Irreverent Tales - 2. A Kick in the Head, or...

This story first appeared in a GA anthology collection, but I re-post it here because it's always been an Irreverent Tale   
 

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A Kick in the Head, or

The Sweet Taste of Amnesia

by Anonymous

Pompous. Sanctimonious.

"Self-inflated, over-bloated, deadeye popinjay!" Can you believe he said that about me?! Sweet little, humble little, me of all people.

Now, never mind about the process, for the last thing I want is people going through this nightmare. Let’s just say, with the aid of the internet, some patient reading and deep-deep digging, I discovered a way to induce temporary amnesia in myself. I don't want to spread the procedure and name the exact pharmaceuticals involved, for fear the next big trend among the kids might be memory-loss for fun and kicks. Trust me, it ain’t a 'trip' except the kick in head variety.

I'm a successful author, and in fact, if I revealed my true identity, you'd be amazed I'm telling this story, for I seemingly have everything already. I enjoy research, so I write true-crime fiction, murder mysteries, ghost stories, all of which are eagerly awaited and showered with praise from the critics and public alike. Get it? I'm a name to conjure with in current literary times, and I habitually haunt the top-seller list. But, and it's a big but, my own work leaves me flat. Not only does it bore me to constantly regurgitate what is expected of me, to entertain a public who – to put it nicely – likes what it likes, it irritates the hell out of my soul. Some people might say annoys my pride, but the flood of book-advancement checks and royalties keeps my pride focused on the bank balance. No, it's my soul at risk of damnation; it's my eternal spirit as a man that's prone to perdition. But in that regard, I’m not much different than anyone.

So, if indeed I placed anything but "by Anonymous" at the head of this tale, I'd also have to set my name next to something else that's frightened me my entire adult life. The "Gay" word.

Well, one step at a time I guess, because this whole exercise in temporary memory loss was supposed to help me improve my output as an artist. Hacks are hacks, and write at volume, but I wanted to find out if I could be more than just a mass-market drudge.

You see, at Yale I had ambitions of writing to match the best of them. Philosophical works to outdo Kafka, Montaigne, hell – even Norman Lear! Something, anything, and I wrote a few things my instructors ate up and called profound. But afterwards, I started writing to make a living and my ambitions were shelved.

Shelved might be a pretty good metaphor to describe what happened with that ‘other thing’ too. It’s not like I thought about my orientation all that much, and in terms of my work and income, I guess you could say I was blessed with a low libido. But more importantly than that, I regarded my shut-valve of affection as all for the best. I mean, look what we’re told sublimation and porcelain hands praying to a sexless godhead did for the likes of Michelangelo and Johannes Brahms! So, feeling dutiful, I relegated my interpersonal life to a dim corner of a cupboard where no overhead lightbulb could penetrate.

Approaching thirty, I just don’t have time for it, and besides, it’s too late. There was a time…but, bah. Enough of that. I need to tell you what happened to me.

I recall the day I did it for the first time with crystal clarity, even though it was nearly a year ago now. Nervous? Yes. But there I sat at my desk, the lamp casting a bright pool of light on the almost too-white cover of my precious printout. A stack about an inch high, I’d written a short story based on a concept kicking around my noggin for the longest time. The title, “The Fracking of Amanda Quartz,” summed up my ambitions for this piece to be masterful. I savored the keen anticipation of how my artsy re-entry into the world of real writing would blow my amnesiac self away.

Yes, that was my goal. Since I’m a good – paid – beta reader and editor for other peoples’ work, honing in on the strengths of a story while excising superfluous words and scraping down run-on sentences, I’d induce amnesia in myself and correct my own work. I’d read that the vast majority of people with the temporary form of the condition can well remember their education, have the same tastes and dislikes – are fundamentally the same person – but I’d be free of the connection I have with the story. It’d be like someone else’s work. “He’d” be the perfect judge!

So, nervously, I readied the last preps, pulling out a small fist of red and blue pens, which I laid by the pile of papers. I’d even bothered to dictate the task at hand for myself, or “him.” A yellow post-it laid out the mission, and I had even cheekily added “Have Fun!”

