Robin And Ruby Part 26

Clark looks it over, front and back. It's hard to read his expression. "Cheesequake! That brings back memories. Your mother used to sing that song."

"I thought it was your song."

"Your mother was the one with the voice." Clark places the card under a magnet on the fridge. He puts the photo facedown, the inscription facing out. The "prodigal" joke seems to Robin lukewarm, an almost almost.

"So," Clark says, "Wanna see my fax machine?"

The machine, a big beige contraption with a phone and a keypad built into it, sits on a file cabinet in the office, next to a surprisingly modern-looking black desk. "I dial the number of the other machine," Clark demonstrates, fingers tapping, "and then I feed in my doc.u.ment here." On a piece of paper, Clark has written in big letters, "Someone is thinking of you!" With a sheepish grin, he explains, "Annie's got a machine at home, too." Robin listens to the oddly melodic pattern of the numbers with their individual tones, the hiss and beep as the connection is made, the efficient clip and slide of the paper getting sucked inside the machine. The sound of his father sending a love note. "It takes a few minutes, but pretty soon a confirmation comes out the other side, in the tray."

"Cool. Bet that wasn't cheap."

"Company paid for it." He says this with pride, evidence of something earned. "Plus, I bought stock in Xerox," he says, pointing to the logo on the console.

Robin takes in the scope of the office, the comfy order his father has created here, in this room that was once meant for their brother's recovery, and then became a place to escape. Last time Robin was here, his father was excited to show him a new computer, something made by IBM. Clark's interest in technology has seemed to Robin a curiosity, but today he's encouraged by it. After all those years of inertia, he's making room for the future, for possibility.

He glances back toward the dining room, as if Dorothy might still be there, and even though she isn't, he lowers his voice. "So, Annie was here earlier when I called..."

"She decided to leave. She could feel the temperature rising, with all of you closing in." He chuckles.

"You didn't want her to meet Dorothy?"

"They've already met."

"When?"

"At your Uncle Stan's wedding."

"That already happened?"

"Last Sunday. Apparently, ahem, you didn't get around to RSVP."

Robin makes an excuse about his mail getting lost in the shuffle between Pittsburgh and Philly, but he knows where the invitation to his uncle's wedding is: exiled to a pile of unopened letters at the bottom of his steamer trunk. He had no intention of celebrating with Stan, Dorothy's brother, the blowhard of the family, the kind of guy who never once visited them in Manhattan because "the city is full of ingrates." The kind of guy who says "ingrate" because he knows you won't let him get away with saying "n.i.g.g.e.r" or "queer." Why his father has stayed close to Stan even after the divorce has always been a puzzle, a notch against him. But the real shock of this news isn't that the wedding has already come and gone with both of them there, but that Dorothy hadn't mentioned it. He realizes that they missed their weekly phone call last Sunday, and that today's call got swallowed up by Jackson's birthday.

Clark pushes the door shut, blocking the living room and dining room from view. Robin feels himself on alert now. Clark says, "The wedding was pretty nice. Your mother and I got along just fine, even with both of us having dates."

"Who did she she bring?" bring?"

"A fellow named Stewart. Nice guy. Insurance. Not sure how they met."

"She mentioned him to me, I think." What she'd mentioned, he recalls now, is that she'd placed a personal ad some time ago; but he didn't know about any insurance man. "I guess I haven't been keeping up," Robin adds.

"You kids live your lives," Clark says, as he runs a finger over the fax machine, wiping off dust that doesn't actually seem to be there, "and we live ours."

There might have been a time when the possibility of his parents, dating other people, meeting face-to-face, would have filled him with agony. Now it's come and gone, out of sight, out of mind. A nonevent. And maybe that's not so surprising, because as much bad feeling was stirred up by the divorce, at its heart it was never about unfaithfulness. Neither one of them had an affair. There was no injured party. There were only "irreconcilable differences." I just couldn't seem to do anything right in your mother's eyes I just couldn't seem to do anything right in your mother's eyes was Clark's way of talking about it. was Clark's way of talking about it. Your father pulled away from me, Your father pulled away from me, was Dorothy's. was Dorothy's. She became such a critical person, She became such a critical person, he said. he said. He's so shut down, He's so shut down, she said. she said. He wasn't/She wasn't the person I married. He wasn't/She wasn't the person I married. For a time, they had confessed to him, over and over. But that was years ago. For a time, they had confessed to him, over and over. But that was years ago.

