No Safeguards (27 page)

“Gina mentioned them last night.”

“Correct. They called John
la Gallina
and Milford Millicent. Every day — every day, until Milford fought back — those two had to run the gauntlet. On good days they blew them kisses and pinched their buns. On bad days they slammed them into lockers, always with a mocking, ‘Watch where you going, man'; or tripped them when they walked by, followed by: ‘Jeez, man, wha' you doing down there? You after my cock or what?' Or they'd get a lecture from one of the Jamaicans: ‘Millicent, where you pick up yo' nastiness? How come you ‘low yourself for catch honky disease? Is cause o' all the honky blood in you, or what? If you been live in Jamaica, man, them would o' beat it out o ‘ your backside or else kill you — long time, man! You think is joke I joking? I serious. Kill yo' ass long time.' Sometimes they'd sing ‘Burn Chi-Chi Man-Them' and ‘Boom! Bye-Bye! Inna Batty Bwoy Head,' shape their hands into a pistol and shout: ‘Pow! Battybwoy fi dead. Me say, shoot the batty bwoy-them. Kill them. Them no fi live none ‘t all.' Jay, I felt like sputum.”

“That was their objective.”

“And then one day the unexpected happened. ‘Millicent, is true unno kaka hole does get slack and unno does have for plug it with cotton wool like them does do dead people?' This from Alfred.

“‘Didn't I see a roll of paper towels in your locker?' Milford countered. ‘Know why? Guys like you are straight in the day and get fisted at night.'

“Silence. We could hear the hum of the fluorescent lights.

“Alfred lurched at him and swung at his head. Milford dodged the blow, kneed him in the groin, and delivered a quick punch. Alfred doubled over. Milford kicked him several times. ‘You fucking dunce, fucking pile o' shit! What the fuck you know about me? Fucking twit! I ain't no fucking Rueben James.' His hazel eyes flamed. His whitish skin was flushed red. His broad nose flared . . . Shithead Illich was on recess duty about ten metres down the corridor from us. He took them both to Bégin's office.

“You remember the day I threatened to bring home a Uzi and blow off your heads?”

I nodded.

“Well, that was a week after that fight, the day Alfred and Milford returned after their suspension. Alfred brought a shotgun to school to kill Milford. He showed us the shotgun in class and said he would off Milford at lunch. Richard Hazan went to get Bégin. Bégin came to the class and sent everyone out except Alfred. The police arrived even before we cleared the stairs.

“Milford and John.” He took a deep breath. “Those guys were brave or just plain stupid. John,
la Gallina
: skinny, with a waist that couldn't have been more than 25; loose-jointed, with a hip-swishing walk, dark-skinned like me. He was in geek classes, doing advanced everything. That only made it worse. Milford was in advanced English and French. John and Milford changed schools the following September, and Alfred ended up in jail a few months later. Too old for Batshaw. He was already 18 and one of Nine Lives'
gorillas
— enforcers.”

Paul grew silent, looked around the dinette, seemed a trifle shaken, was probably thinking
he
barely avoided going to Batshaw.

“So, you see, Jay, I did everything to cover up, even fooled around with girls. I'm into men, period. One girl told her friends: ‘Him not cock, me dear, him is capon.' Whenever they wanted to diss me they'd say: ‘Meatman, is true you're a capon?'” He swallowed loud, lowered his head, and stared mutely at the table for close to a minute.

“Thanks, man, thanks for taking me to Bill's lectures. He saved my life.” He nodded slowly — several times. “I found his number in the phone book and called him. He told me to come to his Concordia office. I told him how I was back in St. Vincent, how abusive I was to you and Ma and how trapped I felt; how I hated myself, my body, my sexual desires, my pot dependence; how angry I was because of my asthma and sexuality; how unjust and unfair it all was; the depression I'd just come out of; that it was all too much for me. I put my head on his desk and howled.

