Unburying Hope Page 11

  He’d lie out on the sofa and pull her close, then shut his eyes and fall asleep, to wake up an hour later broken out of a malaise back into his half-smiles and rolling eyes at her questions about what she could make him to eat. Not everything could be soothed with food, he said, but he let her pull out the cookbooks and he’d smile and dip a wooden spoon into the bowl of melted chocolate like an excited teenage boy, reaching around her but not letting her movements interrupt his dig and lick, dig and lick. “Gross,” she’d said the first time, and he’d protested, “You talking about my mouth germs? Because I don’t hear you complaining in bed.”

  She’d smile wryly and hand him the bowl. “I need most of it for the recipe,” and he’d laughed, releasing any leftover nerves from his leave-taking and like a little boy he’d dip and lick from the bowl until he was satisfied. Then he’d hand the bowl back, looking into it sheepishly, hoping that there was enough for her recipe.

  There was another type of leave-taking that wrenched her heart, confused her because it was dark and cloudy and sudden. And no matter how much she needed it, it never gave her a moment of connection before he broke away.

  Those were the worst times.

  She would find herself suddenly, utterly alone, with a cold chill around her, as though a phantasm had been nearby and had disappeared, leaving behind only the hint of a negative electrical charge.

  There were echoes in their past together, images seen again through the reflections of the immediate terror and loneliness she felt after those leave-takings. The changes Frank had mentioned, the gaunt cheeks, the gray cast on his face, the ragged look of his unkempt hair.

  Some days, the gaunt look came from his sleeplessness, which she knew came from his memories, the unspoken trauma of bleeding bodies. He used words to paint those images for her, in halting sentences when he was half asleep.

  But those weren’t what propelled him out the door.

  It was something else.

  Liquor? Alcoholism? No, because he rarely joined her in ordering cocktails in restaurants, or a half glass of wine at home, which she had changed to since he moved in, in her own silent metamorphosis into a more present, thoughtful partner.

  It might have been drugs, like Frank suspected. But he never carried anything in his pockets, he never pulled out pills or lit up weed around her in the apartment.

  Yet he left, sucking all the dreams for her life out with him.

  And it became a waiting game, holding herself in fear, staying on her own shaky course, matured but without the force she’d used as a centrifugal energy around which she had recalibrated her life. Waking herself up alone, getting herself into her new clothes, feeling an inner centering as she pulled the body conscious skirt on, buttoning up the silky blouse, zipping up the brown boots with heels.

  By the time she had a work outfit on, she’d find herself settled. Able to think, able to then shut off the thinking, her defense mechanism. And the day or two would pass until she heard the knock on the door, she’d open the door and he’d walk in, worn out, shadowy like the drained colors of his threadbare fatigues.

  He would sidle into the bedroom and sprawl on the covers, face first, to sleep for more hours than her workday, for a few days sometimes, until he would emerge whole again, wired and pained, agitated but pulling her close. And she would smile and melt into him, so happy that there was life in the body that had been comatose and sluggish for as long as he’d been back.

  There was a third way he left, when he was still with her. And even though having him lay like a cadaver for a day or two was unsettling, the dead eyes he had when his memories eclipsed him, when he heard sounds and saw things, and, to survive, he enshrouded himself on the sofa or on a kitchen chair or in the shower or standing at the closet door half dressed, those eyes were haunting.

  He was there, with her, but he was broken, paralyzed, a far away stare focused on some bombed out place, barraged by mayhem and exploded bodily fluids that he had to wipe off. For a few hours, he’d stand or sit, haunted, wiping off his face, his chest, washing his hands until the sleeping pills she gave him kicked in and he’d somehow settle back into his skin, his body, his life.

  Of those three ways that he left her, each had its own moment where she realized again that she was a separate person. She remembered to find her own thoughts, her own plans. Because he couldn’t be, and wasn’t, in her face all the time, but was there when his eyes were on her, she had the time and the space to think of her own life, her own dreams.