So then, I took the cocktail of pills and waited.

– – –

Groggily waking up the next morning – afternoon! – I felt hungover. Funny, but I didn’t think the inducement would make me smell and feel like I’d been partying all night.

I tumbled out of bed, surprised to be naked, wondering where my usual cotton pajamas had gotten to. I popped open my closet to grab something, and thought for half a moment it looked kind of sparse. Could I be missing sport jackets and other ‘biz casual’ attire? Bah. I put on sweats.

I rushed to my desk with hopes still sky-high…. The light was on, the pens still there, but my note and the typescript were gone.

‘Hmmm,’ I wondered.

I sat down, and then noticed something.

I pulled my crumpled note and untouched story from the trash!

Flipping through its stiff pages, there was not a single redline or comment to be seen. It made me incensed and angry. How could “he” be so insensitive!

In the week it took me to properly prepare for the second attempt, I’d typed out a long, detailed set of instructions for myself to follow. I wondered if amnesia plays with “his” ability to mark up a story. For added incentive, I’d paper-clipped a $20 bill to the “Fracking” story’s cover.

I took the pills and waited again.

– – –

My blackness slowly faded as I woke up the next day, or at least I thought it was. All I knew for sure was the light from the window hurt my brain….

I pulled my phone to me and blinked at it in total disbelief. This time I hadn’t been out for 18 hours, but a whole weekend.

My exhausted hand landed on my chest. Well, at least I was not naked this time, but what in the hell was I wearing? Some clingy, form-fitting white nylon long johns! When I glanced down to my legs, I realized this lumberman-meets-Cage-aux-Folles costume was basically see-through! A trip to the closet provided no help, as it was now almost empty….

Stumbling to the bathroom to relieve myself, I noticed in the mirror I’d had a new haircut. Now a bit of flop played about my forehead; it was a style I’d been noticing lately, mainly on young men in the Village. Washing my hands, the mirror also readily confirmed my ‘getup’ was definitely diaphanous right at crotch level, leaving nothing to the imagination! Flexing a bicep, and patting my tummy, I wondered if I weren’t more toned than I’d used to be.

I went out to my desk. The light was off, and my heart soared the moment I saw a streak of red. It crashed again instantly as I picked up the printout and saw the name of the work crossed out. Handwritten below was “Stupid Title.”

A note in the lower righthand corner said: “Look, I don’t know who you are and how you keep getting into my apartment, but stop asking me to read your crap. I’m a busy man. THX.”

I thumbed through the whole story and there was not another mark to be seen. It was clear, “he” hadn’t even bothered to read it. The $20 bill was still there too, used as a bookmark on page three!

Was I really like that? Curt with people, unwilling to give them a try or offer encouragement just because I didn’t know them? I thought of the stack of unopened fan mail from my publishers. It used to be I’d go through each missive and write a reply, but it’d been years since I’d actually bothered to read them. In the stack would always be 8 1/2”x11” envelopes, thick with people’s hopes for a word or two on their manuscripts.

‘Hmmm, maybe I’m not as nice as I think….’

For no reason at all, my mind drifted back to the painful blur of my childhood. It’s not that it was awful, for I always had what I needed, including my parents’ love, but as a military brat, the environment was always changing. As a small kid and teenager, every six months or so, my folks would have to move. I gradually discovered writing as a way to escape change. The worlds I created became constant friends to me in a way I could not make in real life.

The doorbell rang. Slightly panicked, I wondered what I could use to cover up; surely not my Amanda Quartz!

Impatiently, it rang again, and I stood behind the door as I opened it up. A time-pressed UPS man was there. He thrust a medium-sized box at me and said, “I need a signature.”

Simultaneously looking at my name and the return address – a company from California – I stepped forward and reached for his tracking tablet.

It was only as I noticed his suddenly new, lip-licked grin, that I realized I was fully ‘exposed.’ I also spotted how the man in brown was undeniably good looking, and giving me the up/down.

Weirdly, I began to have a flashback of disco lights, sweaty, happy men dancing around me – or, “him” I guess. Many of the dancers were looking at me with just the same come-hither glint now in the delivery man’s eyes.

