Edmund White - Our Young Man

Guy said, “Would you mind leaving us alone for half an hour till all this blows over?” He was speaking in his most intimate indoor voice, soft and kind.

Kevin said, “It’s not going to blow over. We got to have this out. You’re either mine or his — which is it?”

“Let me get showered and dressed,” Guy said tonelessly.

A fleeting look of fear crept into Kevin’s eye. He rushed off to dress without saying a word. Guy hadn’t reassured him.

By the time all three of them were fidgeting and formal in the living room, pretending to be at ease as in a posed, “casual” photo, Andrés had returned. Guy noticed his hand was shaking slightly — from anger? Tension? “Looks like a committee,” he said. Then he turned to Kevin and said accusingly, “Who are you?”

“I’m Guy’s lover, Kevin. I’ve been living here for years. I’m surprised you never heard of me.”

“How could I? I wasn’t exactly free to investigate. And God knows Guy would never have told me anything. He’d sooner die.” Andrés looked at Guy menacingly. “All along I thought you were waiting for me. I shoulda knowed you had your pretty blond butt boy in your bed every night. You’re not decent, nobody’s decent. You didn’t mind if I suffered as long as you could fuck a boy every night and get a two-hour rub-down and travel to Europe whenever and wherever you wanted. It ain’t decent.”

Guy inventoried Andrés’s envies — sex, massage, travel. He wanted to buy off Andrés’s rage and wounded feelings with all these things.

He wondered how all this would end. He hoped it wouldn’t be up to him — that he wouldn’t have to choose between them.

And then the focus shifted to Vicente, who was living in the States illegally, since he’d outstayed his original three-month visa by years. Guy had hired a lawyer to sort it all out, but it seemed hopeless, unless Vicente went back to Spain, found an American woman to marry, could prove it was a legitimate marriage, applied for a green card, waited six months … Or he could stay here, never break the law, never try to work, stay off the government’s radar. That was the problem, Guy explained: Andrés wanted him to work, but he couldn’t unless it was off the books. Or Andrés wanted him to go to a university, but he didn’t have a student visa. Nor the grades. So he just ended up sleeping till noon, biting his nails, playing pool, trying unsuccessfully to pick up girls, getting high.

Guy tried to explain all that to Andrés, but even though, as a foreigner himself, Andrés understood visa problems, he shook his head and said, “This has got to change. I owe it to his mother, my poor dead sister,” and Andrés made the sign of the cross and kissed his thumb, which Guy had never seen him do before.

“But, Andy,” Vicente said, using the new prison name, “I help out around the house …”

“Not!” Kevin chimed in, which only drew the unwelcome attention back to him.

“Who are you, kid? Guy fuckin’ you regular?”

“Actually, I’m the one who does the fucking,” Kevin said.

“Oh, yeah? A little punk like you’s Guy’s man? Guy’s your bitch?”

Vicente piped up. “I’m hungry. Anyone else? C’mon, Andy, you must be ready to chow down.”

“We don’t think about sex like that,” Kevin said primly.

“Why don’t you chow down, Vicente?” Andrés asked angrily.

“Vince.”

“Your fuckin’ name is Vicente. Te llamas Vicente ,” and he said his name with a Castilian lisp.

“Get out of here!” Andrés shouted. “Let the grown-ups, the men , talk.”

Looking down, side-swiping them with uneasy glances, Vicente shuffled out but hesitated at the door in case it was all a joke.

“ Salir de acqui! ” Andrés shouted and the boy flew out of the door.

“Great work you’re doing with him,” Andrés said bitterly.

“That’s not fair,” Guy said. “I’ve done my best. He’s a bad seed, won’t work, always gets high.”

“Bad seed? Bad seed, huh? Like his uncle?”

“That’s not what I meant, it’s just—”

“That’s what you said.”

A grim silence set in.

“You’ve gotten so big. So strong and muscular,” Guy said in a matter-of-fact and, he hoped, not-too-oily way.

“Scare you, huh? I could fuck you both so you couldn’t walk for a week.”

Then some evil thought dawned in Andrés’s mind — you could tell from his sardonic smile. He looked at Kevin and said, “Don’t count on Monsieur Guy stickin’ with you through sickness and health, good times and bad. He ain’t got a very good record.”

“He loves me,” Kevin said.

“Oh, yeah? How can you be sure?”

Kevin stood beside Guy and bent his earlobe forward to reveal the infinity tattoo.

Then he revealed his own. And then Andrés revealed his. Kevin looked with confusion at Guy. And then his eyes gleamed with tears and he began to shake his head in denial.

“Trust me, buddy,” Andrés said, “he’s no good. He’s a fuckin’ som-bitch.”

Oh, merde , Guy thought. Putain! And for a second he thought he might end up alone — he’d always been alone, that was his natural habitat, loneliness, he could deal with it better than disappointing everyone. He’d lived so much of his life for sexual love, which was a filthy thing, really, all that saliva and semen and anal smears, filthy! Much better to live alone and watch TV in bed or talk to Pierre-Georges as he was in his bed and watching the same movie. Both of them spotlessly clean. Guy felt it was unfair that his fate was being decided in a language not his own.

They talked and talked all afternoon and both Kevin and Andrés cried, though Guy remained dry-eyed ( I’m a monster , he thought). Guy ordered in two pizzas, one with black olives and anchovies (Andrés’s favorite) and one of quattro formaggi (Kevin’s), and Guy sampled each one impartially.

At a certain point Andrés slammed the side table so hard that it caved in and fell apart. When Guy brought him another cup of coffee, he wrapped his hand around Guy’s leg. Kevin stared accusingly. Guy just stood there though the hot cup was burning his hand. He felt so awkward. He was used to being admired by more than one man at a time; on Fire Island different drunk men would grab at him on the dance floor and he would just laugh and walk away and join his friends on the deck.

But these guys? He knew them. He loved them. He owed them something. He’d nurtured their love for him. In Andrés’s case, he’d ruined his life, if inadvertently. Andrés had committed crimes for him and served years in prison, which had brutalized him; he’d gone from a sweet, willowy art historian to a tank with a buzz cut and a foul mouth. He’d learned English in prison but the worst kind. He’d sunk a dozen social classes — what would his poor parents think? They sent off a gentleman scholar to America and got back a gangster brute.

Sexy, though , he thought. Very sexy .

And Kevin? For once Guy had had a good influence on someone. He’d pushed him all the way through university. He was more confident, more polished, but still Minnesota-pure, if no longer Minnesota- naïf . And yet, the young man was fearfully in love with him. That’s why he’d cried. His love (which he believed Guy betrayed) was hurting him.

Guy suddenly wanted to scald his face, gain fifty pounds, shear his hair. He was sick of his beauty, his “eternal” beauty. People thought he was purer, more intelligent, kinder, nobler than he was because they ascribed all these virtues to him. What if he were stripped of his looks, if he stabbed the grotesque painting in the attic? If they saw him for what he really was — empty-headed, vicieux (how did you translate that? “Riddled with vices?”), narcisse ? Used to being indulged and pursued, terrified he’d outlive his fatal appeal and yet longing to be free of it?