Flux - 12. Chapter 12

June 18, 2002

Claremont, OH

Will

The car zipped down the highway toward Claremont, while I felt my insides churning. I knew a big part of that was sadness, devastating sadness, but it was buried beneath anger, as I felt myself getting really pissed off. I got that Zach needed to keep space between us, but shit, dumping me completely, and doing it over the phone? After I landed in Claremont, so I was already here, he couldn’t at least come over and talk to me in person? No, instead he tells me over the fucking phone. And what the fuck was with this agent? Shit, we’re the ones who had gotten him this gig in the first place. I subconsciously directed my rage in that direction, and called Cody.

“Hey there,” he said cheerfully. “I haven’t heard from you in for-fucking-ever.”

“That’s because you never come see me,” I said, trying to flirt. I was too pissed off, so it sounded lame, which just made me angrier. “I want you to send a message to this douchebag agent Zach hired.”

“Barry Friedman?” he asked, surprised.

“Yeah, that one,” I snapped.

“Technically, he’s not an agent, he’s an advisor,” Cody explained. “If he was an agent, he’d blow Zach’s eligibility.”

“Whatever,” I said dismissively. I really didn’t care about eligibility rules, and I wasn’t in the mood to argue about definitions. “First thing he does is tell Zach he has to cut off all ties with me.”

“He did that?” Cody asked, surprised.

“He did. So here’s the deal. My father owes me a favor, and I’m thinking that having this guy dropped from a plane in the middle of fucking Afghanistan is a good way to spend that chit,” I said, trying to keep from yelling. Only venting like that actually calmed me down, and started to change my mood.

“I’ll pass that on,” he said, chuckling. “Why does your father owe you a favor?”

“For the same reason I’m allowed to fuck you now,” I said, finally calm enough to mess with him.

“Oh you are, are you? Who says I want to fuck you?”

“Dude, seriously?” I asked, pretending to be all stuck up. “Are you straight now?”

He laughed. “I’ll have a talk with Barry.”

And then the anger evaporated, and the familiar cycle repeated itself. “I’m really sorry I got bitchy. This just hit me pretty hard.” And now the sadness engulfed me. I needed to get off the phone.

“Are you alright?” he asked, concerned.

“It’s this same old shit. I get really pissed off, and the rage takes over, then after it leaves, I realize I’ve been a big asshole and I feel like crap about it.”

“You were doing pretty well with that,” he said.

“I was,” I agreed. “I haven’t had an attack in a long time, but these past few weeks have been fucking challenging. Zach’s been my life preserver, so when he was pulled away, it was pretty jolting.”

“I can see that,” he said sympathetically.

“I’ll be fine,” I lied, just to try and get him off the phone.

“You’re sure?” he asked, and seemed nervous.

“I’m sure. We’re at the house so I have to run.” We weren’t at the house at all.

“Alright. Take care,” he said. I took that opportunity to end the call, and stuffed my phone into my backpack. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to anyone.

We got to the house and I tipped the driver, and then lugged my stuff up to one of the guest rooms, the one I normally claimed. I thought about unpacking; that was usually the first thing I did when I got someplace. Part of that was Wade’s influence, because he was so organized, and part of that was because of Robbie. He’d told me that he liked to unpack because it helped him bond with wherever he was. Only this time, I was too depressed to do that, so I left all my things in the suitcase, which remained by the door. I went over to the bed and tossed my backpack on it, then collapsed next to it.

I just lay on the bed for the longest time, with my face buried in the pillow. I’d already had to turn it over because one side was too wet from the tears. This was so typical of my life. One minute I’m doing great, and then the next minute, everything turns to shit. Two weeks ago, I’m at Escorial with Zach, school’s out for the summer, and I’d finally managed to reconcile with Matt. Life was good. Now, here I am, with my father and Wade doing their weird version of incest, which totally fucked them and Matt up; and Zach dumps me. On the fucking phone.

