Edmund White - Our Young Man

“Bernard Herrmann. Dimitri Tiomkin. Classy music composers.”

“What about Michel Legrand?”

“Who?”

“He did ‘The Umbrellas of Cherbourg.’”

“French, right? Forget it. Well, let’s get started.”

Marty had drawn up the papers and now he sat beside Fred on the edge of the bed. “Do you want me to read it to you?”

“Just summarize it in ordinary language.”

“Well, it leaves the Bel Air house to Ceil and twenty thousand to each of the boys and the Fire Island house to Guy. If anyone contests the will their bequest will be canceled. It’s called the ‘in terrorem’ clause.”

“Do you think that will stick?”

“I guess they could claim you were demented.”

“I probably will be if the CMV goes into my head. That’s why I want to get this over now.”

“Only twenty thousand for each of the boys?” Guy asked, trying to sound fair.

“Fuck ’em! They stood by their mother. Anyway, that’s all I have if I pay off the Fire Island house. I’m not made of money; I told you I am a very minor millionaire, unless I get my AIDS movie going. I live from film to film.”

Marty had to guide Fred’s hand for the will but also for the transfer of the deed to Guy. A nurse was called in as a witness.

“Ceil and the boys are going to be spittin’ mad,” Fred said with a big grin.

“You’re right there,” Marty muttered. “I can hear the schreiing already. So long, Fred.”

“So long, Marty, don’t be a stranger. Come back and see me.”

“Will do. What about all your actors? They ever come to see you?”

“Those schwartzes? They’re mostly ashamed to have been in all those Super Fly movies. They want to forget about it. That was a different period, Marty. Do you have Guy’s address? For sending him the deed?”

“You wrote it down for me.”

The minute Marty and the nurse were gone, Fred said, “Are we alone? Good. Kiss me.”

Fred was chewing some of the gum Guy had brought him, so his lips were fresh and moist. But it all felt too much like a transaction to Guy — I’ll give you the house if you give me a kiss. Of course the house was worth millions of kisses. It was just Fred’s assumption he now had the right to a kiss that saddened Guy — everything in America was transactional!

Of course, Guy was the villain stealing the bread out of Fred’s sons’ well-fed jowls. There was more shrieking in the hallway — probably another surprise birthday complete with balloons and candles. But neither Guy nor Fred was curious.

Out of deference, since Fred was blind, Guy left the lights off as the night swept in; Guy felt he should share Fred’s darkness.

It was strange how content they were just holding hands, after all the agony of his love-grappling with Andrés, the constant anguish of trying to get another millimeter inside each other’s holes; it was kind, it was peaceful, it was companionable to just sit together like this. After all, Fred had come to the end and his last thought had been for Guy. He was a rough woodcut of a man, but the portrait was of a kind man even so.

Guy felt that his life was under assault and that Fred was doing something crucial to help him. Guy had a superstition that he could preserve his youth only so long as nothing touched him, so long as he remained immune to any intensity of feeling. But now his father’s death, Andrés’s looming plight, Fred’s blindness and imminent death — all these events were threatening to engrave marks on Guy’s face. Something (or maybe it was Nothing) had stunned him into eternal youth, into immobility and imperviousness, but now the ice was cracking, great glacier shelves were collapsing into the sea, a disaster was warming up — and soon he’d be just a shrinking iceberg, another weathered face, he would come to life only to die. He ran to the mirror to look at himself. Nothing had changed.

Another hour went by. By the last glimmer of daylight seeping down an airshaft and through the dirty window, Guy read a few articles out of Variety for Fred about the movie business. The slang and abbreviations were mostly unfamiliar to Guy. (“Is this English?” he asked, and Fred chuckled.)

Apropos of nothing, Fred said, “Remember that line: ‘I grow old, I shall wear the bottom of my trousers rolled’? I always wondered what that meant. But now I know — you shrink as you get old and your pants are too long. And remember how gays are always supposed to be licking their eyebrows down, like this?” and he mimed licking his finger and pressing it down on his eyebrow. “That was always shorthand for saying someone was gay. But your eyebrows do grow long with age and a gay senior would worry about that.”

Suddenly two men came into the room, wearing cream-colored masks and gloves and blue hospital gowns and shower caps. They switched the lights on and one of them said, “Dad?” and he came to sit beside his father, who touched him and said, “Howie? What are you wearing?”

“Who’s this man, Dad?” To Guy he said, “Excuse me, but would you leave? This is a family moment.”

“Stay right where you are, Guy. This putz is my son. Why are you wearing all that junk, Howie?”

“For self-protection, Dad. You’re highly contagious, in case you forgot. A tear, a mosquito bite, a lick of saliva could infect us, then it’s curtains. Guy, is that your name? Scram!”

“How dare you, Howie? Guy’s my lover.”

“Lover?” the other man said, and laughed. He was shorter and rounder than Howie. “Some lover! So you’re the frog scumbag who infected our father, right? What’s he doing here, Dad — how did he get permission to visit? Family only. Nurse! Nurse!”

Fred said, “Don’t budge. These schmucks ignore me for months, then come rushing in for the money shot.”

The one called Howie, his black eyes flashing with rage over his mask, said, “He has no right to be here. Lover? The law doesn’t recognize same-sex lovers.”

“Howie,” Fred said, “we all know you’re a shyster, but the usual laws don’t apply here at St. Vincent’s. Sister Patricia is running the AIDS wards and she knows we’re all about to croak and she has the good sense to recognize real love as opposed to greedy so-called family love.”

“But the law—”

“Law, schmaw,” Fred said wearily. “I’m blind, so I can’t see if you’re all suited up, too, Buster, for your dad the hazmat.”

“I’ve taken the normal precautions,” Buster said primly.

“I suggest you reduce your risk pronto by getting the hell out.”

“What about your estate, Dad? You’re not leaving anything to this frog-slut, are you? We’re the rightful heirs and we’ll fight him tooth and nail.”

“Nail?” Fred laughed. “I guess you know plenty about infected nails in the foot business. I’ll give you ten to get out or I’ll call two big interns to escort you out. Too bad our last meeting had to be so acrimonious.”

“Dad!” Howie wailed indignantly. “We love you. Didn’t we come in all the way from Scarsdale?”

“Big fuckin’ deal. One, two, three—”

“We’re going to fight this, Dad, poor old demented man. They call it the Stockholm syndrome, the victim bonds with his captor—”

“Shut the fuck up,” Fred said. “You don’t know anything bout this ’cause you haven’t talked to me in two years. Five, six, seven—”

“He’ll never get a dime,” Buster said, “your scumbag so-called lover.”

“Eight, nine, ten!” Fred pushed the emergency button and the nurse came running.

“Yes, Mr. Fred,” a big Caribbean woman said. “What does my boyfriend want?”

“Helen, I want you to get these shmucks out of here. They’re annoying the hell out of me.”