“When I quieted, he said: ‘Paul, it's not easy. Classmates, television, advertisers. First, they try to humiliate you by pushing false ideals. Then they try to con you into believing they can transform you. They use hypnotic ads to make you swallow the lies they peddle and want you addicted to. There's no valid reason, Paul — no valid reason at all — for people to hate their bodies or themselves. But advertisers want us feel we're Cinderella's sisters and tell us their products can turn us into Cinderella. Paul, if a body were so valuable, we wouldn't get rid of corpses . . . The body is a container for consciousness — nothing more. And consciousness, awareness, is what we should cultivate. Our intellects, our compassion for others — that's what we should cultivate. Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying we shouldn't take care of our bodies, eating well and exercising to make them function properly. You don't want the container to leak or get brittle. But we don't have to think of bodies in terms of ugly and beautiful. Beauty and ugliness are in the acts we commit. First commandment: Love yourself. Second: Define yourself; that is to say, resist all those who come ready to stuff you into their moulds.'

“Jay, next, he made me look him in the eye, and he asked me: ‘What is it about same-sex desire that bothers you?'

“‘It's freaky. It's not natural.'

“‘
Not natural
. I see. You were made in a lab, or was it a factory?'

“‘I don't understand.'

“‘You mean you gestated in a womb like every other human being? Who the hell are we to say that any part of what nature gives birth to isn't natural? The gall! You've fallen into the trap set by our persecutors. They hide behind religious tomes and laws they and their ancestors create to justify their dirty work. They are the perverts, not us. Ignore them, Paul, and look to your own happiness.'

“Jay, over the next two months, he and I talked about all sorts of things: about his first boyfriend; about having to tell his mother — his father died when he was 12 — he would stop coming home if she didn't stop pestering him about grandchildren; about a gay uncle who'd committed suicide because his father had forced him to get married and he couldn't bring himself to tell his wife she wasn't what he wanted; about hate mail his students or colleagues — he didn't know which — sent him in the early years of his university career. ‘We have to cultivate an inner strength to fight all this and make sure it doesn't poison our psyche.' He told me to phone him if I ever needed to talk.” Paul quieted, relaxed, grew contemplative. “Jay, older gay men should do more of this for younger men who're struggling with their sexuality.”

Paul stayed silent for a few seconds. “And it wasn't just being gay. I'd failed Grama. Not the sex thing. I'd have shared that with her. Easily. More easily than with you. Grama was an intelligent woman with a brain twice Ma's, and centuries more enlightened. She gave Brady's mother quite a lecture about a month after he and Jack fled Havre. I can still see his mother, in a blue-and-red plaid head-wrap and loose calico dress, talking to Grama. ‘Thank God he run way to Trinidad. Me hope he stay there till he dead, and don't come back here to disgrace me further. Not even for my funeral. Ma Kirton, is two weeks I did not put my head outside my door. Ma Kirton, shame almost kill me. That boy disgrace me. My only child, Ma Kirton: the only one. I did everything to raise that boy to fear the Lord. What more I could o' do?'

“‘Don't stop loving and supporting him. Is not his fault. Educated people say that is how they born. You can't change how nature made you. These things are beyond our understanding and our control.'

“‘But Ma Kirton the bible condemn it.'

“‘Plenty things the bible condemn. You buy salted pigtail from me all the time. The bible condemns that. That dress you wearing, it's made from polyester and cotton. The bible says you should be killed for wearing that. Love your son, you hear me, love your son, and give him all the support you can.'”

Paul stopped talking. He looked around the room, got up, stretched, and then sat back down. “All that stuff's been already archived. That load is on the ground now, and I won't be hoisting it again.” He stared at me intensely. “Why aren't you and Jonathan together?”

I looked away and began recalling what I'd told Jonathan, and decided to skip all but the bit about wanting a wife and children.

“Sounds like a cop-out.”

“You don't see my dilemma?”

“What
dilemma?
”

“Bisexuality. Sleeping with a man, desiring a woman. Sleeping with a woman, desiring a man.”