I wanted to be calm and rational. I wanted to channel Grand. That should be easy, since I was in his house in Claremont, surrounded by all the modern amenities one could want, while still being wrapped in the same, old-world style as his study at Escorial. But this deal with Zach was too big for me to be chill about. I felt like I was in a battle on Star Trek, where the first photon torpedo destroyed my shields, and then the next one blew me to fucking pieces. The deal with my dad was the first torpedo, but Zach’s announcement was the mega-weapon that destroyed me.

I lay there on the bed, crying into the pillow for I don’t know how long. My phone vibrated, but I would have had to reach for it to answer it, and I didn’t have that much energy. I felt like I was a complete zombie, unable to move. I actually tried to think of food, assuming that hunger would prompt me into action, but it didn’t. I wasn’t hungry. I just didn’t give a shit about anything. The only thing bugging me was that I had to pee. I was so tempted to just go, and let it ruin the bedding. What the fuck difference did it make? No one was going to see me anyway.

I forced myself to get up, and glanced at the clock as I staggered to the bathroom. I’d been lying there for about two hours now, and I hadn’t had a coherent thought the entire time. I peed, then went back and collapsed back onto a different pillow, since I’d soaked the first one. With all the shit that I’d been through, with 9-11, with the deal with Matt and Tony, with all of that, I’d been able to stay focused on the future. I’d rarely been despondent, and I’d never been to the point where I just didn’t want to go on. I was at that point now. I mean, I wasn’t suicidal. There was no way I could do that, because even if I was miserable, I couldn’t deliberately hurt the other people in my life. But I just didn’t give a shit. If a comet crashed through the ceiling and killed me, or a tornado whisked me off to Oz, it would be doing me a favor.

My phone rang again, and I ignored it again. There was no one I wanted to talk to. There was no one who could make me feel better about this. I sighed. I guess I had known that someday this would happen. Zach had always been clear about football being his number one priority, and he’d been pretty adamant that it wasn’t possible to be gay and play in the NFL, or even in a good college program. I knew that being with him meant being pals, cousins, in public; and only in private, hidden behind layers of secrecy, could we be a couple. I knew that, but I took the risk, because being with him behind those curtains of secrecy was worth it. I’d never told Zach that I loved him; I’d never uttered those words and neither had he. That didn’t make a damn bit of difference. He loved me, and I loved him, and we both knew it. The past nine months had been a living hell, and the only way I’d really made it through was with him to prop me up. Only now I didn’t even have that. Just like you’d kick crutches away from a handicapped guy, they had pulled him away from me. He’d been the joy to offset the misery. Now I had nothing. Nothing but the misery. I found myself hoping I’d become dehydrated, because that was probably the only way I’d stop crying.

I tried to think of a way to escape from my own mind, from torturing myself, and the only thing I could think of was sleep. I was drained, as surely as if someone had stuck a spigot in my side and sucked out all my fluids, and sleep should have been easy to come by in this situation, but just when I thought I’d drift off, I jerked myself awake thinking about Zach, and how good we were together. We didn’t fight, we rarely argued, and we didn’t have a lot of drama, until now. I’d never thought I’d meet someone who meshed with me so well. It was like that lame-ass movie with Tom Cruise; he completed me. But that train of thought just made things worse again, making me realize what I’d lost, and I was crying even without really realizing it.

I heard feet pounding on the stairs as someone charged up them, and then I heard the door to my room fly open, and it was opened so hard that it banged against the wall. Normally, I would have reacted, jumped up to see who it was, and probably yell at them for just barging into my room, but I didn’t have that much energy and I really didn’t give a shit. I just lay there in the bed, listless. If it was some criminal who had come to torture and rape me, so be it. At least it would be my body that hurt, and not my heart. “Don’t you answer your fucking phone?” Zach demanded. “What the fuck?”

He was pissed off, and he had no right to be, after he dumped me with a fucking phone conversation, but I didn’t move. Not even outrage could motivate me. I didn’t want to face him, to look at him, to feel his body, to smell him, only to lose him again. I buried my head in the pillow and clutched it to my face, as if it would somehow save me. I heard the door close, then the bed moved as he sat in it.

“You fucking called Barry,” he accused.

