Tiffany McDaniel - The Summer That Melted Everything

“I thought you were coming to the funeral, young man.”

“I did,” I whispered down to him.

“What?”

“I was at her funeral,” I said somewhere.

“Fielding—”

“Leave ’im alone, Dad.” Grand was standing in the doorway of his bedroom. As I passed him, he reached out to me. “Do you know how to take it off?”

I loosened the tie the rest of the way and pulled my head out.

“Hmm.” His eyes had slippery contact with mine. “You don’t need me anymore.”

He stepped back and I should’ve reached, but I let him close his door. I dropped the tie somewhere in the hall. Didn’t mean to. It just fell out of my hand on my way to my room. I closed the door and leaned against it. What was that noise? That tapping?

“You okay, Fielding?” Mom at the other side of the door.

“Fine, Mom.”

“You dropped your tie.”

“It just fell.”

“Where’s Sal?”

“He’ll be home later.”

“You sure you’re okay, sweetie?”

“I’m fine.”

I pressed my ear flat against the door, listening to her walk away. I threw my jacket down on the floor and went to my desk, where I grabbed construction paper and scissors. I sat on the floor and took some red, yellow, and orange paper and began to cut. Oak leaves. Maple leaves. Elm leaves. Ohio leaves. A whole big pile I dumped across the window bed. Then I got a flashlight and sat in the pile and waited.

It got dark and Mom came up, asking through the closed door if I was hungry. No, I said. Darker still. Feet outside the door on their way to bed. Dad. Asking if I’m all right. Fine, I say. More dark. A 3 A.M. dark when my bedroom door slowly opened.

“Don’t turn on the light.”

Sal’s hand dropped from the switch. “Where are you, Fielding?”

“Over here, at the winda bed. Come and sit down.” I scooted some of the leaves over to make a seat for him.

“What is all this?” His hands moved through the pile.

I turned on the flashlight and shined it on the red leaf between his fingers. “It’s Dresden.”

He looked at me and I looked at him, but we didn’t say anything for that long while. He slowly looked back at the leaf in his hand, twirling it gently by its stem.

“Thank you, Fielding.”

And so we were, on into the night, two boys sharing a light and building a way, one leaf at a time.

WE WOULDN’T HAVE known about the stones that summer had Grand not fallen for Ted Bundy. Of course, his name wasn’t really Ted Bundy. The journalist. His name was Ryker Tommons.

He left the morning after fucking Grand in the woods. Grand didn’t notice how quickly that was. He had felt the connection of another man, and in the clay of loneliness, he shaped it into something he called love. Before Ryker left, Grand asked for his number.

“I have your number, kid. I’ll call you,” Ryker promised as they stood in front of Ryker’s car.

“I thought you liked me.” Grand was doing his routine, the same one I’d seen him use on girl after girl.

“I do, kid.”

“So, give me your number.”

Was that Grand reaching into the man’s pocket? Pulling out the notepad and pen?

“C’mon, Ted Bundy, write it down for me.”

Ryker had no choice but to take the pad and pen. Grand had forced them into his hands, even wrapping Ryker’s fingers around the pen. It was as if Grand thought Ryker’s hesitation was just a continuation of flirtation.

“I sure will be happy to get away from this heat,” Ryker sighed, and wrote with such reluctance, the number looked written by a child just learning.

“Call me whenever.” He passed the number to Grand. “Well, so long, kid.”

Grand stood watching the car drive away. Stood there long after it went, gripping the paper in his hand and the phone number that would dial through to a pizza shop in Brooklyn.

Grand was convinced Ryker had meant to give him the right number. By Grand’s thinking, there was only one number not right, so he’d dial over and over again, sometimes changing the very last, or the very first, or one of the numbers in the middle. He called the entire state of New York, but never Ryker.

Finally it occurred to him he could just ask the operator for the number to the New York Times office building.

“ New York Times , how may I help you?” a woman’s overworked voice answered.

Grand gave her his name. Said he would like to speak to Ryker Tommons. Said he was a very close friend. Grand waited, curling the phone cord around his finger.

“I’m sorry, but Mr. Tommons is unavailable at the moment, Mr. Bliss. Would you like to leave him a message?”

She would take many messages on behalf of Mr. Tommons, who would never return any of them. It was at some point while on the phone to her that Grand ordered a subscription to the newspaper, as Ryker never lived up to his promise of getting one for us.

When the paper came, Grand would shower, cologne his neck, put on Saturday night type of clothes like he was fixing himself up for a date.

He read only Ryker’s articles. Reading them over and over again like they were new each time. Articles about gays in theater, film, and music. Culture coming at Grand full speed in a language he’d been learning to speak all his life. The foreign cutting away to the shape of his America.

He could spend an entire afternoon reading and rereading one article, afternoons previously spent on the baseball diamond. He hadn’t been back to the team since that day they ran him off. He was officially replaced by Arly. The team would suffer. Three losses in a row. No playoffs. No championships. You could see the team looking down into their gloves, seeming to ask if they had made the right choice. Was winning worth playing on a team with a fag?

Empty gloves always said it was, but then the ball would come sailing their way. They’d catch it. Say to themselves, Of course we don’t need him.

Dad tried to find out from Grand why he was no longer on the team.

“I just don’t wanna play anymore, Dad.” He shrugged. “Is that okay?”

“I thought you liked baseball. I liked watching you play, but if you don’t want to anymore, well, sure that’s okay.”

And then Dad hugged him and Grand sighed in his arms. “Thanks, Dad.”

The team stretched the baseball diamond far that summer, and the things said there went to gossip in town.

“Have you heard about Grand Bliss?” they whispered.

“I can’t believe it. He doesn’t talk like them. Doesn’t walk like one of them. How can he be?”

“But he is. I heard he kissed another boy. You just never know who is or isn’t anymore. I mean, look at Rock Hudson. There’s always rumors about him. I remember watchin’ him in the old films. I never would have guessed he wanted anything more than a good woman. You just never know what a man wants. No, you just never know who a man is.”

Dad was never caught in the circles of gossip. Mom could sometimes be, but only because of Fedelia, who brought that type of news into the house during her visits. Though in regards to Grand, she brought none of it up. Instead she would sit across from Mom and say Grand is a very special boy.

“Hmm-mmm,” Mom would say, not knowing what moved in the deep.

“I’m scared for him, though, Stella.”

Mom would make a noise, something like a chuckle. “Don’t be silly, Auntie, he’s a strong boy.”

Fedelia would rub her hands together. “I know.”