A Question of Manhood (5 page)

I opened the door and stepped in.

Then I shut it behind me quickly, afraid the sounds would get out. In my heart of hearts, I really didn't want to expose Chris, to do anything that would tarnish his image. I loved his image. Hell, I worshipped his image, and that's partly why I was angry. He was destroying it.

He didn't even know I was there. The light from the backyard spotlight Dad insists on leaving on all night was just enough to let me see that Chris was huddled under the covers, and just as I had imagined, his head was under a pillow. His arms were clamped down on either side; it's a wonder he could breathe. I stood there as long as I could tolerate it, listening to something ugly and painful working its way up through his body until it came out in the vicinity of his face, and then I called his name.

“Chris?” It was softer than I'd expected, and he didn't hear me. I tried again.

I heard a gasp. His body jerked, and he lifted onto his elbows. He made another gasping noise. It was like he couldn't speak.

Now that I'm here, what am I gonna do about it? What can I say? What do I want him to say?
I almost turned to leave.

He was breathing oddly, like you do when you've been crying so hard you can't breathe normally, but he managed to say, “Paul?”

“What is it?” It was all I could think of.

He worked his way into a sitting position and ran the fingers of one hand into his hair. I reached over to flick the bedside lamp on. He rasped, “No! No. Don't.”

Now what?
But he hadn't asked me to leave. So I felt my way across to where I knew his desk was, and I lifted the chair and walked it over near the bed. I sat down.

“What the hell's wrong?” I tried again, in a whisper. He ran a hand over his face and groped for the tissue box, blowing his nose as quietly as possible. I added, “I mean, besides the fact that you have to go back. Is that it?” I don't know what I was hoping. In the silence I thought, did I want that to be “it”? What would it mean, if that were it? And did I want to know what else it could be?

Finally he whispered, “No.”

But then nothing. I felt a need to fill the gap. “So it's not that you're thinking the odds are stacking up against you? It isn't that the longer you're over there, the more likely something is to happen?” It was what I'd been thinking.

I could barely see him shaking his head. He snuffled a few times and then said, “No. That's not the way it works. It's not like the real world, the world where real people live. We aren't normal human beings over there. We live in the jungle, we go into the villages, and we kill people. Normal human beings don't do that. Normal human beings die over there. They're the ones in body bags.” He snuffled almost violently.

“So you're not human anymore? Is that it?” I sounded sarcastic to my own ears. It wasn't what I wanted, but what the hell was he getting at?

“I thought I wasn't. I thought I was gonna make it.” He took a deep breath, and it shook his whole body. “So, I guess you're partly right. Because I'm scared, Paul. I've been scared ever since I signed up, but tonight I'm scared shitless. I have nothing”—and his voice tightened so much it trailed away for a few seconds before he went on—“nothing to keep me alive anymore.”

I shook my head at him. “That doesn't make any sense.”

His whisper was angry, sharp. “I'm saying it's over! I've got nothing! There's nothing to hold on to anymore! And when that happens to you, you either lose your mind or your life or both. I've seen it happen, over and over.”

“What's over? Nothing's changed, has it? The place is still there, the war's still going on, your squad is still…” I stopped when I heard him gasp again, like he was trying not to sob. “What? Will you tell me what you're talking about?”

He took a minute to recover. “You don't want to know.”

I stood up, hovering over him. “Will you knock it off? You're in here sobbing like a baby, and now you're telling me you have nothing to live for, and I don't want to know?” I felt like suddenly our roles were reversed. He was the kid brother, and I was the one who had the right to make him account for himself. He covered his face with his hands, and I waited. I stood there, half bending over him, my eyes boring holes into his head so that maybe I could see what the fuck was going on in there.

But he didn't speak. I realized that probably he couldn't; the way he was breathing made it seem like if he spoke, he'd scream. So I sat down again.

What's changed? If something really has changed, wouldn't it have to be sudden? Recent?
I said, “Who were you talking to? In the den? Who'd you call?”

He started breathing in and out really quickly, like he was hyperventilating. God, there was something really, really wrong. This was
so
not Chris. I was getting worried now. I got up and sat beside him on the bed, and when I put my hand on his shoulder he trembled, shuddering all through.

He said, “He's gone. He's gone, and I'm alone.”

“Who? Who's gone?”

It was like he could barely say the name. “Mason.”

“Mason, the guy in your squad?”

