alone.

“So what’s up?” Tony asked.

“Dude, I have to pass on floating. KC can’t go,” Rick said. I’d learned that you float in pairs, so KC must have been his float buddy.

“What’s his problem?” Tony asked.

Rick shook his head. “He has to work.”

“That sucks,” Tony said, then I saw an idea spark in his brain, and I knew what it was even before he said it. “Dana came into town kind of unexpectedly.”

“Kind of?” I asked acidly.

Tony ignored me, even though Dana glared at me. “So we’ve got an extra person. You could float with Will or Dana, if they’re OK with it.”

I was about to jump in and totally blow him apart for pawning me off like that, but Rick spoke first. “Dude, I’ll float with you if you want,” he said to me. He seemed so sincere, so, well, innocent, and I could sense that he really wanted to go.

“I’ve never done that before,” I said, which wasn’t entirely true. I’d gone on one last year at Harvard-Westlake. But I’d never been on a float trip with friends, and I’d never been on one in Missouri, so I stretched the truth a bit.

“You’ve never been on a float trip?” he asked, amazed. I shook my head, continuing my exaggeration. “You’ll like it.”

“You go with him, you may end up gay,” Dana said, trying to be funny.

Rick looked at both of us oddly. “Dude, if he went with you, he’d definitely turn out gay,” I said to Dana. Even Tony laughed at that, while she just sat there, all pissed off.

“If you never floated, you probably don’t have any shit,” he said. “KC was the dude with the tent and stuff.”

“I got some stuff I can give you,” Tony said.

“We’ll get our own,” I said to him, changing the entire dynamic. With that statement, I’d basically told him to fuck off, and I’d clearly identified myself as being with Rick and not with him. “We’ll go buy what we need. You pick it out, and I’ll pay for it,” I said to Rick.

“You sure?” Rick asked nervously. “Camping shit is expensive.”

“I’m sure.”

“You ready to go?” Rick asked. “We got a lot of stuff to buy and organize if we’re going to meet everyone there this evening.”

“I’m ready,” I said. I went up and grabbed my suitcase and brought it back downstairs. “Maybe you can just drop me off at the airport when we get back.”

“Sure,” Rick said. “We’ll see you guys there.” I peeked in and said goodbye to Tony’s mom, and then followed Rick out to his truck. He had a Ford F-150 in pretty good shape. It was probably about three or four years old. Tony watched us go, and I could read beneath his stoic façade and see the agony this was causing him. But he’d set this deal up, he’d refused to deal with Dana, so now he’d have to pay the price. Maybe he’d finally figure her out.