‘Am I attractive?’ I wondered.

As I handed back the man’s device, he said, “This is my regular run if you ever want to grab coffee.”

“Um. I make my coffee at home. It’s too pricy at the corner cookie-cutter cafes.”

I closed the door at this point, more intrigued by the package than Mr. Brown’s sputtering of “But, I meant….”

I went to the kitchen and the utility drawer. I cut the packing tape and opened up the box, grabbing the shipping invoice from the top.

“International Jock?! What in the hell is an international jock…?”

By the time I’d finished asking the question out loud, I was holding up a skimpy pair of black briefs. The waistband, trim at the crotchlines, and a gigantic “X” across the backside were all in traffic-sign yellow. Glancing inside, I saw there was also something looplike dangling at the front. The product card said:

The Cross-Fitter

Provides Perfect Package Presentation

{at all times}

I dug in the box. There were six more, offering a different color combination for every day of the week, and each with a built-in cock ring!

I jammed them all back in there, knowing I’d have to get a refund for this…this…Gay stuff. My God, what was “he” thinking!

Re-sealing the box, I suddenly heard my phone ring. I dashed into the bedroom, but it was too late.

When I checked the recent calls, it said I’d just missed one from Chris. I racked my brain trying to remember which just plain-old Chris this could be. I never enter contacts without full names, right down to middle initials.

As I was fumbling with it, a text arrived. Someone named Robbie had written: “Thanks for ordering that bottle of Bolly Saturday night. You’re the best!” There followed a long string of detestable emoji – including vegetables and clingstone fruit – none of which meant the first thing to me. Bah.

Suddenly, I panicked. “Oh, my God; oh, my God….”

I ran out to my PC. It was on, and the internet browser popped up as soon as the screensaver was deactivated.

I logged onto my credit card account. “What!” I exclaimed. There were substantial charges for dinners out, for cocktails, and many many more debits at a place called Club Eros. I googled it; it was a discotheque down in the Village.

I rocked back in the chair, amazed how “he” had spent more money in a weekend of fun than I usually spend in a fortnight to clothe and feed me. But that would explain the way my head was feeling….

‘Wait,’ I thought, opening up the browser’s history setting. There were links to porn sites! I immediately deleted those…the nerve of this guy, I mean, really. I never ever, you know.

But “he” had also checked out websites for bars and dance clubs, plus community homepages for LGBT organizations, fundraisers, etc.

Looking at my credit card bill closely again, sure enough, there was a $1,000 donation to the “Fallen Angel LGBTQ+ Youth Center” downtown.

A quick look at their webpage – which had been saved as a link already – showed me they provided job counseling, meals and a safe place for kids to stay if they needed it.

It made me realize it had been years and years since I willingly donated any funds to a charity…and then never to one set up to help, my own…kind….

But still! This guy was too much. Who did he think he was?!

Making myself some stiff instant coffee, I thought about it and resolved to put my detective skills to use. As I said, true-crime was my bread and butter, and I had written the ways to investigate a person’s doings more times than I’d care to admit.

I spent most of the day getting ready for my mission, and about 9pm, walked into Club Eros wearing a trench coat.

Being a Monday night, there were few patrons, and those who were there were mainly clustered as self-absorbed couples sitting close together at the open front windows. From there, the club had a gorgeous view on the sunset world just outside.

I sat at the bar, in a corner, alone, pulling the brim of my fedora low. I was also trying not to think how this was my first time in a Gay bar. Semi-loud music spilled down from the club’s second-floor disco, but it all had a pleasant beat, I had to admit.

I ordered a beer, ignoring the smile of the handsome barman who seemed to know me. He put down my drink and moved away without a word, fortunately.

Lifting the glass, I nursed on the foam. I do not like the taste of liquor, of any kind, and especially not microbrew filtered through a rented polyester mustache, like the one I was wearing. When I glanced the place over, I saw a few more guys singly seated around the bar. Everywhere my frightened eye lingered, it was met with openness and warmth. It was all, dare I say, cozy!

The bartender, who was wearing tight jeans, and an even tighter white tank top, moseyed back my way drying a martini glass.