“So, do both. People do combined sex all the time. In threesomes and foursomes even. I've heard stories of married men who take gays home to screw them and their wives. Get a dose of the real world. See sex as recreation, like a tennis match. One of Carlos' friends wanted us to take part in an orgy. I was tempted, but in the end I chickened out.”

“Settle for pickups, right? Pleasure tools — and discard them like paper plates and cups. Right, Paul?”

“Wrong analogy. It's more like recycling. You and Jonathan are like two Victorian biddies without hats and lorgnettes. A good reason you should hitch.”

“Your reasoning makes all Victorian biddies lesbians.” I chuckled. “Paul, I'm
not
sexually attracted to him.”

“Come on! He's not
that
bad. He's not bad-looking at all. Just kind o' intense. Wound up, that's all. Nothing there a few orgasms won't uncoil. He's tall, well proportioned. A trifle effeminate, but when his blue eyes light up and he smiles — oh boy. And his buns are cute. Seriously, Jay, there's more than enough there to turn you on. And he has a mind. Think about that. Loyal partners with good minds are hard to find. Most people are one or the other, not both.”

“Sounds like you're attracted to him . . . Jonathan's a brother, Paul.”

“You're rationalizing. He wants you for a lover.”

“Well, I didn't know that at the beginning. Gays talk about David and Jonathan being lovers . . .”

“Yeah, I read Stephen Schecter's poem after I heard a review of it on CBC. I was tempted to pass it on to you, but I was afraid you'd out me to Ma.”

“Jonathan used to tell me about his sexual frustrations and the kind o' guys that turned him on: dark guys,
foncé.
Mediterranean, Latin-American types, I thought. For a while he dated a Portuguese guy.”

“Probably an ebonophile. Useless baggage, Jay. Drop it. Just jump into the sack with him. If you have to, take a couple of drinks before to loosen up or smoke a joint. Your hormones will do the rest. God, you're so earnest!”

For a while neither of us spoke.

“Constraints,” I mumbled.

“What?”

“Constraints.”

“You know, this is like
so
tiresome. Get real. Gay men meet and have sex in dark places without even seeing each other's faces, without telling each other their names. You're squirming. I'll skip the rest.”

Another long silence. Paul broke it. “A little bed-hopping hurts no one. You'll lose Jonathan. You know how hard it is to find meaningful love in the gay world? Harder still after you've passed your prime.”

“When's that?”

“Thirty. Look at the websites where gay guys post their profiles, you'll see. I saw one the other day by this overweight, midget of a guy, 61 years old and looking every day of 80. You know what it said? ‘If you're over 30, fat, ugly, and effeminate, please don't contact me.' Jay, you have two and a half years — two and a half!” He grinned. “Afterwards it's a fire sale.”

W
ITH THE MONEY
I inherited from Anna's insurance and pension fund — I didn't need to spend the $46, 000 I'd got directly from Grama — I bought the condo I'm moving into today. The week before Anna took sick, she and I had gone over the details of the type of condo she should buy. She'd wanted one with three bedrooms, so there'd always be a room for Paul. It was then that I became aware of the wealth my grandmother had left. Petroleum, Coca Cola, and other shares Granddad had bought in the 1940s netted over US$300,000, and there were the shares Grama had bought in IBM, Cable and Wireless, British Telecom and other companies. They were worth almost as much. I gave Paul his share and begged him not to spend the capital. “We trivialize what we haven't worked for. I plan to repay what I've taken to buy the condo, and to give the earnings from Grama's money to charity. Just remember that you want to be a writer. Earnings from that money might well make the difference between eating and starving.”

“As long as there's food in your house, Jay, I'll never starve.”

“Don't assume that I'll always be around.”

He didn't answer.

Two weeks earlier, Paul said he hoped cultural differences wouldn't “come between the three of us.”

“
Three of
us
?”

“Well, you know, when Carlos comes and we're living together . . . ”

“Living together!” . . . “Oh no. I need my own space.”

He stared at me stone-faced, shoulders slumped.