Chris pulled away from me and reached for more tissues. He grabbed a handful of them and held them over his face. He took several deep breaths and then said, “I loved him.”

I wasn't sure what that meant—loved, past tense. “He's dead?”

Chris nodded. “It was his parents I called. He had asked me to, while I was stateside, and I put it off until tonight. And when I called them, they said”—and he had to get his breath under control again—“he'd been killed. While I've been home. He's gone.”

Shit. Well, this would put the fear of God into a guy. But—Chris's reaction was still confusing me. All I could think of to say was, “That sucks.”

We sat there for nearly a minute, me desperate to think of something helpful to say, him still trying to get himself in hand and not doing very well. Then, again, he said, “I loved him.”

“You said that. I get it.”

“I don't think you do.”

Now I was getting angry again. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“Paul, I loved him. I mean, I really loved him. And he loved me. We—I'm…gay.”

I didn't know I stood up. All I knew was I wasn't on the bed anymore. The three feet between us turned into thirty. My voice hoarse, I said, “You're shittin' me!” I wheeled away from him, paced across the room and back two, three times, I'm not sure. I was giving him time, time to take it back, time to say he was kidding, time to do anything that would undo what he'd just told me. I stopped in front of him, looked at the wall somewhere over his head, and asked, “What the fuck am I supposed to do with that?”

It wasn't a question for him. It wasn't a question he could answer. It was for me, but I couldn't answer it, either. I don't know where he was looking; I couldn't look at him. He took a ragged breath and said, “You hate me.”

I backed up, nearly knocking the chair over.
Do I hate him? Do I hate Chris, my hero, my big brother? Do I hate the guy who's been the buffer between me and my dad's disappointment that I'm not like Chris?

I walked toward the door. I wanted to get out, and I couldn't leave. Finally I leaned against the frame with both hands. Wasn't it just the other night I was lying in my room, wishing I could think of something bad Chris had done so I could be mad at him? Be careful what you wish for; isn't that how the warning goes? Well, here it was. Wasn't Chris
asking
me to hate him, really? Wasn't he giving me reasons with both hands? On one, there was the fact that he was sobbing and moaning in fear, and on the other was the fact that he—I couldn't even bring myself to
think
the word. But did I hate him? With something like fury, I realized I was about to cry. Me! I kept the tears at bay with words. I turned toward him.

“All my life, you've been the one. The good son. The shining boy. The one I was supposed to look up to. I've always come in second, always asking myself, ‘Why can't I be more like Chris?' Should I be like you now? Should I want boys?”

“Stop it!”

I didn't want to stop it. I felt like I was on a roll, like I was about to say everything I'd wanted to say all my life, and finally he'd given me permission. Or at least an excuse. “I won't stop it. You're supposed to be the perfect son. And now I find out that not only are you a frightened sissy, but you're a queer!
This
is what I'm supposed to look up to?
You?
My God!”

I had walked away from the door toward the window, and what light there was shone on his face. For some reason I still don't understand, my knees buckled, and I fell onto the floor. And then I felt Chris's arms around me. Half of me didn't want him touching me. The other half, the half that won, reached my arms around him, too. But almost immediately, by some silent agreement, we let go. We sat cross-legged on the floor with him leaning his back against my shoulder.

“I'm so sorry,” he said. “I didn't ask for this. I didn't want this. I can't help it.”

“It's okay,” I lied, wanting it to be true, knowing it wasn't.

We sat for a while in silence, and then he said, “Paul? I need to ask you…I need…Please, Paul. Please. Don't tell anyone.”

I knew what he meant. I nodded. “Do you think you ever will? Tell?”

“I won't get a chance.”

“What? Why not?”

About twenty heartbeats went by. “I don't think I'll be coming back.”

“Bullshit. Bullshit, Chris. Goddamn it, don't talk like that. Just because Mason…” My voice trailed off. “Somebody else dying has nothing to do with whether you're coming back. You've lost other friends, right? Maybe they didn't mean the same to you, but lots of guys have died. That doesn't mean you will. Lots of other guys come home.”

He didn't answer. And I didn't know what else to say. We sat there like that, maybe five more minutes. Then he said, “You've got school tomorrow.”

“Fuck school.”

“If you get a chance to do this, if the war's still going on? Don't join. Don't go. Do anything you have to do, but don't go over there.” He pulled away and turned toward me. “Do you hear? And don't let Dad push you. Don't let his own frustrated ambitions force you into something like this. Don't try to live his life for him. Are you hearing me, Paul?”

