Contemporary Gay Romances (13 page)

“Diamonds always shine brighter for their setting,” Blue said. “That was one thing I learned—the first time around.”

“Live and learn. Then live again and learn even more,” Marcella quipped. She stood, and when he did, too, she took his arm and began to lead him out to the party. “Of course you’ll both live here in one of the residences when you’re in-City. But we really must find something unique for you in the countryside. Do you like the beach?”

“Does Bruno?”

“I think we’re going to get along, just fine, Blue. Just fine.”

It was sunset when Ben Après drove up to the hanging shingle that read “Sagoponauk Rock Writers Colony,” and on a smaller, added-on shingle, “Visitors see Dr. Ormond.” An oddly autumnal sunset despite the early summer date and no hint of dropping temperature, as Ben stepped out of the ten-year-old Volvo that hadn’t given him a bit of its usual temperament on the long trip, as he urinated on a clump of poison ivy until it was shiny wet, as he surveyed what appeared to be yet another rolling succession of green-humped New England hills.

The muted colors of the sunset fitted Ben’s own fatigued calm following a week of torment, his final uncertain decision to come, and his more recent anxieties since the turn off the main road that he’d never find the place, that he’d driven past it several times already, the directions had seemed so sketchy.

He found himself gaping at the sky as though it would tell him something essential, or as though he’d never see one like it again. Then he made out some houses nestled in a ravine: the colony. He’d made it!

*

Dr. Ormond was easy to find. The paved road that dipped down into the colony ended at his front door in a shallow oval parking lot radiating dirt roads in several directions. Two cars with out-of-state plates were parked next to a locally licensed beat-up baby-blue pickup.

The active, middle-aged man who stepped out of the house chomping an apple introduced himself, then looked vaguely upset when Ben introduced himself and asked where he would be staying.

There appeared to be a mix-up, Dr. Ormond said. Another guest—and here Ormond threw the apple down and went on to mention a woman writer of some repute—had unexpectedly accepted the colony’s earlier invitation, thought by them to have been forgotten. She’d taken the last available studio. They hadn’t been certain Ben was coming this season either. Victor Giove hadn’t heard from Ben in weeks. Of course, Victor hadn’t heard from Joan Sampson either, and she’d come too, though naturally they were all delighted she was here.

Ormond motioned behind himself sketchily. Ben saw a white clapboard, pitched-roof house standing alone on a patch of grassy land. He supposed that was her studio: the one he was to have lived in.

Before he could ask, a plump, middle-aged woman—her apron fluttering, her hair in disarray—was waving to them from the doorway. She’d already telephoned Victor, she called out. He was on his way. Mrs. Ormond, Ben supposed.

He leaned against the Volvo. Darkness was quietly dropping into the ravine. One or two lights were turned on in the Ormonds’ house, other lights appeared suddenly in more distant studios. Ben wanted to wake up tomorrow morning in this enchanted little glen, to spend sunny and rainy days here, long afternoons, crisp mornings, steamy nights. He would not allow the mix-up to affect his decision. After all the inner turmoil, he was glad he’d come. He wasn’t leaving.

Above all, he was grateful to Victor Giove, who was jogging toward them now, accompanied by a large, taffy-colored Irish hound, the two racing, skirting the big oak, circling Ben and Dr. Ormond, the dog barking, then nuzzling Ben’s hand for a caress; Giove hardly out of breath, glad to see Ben. He took Ben’s hand, clasped his shoulder, smiled, and was as openly welcoming as Ormond hadn’t been.

Victor was tan already. His curly, dark head already sparkled with sun-reddened hair. He looked healthier and more virile than he’d ever looked in the city: an advertisement for country living with his handsome, open-featured face, his generous, beautifully muscled body that loose clothing like the old T-shirt and corduroys he was wearing could never disguise. Ben felt Victor’s warmth charge into his own body as they touched, and he knew that all things were possible this summer: even the impossible: even Victor Giove.

“There’s no place here for Ben to stay,” Dr. Ormond protested, once they’d gotten inside the Ormonds’ living room.

