Greg Abraham: Front Man

He acted so straight. For decades they’d been the seraphim among lovers, those straight-acting guys… and now there was a whole generation of boys who were more manly than the media statesmen who’d taken the world over from Cold War Republicans. The young queer men fought. And the perversity of Ron’s heart was perfect. Now that younger men had gotten tough, there was something delicious about the pee-cee softness of the new leaders and movie stars. Ron caught himself craving an edition of Thump with fewer rough edges, with a chiseled jaw cleanly shaven, a mouth blessed by orthodontia and the good sense never to say “fuck” in public.

Thump looked up and smiled, caught, transfixed, his dark eyes like stained glass at dusk, his teeth already stained with life.

“Shower first? Shave?” Ron asked. That stubble… memory again, but no, there was the party to worry about.

“Did this morning.” Thump dropped the teal and stepped into the plum. Ron went over and held him, anthem of pale skin and dark hair. He tasted clean enough, but by the end of the evening his new clothes would harbor that buck scent. It was a smell that Ron sometimes craved, but not at Chad’s party. Most of the guests had never met Thump. No, he didn’t have much to do with Ron’s friends. Whose choice was that?

As Thump slipped away and found a T-shirt in a heap next to their bed, Ron told him, “You need to wear that under a dress shirt, white or eggshell yellow.”

Thump yawned and nodded, meandered out the door toward his room. As he returned, he tucked oxford cloth, starched and luminously white, into his shorts.

Ron looked away, then found himself wrapped in warmth. He turned and buried his face in Thump’s shaggy hair. Holding me, Ron told himself, saying thank you with a quiet intensity nobody else has ever shown me. Ron eased Thump away, ran his finger down a nose a little too long, stared into gothic eyes.

“What kind of snacks do Noiesni like?” Thump asked. He bounced onto the bed and scooted over for the sweater.

The last of day plated the room with gold. Ron yearned for eternity, ready never to leave this place or Thump, drawn of darkness and appetite.

Ron didn’t answer. He said little after that. The night dressed them both.

The Mercedes, a 380 SL that shone like a jewel, waited in the driveway. Overhead, the stars ignited an electric warmth beneath Ron’s skin.

They drove downtown, then climbed back into the hills. The Mercedes took curves as sure of itself as a merry-go-round horse. A red light made it impatient. An instant before the signal blinked to green, the car jumped forward with a will of its own.

How do the Noiesni travel? wondered Ron. The Economist said they used a part of their “souls.” Tonight, light pressed against space, expanded it, turned one place into another… maybe that was what a soul was really supposed to do. And maybe Thump’s quiet gravity bent space just as the Noiesni did. But maybe it was an outward bending, making the world too big, increasing the loneliness that the Noiesni might ease. Maybe Thump created the same loneliness that he sometimes filled.

Full… empty… ideas that meant something else to the Noiesni. They saw the universe as an ensemble of waves, Chad said. Deriving energy from the vacuum—from nothing—they recognized how energy, and space itself, need be nothing more than mathematical sleight of hand. They had clever ways of using nothing to get anywhere. Chad had explained—and he did it so well, could make it sound so gossipy —how the Noiesni turned space into something akin to Fourier transforms (just as CD players did, Chad had pointed out), then used a kind of dimensional down-step conversion to turn the waves back into any region of space they cared to.

Ron hadn’t minded listening to all of this. Brokers spent a lot of time listening to their clients. Homegrown psychiatrists, that’s what brokers were. He had learned it was their job to handle the people and let computers handle the stocks.

The memory returned again… a ride to the store with his father… maybe it had been Saturday morning, full of chores. Saturday morning was when Ron got to be with his dad, really be with him. The store had even had a lunch counter.

“Think Chad’ll bust out the hard liquor?” Thump picked at one of his cuticles.

“If you don’t see it out, please don’t ask.”

“Hey, I know how to act at parties. I go to parties all the time. Just not your friends’. ”

The tone, an outsider’s, made the words ugly enough that Ron didn’t know whether to argue or apologize. Thump’s hurt ended the conversation. Just as he wore everything else like a man, so he wore this wound. He slouched back in his seat and grinned up at the stars flickering among the firs. Then he lolled over and watched the city flicker instead as the Mercedes climbed.

They rounded a corner and parked on cobblestone. A big house, it spoke of success as it covetously hid its view of the city. Thump vaulted over the door. It struck Ron as affected and probably wasn’t good for the car.

Chad welcomed them almost as soon as they rang. Thump rapped him playfully on the shoulder and said, “Hey, bud, how yah been?” He bolted toward the right.

“Just fine.” Without taking his eyes from Ron’s, Chad chuckled.

Sometimes Thump was a mess.

Chad hugged Ron, slipped his jacket away from him and hung it up. Thump migrated toward the dining room, which was loaded with platters of everything. Tall, pear-shaped on long legs, Chad was blocking part of the view. He was older than many of the men at his party. So am I, thought Ron. One of the boys—maybe twenty and put-me-away gorgeous—was posing in black Levi’s and boots. It really wasn’t the right look, not tonight. Ron could hear Thump now, “Shit, all they did was pose. They could have taken up one of those rugs and danced or somethin’!” No, Thump wouldn’t say that. The only time he danced with men was at mob dances, where there were women and even children and probably marimbas.

Thump danced with his bass. Or by himself, as he had when he’d dressed for the party. Maybe he only danced with his guitar. Sometimes it was just invisible.

Chad had Ron by the shoulder and was guiding him toward the dining room. “You’re finally going to let the rest of the world meet him. You know it’s been almost? two years? You should make him come more often.”

Was that a joke? Chad was one of his best friends, and he’d been over for dinner a half-dozen times since Thump had moved in. “That’s not how it is. You don’t think I really…”

Somebody Ron had never met came out of the bathroom, a man about thirty, dressing twenty and shouldn’t try, but a nice haircut. He looked Ron in the eye as they were introduced, then said, “You’re here with Thump? Was that Thump I just saw?”

Ron nodded.

“I thought so. He’s great. I… I didn’t even know he was part of the family, but I figured he must be when I saw him with Young Fagabonds. I caught them everywhere before they broke up. Chad says he’s with some het group now, Solid White Tuna?”

Ron nodded.

“So why’d the Fagabonds break up?”

“I don’t know.” But he did. Thump had left the group because they were too campy. Campy was a barrier, Thump said, a barrier that let people hate each other and themselves while they laughed, a barrier that helped scientists who looked for genes get crooked, lousy grants.

Thump was naive. He didn’t realize that barriers let you be inside, too, and that sometimes you had to be inside to survive.

The guy shook his nice haircut as he slipped away.