6 #3
Patrick’s pretty sure he looks like someone who gets up at six o’clock every morning to take a bright-eyed baby off Susan’s hands.
“So do you.” Luke always looks good, in a neatly combed hair and collared shirt kind of way.
He used to be one of the book and manuscript experts at an auction house in the city, but then he took a job with an auction house in Los Angeles.
Susan and Nathaniel come in from the street, Nathaniel holding the door open for Susan and the baby carriage.
They’d walked over to the Salvation Army on Second Avenue, which might mean Patrick gets his clothes back sometime soon.
Nathaniel has that shell-shocked look he gets after he’s been outside.
Patrick watches Luke do a double take as he realizes he’s seeing Suzie Larkin in the flesh.
Luke glances pointedly at Patrick, clearly wanting an introduction.
It would be shitty not to go along with it, so Patrick introduces Luke to both Nathaniel and Susan.
“We were together until Luke moved to Los Angeles,” Patrick explains.
He feels a little squeamish about that together , partly because he knows he made a mess of together , and partly because it’s a slight exaggeration.
But anything else would look like concealing the relationship.
“Such a fan,” Luke tells Susan, managing to make it sound offhand and sincere at the same time. “Don’t tell me this sweetheart is yours,” he says, cooing at Eleanor. “And are you…” he gestures between Susan, Eleanor, and Nathaniel.
“I work here,” Nathaniel says, but as he says it he takes a step toward Patrick. Luke’s eyebrows shoot up.
“Let’s go try out that new song,” Susan tells Nathaniel, a hand on his elbow.
“Well,” Luke says as soon as they’re alone.
“It’s not like that.”
“We weren’t like that either, not for months, if memory serves.”
“I’m his boss, and I don’t even know if he’s—”
“He’s wearing one of your sweaters.”
“Are you serious? Did you memorize my entire wardrobe?”
“Wardrobe? Darling, you have four sweaters. Let’s not get excited.” Luke snorts. “Wardrobe. So, an older man.”
“Luke.” Nathaniel can’t be more than two or three years older than Luke, but Patrick doesn’t point this out.
“Fine!” Luke holds his hands up in surrender. “You seeing anyone?”
Patrick hesitates, because an immediate no might give Luke ideas.
“I’m not hitting on you. My god, Patrick, I’ll find a way to resist.”
“I’m not seeing anyone.”
“I do have a nice hotel room, though,” Luke says, and they both start laughing. They did get along well, while it lasted, and it isn’t Luke’s fault that Patrick is the way he is.
“Are you seeing anyone?” Patrick asks.
Luke makes a so-so gesture with one hand. “Want to have dinner? I really am only asking about dinner.”
“Sure, why the hell not.”
“Is that crepe place on Greenwich still open?”
“Oh Christ, that fucking place.” They put things like seafood curry on pancakes.
“Come on,” Luke wheedles.
“Fine, all right, whatever.” He checks his watch—seven thirty, which is late enough that he isn’t going to feel guilty about closing early. He flips the sign and locks up the shop.
They wind up splitting a bottle of wine and making it most of the way through a second bottle, so by the time they’re done eating, Patrick’s not even pretending to be sober.
Luke tells him stories about the people he works with, none of whom Patrick has ever met or ever will meet.
He doesn’t pay attention, just listens to the familiar cadences of Luke’s voice.
There’s a thread of bullshit working its way through Luke’s monologue, like maybe he’s trying to impress Patrick with stories about his new car and his new house and his new life.
Patrick is impressed—he was impressed with Luke before they ever got together—so this is all pointless.
Michael used to tell him to get over it.
People aren’t honest, and it’s a fool’s errand to expect them to be.
But it isn’t the dishonesty that bothers Patrick.
It’s more that when he has the feeling that someone’s lying, he knows there’s something they’re lying about .
You only tell a lie when you have something to hide.
He feels like he’s spying on Luke’s new life through a peephole. He feels seedy, but also like he’s being manipulated.
“You do look good,” Luke says. “It’s the hair.”
Patrick self-consciously touches his head. He hasn’t gotten his hair cut since Susan and Eleanor moved in, and he only trimmed his beard when Iris told him he looked like a hippie.
“It’s so long,” Patrick complains.
“All blonds should let their hair grow. More of a good thing,” Luke says decisively. Patrick isn’t even blond, not really. He has the color hair you get when you were blond as a kid: dirty blond, if he gets some sun in the summer.
“I should go,” Luke says after they’ve split the check.
Neither of them make any move to get up.
It’s dark, they’re in the back of the restaurant, and none of the waiters are paying them any attention.
Patrick knows of four gay bars in a two block radius and there are probably others he hasn’t heard of.
So when Luke leans in to kiss him, it’s not an insane thing to do, even though they’re in public.
It’s just this side of a peck, something between goodbye and nice to see you again and remember?
“I’m in town for a week,” Luke says as Patrick watches him get into a cab. “I’m staying at the Americana.”
Patrick won’t call him, but it’s embarrassingly reassuring to feel wanted, however idly. He walks the two blocks home, mildly annoyed with himself for having passed up what would have been a decent couple of hours, but mostly glad to be heading home.
When he reaches the shop, he’s surprised to see a light still on.
He lets himself in, locks everything back up, and feels an odd thrum of anticipation as he heads to the rear of the shop.
He finds Nathaniel in the kitchen, sitting at the table, reading the John le Carré novel that Patrick lent him.
It looks like he’s still on the first few pages.
On the table in front of him is a mug of tea.