And then he remembers what had angered him about Stan's wedding invitation, why he looked at the envelope but decided he wouldn't open it. "I wasn't invited with a date," Robin says. "Ruby got a plus-one, but I didn't."

"Ruby didn't come, either. Two no-shows."

"But you know I've been dating someone, right?"

Clark doesn't say anything, doesn't exactly meet Robin's eyes, either, which only pushes Robin to forge ahead, to make a point. In a rush of words he talks about Peter, how they met, their life together in Pittsburgh, how it got "serious," none of which he's mentioned to Clark before. He takes him all the way through to the breakup. "Just yesterday," Robin says.

Clark mumbles something, impossible to make out but with enough of an encouraging tone that Robin keeps going.

"You know that George is gay, too, don't you?"

"It was great to see George again. I've always liked him." With an uneasy laugh, Clark adds, "Not sure what he's doing with his hair, though."

"He's growing dreadlocks," Robin says.

No response.

"I a.s.sumed you knew about George, but maybe you haven't thought about it." He pauses, every second like a full minute ticking by, demanding to be filled with words. "But, see, the thing is, we've been best friends for so long, but now, I'm wondering if maybe we might be more than friends..."

Clark blows a bunch of air through his lips. His head hangs a bit, and his eyes stay on the fax machine.

Robin feels his own face heating up in embarra.s.sment. This conversation started out okay, but now...Why'd you have to go and ruin a perfectly good moment? He's angry with his father, with himself, too, and it comes out in his tone of voice: "Are you going to say anything, Clark?"

Clark turns to him with a pained look, though he seems to be working to contain it, to put a braver face forward. "One thing I've learned over the years, sometimes less is more. If you shoot off your mouth, it's hard to unshoot it."

"If you need to say something to me, let's just have it out."

Clark waves his hand, as if wiping steam off a bathroom mirror. "Annie told me something recently. She said life is about expansion. Pretty good, huh?"

"I guess."

"Because as you go along, you have to hold more and more in your head. You meet new people, come across some new ideas, adjust to new circ.u.mstances. You can't say, 'Nope, that's all there is, I already know everything I need to know, nothing new for me, end of story.' Because where does that leave you? So, yeah. Life's about expansion."

"All right," Robin says, because he feels like he has to say something agreeable. What he wants to say is What does that have to do with George and me? What does that have to do with George and me? But he knows: A gay son is still a new idea for Clark. A black boyfriend on top of that is newer still. This is what George was predicting, in the car today: But he knows: A gay son is still a new idea for Clark. A black boyfriend on top of that is newer still. This is what George was predicting, in the car today: If I was your boyfriend we'd see how racist they were... If I was your boyfriend we'd see how racist they were...

I'm not there yet, his father is saying, but I'm trying. So be patient. Don't expect too much from me, not yet.

Is this the burden of coming out? Wait for them to catch up, while they try try to understand who you are and how your heart works. It's not exactly the father-son moment he thought they were about to have, a few minutes ago when Clark closed the door as if to signal a new alliance. It's not the advice he maybe thought he might get when he brought up Peter, and George. Because that's what he could use, he realizes. Advice. A way out of the thicket. Not "I'm trying to expand so I can fit you in," but "I have enough room for you now." to understand who you are and how your heart works. It's not exactly the father-son moment he thought they were about to have, a few minutes ago when Clark closed the door as if to signal a new alliance. It's not the advice he maybe thought he might get when he brought up Peter, and George. Because that's what he could use, he realizes. Advice. A way out of the thicket. Not "I'm trying to expand so I can fit you in," but "I have enough room for you now."

In acting cla.s.s, his professor told them to identify the moment when they freeze up, when they can't go any deeper. At those moments, ask yourself: What am I afraid of? This is one of those moments: He can't find a way to play his part, the good son following the father's lead. What are you afraid of? What are you afraid of? His mind flies back to Jackson's grave. His mind flies back to Jackson's grave.

"I'm afraid if I get sick you'll abandon me," he says. He says this out loud, though it could have remained an unspoken thought, an exercise.