I wasn't sure what to say. “Did he do that?”

“Just don't, okay? Don't do it. If you have to go to Canada, you go to Canada.” His voice was getting louder, and I was afraid our folks would hear.

“Quiet!” I was already protecting his secret.

“This is important. Tell me you understand. Tell me you won't let him do that to you. Tell me—”

“All right, all right! I won't go.”

He was quieter now. “I mean it, Paul. Don't let anything or anybody force you over there.”

“I won't. I promise.”

“And the other promise? Will you make that one, too?” I wanted to say what promise, but I knew. I must have waited too long, 'cause he said, “Will you?” I nodded. “Say it. Please.”

“I won't tell Mom and Dad what you told me tonight.” It was the only way I could say it. And there was no way not to say it.

He took a breath, like he had something else to say, but then he kind of deflated. Buried in my own thoughts, I didn't react. My brother was going away to die. My hero was already dead.

I can barely stand to remember what I felt the next day, when Chris left. I hadn't slept at all, I'd just lain there all night feeling like those SADEYE balls had all been shot directly at me. I had the pain in my chest and my gut to prove it.

I went over in my head all the things that might have happened to make Chris gay. Was Mom too affectionate toward him, and it hadn't happened to me because he was her favorite? Did Dad push him too hard, and Chris decided that being gay would be a quiet, internal way to fight back? Did it have anything to do with being over there with all those guys, girls hardly ever available, and being—you know—in his prime? Was it something Mason had talked him into, and it was better than nothing, and now Chris just thought he was gay because he'd—I don't know, done stuff with Mason and it had felt good?

It didn't make any sense. I had to hold myself back several times from running into his room and telling him to go AWOL, to go to Canada right now, I'd go with him, and we'd figure out how he could change back again. But I knew he'd never do that. He'd never back out, he'd never leave his squad like that, or go back on something Dad expected him to do.

Dad! This was all his fault. Chris had practically told me that Dad had pressured him into signing up. But there was nothing for it now; it was done. And Chris wasn't about to undo it.

So that left me being mad at Chris for being such a goody-goody. But if he left here tomorrow, with me mad at him, and then he died…my mind wouldn't go there. So instead it went to a different place: Chris was wrong about being gay, and he wasn't going to die. Lots of guys came home! Some of them were missing limbs, and some of them were pretty crazy, but they came home. If only Chris could survive another few months, the war would end and he could come home for good and I could help him be normal again!

Through all of it, every imagined set of events, every possible outcome, his words echoed: “I don't think I'll be coming back.”

My mind went round and round like this, all night. So in the morning, even though it was still dark, even though Chris was as quiet as he could be, I knew he was up. I knew he was in the bathroom. I watched all his motions in my mind's eye. Soaping his hair in the shower. Shaving as he stood by the sink, towel around his waist. I knew when he was back in his room, dressing—pulling on his underwear, his fatigues, his socks. Running a comb through still-damp hair. Such ordinary things. Such a fucking extraordinary day.

I lay in bed as long as I could, but when I heard him move toward the top of the stairs I sat up and swung my legs over the side of my mattress. Hands pressing on either side of me, I was ready to propel myself out there. To Chris.
Hold on to him! Hang on, don't let him go down those stairs!
My arms tensed, relaxed a little, tensed again.

And then I heard him start down, feet landing heavily with the weight of his duffle. Step. Step. Step.

You could still get to him!

Step. Step.

My entire face clenched, my hands tensed into tight balls. And I sat there. I sat there until the steps stopped, until I heard the duffle hit the floor downstairs.

I could smell breakfast; Mom must have got up incredibly early, 'cause it was pancakes and bacon. Hurriedly I wet my hair, washed my face, and threw on some clothes.

As usual, I sat across the table from Chris. Dad wasn't down yet, so it was just the three of us. No joking today, though. No girlish silliness from Mom. No teasing from Chris. Every so often Mom would stand behind his chair and reach out a hand to touch his shoulder, his ear, the side of his face.

Chris's last meal.

It felt like we were going to a funeral. And in a way we were; but the deceased was here with us. All through the meal I threw glances at Chris. Mostly he was staring down at his plate, but I didn't dare really look at him for fear he'd raise his eyes and see me.