“Paul, my second bedroom will be my study. I'm not saying that . . .” — I stopped —
you couldn't stay with me in a pinch, if you needed to.
It was unwise to give Paul such an opening.

“What are you not saying?”

“Paul, let's get this straight . . .” I took three loud breaths before continuing. “Paul, I came to Canada, glad that finally, finally, I could be close with my mother. While she was in St. Vincent I couldn't. She was too afraid of Daddy. It's like she didn't know if she had the right to show me affection. Whenever he was around she was afraid any affectionate gesture from her to me would anger him. One time he shouted at her: ‘Stop hugging him up? You want him to grow up like a gal?' Then Ma went away and left us with Grama. Grama was good and kind to me, but I think she saw me as something already warped by my father. Maybe it was I who rejected her. Maybe I felt that if I got close to her I would be disloyal to Ma. Who knows?

“And then I came here . . . And you and Ma made me grow up faster than I wanted . . . I had to comfort Ma when you abused her; when your abuse got to be too much and she wanted to put you out, I had to defend you. You want to know why I'm not involved with anyone? I'll tell you. I'm weary. Exhausted. My own space — peace, rest — it's what I long for.

“If there was a time when I wasn't responsible for you, I don't remember it. From now on, Paul, I'll be responsible for myself. No Jonathan or Janet. At least not before I've caught my breath and find out who Jay is and what he wants from life.”

Paul stared at me, attentively, silently.

“I'm not blaming you for any of this. And I don't want you to blame yourself either. None of this was your choosing. Not even your cruel behaviour here.”

Paul looked away, his head hung low.

“All I am saying is that I want space in which to catch my breath and grow; that now you must assume responsibility for your own life, for your decisions, for your behaviour. In retrospect, your trip away wasn't a bad thing, just that you handled it badly.”

Paul nodded slowly, stared ahead of him, pressed his lips, and pulled at his chin. “Funny” — he was looking away from me — “I always took it for granted that you'd be always there — always, but I never wondered what it meant for you . . . That time when you gave me the money to cut loose from Nine Lives — I never even paid you back — and you hugged me and cried and begged me not to disappoint myself and Grama — you didn't include yourself — you won't know how important it was for me. You pulled me out from a current that was about to drown me.” He paused, glanced sideways at me. “Afterwards, it was like, I can't disappoint Jay; I mustn't disappoint Jay. That's when I began turning my life around. That's when, Jay.” He fell silent and stared at the floor. “You are right. You must be tired. I see that now. In your place, I would be too.” He walked toward me, put his hands on my shoulders and looked up into my eyes. “Just promise me that you won't ever abandon me.”

“I promise.”

Two days after this conversation, Paul found a studio apartment on Fort and Tupper, a few metro stops from my own place near Maisonneuve and Champlain.

***

I've known since April that this September I'll begin teaching college-level history. I shared the news with Paul the day I got the appointment letter. Paul was sitting in the armchair in the living room.

“So you're going to teach.” Paul stood, walked to the living room window, and stared out on to Linton. “Going to teach history, you are. Whose? You think you'll like it?” He turned his head to make eye contact with me.

I shrugged. I was standing in the dinette with my buttocks leaning against the table, the appointment letter in my hand. “Time will tell.”

“Teachers,” Paul resumed staring onto the street. “The civilian corps, doing with books what armed forces like NATO do abroad with guns and bombs. Most teachers aren't bright enough to know how they're being used.” He smiled cynically and a long silence followed. “It's one of the reasons I revolted in high school. Most humans, more than 90 percent, will never be more than tools,
quincaillerie
, in the hands of the powerful. In university you studied Howard Zinn. He got it down pat about the powerful, how they pay — I say bribe — the executives they hire with enough of the spoils to buy their loyalty while they screw wealth out of everyone else. You must read
Las Venas abiertas de América Latina
, Eduardo Galeano's book. And if they allow you to, teach it to your students. It's been translated into English. I read somewhere that the wealth of the world's 300 richest people exceeds that of 40 percent of the world's entire population.” He walked to the sofa and sat down. “In Latin America they use troops, corrupt politicians, and assassins to insure it. Here they use teachers, politicians, and the media; of course, they own the media.”