I managed to pull my face up from the pillow and turn sideways to look at him. It seemed like it took more effort than anything I’d ever done. The expression on his face told me that I must have looked like shit. I could see him mellowing as he realized how fucked up I was. “I didn’t call Barry,” I said.

“Where’s your phone, the one you don’t answer?” I just turned and buried my face in the pillow. He must have dialed my phone, because it vibrated, and he dug into my backpack to find it. He was punching buttons on my phone, and I should have been pissed off at this violation of my privacy, but I just didn’t give a shit. “You called Cody,” he said. He must have pulled up my call history on my phone. “It’s the same damn thing.”

Whatever. I hadn’t lied to him. At this point, I just wanted him to leave. I figured if I didn’t say anything, maybe he would. Instead, I felt his body lying next to mine, and it was hot and clammy. His hand stroked my back, but that just made me cry harder.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry for what?” I asked quietly but bitterly, forcing my head up enough that he could hear me.

“Sorry for telling you that we couldn’t be together, and sorry for telling you on the phone, and not in person,” he said. Apologizing for that did me absolutely no good. He’d still broken up with me.

“Just go,” I spat, and buried my head in the pillow again. This was worse than before, having him here like this, telling me in person. It felt like there were razor blades churning around in my heart.

“Do you really want me to leave?” he asked softly. But as painful as this was, I didn’t have the strength to send him away. I shook my head, but still couldn’t look at him. “I want to try to do this right.”

That pissed me off enough to make me look at him again. “You want to try and break up with me a different way, to see if it works better?” I asked acidly.

He gave me an annoyed look, but he was slightly happy, and I knew it was because I’d shown some signs of life. “I want to talk this through with you, and see if you can help me find a way out of it.” I didn’t say anything for a bit, while I digested his words, and while I did, a tear fell out of his eye. “This isn’t easy for me either.”

I guess I’d assumed that he’d done this callously, just tossed me aside like yesterday’s garbage, but I looked in his eyes, and I could see that this was hurting him too. I rolled onto my side and grabbed onto him, hugging him as tightly as I could, and I felt him hug me back just as strongly. I just held him like that, clinging to him, like my sanity depended on it. It probably did. “I’m sorry I hurt you,” he said, his deep voice making my ear vibrate, even though he was speaking softly.

I just held onto him with my left hand, while I took my right hand and ran my fingers through his hair, pulling his head into my neck as I did. “Then why did you do it?”

He pulled back so we could look at each other while we talked. “I’ve been talking to my agent on the phone,” he said, then paused. “Well technically he’s not my agent, he’s my advisor, but that’s what we call him.”

What was with these people and this sudden obsession about clarifying what this dipshit’s title was? “Whatever,” I said, just like I’d said to Cody.

“Anyway, he wanted to see me face to face, so I drove out to the airport this morning to meet with him. Up until today, I really liked him.” He paused. “My parents were with me.”

“Was that your idea?” I asked, referring to Wally and Clara going with him.

He gave me a dirty look. “No.”

“So what did he say?” I asked, referring to the agent.

“My parents and Barry piled on me about how I couldn’t give off ‘the impression of impropriety with other men’” he said, imitating his advisor. “He talked like that since my mom was there.”

“That’s nothing new. We already know you’re not supposed to let anyone know you fuck around with other guys,” I said, cringing as I pluralized the word ‘guy’.

“He said he’d heard some shit about you and me, by talking to people at De La Salle and Don Bosco. They said we were like boyfriends when we were together,” he said.

“That’s bullshit,” I objected. “We work really hard to make sure we barely even touch each other.” There was a public distance we always maintained, and since neither one of us was into PDA, it hadn’t really been a big deal.

“It could be the way we look at each other,” he said. “Or the way we talk to each other. It doesn’t have to be just touching.”

I wanted to argue about that, but I could see his logic. We probably gave off a whole bunch of signs. “So the answer was for you to just dump me?”

“They all think you and I are friends, just cousins who are really close,” he explained. “My parents don’t know we’re together, and neither does Barry.”

It was sometimes difficult to believe that Wally and Clara could be so naïve. “So to them, this seemed easy? Just cut off a good friend because his reputation may stain you? Shit, even if I was just a friend, that would be hella raw.”