Dad showed up after Chris and I had finished. Or, after we had tried to finish. As good as it smelled, as good as Chris knew it would be compared to anything he'd get ever again, neither of us could get much down. Dad didn't even try. He just grabbed a mug of coffee and sat down. I think he was trying to sound cheerful, but the effect was startling and harsh.

“All set, son? Got yourself all put together for the trip?” His voice was too loud.

“Yes, sir.” It was like Chris was getting into the habit again; he didn't usually call Dad “sir.”

Dad saluted, and Chris did the same. He was gonna be himself, right to the end. Doing his best to keep everybody happy, to do what was expected of him. It nearly made me lose the little food I'd been able to swallow.

Chris had a cab pick him up. At first this made me mad; why couldn't Dad take a little extra time from work and drive him? But then I realized Chris probably wanted his last memories of us—and ours of him—to be here, at home, not in some crowded public place that had no meaning for him. As soon as the car arrived, Mom got Chris into this hug that I didn't think would ever end. When it did, Dad shook his hand and turned it into a kind of quick, hard hug that wasn't really a hug but was more a series of slaps on the back.

Chris and I looked at each other. He half smiled, and he made a motion that made it seem like he was going to hug me. I stepped back quickly and my hand shot up in a salute. It was all I felt I could do. You know how in the service, even if you hate your commanding officer, or even if you think he's completely wrong about something, you still salute? It was like that. It was a sign of respect, but it felt like I was doing it at his funeral.

It was also a silent acknowledgment: I'll keep your fucking secrets, but I don't have to thank you for that honor.

His face went all stiff, and then he saluted back. Then he picked up his gear, turned, and walked out the door. I watched through the window as he got into the backseat. The slam of the car door was like a pistol shot.

 

For Thanksgiving, the one on the calendar, we had turkey leftovers. Mom had bought some wine, something we almost never have in the house, and she even let me have a glass of it. I can't say I liked it particularly, but I drank it; I think she was trying to pretend we could be cheerful. And Dad was doing his best, too. I was the lump. I was the one who knew Chris wasn't coming home. I was the one who knew he wasn't the man we'd all thought he was.

After dinner I went upstairs and threw the Ho Chi Minhs into the back of my closet. Then I stood in the doorway to Chris's room for maybe half an hour. Then I went into my room and pounded my pillow until I heard Mom calling up from downstairs.

“Paul? What are you doing up there? Aren't you going to come down and watch the movie with us?”

A rerun of Peter Pan. Hell, why not? I could use a little fantasy right now.
But all the way through I kept making this connection between Wendy not being able to go home and Chris probably never coming home, and her problems seemed so pathetically unimportant compared to Chris's. Compared to mine. I just watched in glum silence. Didn't even want another piece of pie when Mom offered it.

 

That Sunday, lying in bed listening to the sounds of Mom and Dad getting toast and coffee before they headed out to church, I almost got up to go with them. I felt really shitty about the way I'd let Chris leave—no hug, no handshake. So what if he was a fag? He was still my brother. And so what if he was afraid? Anyone in their right mind would be terrified of that place. Look at how I'd reacted to nothing more threatening than my own imagination that day in the basement. And here I'd let him slip away, back to the jungle to die, without even a real good-bye.

I was still thinking along those lines when I heard the car pull away from the house. Some little voice was whispering,
Get up! Go the window and watch them drive away, follow the car with your eyes as far as you can or they might never come back! If something happens it will be your fault for not being with them!

Stupid, right? But my hands had to clench the sheet under me so that I couldn't dash to the window and watch the car disappear. Then there was silence, and this intense feeling of being completely alone.

Damn Chris, anyway! Why did he have to burden me with his fucking secrets?
I'd had to listen to Dad for days, talking about how great Chris had looked, what a good soldier he was, with Mom adding what a handsome man he was growing into. Then Dad would go on about how bravely he was facing everything “over there.” I'm surprised nobody noticed the blood dripping out of the corners of my mouth! I mean, I was biting my tongue so much, and so hard, to keep from telling them how wrong they had it. How they didn't know him at all. How I was the only one who really did.

So I lay there for a long time, feeling guilty about the way I'd treated Chris and wishing I'd gone with my folks to church, and feeling like the weight of what Chris had laid on me was what made me unable to get up and go with them.

If I can't go to church and pray for your safety, big brother, it's your own goddamn fault.