“So, are you preparing yourself for a career on Wall Street?” I asked him.

Paul put his left hand behind his neck, his right on chin, and smiled his smile of embarrassment, all the while slowly shaking his head. “I'm going to write. Books like Zinn's, Galeano's, and Rodney's. I'll be like Thoreau's rooster. I'll wake sleeping humanity up.”

“And the capitalist press will help you?”

Paul crinkled his nose, bit his lower lip, and was silent for a moment. “I'll publish them myself.”

“Naiveté, Paul. You're naïve. Zinn, Galeano, Rodney, their ideas are out there because they don't threaten anybody. In any case most people are already programmed to cooperate in their own oppression; some even promote it. It's why capitalism is so successful.”

Paul nodded almost imperceptibly, brought his right hand to his lips, and bit the nail of his index finger. Lowering his hand, he said, still nodding: “Humanity is in deep shit, Jay. Deep shit . . . But we have to find a reason to go on living. Teach your students to think, Jay. Do like Bill.”

Now I look across at Paul stretched out on the sofa reading
La Presse
. That's the Paul I love, the one Grama sought to mould, the one, had she been alive, she would be proud of.

Tomorrow, Paul leaves for his second trip to see Carlos
.
I hope Carlos has a good sense of humour because it would be difficult not to call him Maria. I laugh. If all goes as planned, they will come back together. On Paul's trip in February, he wasn't allowed to re-enter Guatemala because he'd overstayed his time on his earlier visit. At least that's the story he gave me. He went to Mexico, to Comitán, and Carlos joined him there. The “sissy exercises” he'd spurned before, he now pursues enthusiastically. His body looks better, firmer, and he has lost another four kilos.

I recall our conversation on the back porch in St. Vincent. I hope Paul doesn't have impossible expectations of Carlos. “I am beginning to feel afraid,” he told me the day after he bought his ticket for this trip. We were in the dinette wrapping dishes and putting them in cartons. “I'm worried about all the things that could go wrong.”

I was too, not the least that for Carlos Paul might be no more than an immigrant visa to Canada. “You're wise to worry a little, but why paralyze yourself with fear? Just be there for him. You don't have to win all the battles. I know you on that score. You and Carlos have been apart for some time. You'll need to readjust to each other, and you'll be discovering parts of him you don't yet know. You haven't seen him outside of his family and his culture. And he'll be learning new things about you and about himself as he faces new experiences. That takes a lot of energy, creates a lot of anxiety, and can unleash a lot of ugliness. You know what I'm talking about.”

“So you think it will be difficult?”

“Think back to how lost you felt when we first arrived. Try to imagine Carlos with no support community and having to accept minimum-wage work. I suspect he held your hand a lot when you were in Huehuetenango. Be prepared to hold his when he comes. As to competition from other guys, what can I say? Gays aren't famous for fidelity.” I chuckled. “Your forehead's wide; has space for many horns.”

“Go to hell!” He balled his free fist and waved it at me. He put down the plate that he was wrapping and fell into deep thought. Then he moved to where I was on the other side of the table and embraced me. Smiling and staring intensely into my eyes, he said: “If things go sour, you'll be there for me, right?”

I nodded.

He squeezed me tightly. “That's
my
brother.”

Now, recalling all this, I would like to tell him that at times nothing fills the sort of emptiness he felt in San Jose. It's our attempts to avoid it, to erase it, to flee from it that turn some people into alcoholics, drug addicts, or religious fanatics; and, rather than face it, many people endure abusive relationships. Feelings of emptiness are a part of life and have to be understood, struggled with, and borne, even as we try to forget how easily life could wow us one minute and shred us in the next. But Paul must know this. He rides the waves of turbulence while I'm a mere step from stagnation.