Chapter 8 #2
I lingered behind, eyeing the desk drawer he’d shoved something inside just a moment ago.
I knew it was wrong to snoop, but I didn’t understand this man, and I definitely didn’t trust him.
What if he was looking over deal paperwork from the university?
What if he was plotting to cut me out of it?
I reasoned I had just as much of a right to know what was going on as he did.
Like Midas had said, I was an owner now.
Quietly, I tiptoed to Hatch’s desk. It was covered in stacks of papers, most of which appeared to be bills, all of them addressed to Marion Hatchet.
I pulled the drawer open one painstaking inch at a time.
The paper he’d been holding was right on top.
I grabbed it and turned my back to the door to hide what I was doing.
Before I flipped it over, I realized I wasn’t holding a piece of paper. It was a photograph. An old Kodak print with a laminate back and faded pink numbers. This isn’t deal paperwork, my inner voice said. Put it back and get out of here.
I didn’t listen. Instead, I flipped the photo over, knowing in my bones what it would be.
Uncle George.
He was younger, probably in his fifties, with bristly salt-and-pepper hair and an impressive mustache.
He wore a classic white T-shirt tucked into blue jeans, and he was leaning on a fence post with a crowd of people behind him.
The crooked grin on his face matched the twinkle of mirth in his eyes.
It was exactly how I remembered him—his very essence—except he looked happier, less guarded. He looked like his truest self.
And Hatch had been sitting here for who knows how long, simply looking at this photo. Had he been the one to take it? Had they been on vacation together? Was this how he liked to remember George? My throat was suddenly thick, but my brain couldn’t make sense of how to process anything.
Then:
“What the hell are you doing?!” a voice roared behind me. I spun around, clutching the photograph to my chest. Hatch was frozen in the doorway, his body impossibly large, his face blotchy with rage. His glare went through me like an ice pick.
“I’m sorry—I was—I just—”
“GET OUT!”
My entire body surged with adrenaline. I hurriedly placed the photo on the desk, face down, as if that would make my sin less egregious. I scuttled to the door and around Hatch’s imposing body, my shame so powerful that I couldn’t even look him in the eye.
The door slammed shut behind me. It was so loud that a couple of patrons actually jumped.
I stood paralyzed as the adrenaline rush worked through me, my breath coming so fast it was like I had sprinted from the parking lot.
I hustled through the crowd and ducked behind the bar top to join Hannah and Midas.
“Where did Hatch go?” Hannah asked from the register, brushing her fallen hair out of her eyes.
I focused intently on pouring a draft beer. “Don’t know.”
I was so discombobulated that I mixed a whiskey-Coke instead of a whiskey ginger, then rang someone up for ten beers instead of one. Midas touched my arm, forcing me to stop and look at him.
“Take five, freshman,” he said kindly. “Get your head on straight. Or gay. Or whatever.”
I didn’t need him to tell me twice. I dipped away from the bar top and wove through the hot, sticky bodies until I reached the back exit door. I shoved it open and pushed myself into the clear night air, putting my hands on my knees while I took several deep breaths.
“Louisa,” said Hannah’s voice.
I turned around to find her closing the door. I knew by the look on her face that she had talked to Hatch.
“I didn’t do it on purpose,” I said quickly.
“I’m not here to lecture you.” She met my disbelieving stare. “Okay, maybe a little. But mostly I wanted to check if you’re okay.” She came toward me, put a steadying hand on my back, and gestured for me to sit on the same steps where I’d first met Hatch. “Tell me what happened.”
I explained about the paper he’d been holding, and my suspicions about him hiding information about the sale, and even about the wave of emotion that had come over me when I’d seen the photograph.
“Why would you think Hatch is hiding information from you?” Hannah asked.
“Because he never told me about the football facility. I had to find out from someone else.”
“Did you ask him?”
“No, but … can’t you tell that he doesn’t care about this place? We’re going to lose something precious all because he’s ready to wash his hands of everything Uncle George built here—”
“That is categorically untrue, Louisa.”
“Hannah, you don’t get it. I’ve never had a place like this before. I didn’t even know there were queer people in Rustin, or that they—we—had a place to go. I can’t understand how anyone would give up on that.”
Hannah turned toward me, suddenly sharp. “You think I don’t get it?” She laughed hollowly. “You think Baker doesn’t get it? And Midas? And Edge and Claudia and—”
“No, no, I know you guys get it, but—”
“Hatch gets it, too, Louisa. Every queer person does. We’ve all needed a place to go at some point.
You are not unique or misunderstood or exceptional for feeling the way you do about the Cricket.
But before you get up on your high horse about saving this place, you need to learn what it has meant to the people who’ve come before you, especially Hatch. You don’t know what it cost him.”
“What do you mean, what it cost him?”
Hannah drew up short. She bit her lip like she had said too much.
“What does that mean?” I pressed.
Hannah blew out a breath like she was furious about something. “It means I loved George dearly, but he didn’t always do right by Hatch.”
I waited for the beat to drop. When it didn’t, I asked tentatively, “Have you ever been to Uncle George’s house?”
“No,” she answered impatiently. “Why?”