  On an ordinary day, it felt like having him in her life was worth the moments of physical and emotional separation. Except for the addled walkouts, when she felt something in him was dying, which threatened to kill off something in her if she didn’t pull herself together.

  Those were the only moments that ripped her back into the sorrows of her childhood, but they were also the ones she pulled herself through by her own boot straps, with images and ideas of how she wanted her own future to unfold.

  Knowing that he wouldn’t be at the bus stop each day, she prepared herself for aloneness, going a few extra stops and shopping at a larger market than the one in her neighborhood, buying ingredients she didn’t have so that she could cook herself foods that interested her, scones with fresh peaches inside, or brown rice with avocado, shredded cheese, red onion slivers, almond slivers and a zesty chipotle sauce.

  She decided to start collecting information on elder centers, typing organization names, addresses, emails and phone numbers into a spreadsheet. Maybe she could put together a map to show what neighborhoods needed help. She plotted spots on a local map, saddened to see how few and far between they were for usually immobile old people. There were plenty of single-floor cinderblock old folks homes, but no activity centers, no art or music programs and she remembered the joy on the old lady across the hall’s face whenever she turned on her small plug in radio and listened to classical music. Looking for specs about places she walked by grounded her when she was alone. It was the propellant that let her grow herself more towards the light of her future and helped her feel like her roots were stretching outwards instead of stifling in on a small, outgrown pot like the plants that Eddie always talked about.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Celeste was worried, but also curious about the inevitable formal meeting between Frank and Eddie. She figured that since they both loved her, they’d find something in common but it occurred to her too late that they might love opposing sides of her. Frank might be warm to the party girl in her and Eddie to the homebody. She realized as she showed her ID to the club bouncer that this meet-and-greet could blow up in her face.

  It was what Frank called a ‘straight bar’, a honky-tonk that she’d never been in, with pool tables and beer signs for local brands that had died along with the region decades ago.

  Frank had picked the place, as a gesture of openness to what he called Eddie’s ‘alternative lifestyle’ of hanging out 24/7 with straights. He was already sitting at a tall table, on a stool that rocked with his nervousness.

  He was ‘passing’, looking as heterosexual as he could muster, she saw, and she knew it wasn’t to pick up the straight guys on the down low who hid their sexuality from their buddies. He sometimes did this, until they were sure new bars weren’t filled with drunken homophobes. They’d had run-ins before.

  His hair lay flat. She was surprised at how handsome he was in this different way as he sat like a chameleon, blending in to the crowd of plaid flannel-shirted, jeans-wearing regulars.

  Frank smiled at her wanly. “Don’t try to pick me up, Missy, without buying me a few cocktails. I’m not easy.” He held his beer bottle dangerously close to his licking lips and winked at her.

  “Who knew that there were good old boys in Detroit? Better watch your intake, honey,” Celeste winked back, “or else you’ll start tapping your red sparkly shoes together to get yourself back home.”

  “That’s what’s missing here,” he laughed, “Check out the shoes! Eve
ryone is wearing horrid brown clodhoppers.”

  Celeste looked down and saw several men in tan work boots. It was clear from the vacant stares in their eyes, the broken slouch of their shoulders that drinking at this bar didn’t let them forget that they weren’t working. There were no jobs. That’s why Frank and Celeste had created their original pact, to work together, to keep their jobs and the roofs over their heads and to postpone any life dreams until the economy resurrected itself from the third level down crypt within which it was now buried.

  “When’s that boy of yours going to get here?” Frank asked. “I’m afraid that years of hair spiking gel aren’t going to let my hair lay down like this much longer.”

  “”You’re pretty hot, Frank,” Celeste said, “as a straight guy.”

  “Bite your tongue.”

  “Seriously, a few gin and tonics and I’d probably hit that.”

  “And you’d never pick up a man again.”

  “Why?” She teased him, “You are a hunk.”

  “Because I’d throw a hissy fit when we got home and I figured out that you aren’t a guy in drag.”

  She burst out laughing. “Can’t get you on my team, eh?”

