Teddy #2
Barry is an actor who appreciates a great line.
He actually has a more impressive body than body of work.
He is infamous for a starring role that no one ever saw.
Barry’s career has seen a resurgence of late, thanks to our little show.
And by resurgence, I mean he does gigs for local restaurants and hearing aid companies.
“Everything old is new again,” I always tell him to keep him grounded. “Just give it time. You’ll eventually come back in style like women
with Farrah hair and men with moustaches.”
Barry is sixty-five and goes to the gym seven days a week. His muscles have muscles. His hair is cropped short and dyed black
to match his ever-present five-o’clock shadow. He is what gays my age call a “bear” and what the young gays call a “daddy.”
I just call him an old queen.
Barry is the living, breathing embodiment of the name of the vintage clothing store I own, Dorian Gay. Fashion, like Barry,
will remain eternally young, even if both of them are beginning to show a little wear.
“Someone obviously brushed his teeth and sharpened his tongue this morning,” Sid says to me.
I laugh and tip my glass of champagne.
“You know how much this Dorothy adores Dorothy Parker.”
Sid takes off his pink bonnet—the same shade as our house—and fans himself.
“You’re welcome,” he says.
“Can we start our brunch now?” I ask. “I have to eat an hour after I take my meds.”
I begin to reach for the sausage-and-egg casserole Ron made. It’s fabulous, like biscuits and gravy in a baking dish. You’d
think the fancy Le Creuset Sauteuse it was made in would reject the spicy Jimmy Dean sausage and cans of condensed soup like
a bad kidney. It’s a recipe from Ron’s mom. We all loved and respected our mothers—more than most of them ever loved and respected
their boys—and still do to this day. It’s like making their favorite dishes is a way to understand and forgive.
Recipe repentance.
Ron slaps my hand. Our routine never changes.
“Ouch!” I say.
“We haven’t prayed yet.”
Ron is wearing a proper, respectful church bonnet—in black, without showy flowers.
Yes, we wear bonnets to the Church of Mary every Sunday, based on theme, season or holiday.
I mean, who do you think we are? We were raised right. Mostly Midwestern and Southern boys who went to church and Sunday school
every week with our mamas and grandmas.
Plus, it doesn’t hurt that Dorian Gay is one of the most popular vintage mid-century resale clothing stores in the desert.
I can pluck the best bonnets for my family.
“Let us pray,” Ron says. “Dear Lord, thank you for having us gather here on this glorious Sunday. We thank you for the sustenance
of this food and this friendship. As I was hiking the other day, I realized that we all seek a way to be better people. We
all seek to ascend.”
I open my eyes and take in the breathtaking San Jacinto Mountains that surround us.
“Which is why the four of us go to church every Sunday,” Ron continues. “We strive to live at a higher level . . .”
Barry titters.
“Ssssh!” Ron reprimands before continuing. “We strive to be worthy of you.”
Ron has faith as high and majestic as these mountains. I glance at him as he prays. My mother told me before she died that
it’s easy for those who have never been tested to have faith.
“When you feel like you’ve lost everything and have nowhere to turn, that’s when true faith comes to call.”
Ron has true faith. I think my telephone has been ringing my whole life, and I just don’t want to answer.
“Close your eyes please, Teddy,” Ron says, catching me staring at him.
Ron is now an esteemed interior designer who grew up on a farm in a town of five hundred people.
He wasn’t allowed to watch TV or listen to music, so he watched thunderstorms roll in from the horizon for entertainment and listened to the purple martins sing at night.
His father was a pastor at the country church.
He preached fire and brimstone, and he tried to beat the sin out of his little boy, but the holy spirit still burns in sweet little Ronny, a pint-sized man with a mass of coiffed white hair that looks like cotton candy.
You can actually see the sun through it.
It looks just like his mama’s hairdo in old Polaroids.
“Dear Lord, thank you for our blessings and for allowing us to join together again in your outdoor church.” Ron takes a breath.
“As I was shucking the corn today to make mama’s casserole . . .”
We release a collective groan at the meandering prayer of our Rose Nylund.
“Forgive them, Lord,” Ron continues undeterred. “Anyway, I was reminded of what she taught me growing up: that each strand
of silk on an ear of sweet corn represents a single kernel of corn on the cob. One silk for every kernel. Lord, we all know
the world tries to rip those special strands from our souls until we appear nekked, but let us remember today that you gave
us those strands, and even if just one silk remains, it holds on to remind us of the person that you created, the unique soul
that still remains. This tiny, soft thread ties us to our pasts and our futures. In God’s name we pray, amen!”
“Amen.”
Ron squeezes my hand hard.
“Ouch,” I say. “Amen.”
Ron looks at me and nods his head because he knows I need this affirmation more than anyone else.
He squeezes again, even harder, and I finally squeeze back. Ron smiles, pleased, and releases.
“Now we can eat,” he says. “Bon appétit!”
We dig in, going around the table sharing stories of our weekend and talking over the next show.
“I have an announcement,” Barry says.
Ron has made Barry his own special Sunday brunch: no fatty, salty casseroles but rather a protein shake, plate of fresh fruit and three grilled chicken breasts with steamed broccoli.
I should hate Barry, but he’s the only man left who can still score us free drinks.
Barry pulls out his cell and holds up a photo of a young man about the age of my rude server who resembles Patrick Schwarzenegger.
“Don’t you already eat enough chicken?” I ask.
“His name is Colton . . .”
We again groan collectively.
“. . . and he’s very sweet.”
I act as if I’m gagging.
“He’s pursuing me, if you must know,” Barry continues undaunted.
I roll my eyes. I actually didn’t realize they could go that far back in my head.
“Spare me,” I say.
