They didn’t say anything, they just stopped talking and looked me up and down.
“You guys know Shony Wright?”
“Why you asking?” the girl in the middle asked.
“I’m a counselor and I’m looking for her.”
“She in trouble?” the girl closest to me asked.
“Nah, I’m trying to find her. Anyone know where she went?”
“She stopped coming to school last week but sometime she do that when she go with her father,” the middle girl said. She was clearly the leader and I only expected her and the one closest to me to say anything.
“Was she doing okay? Was Shony a happy kid?”
“She’s okay. Her family is wack and her mother a crackhead.”
“That embarrass Shony?”
“What you think, mister?” She scowled at me. “Shony has it goin’ on, though. She smart, she pretty, and that girl can sing.”
The other three girls gave a series of “uh-huhs” and “Word!” at the notion that Shony could sing.
“She seem happy to you guys?”
“Mister, who you know who happy all the time?” Again with the scowl. “She happy as anybody else around here.”
I thanked the kids and they went right back to talking and yelling and snapping their gum. It was the most intelligent conversation I had all morning.
17
The news about the beatings in the park started to get some attention in the local media. The Crawford Union Star carried a story on the front page of its local section about the assaults and suggested that the beatings were hate crimes because several of the victims were gay. Channel 13 ran it as its second lead story on the six o’clock news and MetroCrawford, the local alternative newspaper, ran it as a cover story.
The attention would bring more of a police involvement, at least at first, which was a good thing. I found it a little disturbing that before the victims were identified as gay no one was really up in arms about the situation. Eli wasn’t gay, but he was beaten just as badly as if he were, and it didn’t seem right that when it was alcoholic street bums getting beaten there wasn’t a single reporter interested. Then again, there wasn’t a united front of street alcoholics in Crawford like there was a united organized front of gays and lesbians.
The Crawford Gay and Lesbian Community Center was a political force to be reckoned with in Crawford. I knew a little bit about the center from Monique, but she wasn’t a big fan of the place. She respected some of the efforts the center made but found the people there cliquish and self-serving. Monique was a proud lesbian woman and secure enough that she didn’t feel the need to shout it angrily at everyone within earshot.
With the beatings making it to the newspaper and the TV, the center decided to have a candle-lit march through the park to make a show of solidarity from Crawford’s gay and lesbian community. It was a nice idea, but I must admit I found it a tad hypocritical. Guys like Mikey and Froggy weren’t really accepted at the center because of their lifestyle. Their flamboyance and their promiscuous park activity were seen as hurtful to the overall gay and lesbian cause in Crawford. Mikey and Froggy fit too many old stereotypes that shamed the yuppified nouveau gays and lesbians, and my guess is that if they ever showed up at the center, they would not be welcomed with open arms. Sure, they would get a free AIDS test, but then they would politely be shown the door or at least made to feel that going out the door would be a good move.
Just the same, the beatings gave the center a visible opportunity to demonstrate to Crawford the power of numbers and the strength of the gay community. Monique was going to go because, as she explained, for all her differences with the center, the cause was a good one and a chance to let people know that what was going on was not acceptable in a civilized culture.
I went too, partly because I felt like doing something to honor Mikey and partly to see if there was anything for me to learn. The march began just after sunset and it went around the whole perimeter of the lake within the park, finishing at the bridge where there were to be some speeches and a prayer or two.
I fell in with my candle in one of the back rows, and I’d like to say I was perfectly comfortable and that being one of the very few heterosexuals in a group of gay people didn’t make me feel funny. But it did, in the same way that I feel a little strange when I’m the only white person in a room. I think most people who are honest with themselves will admit feelings like this, although many holier-than-thou super-liberals will say otherwise. It made me start to think about what it might be like to be in the minority and how that could shape your entire view of the world. Putting yourself in a position as a minority is probably a good thing to do once in a while to give you some idea of how a fair portion of the world feels.
The march moved slowly, and I recognized a few faces but not enough to really bond with anyone. I let my eyes wander through the crowd and I saw all types of people. There were men who looked effeminate and men who looked rough and lots in between. There were a lot of women with no makeup, sensible shoes, and short hair. There were some women with exaggeratedly tough veneers with just a little too much leather, denim, and piercings. It seemed like some were trying incredibly hard to make an impression with their appearance, and there were others who seemed to make their statements by not trying too hard to state anything.
As I marched on, I noticed a familiar pair of jeans a couple of rows up ahead of me. I let my eyes travel up the legs to the back and head and realized it was a very familiar pair of jeans. It was Lisa and she was walking hand in hand with a short, squat woman in a leather biker jacket and so many piercings in her face that it looked like she fell down a flight of stairs while carrying a tackle box. I found myself staring even when I didn’t want to.
While the march slowed, the squatty tackle box woman ran her fingers through Lisa’s hair. Lisa looked her in the eye and then the two of them kissed. At first it was just a quick lover’s-type peck, but in short order they were doing the whole tonsil-hockey thing. It was like a bad car wreck-I couldn’t not watch, but it gave me kind of a surreal feeling, like it was happening but it wasn’t. I’ve seen old girlfriends kiss somebody new, but it was always another guy. When that sort of thing happened in front of me I usually went off by myself and listened to Elvis sing something like “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” or “That’s When Your Heartache Begins.” Elvis didn’t have a song for this. The closest I could come was “A Fool Such as I,” but I wasn’t sure that would’ve worked.
You know, I’ll admit that on occasion I’ve accidentally looked in porno mags, you know, if there was an interesting article or something. They almost always have some sort of lesbian pictorial. I don’t ever recall one of the models being five foot one with a Dick Butkus hairdo and a face that would overwork a scrapyard magnet. Geez, to think all these years the dirty magazine business has been misleading me.
Eventually, Butkus got her tongue out of my ex-girlfriend’s esophagus and when their lips parted, a gobber of spit got hung up on the Butkus’s second lip piercing from the left. This car wreck was getting worse, and apparently so was my staring because Butkus turned around and saw me.
“Hey, take a picture next time-it lasts longer,” she said in her Ernest Borgnine voice.
It didn’t register with me because I was in a lesbo-induced trance.
“You, buddy, you got a problem?”
I came out of my hypnotic state and realized I was being confronted by an angry, semi-dwarfed, metalicized Dick Butkus. My mouth opened but nothing came out. In my head, Elvis was singing the first verse of “A Fool Such as I,” and I couldn’t imagine anybody ever feeling so foolish.
“Uh me?” was all I could get out.
“Never mind,” Butkus said. “Asshole.”
Next to her, Lisa waved and seemed as awkward as any person who ever lived. I waved back, ignoring Butkus. The two of them turned around, and I could tell that Lisa had to explain a few things. As they walked away, Butkus put her hand on Lisa’s ass.
I still hadn’t moved when a voice distracted me.
“Mr. Duffy, whatever are you doing here?” It was Froggy. He was standing, thrusting his one hip out and looking at me with his big brown eyes.
“Hey Froggy,” I said. “Here to show my respect for Mikey and the others.”