“That’s how this works,” he said, frustrated. “You grew up in Hollywood. Doesn’t it work that way there?”

“The way it works is that even if there are rumors, people are pretty low key, unless some proof comes out,” I said.

“It must be more intense in football,” he said.

“So you agreed to that? They said ‘dump him’ and you said how fast?” I asked, not a little irritated.

“It wasn’t like that,” he snapped. “They laid out this compelling case, about how it would make things so much more difficult, maybe even impossible for me, if people thought I was gay.”

“They? So your parents were there, cheering Barry on?”

He rolled his eyes at my dramatic depiction of things. “He asked me how important it was to me that I make it to the NFL,” he said. “I told him it was the most important thing to me.” He watched me carefully to see if I’d grimace at that, but I didn’t. I knew the deal.

“And they said that if that was the case, you had to completely cut off all contact with me,” I concluded.

“It wasn’t that harsh, but almost,” he said sadly. “I was only supposed to hang out with you at family events.”

“So I only get to see you at Thanksgiving and Christmas?” I demanded, which was actually wrong, since we didn’t celebrate those holidays together. “And you were OK with that?”

“I wasn’t OK with it,” he said. “But it freaked me out. They were there, and I was feeling a lot of pressure, so that’s when I called you. I stepped outside and called you.”

“You’ve been clear that I will never be the most important thing in your life,” I said bitterly. “I was willing to trade that for having part of you, because we’re so good together.”

“We are,” he said, trying to make me smile.

“But that comes with some basic things you owe me,” I spat. “You owe it to me to treat me with respect, and to think about my feelings. Even if you had to dump me, to do it on the phone was absolute bullshit.”

“It was,” he agreed. “I’m really sorry about that.” His apology was almost more annoying than having him argue about it, since he was making it hard to stay mad at him.

“And if you’re going to do that, did you have to cut me off at the knees? I mean, I think about you all the time. You’re a huge part of my life.” A tear fell out of his eye, and that reminded me that this was hard on him too, so I tried to lighten things up a bit. “It’s like when I’m fucking you and I pull out all of a sudden. Kind of hurts.”

He snaughed, then kissed me. “I’m not complaining.”

Then I got sad again. “Not that it matters. What’s done is done.” Arguing about how he broke up with me wasn’t going to change the fact that he’d broken up with me.

“It matters,” he said. “When you wouldn’t answer your phone, I knew I had to come see you, to try and work through this. You’re so fucking smart, I was thinking you could help me find a way around it.”

“Smooth talker,” I said, smiling. He’d decided I was important enough to keep in his life. He wasn’t going to completely cut me off. Despite his advisor and his parents pounding on him, he wasn’t willing to end things with me. That was the surest proof of his love, as far as I was concerned.

“My parents wouldn’t let me borrow a car, my brothers were gone, so I ran,” he said. For the first time I noticed that he was wearing running clothes, and he was pretty sweaty.

“Dude, that’s like five miles!”

“Well, it’s a little farther than that; since I took the back ways in case they came after me. They weren’t very happy that I left, and I wasn’t real nice about it,” he said.

“Great. They’ll hate me even more,” I grumbled.

“Yeah, but I don’t,” he said, and kissed me again. “I had to go down Harrison, since Coolidge was too obvious.” It was hilarious that the main streets in East Claremont, the seedier side of town, were named after US Presidents, and that the two main drags had inadvertently ended up being Coolidge and Hoover.

“So they chased you?”

“Don’t know. Didn’t want to deal with that,” he said with a shrug. “Besides, I could use the exercise.”

“Yeah, you’re so out of shape,” I said sarcastically.

“Barry called me while I was jogging over, in between times when I was trying to call you,” he said with a frown. “That was after you called in the SWAT Team.”

“What did he say?”

“He said you threatened to have him dropped in the middle of Afghanistan,” he said. Cody was evidently a pretty good messenger. “Like you could do that.”

“I can’t, my father can,” I said. I was probably exaggerating, but my dad was a pretty scary guy when he was pissed, or when someone crossed him or his family.