“Remember me?” he asked. “Paul.”

“Um.”

Paul chuckled. “What’s with the getup?”

“So, you know me?”

His lips sputtered. “How could I forget! You were the life of the party, here every night of the weekend, Friday through Sinday. Hehe, make that Sunday.”

It was worse than I thought.

“Yeah, I remember,” I lied. “But I thought I’d see if anyone likes me without my free-spending ways.”

Paul looked truly taken aback. “Oh, man, you okay? It’s not like that—” The bartender had to break off and move away. A patron had ordered a top-off for his prosecco-cranberry, and saved me from getting a scolding by the barman.

A part of me did feel bad for what I had just suggested. But that thought was lost instantly as a hand landed on my shoulder.

“I knew it was you! OMG.” Two air kisses glided around the general vicinity of my cheeks as a young man slid onto the stool next to mine.

Dangerously, I suppose, I followed a hunch. “Robbie?” I inquired.

“Listen to you,” he said in bass tones, “trying to be all man of mystery.” He snapped his fingers with a smile. “Ain’t gonna work, child.”

Paul came back. “Robbie! Can’t stay away, huh?” Warmth reverberated in his tone.

“How am I gonna land a husband moping in my apartment?!”

Robbie had a point there.

“What’ll ya have,” I asked, reaching for my wallet.

Robbie’s hand shot across my chest. “No, no. Let me.” Turning to Paul, he said, “One more of whatever he’s having, and bring me a Moscow Mule. There’s a chill in the air!”

Paul nodded, taking a moment to flare eyebrows at me. He was saying “I told you so” without words.

“What’s with the disguise?”

“Um,” I told the perky fellow, who was about five years younger than me. “Just low-keying it to see who’s around.”

Robbie shrugged complacently, but only a minute later grabbed my arm in excitement. “So? You’re by yourself.”

It was a matter-of-fact statement.

“You expected me not to be alone?”

Robbie laughed. “I don’t know, the way you and – you know who – were mooning and spooning over each other all weekend, I thought you’d be Upstate shopping for farms by now.”

Another wisp of intuition told me who Robbie might mean, but instead of following it, my mind floated back to an unhappy time. Well, honestly, the unhappiest period of my life.

Thirteen years ago, I was a gawky, awkward sixteen-year-old, new to a new school and deciding to be in my shell for general protection, but there was still one boy who looked upon me differently. I mean, we knew, if you know what I mean. We didn’t have to ‘admit’ to the other what was growing inside of us, of how our buddyhood was blossoming into a…a…well, romance I guess.

Kip got me, and how exhilarating it made me feel. How loved it made me think of myself. And even though we were not brave enough to ever get beyond a little heavy petting, I made sure he knew he was loved too.

But it was a fucking mistake, one to make me want to cry in this bar. There was nothing either of us could do when the Army reassigned my dad to yet another town, in yet another goddamned state.

But cry also because I could never bring myself to answer his emails or texts. I felt less pain in denying anything I felt was real than letting myself be. Instead, that’s when I turned to writing with abandon. After losing Kip is when I lost hope of ever being really, truly me. My make-believe became my enforced reality.

Robbie hugged me. “Don’t, please. I was only teasing. Man, you know I wish you and Chris the best, I really do.”

I blinked. There was my suspicion confirmed, the same sort of inexplicable warm-gut feeling I got this afternoon seeing he had tried to call me.

“Tell me about Chris.”

Robbie laughed. “Listen, Romeo, if you think you can pump me for dirt on my best friend, it won’t work. Besides, you know him intimately, don’t you?”

“I do?!”

The stunned reaction of Chris’ bestie made me regulate my tone. I indulged in a quick glance at an equally dazed Paul, and hitched up my voice, saying, “I mean, what…are his favorite…movies, books, colors…?”

Robbie and the bartender laughed, with Robbie saying, “That’s for you to find out. All part of the budding relationship phase.”

“Oh.”

Once Paul took our empty glasses, Robbie proceeded to tell me all the minutia of his day, ending with, “And I missed you at Fitness Freak this morning. You are supposed to make an exercise routine and stick to it.”