Like that made any sense. I pressed the heels of my hands against my eyes and held my breath to keep tears in. I missed him so much! So fucking much! And now I felt like I'd never have him back. Even if he was wrong about dying over there, if he couldn't go back to being normal I felt like he'd never be my brother again.

I tried to focus on what being gay was all about, tried to figure it out so maybe I could help undo it, but trying to think about that was like grabbing a fish underwater. I could sort of see it, and I could get close but not close enough. And sometimes I could feel it, but that was all.

What did come to mind clearly was the time Marty Kaufman and I had decided to teach this nerd a lesson. I couldn't figure out at first why my mind went there, but I guess it was an indirect way to think about something that was too uncomfortable for me to look at directly. Kind of like if you want to see a star in the sky, you have to look off to the side a little.

I was fourteen. Marty—who'd been held back in sixth grade—was fifteen, and the nerd, Anthony (a.k.a. Don't-Call-Me-Tony), was only thirteen because he'd been accelerated a grade at some point. This one year Anthony had seriously over-stepped his usual level of priggishness. He'd always been kind of a teacher's pet, always won prizes for things like spelling bees and giving the best speech, always got high marks for everything—especially math. And always lording it over us dummies. Or so it seemed like, anyway. Looking back, I think maybe he wasn't. I think maybe he was just trying to make us think he wasn't afraid of us, 'cause that would have been the worst.

Anyway, at the start of that school year, it didn't take him very long to let us all know that he'd been to this summer camp for math geniuses, and it became obvious real fast that this experience had given him some superinflated idea of his own worth as a human being. Like because he was so smart, he was more important than the rest of us.

I suppose that if there were two kids in class who would take this the hardest, it was gonna be me, because of always feeling like the bad kid in the family, and Marty, who really was the bad kid in the family. He'd already run away like, three times? He'd been caught stealing records, he'd broken into the high school once with Kevin Dodge and they'd smashed as much glass in the chem lab as they could find, stuff like that.

Since my last name's Landon and Marty's is Kaufman, we've usually sat either next to each other or me behind him since sixth grade on. He was the sort of kid who's always thinking of new ways to get into trouble. You could usually tell when he was hatching something; his head would sink a little into his shoulders, and his light brown eyes would look at you sort of sideways from under the nothing-brown eyebrows. He wasn't too much of a threat in sixth grade—at least, not to me—but with each year he got taller and a little more threatening. And it always seemed as though his hair was just a little longer than it should be, like proving he was defying something. I sort of had to make friends with him, or it would have been hell. But I'd managed to avoid getting sucked into the worst of his schemes. Until Anthony came back from math camp.

And it was just too good. Too tempting. It was Marty's idea. I don't say that to get out of any of the blame, just to be clear that it was his genius. And it was genius.

You know that expression that goes, “It seemed like a good idea at the time”? Well, we literally kidnapped Anthony one Monday afternoon, on the way home from school. Marty had skipped out on his last class so he could go home and sneak off with his mom's car. She'd gone with a friend to a bridge party, or some such thing, and the car was there for the taking. He had a learner's permit, not the full license, but Marty wasn't one to let a thing like that stop him.

He picked me up at school, and we headed off in the direction Anthony would walk to get home. He was walking alone, par for the course; who'd walk with him? Marty slowed the car way down to roll alongside, and I rolled my window down to get his attention.

“Hey, Tony, wanna lift?”

He glared at me and then stared straight ahead. It took a few seconds, but finally he couldn't stand it, and he said, “Don't call me Tony.”

“Aw, don't be so stiff. C'mon, let us give you a ride home. Whad'ya say?”

He looked hard at me, and I think we almost had him, but then he looked at who was driving. “No, thanks. I'm fine.” He picked up his pace and moved ahead of us.

I fished a rope from the floor by my feet. One end was tied into a slipknot. And then I tried once more. “Anthony? You sure?”

He didn't even look at me this time. “I'm sure.”

I could tell he was getting a little nervous. I rolled up my window and looked at Marty like it was now or never. He nodded and pulled a little ahead of Anthony, I jumped out and threw the rope over the kid, and then I shoved him into the back. He started screaming right away, and I almost didn't want to take the time to pick up his books, but I did. I threw them into the back, and one of them hit the side of his head. I looked to make sure he was okay, and he was staring at me, stark-raving terror on his face. At least it had shut him up.