Boystown 7: Bloodlines (15 page)

I grabbed the bag with Joseph’s suit in it and walked home. I felt uncomfortable about our “normal” date. I hadn’t given a lot of thought to what we were doing. In my world, the options were sleep with him a few times and move on or, if I liked him enough, not move on. I hadn’t really considered the possibility of seeing him for a while, fooling around, getting to like him, and then getting dumped for God. The whole thing was giving me a lump in my stomach. I’d had a lot of shitty things happen in the last few years and I was just starting to feel good. I didn’t want anything or anyone fucking with that.

Brian worked mainly lunches at The French Bakery, which meant he was down in the Loop by ten-thirty and gone by two. Twice a week he worked dinner, usually Thursday and Friday but sometimes he traded shifts or gave them away outright. He didn’t need the money he made there. In fact, I wasn’t sure why he bothered to work there at all. When I was walking into the apartment I was really hoping to take a nap. But Brian was home. He and Franklin were stuffing envelopes on the dining room table and drinking white wine. A bottle of Chardonnay sat half empty on the table.

“Hey,” I said.

“How are you, Nick?” Brian asked.

Franklin sat there like I hadn’t entered the room.

“I’m okay. Has Terry called and asked to come home yet?”

“Twice. When can we let him come home?”

“I’m thinking Sunday. That should be long enough to make the point.”

There was a sour look on Franklin’s face but he kept his mouth shut. Brian seemed to relax, whether it was because he knew when Terry would be back or because he was relieved that Franklin hadn’t made a comment about Terry, I couldn’t be sure.
 

“What are you guys doing?” I asked.

“Fundraising letter for Howard Brown. Sugar bought us the mailing list from the Opera so we’re doing an extra push. Opera queens.” Brian rolled his eyes flamboyantly.

“Don’t do that,” Franklin said. “Using terms like that. It’s degrading.”

“What?” Brian was honestly confused.

“Don’t call men queens. It’s degrading to feminize men.”

“Oh, Mary,” I said. Not a term I normally use but he was pissing me off.

“I have a legitimate point,” Franklin said, setting his jaw.

“Do you hate women?” I asked.

“Of course not.”

“Then why is it degrading to feminize a man if there’s nothing wrong with women?”

“You’re twisting my words.”

“Please don’t fight,” Brian said.

“I’m going to take a nap in Terry’s room.”

“Is that a good idea? You know how protective he is of his space.”

Even though the kid wasn’t there, it didn’t feel right.
 

“Why don’t you use my bed,” Brian said.

“But—” Franklin started but stopped. He was protective of his space, too.

“You know, maybe I’ll go for a walk. That’ll wake me up.”

“Oh, okay,” Brian said. “Before you go, though, I’m not sure about Saturday night. Could you go with Sugar to the Glory Hole?”

“You’re not sure? Why aren’t you sure?”

“I don’t know that Franklin’s going to be very comfortable at the Glory Hole.”

“I’m sorry. I’m really not used to spending a lot of time with gay people,” Franklin explained. “Most of my friends are straight. I don’t believe in segregating ourselves.”

There were a lot of things wrong with what he said. Most importantly, did he really expect me to go down to Rush Street and try to pick up guys? I mean, the whole point of gay bars was segregation. He was viewing the segregation as a rejection by straight people, but, hey, maybe we just wanted to be alone.

“How long have the two of you been together?” I asked.

“We met two weeks ago.”

The look on my face must have been very articulate because Franklin said, “I know what you’re thinking. We’re moving too fast. It hasn’t been long, but I really care about Brian.”

Brian smiled, obviously pleased.

I wanted out of the conversation so I said, “Sure. I’ll take Sugar if you don’t want to go. Why not?” Then I said, “See you later” and walked out of the apartment.

Chapter Thirteen

I walked toward the lake thinking I’d take a walk in the park or maybe along the Belmont Rocks. When I got to Lake Shore Drive though, I had another idea. I walked south to Two Towers, Lana Shepherd’s building. In the lobby, I followed the sign to the rental office, which was set up a little like a doctor’s office, with a door and a receptionist’s window. Next to the window, which was frosted glass and closed, was a plastic doorbell. I rang it.