“A gym?” I asked.

“Gurl! Listen to you. Yes, a gym, the hottest Gay gym in the city. That’s why you joined, right?”

“I guess so.” Will wonders never cease?

“So, why weren’t you there?”

I told him the truth, knowing I was making a giant understatement, “I haven’t been feeling like myself lately.”

The rest of the evening was a blur. Robbie grew concerned, placing a hand on my forehead and saying I was feverish. I remember when he called and paid for an Uber to take me home, asking “Really, you’d do that for me?” He said “Of course. You’d do the same for me,” making me wonder if I really would. Which one of us knew me the best? That was an unsettling thought.

That night I ambled into my apartment undecided, but tenaciously not willing to walk away from my artistic goals. So, I put Miss Quartz in a bottom drawer, ignoring how I might have also been setting my feelings aside – again – and threw myself into my work. I wrote and edited a novella about animals doing nasty manmade occupations. In a feverish pitch of social criticism, I wove an intricate series of overlaying episodes, first about a secretarial pool of Wall Street cockroach typists, then an obsessed group of boyhood rats competing to build the fastest soapbox derby car to race down Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles. And then, to supremely crown off the absurdity, a murder of Madison Avenue crows cawing and pecking out a vape tobacco ad campaign aimed at kids!

It was my masterpiece. “He” couldn’t ignore my writing now, or me for that matter.

All week I had been disregarding texts from Chris and Robbie; my work had to come first, and I was going to make “him” do what he was supposed to do, even though I had to stay my hand a dozen times a day from asking Chris to come over. But what could I say to him…. Bah.

I prepared for the next attempt at getting myself to do amnesia-editing very carefully. Resisting the urge to ask what in the hell he’d done with my clothes, I composed a cajoling letter to “him,” explaining how I was sorry to be a bother, but this piece was special. It was my soul on these pages, and if he ignored them, then it would be over for me, totally. I tried to tap into my alter ego’s sense of charity, and give a struggling young artist like me a helping hand. Although successful in life, I guess I was something like a child emotionally.

To sweeten the plea, I attached two $100 bills. Let’s see him ignore that!

I arranged the novella’s typescript, with the please-please letter neatly on top, and took the pills. Again, for the third time, I waited.

– – –

I woke up ten days later.

In the bathroom, I admired how my gym-going had really developed my tummy chicklets. As I stood there peeing, I also noted a mysterious set of toothbrush and toothpaste on the counter. An extra set, as it were, because mine were in their usual place. I thought it was curious, but so was my attire, which consisted of only a pair of soft-brown corduroy lounge shorts. Damn. “He’s” been ordering from International Jock again….

Suddenly I exclaimed: “My novella!”

I ran out to the living room, but slowed as I noticed big changes. Gone were the heavy privacy drapes, replaced by lightweight bamboo blinds. Here and there were fresh cut flowers, adding both scent and color to the room. Color also came from big, blowsy throw pillows. My coffee table had been transformed into a display piece, piled high with glossy fashion and interior design books. On these were stands with wooden figure-drawing models, their joints bent to make them seem like they were leaping and cavorting.

I was stunned looking around, I mean, besides moving into a Pottery Barn store, how Gay can one guy get in ten days?!

Anyway, I stumbled onwards, to my desk.

Sitting down there, things were in disarray. I rifled through the papers on top, seeing no sign of my precious creation. But instead, I stopped cold. Glinting in a silver frame was a picture of myself with Chris. I knew it had to be Chris, because I found it a bit difficult to swallow the lump in my throat at seeing the guy.

We stood, arms around one another at the shoulders, in heavy ski jackets, on a snowy slope with tall trees off in the distance. The scenery was brilliant, yet no match for the radiance of the smiles we wore. The nearly unrecognizable look of happiness on my own face – dare I think of it as love – made me profoundly uncomfortable.

“Wait. Ski…. As in a ski trip?!”

Tapping furiously, I pulled up my credit card bill. The week in Vermont was painfully, blissfully itemized. It read like an à la carte menu of fun: suite reservations; gear rental for two; dinner in the “Candlelight Room”; ski lessons the next morning; coffee; lift tickets; and on and on and on.