“What about the little cottage?’ Victor asked. “That’s empty.”

“What little cottage?”

“Out by the pond. I passed it today. It’s all closed up. You don’t need a full studio, do you, Ben? Of course he doesn’t. He’d love the little cottage.”

“It’s a half-hour walk from here to there,” Ormond said, unpersuaded.

Ben suspected he’d be crazy about the little cottage.

“He’s young,” Victor argued. “It’s not far for him.”

“But it isn’t ready.”

“Sure it is. You helped clean it up yourself. Remember? It can’t have gotten more than a little cobwebby in the meanwhile. Besides, he can’t go all the way back now, can he?”

Ben told them he’d already sublet his apartment in the city. He had nowhere else to go.

“You see!” Victor was triumphant. “We’ve got no alternative. Come on, Ben. Dinner’s ready. Afterward, I’ll take you to the little cottage.”

“Victor,” Ormond said, his voice unexpectedly throaty, “That cottage belonged to Hunter.”

“It belongs to the
colony
.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Ben’s here,” Giove said firmly. “Hunter isn’t.”

“That’s true enough.”

“Then it’s settled.”

*

Four of them ate dinner. Joan Sampson was to have joined them but she called to cancel, saying she had work to do.

Ben did know they had no such thing as community dining at the colony, didn’t he, Frances Ormond asked. Everyone took care of themselves. Except, of course, everyone dined with whomever they wanted to. She hoped that Ben would feel as welcome at her table as Dr. Giove was. It was impossible for Ben to not like the transplanted urban woman who’d evidently found peace in Sagoponauk Rock. Like Victor, she radiated health and happiness. Ben would later discover that as a rare enough quality at the colony. Others had brought their sufferings and neuroses, unable or unwilling to let them go. They argued around kitchen tables just as badly as they had in Manhattan bars. They outraged and scandalized each other in country bedrooms with infidelities and treacheries as though they still lived in West Side apartment complexes. Over the following week, Ben sized up the colony members quickly. Only Mrs. Ormond was judged to be sound.

And Victor, of course. Victor who was the reason Ben had come to Sagoponauk Rock, and the reason he had almost not come. Even after Ben had sublet his apartment. Even after Ben had turned off the exit from the New England Thruway and had driven north for what seemed hours more.

After dinner, Victor got into the Volvo’s driver’s seat and drove through the dark, rutted road to the little cottage. Ben held an extra kerosene can Frances Ormond had provided, unsure whether or not the electricity was turned on.

It was, they discovered, after a longish, silent ride through the deep darkness of the country, passing what would later become landmarks to Ben on his night walks and night drives: the community house, the first two studios, then Victor’s, the apple orchard, then the fork past the pond.

The cottage was L-shaped: a large, bare bedroom separated by a small bathroom and cavernous storage closet from a good-sized study area that opened onto a small, single-wall kitchen with a long dining counter.

Victor built a fire to help clear out the mustiness and the unseasonable chill. Ben went through the kitchen cabinets and found a bottle half full of Fundador. They sipped the brandy, talking about the program they’d tentatively set up the past April at school, which Ben as an apprentice writer would follow at the colony. He was only to show Victor a piece of writing when he was satisfied with it, or unable to find satisfaction in it. Some of the others at the colony never shared their work with each other. Victor and Joan had agreed to meet regularly to read to each other. If he wanted, Ben could join them.

Although it was only a three-and-a-half-month stay, Ben had decided he would write day and night. Not only the few short stories Victor asked for, but a novel too: the novel, the one he’d planned, the one he believed he’d been born to write. Free here of most distractions, he felt certain he’d get much of it done before the last school year rolled around again. He already loved the cottage.

Only the bedroom—after a second look—didn’t seem as cozy as the rest of the house. Ben thought the bedroom’s coldness was due to its appearance: low ceilings, uncarpeted dull wood floor, only a few pieces of furniture—hardly inviting. Perhaps a single night’s sleep would warm it up. The double bed—higher and wider than the one he was used to—was firm yet comfortable when he tried it out.