“Want me to put on some water on for you?” Nathaniel asks, looking up from his book.
Patrick shakes his head. Instead, he fills a glass of water at the sink and uses it to swallow a couple aspirin.
“That man,” Nathaniel says. “Are you and he…”
“Not anymore.” Patrick leans against the counter. Now that the paint has dried, the green doesn’t seem quite so violent. Maybe it’s grown on him. Maybe it’s the wine.
“Why not?”
“He moved back to California.”
Nathaniel has an expression that Patrick can’t decipher. Some people are fine with a person being discreetly queer, but change their tune as soon as that person stops hiding. Even some queer people think everybody belongs in the closet.
And it hasn’t entirely escaped Patrick’s attention that Nathaniel might not be straight.
When Patrick starts talking about this stuff, Nathaniel seems curious in a way that straight people seldom do.
He doesn’t seem comfortable—very much the opposite—but that combination of discomfort and curiosity is practically a mandatory stop on the trip to figuring out you’re queer.
Or—maybe Nathaniel already knows. It’s not like he goes around talking about who he used to fuck—or where he worked, where he went to school, or anything at all.
The only thing Patrick knows about Nathaniel’s past is that he used to work in an office and he stopped playing the violin in college.
That level of cageyness ought to feel dishonest. If Luke’s harmless storytelling rankles, then why doesn’t Nathaniel’s secrecy?
They’re both trying to cover things up. The difference, maybe, is that Nathaniel is practically announcing that there are things he doesn’t want Patrick and Susan to know.
Patrick watches Nathaniel frown at a stain on the table and tries to summon up some annoyance, but all he can think is that Nathaniel waited up for him.
So, yeah, Nathaniel might be queer, and he might think Patrick’s being rude and déclassé by not hiding it, but those topics are too delicate to navigate half drunk and weirdly sappy.
Patrick ought to go to bed and walk away from this conversation before it can get dicey, but the wine’s loosened his tongue.
“Is this going to be a problem? Me being gay?”
Nathaniel’s eyebrows shoot up. “No? Is this supposed to be brand new information? I’ve known since before I came here.”
Patrick imagines that there’s something so powerfully gay about his presence that you can see it from a cab several blocks away, even though it probably just means that Mrs. Kaplan screens her strays to make sure they aren’t going to be a problem.
Extremely bold of Mrs. Kaplan, but Patrick’s given up questioning her methods.
Patrick’s had enough wine to find all of this very amusing, or maybe he’s relieved, so he laughs a little, and Nathaniel smiles up at him—the real deal, both sides of his mouth and everything.
Patrick’s just drunk enough to admit to himself that he’d do practically anything to guarantee a steady supply of those smiles. Appalling.
“And also,” Nathaniel says, “I’m not an idiot. You’ve clearly fucked the entire male half of your clientèle.”
“Not all of them,” Patrick says, which sets them both off.
“Did you love one another?” Nathaniel asks when they’ve settled down. His tone is blunt, even unsentimental, like he’s asking whether Patrick remembered to mail the gas bill.
“Me and Luke? No,” Patrick says. “I liked him a lot. I still like him a lot. And I guess he liked me a lot, but it beats me why.”
“It might have something to do with the way you look,” Nathaniel says, and Patrick watches in amazement as his cheeks turn pink.
Patrick’s own face is heating, but there’s no way he’s doing it as prettily as Nathaniel is.
Nathaniel has more aplomb than Patrick’s given him credit for, because he simply crosses one leg over the other and moves right along.
“I mean, it probably isn’t because of your personality. ”
Patrick bursts out laughing. Nathaniel looks terribly pleased with himself.
“You don’t keep it a secret?” Nathaniel asks.
Patrick shrugs. “Depends. Susan knows, obviously. Mrs. Kaplan knows. Michael knew. The Valdezes have seen men coming and going at all hours, so they know. I’m more cavalier about it than most people.” The fact is, once he told Michael, there wasn’t anyone left whose opinion mattered.
Nathaniel makes a tsking sound. “Risky.”
“If they can pretend we aren’t here, they can pretend there isn’t anything wrong,” Patrick says.
“It’s time to stop hiding.” It isn’t anything he hasn’t said before.
It isn’t anything he hasn’t heard and read dozens of times.
It feels odd saying it now, though, because if Nathaniel is queer, then it sounds like a criticism.
Nathaniel is quiet for long enough that his tea is probably cold. “I suppose things are different now,” he finally says.
“I mean, you can still get arrested. The cops still raid bars.” Patrick’s been in two raids. The second time he managed to sneak out through the basement with a few other patrons. “This is a good neighborhood to be gay, though.”
Nathaniel, who started frowning when Patrick mentioned people getting arrested, now looks like it’s taking him a real effort not to laugh. “I have noticed that. There’s a gay bar on our street, Patrick. There’s a gay bookstore a few blocks away.”
“Well, shit. I didn’t realize I was dealing with a regular expert.” He sort of expects another blush, but Nathaniel just gives him a level look, and Patrick’s face heats again.
“Maybe I will have some tea,” Patrick says, mainly for an excuse to stay. “Want another cup?”
Patrick fixes Nathaniel’s tea the way he likes it.
He takes his coffee black: medicinal and bitter, a means to an end.
But his tea is a different story: he adds enough milk to turn it the color of melted vanilla ice cream and so much sugar it never fully dissolves.
There’s always a layer of sugary silt at the bottom of his cup.
He always looks a little guilty as he adds that fourth spoonful.
Tonight, Patrick makes sure each spoon is as full as it could possibly be.