“Whatever,” Zach said. “So Barry told me that he didn’t realize that you and I were such good friends.” I could read his concern, that Barry knew we were lovers.

“But he got that now?”

“He said that if we’re going to be friends, we have to set up some basic guidelines on how we’re together. We can talk on the phone as much as we want, but being together in public has to be more limited.”

“So you’re not breaking up with me?” I asked, kind of coquettishly.

“I’m not, under one condition.”

“What?” I asked nervously.

“Don’t fuck with my career again,” he said firmly. “I’m serious.”

“I’m sorry, you just hit me really hard with this,” I said, but his firm gaze didn’t moderate, because he didn’t want excuses. “It won’t happen again,” I pledged.

“Good,” he said, smiling. The smile faded again. “Now I have to get my parents to do the same thing.”

“What did they do?”

“That’s what this whole deal with Barry was all about. They basically cornered him and made it sound like you were trying to turn me into a flaming fag,” he said reluctantly. He didn’t want me to have a conflict with his parents, or a bigger one than we already had, but there was really no way around telling me.

“They’d better hope I’m not a vengeful person,” I growled. I had limited patience with them under the best of circumstances.

“I know you’re not,” he said. “They’re my parents. They love me. They want what’s best for me. They’re just not that bright.”

I laughed at that. “So what kind of guidelines do we have to have?”

“Barry asked me if we could meet with him together, in LA,” Zach said.

“When?”

“I didn’t set that up yet. Probably as soon as we can.”

“We can leave whenever you want,” I said.

“I need to get back home,” he said, glancing at the clock on my nightstand.

“Now?” I asked sadly. He’d just gotten here, or so it seemed. He nodded. “You have an extra 15 minutes?”

“What for?” he asked me with his sexy leer. We used that time making love, and we’d done it so many times, our bodies just flowed together seamlessly. But it kind of sucked because when we were done, he had to jump up and throw his jogging clothes back on. Normally, the time after we had sex was the best time, a time when he let his shields down and really opened up. It would have been nice to have that today, but it was not to be.

“Will I see you later?” I asked.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he promised. It was late, and he’d be hard pressed to make it back to Wally and Clara’s house for dinner. His phone rang and he pulled it out and gave me an apologetic look as he answered it. “Yeah, I know they were pissed, I don’t care,” he said, and then paused. “Yes, I’m at Will’s.” Another pause. “Yeah, a ride would be great.” He hung up the phone and filled me in. “Brent’s going to come by and pick me up on his way home. He should be here in fifteen minutes.”

“Want me to buy you another car so you can come see me later,” I joked.

He laughed. “That would go over great.” His parents had about had a cow when I’d bought him a Durango last year.

Grand’s house had a detached garage in the back, and there was a large area of pavement in front of it, next to the porch and the pool where we were sitting, just hanging out and bullshitting. Our conversation was interrupted when Brent drove up in Gathan’s old Dodge pickup, the one he’d given Brent when he’d moved to California.

“You ready?” he asked, leaning out the window of his truck.

“Dude, seriously?” I asked, giving him shit. “You’re not even going to say hello?” Of all the Hayes brothers, besides Gathan and Zach, I got along best with Brent. He was tall and handsome in a rugged kind of way; a real blue-collar kind of guy.

He gave me an annoyed smile and got out of his truck, wearing nasty, greasy overalls. We stood up and walked over to him, and he pulled me in and gave me a big hug. “Gross,” I said, looking down at my clothes like he’d messed them up.

“You wanted some love,” he joked, cracking me up. “We gotta go,” he said to Zach.

“See you guys later,” I said. They hopped into Brent’s truck, and Brent leaned out the window. “You busy tonight?”

“No,” I answered.

“Maybe I’ll bring my latest project over here and show it to you.”

“Cool,” I said. I watched them drive off and went back to the patio and sat in the chair, letting the muggy heat make me feel all sticky. I couldn’t believe people liked living in this humid shit. Zach was gone, and the whole ordeal of today, and the last few weeks came roaring back in on me. I felt really lonely, and it wasn’t long before I felt myself getting depressed again. I stood up to walk into the house when a limo drove up, surprising me. I didn’t expect any visitors, certainly not the kind who showed up in style. The car sat there for a minute, just idling, then the driver got out and opened the door, and Grand stepped out.

