The Role Players (2 page)

Although we took our time getting to the baggage area, when we found the carousel for our flight, the first bags were just starting to come off the conveyor and the feeding frenzy of passengers scrambling to retrieve their luggage and get the hell out of the airport had just begun.

“Give me the tags, Dick,” Jonathan said. “I'll go get our suitcases. I know what to do, and no sense all of us getting caught up in that crowd.”

“Okay,” I said, exchanging the claim checks for his book bag so he could wend his way more easily through the mob. Smiling broadly, he dove into the pack and expertly sidestepped and swerved and wriggled his way to the carousel.

As he disappeared momentarily into the crowd, Chris smiled and said, “Think he's having a good time so far?”

I nodded. “He hides it well, doesn't he?”

Since ours had been a nonstop flight, I was fairly sure there wasn't much chance that our bags had gotten misdirected to Lisbon, and I was right. Less than five minutes later we saw Jonathan retrieve one bag and set it at his feet between himself and the carousel. He reached for another, looked at the tags, and pulled it off the carousel. I handed the book bag to Chris and moved forward to meet Jonathan as he wended his way back through the crowd.

“Ah, the luck o' the Quinlans,” I said as I reached to take one of the bags. Rejoining Chris and Max, we followed them to the exit.

A friend in their building had lent him his car—like many New Yorkers, Chris and Max didn't feel the need to own one themselves—and soon we were headed into the city, catching increasingly frequent glimpses of the impressive skyline across the river. As a special concession to Jonathan's first trip to New York, Max took us over the Queensborough Bridge, which brought us onto Manhattan at the bottom of Central Park. Max turned up Park Avenue to 96th, then through the park to Central Park West. Chris acted as tour guide, pointing out various landmarks and points of interest as we drove by.

By the time we'd turned left on Broadway and were approaching Times Square—something I know few New Yorkers in their right mind would ever do in their own car if they could avoid it—I was beginning to think Jonathan might be close to sensory overload. He'd been silent most of the trip (a pretty strong indication right there), and he just kept staring in apparent disbelief that we were actually there.

While we weren't exactly from Hicksville Junction ourselves, it surely wasn't New York, either, and for a kid who was originally from a small town in Wisconsin and who'd never been on an airplane until today, it was all pretty overwhelming.

*

As we entered Greenwich Village, Jonathan pointed to a street sign and said happily, “Christopher Street!
The
Christopher Street?”

“Yep,” Max said.

Jonathan turned his head to keep the sign in sight as long as possible, then turned back in his seat.

“Wow! You're so lucky to live in Greenwich Village!”

“Actually, we're in the West Village,” Chris said. “But close enough.”

Max and Chris lived on a narrow, tree-lined street less than ten blocks from Washington Square. Max pulled up in front of a very attractive four-story building that blended in perfectly with its three- and four-story neighbors. Chris, Jonathan and I got out and retrieved our suitcases from the trunk, after which Max drove off to find a parking space. Jonathan slung his book bag over one shoulder and picked up one of the suitcases as I took the other.

Chris led the way up the steps to the bright-blue front door, taking out his keys as we climbed. Like every other building on the block, the front entrance was raised above the street, allowing what might have been a basement in most buildings back home to in fact be a sunken apartment with its own few steps leading down from a wrought iron gate.

The hall, when we entered, was neat, clean, and well lit. A stairway to the left led up, and we followed Chris to the second floor. We walked back past the stairs to a door close to the window overlooking the street. He took another key, unlocked the door, pushed it open, and waved us in.

“Wow, Chris!” Jonathan exclaimed, looking around the high-ceilinged, cream-colored room, brightly lit from the large front windows. “This is fantastic! Look, Dick! They've got a
fireplace
!”

I had to admit, Jonathan was right about the apartment. Chris's decorating skills were clearly in evidence, and I thought back to the apartment we'd shared when we were lovers fresh out of college and with very little money. Even then, Chris had done a great job with it. We'd actually built our first couch out of plywood and Styrofoam, and we haunted Goodwill for most of our other furniture, which we refinished ourselves.

Nothing Goodwill here.

“You like it?” Chris asked, smiling.

“I'm impressed.” I said. “You've really done very well for yourself.”

I noticed several small pieces of artwork, a couple sculptures, a crystal cigarette lighter and ashtray, and some other things I recognized immediately from our days together. An odd feeling, in a way. And I'm sure Chris must have felt the same way when he and Max visited us. Though I'd moved from the apartment we'd shared, many of the
things
were the same.

Noticing we were still holding onto our suitcases, Chris said, “Come on; I'll show you your room and the rest of the place, what little of it there is. I'm afraid the living room's as big as the rest of the apartment.”

We followed him to and down a short hall. To the left was a very small kitchen, across from which was an open bedroom door.

“Our room,” Chris said with a nod of his head as we passed it. Next to it, on the same side of the hall, was a bathroom with a claw-foot, bright white cast iron tub that had been retrofitted for use as a shower. Across from the bathroom, and behind the kitchen, was another small room with a comfortable looking couch, a desk, and several bookcases.

“The sofa's a sleeper,” Chris said. “I hope you don't mind. It's really pretty comfortable. We needed a den, and there just wasn't room for another full bed. I'll pull it out for you later.”

Jonathan, who had been taking it all in, said, “I've slept on a lot of couches,” he said, “but never one that made into a bed. This'll be great!”

Chris opened the door to a small, empty closet with lots of hangers. “I hope this will be big enough for your things.” We assured him it would, and he excused himself to go off to start coffee while we unpacked.

As we walked into the kitchen…well, actually the kitchen was really too small to be practical for three people, so we mostly stood in the doorway…the front door opened and Max came in.

