Richard Stevenson: Red White and Black and Blue

"It's just that…this whole thing is making me kind of nervous. Oh, I know, I know. This was my idea. I was the one who called up. But, like, this guy is a senator. Those people do not appreciate getting screwed over."

"Assemblymen don't have their own militias or goon squads. I wouldn't worry about that."

"No, I mean they can just pick up the phone. And then all of a sudden your income tax is overdue or your car insurance is no good. I know a girl who crossed this dude who works for the Albany water department, and now she gets speeding tickets all the time."

"It's up to you whether or not you want to go ahead with this, Janie. I've already got Virgil's version of events. It would be helpful, though, if you would just confirm or maybe add something to what I've already been told. I understand that you and Virgil were Greg Stiver's neighbors on Allen Street."

She nodded.

"And you knew Greg casually?"

"Yeah."

"You rode out to SUNY with him twice a week?"

"Yeah. But wait a minute. I have to ask you something."

"Go ahead."

"Did Virgil badmouth me?"

"No, he spoke of you with tender affection."

She laughed. "You're a freakin' liar."

"Okay. He said you left him for a woman, and that you were a lot of trouble."

"I did not leave him for a woman. I left him because he was always trying to get another guy into bed with us. I did it one time, and then I got creeped out. I think Virgil has some issues he hasn't worked out. Anyway, Lori Wroble is my friend, not my girlfriend."

"Either would be okay in my book."

"I've tried gay sex, sure, but something was definitely missing. Not with Lori, I don't mean. I prefer guys, and I 38

Red White and Black and Blue by Richard Stevenson started to wonder if maybe Virgil does too. God, should I be mentioning this?"

"Up to you. But I'm mainly interested in Greg Stiver and his relationship with Kenyon Louderbush."

She rolled her eyes. "Now Greg, that poor guy was totally gay. What I didn't get was, a guy that attractive, why didn't he have a nice boyfriend his own age, somebody who treated him with respect? Greg was kind of straight-I don't mean sexually-but very sort of… serious. He was very political.

Very conservative. He had a lot to say about that stuff if you gave him half a chance. Sometimes in the car I would just, like, tune out. It was blabbedy-blah, blabbedy-blah. Bush was driving the country into an economic ditch. Bush was! And Bush was a Republican! I hate to think what Greg would say about Obama. Oh my God."

"Apparently it was Louderbush's and Greg's politics that were part of the attraction the two had for each other. Was that your impression?"

"I guess so. Why else would Greg get involved with an older man? Especially a guy who was married with kids? But it was also, like, low self-esteem. Greg told us about how his dad used to beat on him when he was a kid. And when Mr.

Louderbush pounded him around, this was just what he was used to and even had it coming. It was really sad. Greg was one mixed-up puppy."

I asked Insinger about the pattern of abuse as she had heard it through the walls of her adjoining apartment and as Greg had described it to her and Jackman.

"It was always kind of late," she said. "Virgil and I would be studying or chilling out or whatever, and we'd hear them going at it. Yelling and banging around and breaking stuff.

Sometimes we talked about going over or even calling the cops. We waited, though-we decided to mind our own business-and then we asked Greg about it one day, and at first he said oh no, nothing was going on, don't get your thong in an uproar. Then later he finally did admit they were fighting, but he told us to never mind, he would be okay. He was afraid of getting Louderbush in trouble, I could tell."

"Afraid?"

"Well, yeah. I mean, Louderbush was this extremely successful big hotshot. If Greg ruined his life or told his wife or put it on Facebook or something, who knows what might happen?"

"Did he say Louderbush threatened him?"

Insinger picked up a shiny peanut and popped it into her mouth. "No. He never said that straight out." She glanced around the bar, and so did I. Nobody was within earshot of us, and nobody seemed to be paying us any attention.

"When the two men were yelling at each other, were you ever able to make out anything anyone said?"

"Hmm. One time somebody screamed, 'You can eat shit!' I think it was Louderbush. It was a lot of that kind of drunk yelling. They'd get liquored up and start in. I have to say, I'm a little surprised Greg didn't defend himself more. Senator Louderbush was big and strong, Greg said, but he was older, too. Virgil asked Greg one time if he ever hit Louderbush back, and Greg just said no, it was a sin to hit a Republican.

He was being funny, but I think he really was, like, kind of scared to get in this guy's face. Maybe he'd get Greg kicked out of SUNY or his degree would be a blank sheet of paper or something."

"Did Greg ever talk about taking his own life?"

Insinger grew thoughtful. "I don't know."

"I mean to you or Virgil."

"Sometimes he said he was worn out."

"Uh-huh."

"He'd be really, really tired, and he'd have this kind of what's-the-use? attitude. But then a couple of days later he'd be, like, oh-fine. Right before he died, Greg was really down in one of his moods. A total mope-head. But that was mainly because he got turned down by two colleges for teaching jobs. One in Connecticut, one out near Rochester, which was his first choice. He didn't know what he was going to do after he got his master's, and he had these huge student loans. I was a senior then, and I knew how he felt, though this was before Obama fucked up the economy, and five years ago there were still jobs in retailing, thank God. Virgil and I both got jobs right after we graduated and got into management career tracks. Today we'd both be, like, out selling our butts on a street corner in Arbor Hill."

"Assemblyman Louderbush represents a district near Rochester. Was Greg hoping to live near him?"

"Oh. He didn't say. But he wouldn't have said anything.

Not to Virgil and me. He knew we disapproved and that we thought the relationship was self-destructive for Greg."

I said, "I understand you saw the suicide note."

"Yeah. It was so sad. I cried. Even Virgil teared up. Mrs.

Pensivy cried her heart out."

"The landlady."

"She lived next door, but she let us in before the cops came. Somebody called her who she knew at SUNY."

"And the note said-what was it?"

"'I hurt too much.' So sad, so sad."

"And you recognized Greg's handwriting?"

"Yeah."

"Where had you seen his handwriting before?"

"Oh, hmm. I guess when he taped a note to our door about rides or whatever."

"What became of the suicide note?"

"The cops took it, I guess."

"How can you be sure that Greg's suicide was directly related to Kenyon Louderbush? It's plain that he was a source of stress and confusion and pain in Greg's life. But it also sounds as if Greg thought that the relationship had some kind of future. Greg's attempt to move to Louderbush's assembly district is an indication of that. You and Virgil told the McCloskey campaign that you thought Louderbush drove Greg to suicide. Wasn't that the term you both used?"

"Yeah."

"How could you be so certain?"

"Well, jeez. I mean, like, if you were involved with a person who was giving you a black eye once or twice a week and making your lip hang off and bleed all over, and you just couldn't help yourself and get away, and you didn't know any other way out, wouldn't you think about just ending it all?

When life is a living hell, and the person who is making it that way won't back off, it's just what people do sometimes."