Clark looks bewildered, and then the words sink in, and his look turns stricken.

"I'm not sick," Robin says. "I mean, I don't think I am. But it scares me."

"I don't know much about it," Clark says, in a clear voice.

Robin waits for something more, but there's only silence that can't yet be filled in.

"Never mind," Robin says and makes a move for the door. "This is the wrong time-"

He's shot off his mouth, and now he can't unshoot it.

Clark extends his arm, as if to stop Robin from leaving, but his reach falls short, and so Robin keeps going.

Behind Ruby's bedroom door, Robin hears them going at it, his mother and his sister, loud enough that he considers listening in for the blow-by-blow, loud enough that he decides to keep on moving.

In his bedroom, he flips the light switch and is a.s.saulted by the flashy, silver Art Deco wallpaper he chose years ago. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Jackson's bed had been taken out, and the room was Robin's alone. (He never asked where all of Jackson's things went. Were they thrown out? Or is there a box in the bas.e.m.e.nt packed with the baseball trophies that used to line a shelf over Jackson's bed, bra.s.s-plated figurines of boys with raised bats that glinted in the morning sunlight while Jackson lay sleeping beneath, a bubble of spit at his lips? Robin remembers how he used to wake up early and read quietly in bed, getting a half hour to himself before Jackson bolted up and began talking right away: "Wanna play Star Wars Star Wars? Wanna play Army? Wanna play Planet of the Apes Planet of the Apes?") The wallpaper makes him cringe now: a busy pattern of strong vertical lines blooming into sh.e.l.ls, flowers, b.u.t.terfly wings that makes the walls look they are leaning inward, threatening to collapse. He'd picked it out during a brief, intense phase when he became obsessed by everything Art Deco. Living in Manhattan had attuned his eye not only to the majestic Chrysler Building but also to other buildings done in that style, st.u.r.dy banks and elegant apartment houses, and the decorative details that popped up everywhere, like on the sidewalks around Rockefeller Center, where the trees grew out of pewter grilles shaped like crescent moons. He saw himself in those earliest New York days as a refugee from the suburbs, from the rituals and routines of boys he didn't like and didn't understand. This was his dandified, Oscar Wilde period, when he addressed his friends as "darling" and wore velvet pants he'd begged his mother to buy him from Macy's. Transporting this aesthetic back to his weekend bedroom in Greenlawn was a way to extend the vision he'd created for himself as a young urbanite, a student of theater, finally living in a suitable place, awash in grand style and sharp decor.

New York proved to be grimier and harder-edged than he'd first let himself see. The city was still recovering from financial bankruptcy, was famous for potholes and gridlock, was under the weight of constant crime no longer confined to "bad neighborhoods" but potentially waiting around any corner. His feminine getups, which gave him a certain l.u.s.ter among the other drama students at Was.h.i.+ngton Irving, also attracted the very same insults he thought he was leaving behind in New Jersey, and he soon enough switched gears and began wearing olive drab bought in Army & Navy stores and Converse high-tops with argyle socks. Now the wallpaper seems not to point to New York's lost grandeur, but to his own tarnished vision of the fabulous life he'd expected. And it's also wildly out of place in this old house, like a silver buckle on a broken-in work boot.

He can see now that there was something remarkable about his father letting him choose this paper. When they had stood side by side, slopping the paste on the back, then hanging and smoothing it together, Robin was aware of it only as work, not as a gift, which it surely was. Clark was letting him have his little bit of glamour, even if it was a folly. It must have been difficult for his father to hold his tongue. He wonders if he ever thanked him.

Next to his bed is a nightstand that was also part of the redecoration, with a bit of Deco flair: curved corners and sculpted feet. It has a little locked cabinet in it. Robin reaches his hand around the back of the nightstand, where the key hangs on a hook. He knows what he'll find inside the cabinet: a pile of diaries that he kept during high school. He used to fill them up, and then bring them to New Jersey and keep them hidden here, away from the prying eyes of his mother, who would read them, he was sure, if she had the chance.