  “Your team has no style,” Frank said, adjusting the buttoned down collar of his shirt.

  “Plaids are supposed to be flannel fabric, Frank,” Celeste said.

  “If you’re a lumberjack, maybe,” he responded, “but I’m the indoor type. I wear my plaid with a sateen finish.”

  “I wonder where Eddie is,” Celeste said, looking around the bar.

  “Probably outside casing the perimeter.”

  “Frank,” she admonished.

  “He’s some kind of spy, I’m sure of it,” Frank teased.

  “No he’s not, his training just dies hard.”

  “I know. I’m here,” Frank’s voice turned serious, “because he’s so good to you.”

  Celeste brightened.

  “You said he holds you like he really wants you in his arms, like it makes him feel good.”

  “I know!” she crowed with delight. “He does!”

  “That’s so adorable! So opposite of those man sluts you’ve been cavorting with for years.”

  “Always looking for someone like Eddie.”

  “Eddie might not be the one, Missy,” Frank said cautiously.

  “But you said he wants to be with me.”

  “Because you said he puts his arms around you and his eyes light up with how happy he is.”

  “You’re just jealous.”

  “Let’s try it, let me hug you like that.” Frank jumped off his wobbly stool.

  Celeste stood up, a huge smile erupted on her face, she felt the warmth of it in her chest. She put her arms out, waiting.

  “Slow down, Missy,” Frank joked. “I’m not sure I can back this urge up. I love you, but I’m strictly dickly.” Frank hugged her just enough to put his arms around her but not enough for their chests to touch.

  Celeste yanked him into a body tight hug.

  “Oh, my god, your breasts, they’re real, Missy, get them away” he said, laughing into her ear.

  Celeste heard Eddie clear his throat standing directly behind her.

  “Hey, that’s my girl,” he growled.

  Frank jumped back and Eddie came in close, hugging Celeste from behind. He kissed her neck, “You must be Frank.”

  “How can you tell?” Frank asked warily. “I might be some stranger she’s trying to get directions from.”

  “I’ve been watching you,” Eddie said.

  “Of course you have.”

  Celeste turned around and kissed Eddie’s lips, whispering, ‘Hi, honey’. Then she took his hand and formally introduced him to Frank.

  “She’s my girl,” said Eddie, still with a growl.

  “Down, Rover,” said Frank. “She used to be my girl.”

  Eddie looked around, “This dive is where you guys come to drink?” he asked.

  “No,” Celeste said.

  “We picked this place for you,” Frank said.

  Eddie was eyeing Frank and scoping the interior, Celeste could see. She registered a flicker of activity in his eyes, checking doors, exits, windows, the bouncer he’d had to pass. He turned his stool so that he could see both the front and back door. “Can’t we sit in a booth?” He walked to a nearby banquette, taking a seat where his back was to a wall of the building, where he could still see the front door and the bar door to the kitchen.

  “Like we have a choice,” Frank whispered.

  Celeste gave him a look that silenced him and she watched as he changed his gait, copying Eddie’s stalking walk. She couldn’t stop a giggle, he was a nearly perfect mimic.

  She sidled into the booth next to Eddie, suddenly realizing that Frank was saving her room on his side. She reached her feet under the table to tap him on the foot.

  “That had better be you, Missy,” he whispered under his breath.

  “Have you two slept together?”

  Celeste choked and waved her hands, “No, of course not.”

  Eddie leaned back to look at her as she coughed into a napkin.

  “What? I’m not good enough for you?” Frank teased, speaking with a hyper-deep twang, no trace of his regular voice left.

  Eddie leaned forward, both hands on the table. “I’m not the jealous type, my friend, but she’s my girl.”

  Frank relaxed into himself, Celeste saw. He ran his fingers through his hair, spiking the short bangs at his forehead. He tucked his shirt tails into his pants and delicately rolled up his sleeves, looking less and less like an older college student, transforming himself into the warm gay young man that she loved.