I walked over to him, grinning from ear to ear. “Would you like me to carry your bag inside for you, sir?” the driver asked.

“I got it,” I said, and gave Grand a big hug. It was funny, because I had to stoop over to do it, but it didn’t matter. He was so strong, so smart: it was wonderful to have him here. I heard the car drive away, and that made me realize I’d been hugging him for quite a while.

“I take it, from this reception, you are glad to see me?” he asked with a smile.

“I have had a horrible day,” I told him. “It just got better.”

He raised an eyebrow. “I am not usually able to elicit such a strong change in moods or days.”

“A banner day for you,” I said. “You got here just in time for dinner. Does that mean you’re taking me out?”

“Perhaps you will allow me a few minutes to put my things away?” he asked.

“I’ll help,” I said, and grabbed his bag and his briefcase for him, and followed him up the stairs. I left him alone, but he was quick, and came down no more than ten minutes later dressed in shorts, a polo shirt, and sandals.

“Let’s walk down to the Mills,” he said, referring to the shopping and recreation complex that had been one of the drivers of Claremont’s rejuvenation. We started walking, and now that it was evening, the heat wasn’t so bad, and it was almost pleasant, except for the occasional mosquito attack.

“What brought you out here to Claremont?” I asked him. He was organized, and a trip out here hadn’t been on his agenda.

He was thinking, and that probably meant he was trying to decide whether to be honest with me or to feed me some line. “I spoke with Matt about the liaison with your father and Wade. I secured his permission to broach the subject with you. I thought you may want someone to talk to.”

I stopped and looked at him, stunned at what a nice thing that was for him to do, to drop everything and fly across the country to see if I was alright. “That was pretty fucked up.”

“I think Matt agrees with you,” he said.

“I had a long talk with Dad about it on the plane ride out here,” I explained. “He told me why he did it, and while that didn’t make it any better, I at least understand where he’s coming from.”

“We’ll see if Matt agrees with you,” he said dubiously.

“I think that Matt is going to end up coming around on this pretty damn fast,” I said, “since he can’t really moralize about it.”

“No, he can’t,” Grand agreed.

“I guess for me, there’s this line in the sand when it comes to family. I just don’t get how Dad and Matt could cross it. If we can’t trust each other, who can we trust?”

He smiled at me patiently. “Family is very important to you, a trait that I share. It is easy to look at this baldly and come to the same conclusion you have reached, but I would submit that it is reasonable to take into consideration the extreme stresses both of them, as well as Wade, were under.”

“You think they should get a pass on this shit because of 9-11?” I asked. He got mildly annoyed, because he hated it when I distilled his long, pontificating speeches into a simple thought.

“I am not in a position to tell you, or anyone else, what to do in that regard, I can only tell you what I have done, and I have indeed done that,” he said. “Think of how much those events have wrenched us apart on the inside and it is easy to see how those emotions can cause wrenching emotions externally.”

“I can see that,” I agreed. “I think that with Matt and Tony, it was all sex, just a fuck. With Dad and Wade, it is more than that.”

“I can see that,” he said cautiously, not wanting to betray a confidence.

“So what happens if Dad and Wade want to keep on fucking?”

He grimaced. “I think that would be a very problematic thing. Much would depend on Matt, and how he feels about that.”

“I told Dad the price was too high, but he doesn’t always listen to me,” I said with a smile.

“It is possible that if he meets someone new, then his attraction to Wade will not be as strong,” Grand hypothesized.

“Maybe I need to try and fix him up,” I said, making Grand chuckle. And then as we walked along the streets of Claremont on our way to the Mills, I poured out my soul, and told him all about what had happened with Zach.

He shook his head sadly when I finished my story. “It sounds much like it was when Stef was dating that actor, Peter Gordon, back in the 1970s. It is disappointing that in professional sports, so little progress has been made in accepting gay athletes.”

I agreed with him, but that didn’t make things any better for Zach, or for me.