“I love New York,” he said, shaking his head, “but I'd
never
have a car here!”

We joined Max at the teak dining room table in the dining area at the kitchen end of the living room, and Chris came out with a tray with four mugs of coffee, an open carton of half-and-half, a bowl of sugar packets, and a couple of spoons.

“What?” I asked. “Not the good china?”

“This
is
the good china, at least for family, which includes you. I thought you might be insulted if we started treating you like guests.”

He had a point.

Max looked back and forth between Jonathan and me. “I see married life seems to agree with both of you,” he said. He looked at Jonathan appreciatively. “You, especially. What happened to that skinny kid we saw just a couple months ago?”

I guess I hadn't really realized it, seeing Jonathan every day as I did. But Max was right. Jonathan had filled out very nicely.

Jonathan blushed. “Well, when you haul trees and bushes and fifty-pound bags of mulch around all day…”

“Well, whatever you're doing, keep it up!”

We drank our coffee and small talked about things that had been going on in our lives that we hadn't covered in phone calls and letters. Max wanted to hear about the cases I'd been working on since their visit and I sketched in a couple of my more interesting ones. The conversation eventually got around to the play.

“Sorry to hear about one of the leads dying,” I said.

“Yeah,” Max sighed, sitting back in his chair. “A couple cops stopped by today just as we were getting ready to leave for the airport, and I told them what I could, which wasn't much. I gather they're pretty much convinced it was just a robbery gone wrong. But Rod's death was a real blow. He was a recognizable name; he would have pulled in a lot of business.”

“You think the play won't draw enough business on its own?” I asked, a little surprised that Max's concern seemed to be more for the success of the show than for the poor guy's death.

Apparently realizing what he'd said, Max did a quick backpedal. “Sorry,” he said with a small smile. “I'm sure the play will do just fine. At least I hope so. It's just that Rod was, well, he was kind of…”

“I think ‘slut' is the word you're looking for,” with a very strange smile aimed directly at Max.

“Well, ‘slut' might be a little strong,” Max said, “but…”

Chris looked quickly from Jonathan to me. “Sorry,” he said brightly. “Just a little of the jealous lover cropping up in me, I guess.”

Jonathan and I looked at one another, not quite sure what to say, since neither of us had a clue as to what Chris was referring to.

Chris smiled sweetly at Max and said, “Tell them, Lamb Chop.”

Max shuddered and gave Chris a quick grin. “I
hate
it when you call me that!”

Chris returned the grin. “I know. So tell them before they think we're on our way to divorce court.”

Max gave another deep sigh. “Chris walked into the bathroom at rehearsal one night and saw Rod reaching out to grope me at the urinals. It's not like I'd been standing there for hours just hoping he'd come in and make a pass.”

“I know,” Chris said. “Rod had the hots for Max from day one. The minute I saw him follow Max into the bathroom that night I knew what he had in mind.”

“Rod had the hots for
everybody
from day one,” Max amended. “You, too, if memory serves. Like the Sunday afternoon he showed up here when he thought I was at an A.A. meeting?”

Chris's grin grew. “Yeah, that was kind of awkward, wasn't it? But I'm sure it was just an innocent drop-by visit.” He leaned toward Jonathan and said in a stage whisper, “Actually I gave him the wrong time by accident.”

“Uh huh,” Max said.

“Didn't Dick tell me Rod and the guy who wrote the play were lovers?” Jonathan asked.

Chris and Max nodded in unison. “Yep,” Chris said, “which just adds to the general merriment.”

“How so?”

“Well,” Max explained, “Gene Morrison, the playwright, got his start here in New York, but then got lured away by Hollywood to write for the movies. That's where he met Rod. I don't know if you remember him; he went by the name of Rod Pearce? He played the soldier who got killed by that other soldier he made a pass at in…uh…”

“
War and Destiny
,” I said. “Jesus, I thought I was the only one who remembers that movie. He really was a walking wet dream!”

Jonathan smiled. “Tell me! On nights when my brother Samuel was away, I used to lie there in bed and think of Rod Pearce and…uh….” He blushed furiously and looked at the table.

“Yeah,” I said. “Me too.” Max, Chris, and I exchanged smiles.

“Anyway,” Max continued, “Rod had a short-term contract with one of the studios, but
War and Destiny
was the closest he ever came to making it big. He was a little too openly gay and refused to play the starlet-dating games the studio insisted on, so his contract wasn't renewed. He met Gene at a party just before his contract expired, and he recognized a good thing when he saw it. Gene is a great guy, but like a lot of writers, he's basically pretty insecure and really, really quiet until you get to know him. So here we have a quiet, shy Gene meeting Rod-the-never-shy hunk, and the rest is history.

“Gene hadn't written a new stage play in nearly ten years, and he thought…or Rod convinced him…that writing one for Rod would be a way to help Rod's career and get Gene back to doing what he loved best…theater.”

“Did Mr. Morrison know Rod was playing around on him?” Jonathan asked.

Chris got up from the table to get more coffee, pausing behind Max to run one hand casually down under the front of Max's shirt. Max reached up and held it through the fabric. It was a totally spontaneous gesture on both their parts, but it fairly well erased any possible thought of divorce court.

“I don't know how he couldn't have known,” Chris said. “But from what we can tell, he really loved Rod, and he wrote
Impartial Observer
for him.”

“Gee,” Jonathan said, sighing, “what a shame for Mr. Morrison.” He paused, then said, “What's the play about?”

“It's an allegory about society's increasing loss of humanity and where the world is headed. Neither of the two primary leads…Rod being the primary primary, of course…has a name. It's that kind of play.”

“So it doesn't have a happy ending then?” Jonathan, who loves happy endings, said, trying to hide his disappointment.