  Celeste watched Eddie’s face. His territorial anger receded and he mellowed like a puppy that knows that a stranger is here to visit instead of attack.

  “Oh, it’s like that!” he said. He turned and Celeste saw relief in his eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “You didn’t tell him?” Frank said in disbelief.

  “Why would I say that? It’s neither here nor there to me.” Celeste asked.

  “It’s who I am.”

  “And then I wouldn’t have been worried all these weeks.”

  “I thought you weren’t the jealous type,” Frank said, smoothing himself back against the banquette, comfortable again in his skin.

  “I could kill you with my bare hands,” Eddie said, leaning forward with a half smile. “So no more full body hugs.”

  “It’s not like I enjoyed it,” Frank said.

  Celeste rolled her eyes. She was relieved. “I thought you might not like gay guys,” she stammered.

  “Celeste,” Eddie said, his eyes focused on her for a few seconds before he resumed his scan of anyone entering the bar, “I don’t give a shit who Frank sleeps with as long as it’s not you.”

  “Well, that’s my passport to the lovely world of men,” Frank said. “I don’t know how you do it,” he said to Eddie, “playing straight is immensely boring. There’s no style to it.” He spiked his hair a bit more. “Think I can order a cocktail here?”

  “As long as it doesn’t have an umbrella in it,” Eddie said.

  “How about me, can I get a drink with an umbrella in it,” Celeste laughed.

  “No, no umbrellas. You picked a beer swilling honky-tonk. Not many of these places left.” Eddie signaled the waitress.

  Celeste relaxed into Eddie’s arm, which he’d casually draped around her.

  “I’m not a fairy,” Frank said defensively. “I’m just gay.” He ordered a scotch on the rocks and the waitress turned to Eddie.

  “Fuck it,” Eddie said, “Bring me a gin and tonic and make sure there’s an umbrella in it.”

  Celeste ordered a glass of champagne.

  “This is a country bar, Miss,” the waitress said, “We don’t have champagne.”

  “Then I’ll have a Mai Tai,” she said.

  “You and your tropical drinks,” Frank said.

&nbs
p; The waitress was short tempered, “Don’t have that either.”

  “Just a beer, then, make it American,” she shooed the waitress off.

  Frank laughed. “A tropical drink in a dive bar in Detroit, the blight of the Midwest.”

  “I drink my dreams, Frank,” Celeste said, clinking her glass bottle with their cocktail glasses when the drinks arrived.

  “Frank, you should think of moving,” Eddie said. “This can’t be a good place for you.”

  “Why, because I’m gay?” Frank asked defensively.

  “No, because there’s no future here.”

  “There is too,” Celeste said.

  Eddie eyed her thoughtfully. “You think you’re going to live forever in the City like Celeste does? With broken down bus systems and no jobs?”

  “We have jobs, for this week at least,” Frank said. “Not good ones, but they pay the bills.”

  “But aren’t you guys at the point in life where you want to move forward, be somewhere you can grow? I mean, I love Detroit too, but I think it’s time to bail. The big banks are saying they’ll pay to tear down the empty houses but that means they’ll own the land and can sell it for other purposes. You heard the Mayor ask people to move into one-third of Detroit, they’re going to leave the other two-thirds to grow wild, maybe rent it out to big agriculture. It’s going to be a mess here for the next five years at least.”

  “I think about it. I want to move down to South Carolina, but the hurricanes there keep destroying the coastline.”

  “Yeah, you have to draw a line about ten miles inland around the country. Global warming’s going to flood the beaches. We need to put trees in on the coastline, reforest so the winds won’t take down houses.” Eddie put his hands together into a steeple, his voice distant. “You need to reconnoiter northerly before it gets too hot, you need to have land to have a garden so you can feed yourself.”

  Frank lowered his voice. “See, Celeste, I’m not the only one who plans on having a Farmagghedon.”

  “We’re in a tough time, my friend,” Eddie said. “The US is propped up on false hopes. The car companies are even off-shoring the electric cars, the one thing that’s supposed to save Detroit.”