A moment later, a young woman of about twenty-five opened the window. She was odd. I noticed that right away. For one thing, she was at least six feet tall. She practically looked at me eye to eye. For another, her hair was cut in the same kind of extreme pixie cut that Mia Farrow wore in
Rosemary’s Baby
and dyed flat black. This was completely out of step with what I’d seen other girls her age doing, which was to make their hair seem as big and as curly as possible. Half of them looked like they’d killed some poor woodlands creature and stuck it on their heads. So maybe this girl had the right idea.

“Can I help you?”

“How much do one-bedrooms go for?”

“Three-seventy-five to four-forty, depending on the floor.” It was much more than my garden apartment had cost, but was still far less than I was making in a week. In fact, this rent and my office rent were still less than a week’s wages. I was flush, too. I had most of what Jimmy had paid me for the last two months in the bank. I tried to give Brian money but he wouldn’t take it. Whenever I tried to leave money on his dresser he always snuck it back into my jeans.
 

“Do you have anything with a view of the lake?”

“We have a tenth floor unit in the front. Hang on a second.”

Behind the wall were a couple of desks sitting in a small, windowless room. She walked over to the nearest desk and looked at a sheet. She wore a sort of T-shirt that was red with cap sleeves, well-tailored blue jeans, and pair of penny loafers. I noticed she never stood up completely straight, as if trying to compensate for her height, not by slouching as many tall girls do but by leaning. She leaned to the left, to the right, and back. I don’t think she was conscious of it.

“That unit is four hundred and twenty. Would you like to see it?”

“Yes. I would.”

Taking the sheet with her, she walked over to a pegboard that held at least a hundred sets of keys. She pulled four sets, then walked back and closed the window. Coming through the door she said, “My name is Clementine. I’m the manager for the building. I handle showing the apartments and applications. I also direct all the maintenance. If you become a tenant you bring any problems to me.” That would be strange, bringing my problems to such a young girl. But I suppose I could get used to it.
 

“And you are?” she asked, leading me back to the lobby.

“Nick. Nick Nowak.”

“What you do for a living Mr. Nowak?”

“I’m a private investigator. You can call me Nick.” Because calling me mister made me feel really old.

As we walked across the lobby to the 3220 side, we continued to chat.

“Private investigator. Is that a stable field?”

“It can be. It’s very stable at the moment. I’m loosely attached to a law firm downtown, Cooke, Babcock and Lackerby.”

She smiled at that. Everyone knew that anything connected to lawyers, loosely or otherwise, meant a goldmine. “How did you find us?”

“I interviewed someone in the building.”

“I see. Where are you living now?”

“With a friend around the corner.” That didn’t sound good. “I was over on Roscoe for about four years. I left on good terms. I’m sure the landlord will give me a good recommendation.”

“Are you on the lease where you are right now?”

“No. I’m on the couch.”

“I see.”

We walked into the elevator area of 3220. She pressed the call button. I decided I’d better say something close to the truth if I wanted her on my side. “I had some bad things happen to me last year. None of them were financial though. All my bills got paid.” Mainly because I moved out of the Roscoe apartment rather abruptly, but that was fine because I hadn’t been on a lease for a couple of years. The elevator arrived and she was polite enough not to pry any further. It was a nice elevator with imitation wood paneling on the walls.
 

“There’s a service elevator around the corner for moving in and deliveries. In the basement there’s a laundry room, a dry cleaner and small store where you can get, you know, this and that.”

When we reached the tenth floor, we were in a hallway just like Lana Shepherd’s on the fourth floor. The walls were painted a buttery yellow and there was a low pile brown carpet. We didn’t wander around as I did when I tried to find Lana’s apartment, Clementine knew exactly where we were going. We walked to the end of the hallway where there were three doors leading to three apartments: 1008, 1009 and 1010. She opened the door to 1008.

Empty apartments are curious places. They’re full of the ghosts of past tenants and the hopes of prospective ones. The living room space was large and carpeted in chocolate brown wall-to-wall, and the walls were painted…in all honesty, they were painted the color of a cum stain. It had the same kind of kitchen in a closet arrangement as Lana’s apartment. The only thing that was at all remarkable was the window. It went from the kitchen all the way across to the far wall of the living room. Probably a good twelve or thirteen feet. It began at hip height and went nearly to the ceiling. There was a white marble sill about eight inches deep.
 