Victor had gone into the bathroom. He found Ben stretched out on the long wide bed and he stopped, lingering on the threshold.

For a long minute, they looked at each other. Ben—his hands under his head for a pillow—felt suddenly exposed, then seductively positioned, inviting. Giove seemed suddenly bereft of his usual composure; uncertain, fragile, even frightened. Neither of them moved. Ben could feel the tension of the possible and the impossible filling the room like a thick mist.

“It’s getting late,” Victor said, his voice subdued, his hands suddenly gesturing as though controlled by someone else. “I’ll come by in the morning to show you around the colony.”

Ben was embarrassed now too and quickly sat up, then got off the bed to see the older man out. In an attempt to cover over the shame he’d unexpectedly felt, he asked, “Who had this cottage before me?”

“Stephen Hunter, the poet,” Giove said, looking out into darkness.

“You’re kidding! I didn’t know he stayed here at the colony.”

“Oh, everyone important comes to Sagoponauk sooner or later.”

Ben was about to say something about how happy he was that the cottage had such a stellar literary past, but Giove said good-bye and was gone.

Ben settled into the dank chill of the sheets they’d located in the big closet and thought of that moment in the bedroom, of Victor’s suddenly coming upon him on the bed, his hesitation, his distracted gestures, the sudden quiet tone of his voice and his sudden decision to leave. If he had remained another minute, come into the bedroom, come closer to Ben, the impossible would have been possible—in this very room.

 Ben climaxed with a sharpness he hadn’t experienced masturbating in years, not since he was an adolescent. Wiping his abdomen with a hand towel, he wondered whether it was the fresh country air or seeing Victor Giove again after so long.

*

Victor didn’t come by in the morning to show Ben around; Ben didn’t see him until dinnertime. But that was only the beginning of Victor’s fluctuations of intense consideration and total aloofness that formed itself into an inescapable pattern.

That first morning, Ben didn’t much care. The bedroom faced east and he awoke to a sunny splendor of bright clear light through nearby trees flooding every inch of what seemed to be a really handsome, though sparsely furnished room.

After a breakfast of bread and honey provided by Frances Ormond the night before, Ben wandered around the colony. He was still too awed to closely approach any studio, believing the other colony members would be intensely concentrating on their writing, and thus not to be disturbed. But he had enough to look at: the pond, surprisingly large, still and lovely, quite close at one edge to his cottage; the apple orchard stretching for miles; the lively stream that formed a tiny marsh where it entered the pond; the large old trees, many varieties he’d never seen before; the young saplings everywhere; the fruit and berry bushes in demure blossom; the wildflowers surrounding the houses; the cottage itself, beautifully crafted out of fine woods, so that built-in tables, drawers, and cabinetry were perfectly integrated by color and grain, all of a piece.

Following Mrs. Ormond’s instructions, he skirted the colony later on, driving up to and along the two-lane highway, locating in one direction a truck-stop all-night diner, a gas station, and after another five or six miles, the tiny hamlet of Sagoponauk—where he purchased a backseat full of groceries and supplies. Driving in the other direction past the colony, Ben found another gas station and an old clapboard roadhouse containing a saloon and an Italian restaurant.

The peace that had settled on him momentarily the dusk before returned when he drove back to the colony and arrived to see the little cottage—highest placed of the houses on the property—aglow with fuchsia and orange, its western window reflecting a brilliant summer sunset.

Victor apologized when he saw Ben. Besides doing some writing that day, he said he’d had to fix a propane gas line to Joan Sampson’s oven and hot water heater and then help Mrs. Ormond pick early apples for saucing.

Ben was embarrassed by the apology. He could spend all day with Victor. That was why he had come to the colony. But now that he was here, he could not justify deserving Giove’s attention. Victor wasn’t merely gorgeously unself-conscious, he was altruistic, giving his time and energy to anyone who needed it. Obviously there were others in the colony who needed it as much as Ben.