Prologue #2
Even with his family rejecting him like mine did. Even with his mother not returning any of his calls in over four years. Even with her not replying to a single one of his letters and cards and postcards…
Even in the last few years with AIDS bringing gay sex onto the front pages of newspapers and into the leading stories at the Six and Ten O’Clock News bulletins, Danny has been unwavering about his sexuality and about his pride in it.
Even with men in his social circle getting sick, dying or, more worryingly, simply disappearing, he doesn’t seem bothered overhearing comments about ‘promiscuity’ and the ‘gay plague’ or someone saying ‘they had it coming to them’.
I’m sure if he was me, he wouldn’t mind so much getting stared at in the supermarket checkout queue because my hair is short and spiky, and I’m wearing a man’s shirt.
Somehow he doesn’t let whatever his mother said to him stop him from doing whatever he wants.
Unlike me. I can still see my mother’s dark stare, her pursed lips and her square shoulders as she told me I was her biggest disappointment.
That my telling her was even worse than the moment my father left us.
That my ‘choosing this lifestyle’ will be my downfall.
That my sweet dear grandmother, my bubbe, will never want to speak to me again.
The last part is a lie. Bubbe and I speak on the phone once or twice a month at least, but I don’t know if she knows and each time I call her in her nursing home, I’m filled with fear that my mother has told her. That Bubbe will refuse to speak to me. That I’ll be truly abandoned by all my family.
Like Danny. Danny who doesn’t seem to care. Danny who continues to live his life like the whole world loves him, which I’m often convinced it does.
I don’t know how he does it. I don’t know how he doesn’t care.
I don’t know, but I do know that now is not the time to ask him because he’s turned the music back up, is pulling a bottle of supermarket whisky out of our fridge and is pouring a dash in each of our cups of tea.
“Let’s get this party started!” he says. “Tonight, we’re going to find you somebody to love!”
I roll my eyes at yet another Queen quote.
“I haven’t even agreed to come out,” I say, knowing full well I’ve made up my mind to stay home.
I justify the decision by promising to call Bubbe and see how she is.
And after that, I can forget all about the women I’m not kissing by reading my Lady Phantom comics.
“What about you?” I shout out over the music. For all his performing and his peacocking, I know, deep down, Danny is like me. He wants to meet somebody who lasts more than one night. He wants to fall in love. He wants somebody to love too.
“Oh, darling,” he grabs me and spins me around. “I love everybody! That’s the beauty of me!”
*****
Kate
“So that’s it then?”
Tao’s shoulders sink and he looks at me with an imploring expression. Like this is all my fault. “What else is there to say?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” I fold my arms. “Something about sickness and health, for better, for worse.”
“But you’re not sick,” he levels at me. “Yet.”
That pushes my last button. “And I’m not going to get sick. Because I know what I’m doing. I’m good at my job. And I’m not a fucking idiot.”
He winces at my curse. He never has liked me swearing, fucking dickhead. Then he scoffs out a bitter laugh. “You really think you’re immune, don’t you?”
“I didn’t say that!”
“But you act like it. You always have. Like you’re so much better than everybody else. Like you know better than me.”
“Frankly, Tao, when it comes to my job, yes, I do know better than you.”
“But what about our marriage?” he barks back.
“What about our marriage?”
“How can you possibly think you know what’s best for our marriage when you don’t put it before… anything?”
My voice is lower, quieter. “That’s not true.”
“Yes, it is, Kate. It always has been. I don’t think you ever wanted to marry me, so why are you fighting me on this?”
My eyes narrow on him and it’s honestly like I’m seeing him for the first time.
This man that promised to love, honour and obey me until death do us part.
I’m now seeing him with fresh eyes, and I don’t like what I see.
No, not fresh eyes. I’ve seen this view before.
It's just one I’ve looked away from too many times. But not today. Not now.
“Is this because of my sexuality?”
He blinks at me, long and slow. “What?”
“It is, isn’t it?” I feel like a dog with a bone, but I’m absolutely not surrendering it now. “You’ve never liked that about me.”
“What do you mean?”
“The fact that I had relationships with girls in the past. The fact that I still find women attractive. The fact that I’m bisexual.”
“Jesus…” He brings a hand to his face and rubs at his cheeks, dislodging his glasses.
Glasses that I used to find so cute but now they just annoy me, the way they’re never clean and they’re a little bit too big for his features.
He sucks in a sharp breath and then looks at me like I’m a child who has asked him one too many questions.
“You’re not bisexual. You’re married. To me, and I’m a man. ”
In a single loud instant, all the fight leaves my body. And so does any last scrap of love I may have felt for this man I’ve been married to for three pitiful years.
“Not anymore,” I say.
“Not anymore, what?”