He scans across pages of his cursive handwriting, fatter and loopier than the way he writes today. The words are large and spread out on the page, as if his every thought deserved headline treatment. There are details about his cla.s.ses, arguments with his mother about his curfew and his ch.o.r.es, breathless accounts of shows he'd seen: Children of a Lesser G.o.d, 42nd Street, Baryshnikov on Broadway. Children of a Lesser G.o.d, 42nd Street, Baryshnikov on Broadway. But this isn't what he wants to read. But this isn't what he wants to read.

He wants to read about falling in love. He wants to read about Alton.

There's this girl named Mich.e.l.le who wants to go out with me, but I told her I didn't want to. Alton said his new special nickname for me is "Heartbreaker."...I went with Alton to get his ear pierced at a store in the West Village. His father's going to disown him when he sees it.... Alton told me I was good looking enough to act in movies. He said his cousin knew an agent and I should talk to him.... Alton and his fake girlfriend Carolyn and me went and saw The s.h.i.+ning, The s.h.i.+ning, which was creepy. She hid her eyes the whole time on his shoulder. She was totally faking being way more scared than she really was. She's jealous of his friends.h.i.+p with me.... I told Alton his curls were cute, and he let me put my fingers in his hair. which was creepy. She hid her eyes the whole time on his shoulder. She was totally faking being way more scared than she really was. She's jealous of his friends.h.i.+p with me.... I told Alton his curls were cute, and he let me put my fingers in his hair.

Eleventh grade, Was.h.i.+ngton Irving High School. He thought at the time that he'd found a "soul mate" in Alton. I finally told him about the stuff I've done with other guys. I told him about my piano "lessons." I figured I'd shock him, but he didn't say much. I finally told him about the stuff I've done with other guys. I told him about my piano "lessons." I figured I'd shock him, but he didn't say much. His silence at the time seemed like acceptance; now Robin can see how quietly freaked out Alton had been, in part because he was so intrigued. His silence at the time seemed like acceptance; now Robin can see how quietly freaked out Alton had been, in part because he was so intrigued. He said we should be totally open with each other. And he said "I would only do that with someone if it was love. He said we should be totally open with each other. And he said "I would only do that with someone if it was love." He flips ahead, looking for the entry about the weekend spent at Alton's family vacation home in the Hamptons. The night Alton climbed into bed with him, and after months of flirtation, and teasing, and circular conversations about beauty and bis.e.xuality, they finally had s.e.x.

I'm afraid to even write this because I might jinx it or someone might find it, but I'm not going to hold back. Alton rubbed Vaseline on his d.i.c.k and put it inside me. I told him I'd never done it before and he said "You love me, so why not?" It hurt especially when he got faster but love hurts they say. I think that this was the most special thing that's ever happened to me. I can't believe we DID IT. I wish we kissed more. He was weird the next day in front of his parents at breakfast.

And then weeks of worry and pining: He's been so busy we haven't had any time together.... We're not in the same workshop this quarter so we don't have much to talk about.... He said he's "resetting hispriorities" whatever that's supposed to mean.... I asked what I did wrong and he didn't answer.... He said he has a lot of pressure on him. He's been so busy we haven't had any time together.... We're not in the same workshop this quarter so we don't have much to talk about.... He said he's "resetting hispriorities" whatever that's supposed to mean.... I asked what I did wrong and he didn't answer.... He said he has a lot of pressure on him. No more trips to the West Village, no more weekends in the Hamptons, no more tagging along on dates with Carolyn, no more special nicknames. He remembers all of it clearly, remembers how he'd keep himself awake at night, crying under his pillow. The surprise is this: between the first diary entry and the last, only six months went by. The great obsession of his high school years flourished and died in half a year. That's less time than he spent with Peter, though it somehow has the weight of something longer. No more trips to the West Village, no more weekends in the Hamptons, no more tagging along on dates with Carolyn, no more special nicknames. He remembers all of it clearly, remembers how he'd keep himself awake at night, crying under his pillow. The surprise is this: between the first diary entry and the last, only six months went by. The great obsession of his high school years flourished and died in half a year. That's less time than he spent with Peter, though it somehow has the weight of something longer.