I faltered, not knowing how much to share.
“It’s just … I was helping my dad and grandparents clean out his house this week …
and there were all these personal effects and like, pieces of his life …
but not a sign of Hatch anywhere. No pictures, no birthday cards, nothing.
But then I come here and everyone’s like, Oh, Hatch is grieving George, Hatch is trying to move on, this place was Hatch and George’s baby …
and it’s like, is that really the truth? ”
Hannah took a deep breath. “There wasn’t a single picture of Hatch?”
“Not one, Hannah.”
“That breaks my heart.”
“I know. It’s like Hatch is pining for someone who didn’t want him back.”
Hannah’s brow furrowed. “No, I mean it breaks my heart that George couldn’t even feel safe in his own home.”
I stared at her. “What do you mean?”
“Louisa, George and Hatch were deeply in love. Flawed love, yeah, but it was love nonetheless. The fact that George has no evidence of Hatch in his own home—it just goes to show how far he compartmentalized his life.”
“I don’t understand.”
Hannah searched my face. “Literally no one in your family has told you about their relationship?”
“My dad said they used to be partners. That’s it.”
Hannah dragged a weary hand down her face.
“Listen. I am telling you this not because I want to get into their personal business, but to help you understand where Hatch is coming from, and why it hurts so much for him to have you here.” She took a centering breath.
“George got into the bar business because of Hatch. This was like twenty years ago, and Hatch had just moved to Rustin from … I don’t even know, it doesn’t matter.
But Hatch worked for a restaurant concessions group and had always dreamed of opening his own bar.
He met George, they started dating—secretly, of course—and George agreed to go into business with him, as long as he could be a silent partner. ”
“For a gay bar?”
“For a gay bar,” Hannah confirmed. “Which is why George insisted on the silent partner part. The way Hatch tells it, George figured he could use his businessman facade to invest in whatever kind of real estate he wanted, and if people asked questions, George could justify it as being open-minded, a good ally, willing to take a chance, what have you.”
I remembered Grandpa’s words: He was diversifying his portfolio.
“Supposedly the deal was they would run the bar together—with George behind the scenes, of course—until they had made enough money to move away and officially start their life together. Hatch wanted to get married, live openly, do the whole white-picket-fence thing.”
I waited breathlessly, already suspecting where this was going. Bile started to rise in my throat.
“But years passed, and George couldn’t do it. He was too attached to the life he’d cultivated here.” She paused, and her next words were drenched in sadness. “He was too attached to that Golden Boy persona. He couldn’t let it go.”
I remembered standing in my grandparents’ living room last weekend, reading the obituary, agreeing with Dad that Uncle George wouldn’t have wanted a big sendoff. Grandma’s words echoed in my head. George’s ego was bigger than this house.
“So what happened?” I asked, the words coming from some scraped-out pit inside of me.
“They broke up.” Hannah shrugged like there was no way around it.
“But they continued working together?”
“Business is business,” she said simply. She hesitated. “And I don’t think they ever fell out of love, even if they couldn’t make it work.”
I pictured the old photo of Uncle George—the crinkly smile, the sun-browned skin. I pictured Hatch on the other side of the camera, trying to capture the man he loved. To my great embarrassment, I felt tears prick my eyes.
Hannah didn’t seem fazed by my crying; if anything, it was like she expected it. Wordlessly, she wrapped me in a hug and squeezed, and I only cried harder.
“You’re all right,” Hannah cooed.
I pulled back and sniffled, wiping my eyes. “I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’m so emotional lately.”
“Maybe because your uncle died, and he never told you he was gay, and he left you this giant-ass rainbow bar, and his ex-lover is being mean to you?”
I let out a watery laugh. “Yeah, maybe. I’m sorry, I don’t usually cry all over people.”
“Louisa, I’m a school counselor. My whole job is to let you little urchins cry all over me.” She paused like another punch line was coming. “Personally, I never cried in high school.”
I laughed again. “Yeah, I call bullshit.”
Hannah released me. She handed me a bar rag like I might use it to dry my tears, and we both laughed.
“Where will you go?” I asked. “If the sale goes through?”
She gave me a quizzical smile. “I won’t go anywhere. I have a full-time job for most of the year, remember?”
“Yeah, but … won’t you be sad?”
“Of course I will be,” she said like it was the easiest thing in the world. “But that’s just how life goes. Some things end, others begin. I’m getting married in the fall. That’s my main focus.”
I smiled. “You and Baker will be really pretty brides.”
“I know,” she deadpanned. “Listen, I’m sending you home for the night. You need a break.”
“No, no, I can help—”
“No offense, freshman, but your absence won’t make or break us.
” She stood up and pulled me to my feet.
“Don’t you have anyone to hang out with other than us ‘elders’?
Go call your friends. Make bad decisions.
Do whatever the young people do.” She leveled me with one of her trademark looks.
“You have twenty-five days left in your bargain with Hatch. Think carefully about how you’ll use them. ”
And then, to my shock, she called for RuPaw, who had been hiding under the back steps the entire time. The cat slinked past me with an air of She sure told you, her tail held high as she followed Hannah back inside.