The view was terrific. It was probably a little after six. The sun was edging off to the western horizon but it was still fairly bright out. The apartment faced north, and the building jutted out a bit from the one directly next to it, so there was a wide view of Lake Shore Drive, Lincoln Park and Lake Michigan. It was a great view.
 

Oddly though, looking north like that at the arching row of apartment buildings the image reminded me of the beginning of
The Jackie Gleason Show
, which showed a similar shot of Miami Beach while the announcer said, “From the sun and fun capitol of the world, Miami Beach…”
 

I wanted the place. I wanted it bad.

“I’ll take it,” I said.

“Why don’t we look at the bedroom first?”

I followed her into the bedroom, which was nearly as large as the living room. It had two closets and a place for a dresser inset between them. The window was large, but not as wide as the one in the living room. The floor was tiled in marbleized brown linoleum. It was fine. It would do.

“The bathroom is right here,” Clementine said and led me out of the bedroom. The bathroom sat in between the living room and the bedroom. It was small with tiny white tiles that were occasionally broken up by a colored tile, red or yellow or blue. Above the tub was a small window with a deep shelf.
 

“Can I say I’ll take it yet?”

“Wouldn’t you like to see other units? We have several floor plans.”

“Do they have better views?”

“No, not really.”

“Then I’ll take this one.”

“All right. You’ll need to fill out an application. We’ll need a check for first and last month’s rent, so that would be eight hundred and twenty dollars.”

“Can I paint if I want to?”

“We don’t encourage it. But people do.”

“Can I move in tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow? We usually do the first.”

“I’ll pay for half a month. In fact, how about I give you the deposit and the first three months. Sixteen-forty plus two-oh-five is eighteen-forty-five.” Money is amazing; it smoothes over so many things.

“Um, sure, you can do that if you want.”

“I want.”

“Okay. Let’s go fill out the application and I’ll call you tomorrow.”

“Morning.”

She laughed. “I’ll call you tomorrow morning.”

When we finished it was still early so I went down to the Melrose and had a hamburger with some fries. Then I walked over to my office. On the way, I thought about the situation with Brian. Franklin wasn’t
that
bad. If he liked Brian, that was terrific as long as Brian liked him. The fact that I already knew I didn’t want to spend a whole lot of time with him was my problem and I’d just resolved it. Everybody was going to be a lot happier as of tomorrow. Provided the powers that be at Two Towers liked my application. Or at least my check for nearly two grand.

When I walked into my office, I immediately sat down and began a list of all the things I needed to do. I had to call and make arrangements for a phone to be put in. I didn’t relish the idea of my beeper going off and having to wander over to Broadway to find a payphone. I also had to buy a bed. The one place I knew I wasn’t going to buy a bed was the mattress store that now occupied Paradise Island. It felt like it would be an insult to my past to do that. It was bad enough the bar wasn’t there anymore.

I’d asked if I could paint. Did I really want to do that? It was a lot of work. I’d painted the Roscoe apartment with Daniel. This one I’d be doing alone. And, if I did paint, what color did I want? Cum stain was not my favorite color. Well, in certain situations it was; just not on the walls of my apartment. Daniel had decided on gray for the old apartment. Could I ask Joseph to help me? Was he even good—

My phone rang. I picked it up and heard nothing for a moment.

“Hello? Is someone there?”

“You’re looking for me?” a woman’s voice slurred.

“I may be. Who is this?”

“Emily Fante.”

“Yes, I have been looking for you.”

 
“Well, come and find me.”

“Come and find you where?”

“I’m at a bar on Broadway.”

“Which bar on Broadway?”

“It’s called The Closet.”

“I know it.”

“You do? That’s interesting.”

“Not really. I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

I hung up, grabbed my coat, and walked out of my office. It was a five-minute walk to The Closet. I remembered Kimmy saying that Emily looked kind of “dyke-y.” Apparently, Emily might be a lesbian. The Closet was mixed, catering to both gay men and gay women. It had a neighborhood feel, and if you lived in the neighborhood you were more than welcome. Especially if you were as serious about drinking as Emily seemed to be.