And then there's this, the final entry in this diary, dated June 25, 1981, almost four years ago to the week: George says I let my feelings take over with Alton. He said s.e.x is an animal act. Humans are animals and have basic needs that are biological or chemical. Alton's tendencies were probably "experimenting" even though he said he loved me. George said for me it was more of an "orientation" being gay, based on the way my brain is wired, and I agreed, which was more than I ever admitted to George before. He is such a good friend. He never says anything mean to me and actually never fills my head with compliments, which maybe is the sign of a true friend, unlike a user who is always b.u.t.tering you up. I didn't really get until now what a user Alton truly was. George is honest. I asked George if he would ever "experiment" and he said "I would never rule it out" which is so so George. I almost said do you want to mess around, because I'm h.o.r.n.y (like an animal, ha ha). Though I don't need to fall for another straight boy. George. I almost said do you want to mess around, because I'm h.o.r.n.y (like an animal, ha ha). Though I don't need to fall for another straight boy.

At first, he doesn't remember writing this, though with every sentence the moment comes into focus. George had come into the city that day, and the two of them rode the subway downtown. They paid the quarter for the Staten Island Ferry, traveled there and back in the salty harbor air, and then went up to the observation deck at the World Trade Center, which was the closest he'd ever been to the top of the world. They stayed there through sunset, watching the lights come on all over the city, and were the last to get kicked out by the guards. While Robin confessed about Alton, George looked him in the eyes and listened, and that made it easier to speak.

Dorothy says that George is going to be really handsome when he gets older. Some people are late bloomers. Too bad George isn't my boyfriend. He knows me so well. Better than anyone in the world.

When they parted earlier, he wanted to say more to George, wanted to blurt out, "Let's be lovers." But somehow he couldn't. When Peter dumped him in the restaurant, he didn't speak in his own defense. When his father, just a little while ago, wouldn't a.s.sure him, I won't abandon you if you get sick, Robin kept quiet again. He often thinks of himself as a open book, all his feelings on the surface, but now he sees that over and over, where his heart is concerned, he has failed to speak his truth. It's there on these pages about Alton. It was there even when he lived in this house, when his friends.h.i.+p with Scott Schatz became s.e.xual at the same time his crush on Todd Spicer became s.e.xual, too, and each of them, in their own way, stifled his affection, chastising, "Why do you always have to talk talk about everything? You're acting like a girl." The message is clear: Don't tell another guy what you feel, if you don't want your feelings hurt. Don't ask for more than he's willing to give you, because then he'll give you nothing at all. If your heart is aching, keep it to yourself. It's your problem, not his. Alton's vision of Robin as a about everything? You're acting like a girl." The message is clear: Don't tell another guy what you feel, if you don't want your feelings hurt. Don't ask for more than he's willing to give you, because then he'll give you nothing at all. If your heart is aching, keep it to yourself. It's your problem, not his. Alton's vision of Robin as a heartbreaker heartbreaker is exactly backward: It's his own heart that's been injured, again and again, sometimes cleaved by rejection, sometimes smothered by silence. is exactly backward: It's his own heart that's been injured, again and again, sometimes cleaved by rejection, sometimes smothered by silence.

He looks up from the old diary, to the opposite side of the room, and he is overtaken by a jolt from the past: suddenly the Deco paper is not yet up, Jackson's trophies have not yet been cleared, and Jackson's death is new and fresh and staggering. Robin is fourteen, and feverish, lying right here, reading the copy of Franny and Zooey Franny and Zooey he got for Christmas. He looks up from the book to the other bed, and he understands that it will never be host to his brother again, but at the same time the bed doesn't seem exactly empty, either; and then he looks out the window, across the back yard to the Spicers' house, where a light is on in Todd's bedroom, a shadow moving across the window. The last time he'd seen Todd, he'd been humiliated in front of all his friends, Todd had actually spit beer on him and threatened to beat him up. And in that moment he couldn't tell: was his brother gone and Todd still around, but out of reach, or was Todd gone and Jackson lingering here like a ghost? What has been lost, and why, and what part of it is his fault? It is a moment of infinite disorientation: There is pain that he thinks he has caused, and pain that he thinks was thrust upon him, but he can't tell one from the other. he got for Christmas. He looks up from the book to the other bed, and he understands that it will never be host to his brother again, but at the same time the bed doesn't seem exactly empty, either; and then he looks out the window, across the back yard to the Spicers' house, where a light is on in Todd's bedroom, a shadow moving across the window. The last time he'd seen Todd, he'd been humiliated in front of all his friends, Todd had actually spit beer on him and threatened to beat him up. And in that moment he couldn't tell: was his brother gone and Todd still around, but out of reach, or was Todd gone and Jackson lingering here like a ghost? What has been lost, and why, and what part of it is his fault? It is a moment of infinite disorientation: There is pain that he thinks he has caused, and pain that he thinks was thrust upon him, but he can't tell one from the other.