Oddly, as I scanned the list and got deeper and deeper into it, the feelings I experienced grew happier. Small snippets like recollections imbued the mundane rundown with flashes of emotions. They were happy ones, and ended with a memory of being in bed with the young man, a blazing fire keeping us toasty under the covers. And then, and then of…well, I’ve never made love before…have I? The answer seemed to come from my lounge shorts, which grew noticeably tighter right in front. ‘Oh.’

But overall the feelings raised in me thinking about Chris were more than my writer’s imagination could ever summon on its own. They were sensual, yes, but so much more; the pleasure was more than physical.

The gratification was almost 100% tied to who I was sharing the experience with, not necessarily the sex itself. It was like how I felt with Kip, even though we only ever kissed.

A sudden flash made me realize something. I opened the desk drawer and pulled out my novella.

Tears nearly welled in my eyes as I saw redlines on it. It was also creased and careworn, proving it had been read, and read carefully.

Flipping through the pages, making my way back to the end, I saw innumerable cross-outs, rewrites and notes. I felt so happy and lighthearted it had finally worked, but I wasn’t prepared to read the summary at the end.

He had written: “Look, people can relate to others’ weaknesses and shortcomings. Vulnerability makes people approachable, but in your work, this too-stoic perfection you’re going for puts people off. I know it did for this reader. While there are glimpses of intellect and promise here, and the prose is mostly professional, the overall work is soulless. Where is the heart? Where is the holy spirit of the writer himself making the flat words come to life with meaning, purpose, or love? If these elements are missing, which they are in abundance in this pretentious work, then the author can be no more than a repressed, pompous, sanctimonious hack. What I read here is without animation, written by a person with a life unlived but still conceited enough to parade around as a self-inflated, over-bloated, deadeye popinjay. This is tough criticism, I know, but I think you should pursue other interests. If you can’t loosen up, as you evidentially cannot, then writing is not your calling.”

My hand quivered. It was the unvarnished truth, and he – and I – were right. There was no counter-arguing about my income proving I was a writer, or awards and accolades to show “him” I was well respected for it. No, in our hearts of hearts, we both knew I was a soulless machine, turning out incidental hits, and that’s all.

I felt so low, I thought about ending it all then and there. Let them scrape my lounge-pants-wearing remains off the sidewalk. Who would miss me? Who would care…really care….

Whom had I ever touched in my miserable life and not hurt.

Thoughts of my last night at Kip’s house, of holding his hand and asking him not to cry so much. But me, still and stoic, already removing myself from the situation and into a world of painless make-believe. I had reassured him over and over that we’d talk on the phone, text and email every day, knowing I was lying; knowing I’d already prepared to kill myself…. What was the point of living? I had no control. I only seemed to spread misery around, so I thought the boy I loved – Kip – would do best to forget about unworthy me. Me, unworthy of anybody’s love.

I’d almost done it too, climbed to the roof of a five-story building and peered off the edge, imaging myself as a lifeless thing splattered on the ground. I knew no one would care, least of all – me – bah….

And so I stood, letting my novella slip to the floor in a fluttering pile. I went to and opened my fifth-floor apartment window. A part of me knew I’d caused hurt again, but now that my fantasy world was dead, there was only one way to escape reality. Besides, who would care? I didn’t. I hadn’t mattered to anyone….

Sounds at the front door distracted me. They seemed like muffled packages being set down, then a voice out in the hallway chiding itself.

As if in a stupor, I got down from the ledge, thinking it must be more Gay undies from the UPS man. I opened up.

Chris was fishing in his coat pockets. “Oh, baby!” he said, relieved. “Thank God you’re still here. I must have forgot my keys.”

He swept up his grocery bags and glided past me with a smile and kiss on the cheek. I turned and watched him enter the open area of the kitchen, barely registering his question of “Aren’t you going to the gym,” because inside, my heart and mind were a roil of emotions.

The instant I saw him, I knew I was deeply in love…. The instant I saw him…dancing at Club Eros. And here at the door, again.

From the refrigerator, Chris called back to me, “They were out of your favorite yogurt, so I got the other kind.”