Barry taps on his cell for a second and then holds it up again for us to see. A stream of texts—accompanied by a number of
photos that would make the lemons in our trees turn red—goes on forever.
“Where did you meet Colton?” Sid asks.
“Oh, let me guess?” I add. “A dating app? How original.”
“No, it was very old-fashioned,” Barry says. “A real meet-cute. It was my chest day at the gym, and he asked if he could work
in.”
“You’re right. That is so old-fashioned,” I say. “In fact, I think I saw that same scene in a movie at a bathhouse once.”
“Stop it!” Barry says, his voice rising suddenly. “He really is nice. Sweet as a date shake. He has his degree in theater . . .”
We all groan even louder.
“. . . and,” Barry continues unthwarted, “he wants to be an actor.”
This time, we pull off our bonnets and sling them at his face.
“He saw our show,” Barry says. “He loved it. He says he has some ideas. Oh, he’s calling! I’ll be right back!”
Barry leaps from his chair and walks to a chaise by the pool, where he takes a seat under a yellow-and-white-striped umbrella
with fringe.
“Is he giggling?” Sid asks.
“Maybe it is love,” Ron says with his forever-sunny demeanor.
“Right,” I say. “You know what Dorothy would say right now? ‘When a twenty-two-year-old girl marries a man who’s eighty, chances
are she is not after his body,’” I say, before adding, “‘Even his.’”
“Eat, eat,” Ron says. “It’s getting cold, and I cooked all morning.”
I watch Barry as I eat. He’s sitting cross-legged like a schoolgirl on the chaise, leaning forward, holding the phone so tightly
it looks as if it might break, his free hand drawing a heart on the orange Sunbrella fabric.
Am I jealous? A little.
Am I worried? A lot.
This is my family. The one I chose. The one who chose me.
A chosen unit so we wouldn’t be alone.
But how much time do we all have left? Not just on this earth but with one another?
We made a pact. We went through hell to get here. All it takes is the smallest quake in the desert to tear it all apart.
The table vibrates.
I jump.
“It’s not an earthquake, Teddy, it’s your phone,” Ron says.
I look down at my cell humming on the table.
Caller ID reads: She Who Has No Name
My sister, Trudy.
Whom I haven’t spoken to in decades. She’s left messages for me over the years—I had a grandchild! I had heart surgery! My husband retired!—that I have never returned. She wants me to forgive and forget. I want to make her pay forever.
“Who is it?” Sid asks. “And pass the corn casserole, please.”
“Chappell Roan,” I say.
Why would Trudy be calling me this time? Hasn’t she already blamed me for everything wrong in her life? Everything wrong I
did to make our parents miserable? Everything wrong in the world? What hateful words are possibly left in her vocabulary?
Cher may be queen, but my sister proudly suffers wearing her crown of thorns.
My cell vibrates again.
I turn my phone upside down on the table.
When it stops, I pick up the cell and hold it to my ear.
The mere sound of her voicemail makes me knock back my glass of champagne and grab the bottle for round two.
“Theodore? It’s Trudy. Your sister. Remember me? We need to talk. It’s an emergency. Call me.”
In the background, I hear names being called over an intercom. She must be eating somewhere fancy after church, like Applebee’s
or Olive Garden.
I set my phone down and take a bite of corn casserole.
Trudy is the last silk on my dried-out cob of a soul. And I ripped her out of my life a long time ago and boiled myself until
I could no longer feel any pain.
You see, when you’ve been not simply hurt but gutted like a fish, when you’ve lost everything and everyone you believed would keep you safe, when you forged a life without family, when you have been to hell and back and realized the devil does not reside there but sits in your kitchen, living room, church and school, when you have put a knife to your wrist and were found by your sister, who bandaged you up and said, “Just wear long sleeves for a while,” when you have called home at Christmas praying for a miracle only to hear your father and sister say in the background, “Hang up, Mom! Teddy’s dead!
” well, honey, you are not only forced to take chances you never would have taken, but—somewhere along the way—you die and are reborn as the person you dreamed of becoming even when you didn’t think it was possible.
“Is everything okay?” Ron asks.
He has the instinctual empathy of your favorite dog.
I sip my champagne and nod as Barry returns to the table.
“I’m good,” I say.
I am lying.
Bad things are happening.
Really bad things.
I, my dears, am dying.
My starring role is soon to be over. My sitcom is being canceled.
But I’m the only who knows. There’s no reason to reveal the finale to the cast yet. It would only spoil our last season together.
I will not burden my friends with my health issues during what are supposed to be the carefree years of their lives. I’m a
year away from Medicare, and my wonky insurance wouldn’t cover all my costs. I do not have an IRA to cash in to help with
medical bills. I have bonnets and baubles.
What if they had to sell this house because of me?
I cannot—no, I will not!—burden them with my struggles.
And that’s okay. Truly it is.
To be honest, I died a long time ago. When John passed away. We were one soul, and that rarely happens in this life. I was
given the greatest gift, and I will leave this world forever grateful for that.
My friends laugh.
I wish they understood that happy endings only take place on old sitcoms where a snappy one-liner, a laugh track, a glass
of Bartles & Jaymes and a platter of pizza rolls could erase all your troubles, if for only a half hour. As my waiter made
abundantly clear, we are old. Our calendars are stamped with an end date. I just happen to know mine will come a little sooner
than theirs.
Ron eyes me closely. He is suspicious. I must lie again.
“To the Church of Mary!” I suddenly say, holding up my glass.
“To family!” The Golden Gays yell.
“Alexa!” I command our outdoor speaker. “Play Cher!”
I cannot help but smile at Alexa’s choice. That AI vixen is an even bigger bitch than I am.
“Do you believe in life after love?” Cher asks, singing “Believe.”