And now, here, today, coming back from this slide into the past, he sees that there is a difference between these various losses, these multiple pains. That for all his confusion as a fourteen-year-old, there always was. He can't bring his brother back. He can't ever undo that day on the slide in the playground. He can't change the ways he has been misunderstood, even used, by boys he has been drawn to.

But it must still be possible to love and be loved back in equal measure. It has to be. Because why else is that love put in your heart, if not to find expression? And why else do we carry on, if not to try again?

He thinks of the moment at the graveside when George took his hand.

And he wants to bow his head again, because what he wishes for, hopes for, even prays for, if that's what this is, is not forgiveness, not for the past, but courage, for what comes next.

OK, here it goes. Mother-daughter hour in her childhood bedroom. Another scolding from a member of the MacKenzie family. Ruby has already tried to beg for some time to take a nap, but Dorothy insisted on talking right now, said she'd been in Greenlawn long enough and wanted to get back to Manhattan. They could talk there or here, but they were going to talk. "OK, talk," Ruby told her. "But I'm expecting a call."

She has already tried the motel-glad to get a woman at the front desk instead of that patronizing man. Very kindly this woman told her that Chris had checked out. Yes, she was quite sure he'd gone. The maid had already turned the room. Ruby hung up the phone and stared out her window into the night sky, pitch black, except for a single star, or was it a planet, she can never be sure what she's seeing up there. The moon wasn't yet visible-that's not a sign, she tells herself, though it's hard to avoid thinking that way.

The mood is fraught-it seems like one of them will speak, and then the other, but all that comes out is a series of sighs. Ruby huddles near the headboard. Dorothy sits on the other end of the bed. Under a bright overhead light, the wear and tear of the years strain her face. People sometimes tell Ruby that she resembles Dorothy, but she hates that. She'll never be a woman like her mother, whose every worry, att.i.tude, and opinion is so transparent. A woman marked by a failed marriage, the mess of divorce, children gone or out of reach. No way.

It occurs to her to deal with this the way Wendy did with her mother-to just take whatever is coming, and leave it at that. Not to put up a fight, because everything eventually blows over. Laugh it off. And yet, when it comes to Dorothy, she doesn't feel very forgiving, doesn't feel it in her to cut that much slack.

Dorothy says, "Tell me about this boy," and Ruby immediately wants to explode.

"It's none of your business." She can hardly keep her voice down.

"I would like to know."

"I'm ent.i.tled to privacy."

"I wish you'd confide in me."

"Been there, done that. It didn't do me any good."

"What on earth are you referring to?"

"You know."

"I'm not clairvoyant, dear."

"When you told me to pretend I was still a virgin. After After I had s.e.x!" I had s.e.x!"

Dorothy adjusts herself uncomfortably. "You were traumatized, Ruby. I was trying to help."

"You told me to forget forget about it." about it."

"I wanted you to move on."

"You wanted me to lie."

In the hall she hears footsteps-Robin must be out there. He seems to pause, but then his door is opening and closing. He's blocking himself off from this. She can't blame him.

Dorothy says, "You didn't want anyone to know, Ruby. You were upset that Robin found out." didn't want anyone to know, Ruby. You were upset that Robin found out."

"Found out? You told him!"

"He knew something had happened."

"You could have helped helped me." me."

"I did help you, Ruby." She lowers her voice. "I went to that boy's, to Brandon's, high school and filed a complaint. I remember it very well. I was told by the counselors that his parents were called in, and that they would discipline him. I followed up, and they told me they'd keep him away from you."

Ruby hugs her pillow. This is new information-is it even true? If it was, wouldn't she have known about it by now? It's true that she never saw Brandon again at any of the school mixers. She'd thought that was a matter of luck. She was sixteen when all that happened, though it seems forever ago. If it hadn't been for Chris this weekend, Brandon would have remained buried.