“What, I’m not enough for you?”
“Research, Tony. For the show.”
“Sure, sure.”
“So,” I asked him, “what happened to Brent? How did he wind up in the river?”
“We don’t know. It could have been accidental. Blood tests showed high levels of Ecstasy, Valium, and Viagra. There’s some cutting and bruising, but nothing inconsistent with falling into a river and scraping along the bottom. Maybe he was partying and took a tumble on his way home?”
“He wasn’t that kind of person.”
“He was a porn actor, Kevvy.”
“So? That doesn’t mean he was a drug-abusing sex addict.”
“It doesn’t make him a model citizen, either.”
This wouldn’t be the first time we fought about the moral implications of working in the sex industry. Since I was still earning my living as an escort when Tony and I reunited, it wasn’t a theoretical discussion, either. Nor was it one I was in the mood to have again tonight.
“Let’s talk about something else,” I said.
“Probably a good idea,” Tony agreed. He scooted me off his lap and pulled a slim reporter’s notebook from his pocket. “But let me just get his full name and employer’s contact info from you. Anyone else you know who knew him, too.”
“Actually, I just got his parents’ number. I was going to call and see if they knew where he was, but I guess I won’t be needing it now.”
Tony frowned. “Catching the bad guys-that’s why I became I cop, Kevvy. I still love the feeling that comes with bringing justice. But notifying parents that their child’s dead? That part’s tough.”
I turned around and kissed him. “You’ll be very kind, I know. But there are some things you should know…”
I filled Tony in on the broad strokes of what I’d learned about Brent’s severed relationship with his parents. I also gave him Charlie’s and Lucas’s numbers. Not as suspects, but as lovers who needed to be notified. I supposed I could have called them, but I figured it’d be better coming from Tony. He knew how to put things like this. I’d follow with my condolences later.
“Do you need to go now?” I asked when I was done.
“To work on the case? No, it’ll wait till morning. It’s late. Might as well let his parents have their last good night’s sleep for a while.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “From what I heard, his parents won’t be too broken up about it. They tossed him aside years ago.”
“Maybe,” Tony said, “but I bet they never stopped hoping he’d change and come back to them.”
“If they wanted him in their lives, they wouldn’t have kicked him into the streets because of who he was, ” I snapped, the words coming out with more bitterness than I’d intended. “That’s not tough love. That’s hate.”
Tony knew he’d pushed another button. “I’m not saying they had any right to do what they did,” he said, using his calm-the-horses voice. “I’m just saying that, when you have children, it’s not that easy to stop caring about what happens to them. Even if you try to. If you were a parent, you’d understand.”
If I were a parent, huh? So much for Rafi Has Two Daddies.
Who did he think has been spending every other weekend with him and Rafi? Whose apartment was Rafi sleeping in? Who was taking the kid to school? What was I, the nanny? I may have been half-Jewish, but that didn’t make me Fran Drescher.
Another conversation I didn’t feel like having tonight. More land mines to tiptoe around.
Was it possible Tony and I just weren’t meant to be?
Or was I feeling unusually pessimistic having just heard about Brent’s death?
“Well,” I said, wondering if we could fast-forward to the make-up sex without having to have the fight, “I’m glad you don’t have to run out again. I’ve missed you.” I ducked my head and regarded him through my bangs. My patented do-me look.
“Besides,” Tony said, ignoring the do-me look for what possibly might have been the first time, “I have to figure out how to ID the vic at the station.”
“What do you mean?” I pointed at the Advocate. “Just show them this.”
“And how would I explain that I was looking at porn ads in a gay magazine?” he asked. “Or should I just say my ‘boyfriend’ gave it to me?”
Wow. Remember that part about not wanting to step on any land mines? Tony just hit one or two with a hammer.
Boom-fucking-boom.
Only, the mine wasn’t filled with explosives. It was like one of those flash bombs that police use to incapacitate suspects with blinding light. And in that moment of searing clarity, a truth I’d buried under the darkness of denial was suddenly revealed.
Tony and I might not make it.
I knew we had our problems. We’d even separated over them. But I don’t think I ever believed they were insurmountable. A part of me was certain we belonged together. Like a couple that meets cute in a romantic comedy but has to endure all the genre obstacles before they finally reach their happy ending.
But, right now, I wasn’t feeling the love and I wasn’t having any laughs. Maybe we were less The Main Event and more The Way We Were.
We might not make it to the final reel.
It must have shown on my face.
“What?” Tony asked. He waited.
I couldn’t think of a thing to say.
He looked at me being speechless. Another first.
“Kevvy, I didn’t mean it like that,” he began, assuming I was upset about his ongoing refusal to come out at work. “You know how it is. It’s the New York City Police Department, babe. All the ‘diversity training’ in the world isn’t going to-”
I stood up. “I’ve heard this before, Tony.”
Tony rose to meet me. “Babe.” He brushed my hair out of my eyes. “You know I…” He moved in for a kiss. Sure, now the do-me look was kicking in.
I pushed him away. “I’m just tired, Tone. And sad.”
“I know. You just found out that a friend of yours passed away, and I’m playing cop with you. That was a douchebag move on my part, Kevvy. You were right. We should have changed the topic half an hour ago. Come here.” He enveloped me in a non-sexual buddy hug.
I didn’t mean to and I wished I hadn’t, but I started to cry against his strong chest. He just held me, even when I knew he must be uncomfortable, his shirt soaked through with my tears.
“It’s okay,” he said, “let it out. It’s hard when you lose someone.” He rubbed my back in circular motions.
I liked Brent. I was sorry to hear what had happened to him. But I wasn’t crying for him.
It was the increasingly likely prospect that Tony and I could never be together that was breaking my heart.
Sometimes, when I’m feeling especially sorry for myself, I think in rhyme. Self-indulgent poetry sprung from too many readings of The Bell Jar in high school. Worse, with my ADHD, those couplets often stick in my head, repeating themselves in a torturous, self-inflicted loop.
So, as I shuddered and sobbed in Tony’s arms, I kept hearing myself think the words I couldn’t tell him.
It isn’t Brent’s passing that fills me with fears.
It isn’t his sad fate that brings me to tears.
It’s losing the man I thought I’d been born for.
It’s the loss of you, Tony, I weep and I mourn for.
Later, I thought, I’ll have to write that down. Then burn it.
As Bette Davis so memorably said in All About Eve, “I detest cheap sentiment.”
That didn’t mean I couldn’t wallow in it, though.