‘Yogurt? When did I start eating yogurt?’ But more importantly, I realized since the age of sixteen, I’d never let myself feel love again. I’d always pushed it away with excuses, with notions of not having time for it….

And then like a bolt, it all came flooding back to me. We were no mere cockroaches scurrying along in the dark, doing what we had to to survive. Much less were we hamsters spinning our wheels endlessly for reasons unknown.

I regained my point of view from my amnesiac time away. I felt how free the other me had been. How fearless, and how optimistically he looked upon the world. And memories, oh what memories came flooding back!

 

I recalled my first Friday out; of shopping and flirting with a handsome sales clerk. Of visiting the youth center, looking to volunteer and hand over garbage bags of my old business-casual clothes; of meeting the shy kids and young adults making it alone in the world, and having my heart break; but also awash in thoughts of how ‘lucky’ they were to have this safe zone where they could make normal connections with each other through shared experiences. That was very different from the utterly bleak isolation I felt at their age….

Then I saw and felt my first time at Club Eros: the crowds, the music, the fun swirling in the air. I tried to flirt with Paul, but he merely smiled and tapped his wedding ring with the thumb of his left hand. It was he who introduced Robbie and Chris to me, and it was love at my first sight of Chris. We chatted a bit, then went upstairs to dance with happy abandon. Robbie got the vibe and left us to a cooling but sweat-speckled slow dance. And I remembered our first kiss.

Skyrockets went off in my head.

Then a blur of happy daylight memories followed. Of walking the streets the next morning, feeling compassion for those around me; of feeling so alive. Of calling Chris, showering, packing myself into a Cross-Fitter and liking it; of having a lazy champagne brunch with Chris and talking – talking about everything and nothing – trading stories about friends and family; and then of strolling through the park, of me bravely slipping my hand into Chris’ and getting rewarded by a kiss. I remembered how we walked the whole afternoon like that, ending up at Chris and Robbie’s place, where kisses led to petting, and petting led to more skyrockets.

But all this sweetness was threatened when I had almost ruined it by not contacting Chris for so long. I had agonizing recall of tearful apologies and heartfelt words that I’d been an idiot, that I knew I belonged in the doghouse, that something had been wrong with me recently, that Chris should try and let me make it up to him.

Then another blur of sensations hit me, one of the blissful ski weekend, tempered with Chris’ tears not to break his heart because he’d fallen in love. The love word was returned and deeply meant. The proof? The spare key to my apartment and “squatting rights” for his clothes and toothbrush. “What about me?” Chris had asked playfully. “Well, what good is your stuff without you? You I’m gonna embrace and never let go. I promise you that.”

The memories all crescendoed in the tranquility of settling down, feeling safe and deeply connected when kissing him goodnight and switching off the light to sleep. We had the glow of the fireplace and our hearts to keep us warm. I felt alive. I had mattered after all. I’d brought love into the life of Chris and found myself in the process.

Tears came to me. Uncontrollable tears, and even though the front door stood open, I crumpled to my knees. I couldn’t stop sobbing.

Chris dropped everything and came to me. “Baby…” He hugged my shoulders, coming down besides me. “What’s wrong?”

After a moment spent just admiring him, I finally managed to say, “I just…I just never knew I could be this happy.”

He frowned sweetly, tears instantly coming to his eyes as well. “I know. You’ve made me happy too.”

We kissed, and although it was not my first, it sure felt like it.

˚˚˚˚˚

Well, there’s not much to tell after that. Only that Chris and I eventually left the city and bought a small homestead up near the Vermont ski lodge we both love so much. Together we raise goats and pen stories celebrating the joys and pains of men in love. We post them for free on a Gay Literary website, and my fiancé and I couldn’t be happier.

The things we write include this tale of how I got a sweet taste of amnesia to liberate me. I may still be a work in progress, but bah, let’s face it – most of us are. With Chris’ help, I’m trying to grow up from my prolonged state of emotional childhood; he’s bringing me along nicely. So much so that together we’ve put that pompous, sanctimonious, over-rated popinjay to sleep and out of his misery for good!

~

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