Best Friends (56 page)

“There are mountains. There are rivers. Did you see the movie
A River Runs Through It?
That was actually filmed in Montana, but the landscape—”

Oh sure, I was thinking, there's a movie Sally could tolerate. A drippy movie. “How do I fly there?” I interrupted. “Do I go through St. Louis?”

“I'm not sure,” Sally said. “I'll look it up for you.”

“Where do I fly to, Boise?”

“We flew into Salt Lake City; we're pretty close to the Utah state line.”

“I'll have to check a map,” I said. “You've lost me.”

 

 

 

I HAD A NEW PATIENT at two-thirty, and I was in such a hurry that I barreled into the exam room without looking at the name on the chart. There was Cleve Burton, Mr. Angry Man himself.

I don't see partners, I don't see possibles.

“I was hoping it wouldn't come to this,” he said drily, catching my eye and looking away.

I opened the chart, leafed to the lab results section. It was true. I sighed. “When did you find out?”

“I took an antibiotic for a sinus infection, and then I got this yeast infection that would not go away. That concerned me. So I went to the health department for the test.”

“I'm sorry.”

“To quote Hymen Roth talking to Michael Corleone: ‘This is the life we've chosen.' I'm not surprised, in a way.” We looked at each other. I knew that the choices he was talking about had nothing to do with any harebrain theory of homosexuality as a conscious preference. “
Godfather II,
” Cleve said. “Do you know that movie? I watched it last night on video. Great film.”

“It's my best friend's favorite movie. That or the original
Godfather,
she can't decide. She loves those movies even though she hates violence. I don't think she's seen every minute of either one. She closes her eyes. She ran into James Caan once at a dry cleaner, and she said, ‘Santino!' It just popped out.”

“And what did James Caan say?”

“Nothing. He winked.” I added an explanation: “My friend used to live in Los Angeles.” She was thrilled to be out, she'd told me, now that everyone in the city was obsessed with O.J.

“Oh, she must have seen all kinds of stars.”

“She did. She actually used to make movies, or her father did. Not Hollywood-type movies. They made what they called blue movies—a euphemism if I've ever heard one.”

Cleve smiled again. “I've seen a couple of those.”

“Her father used to target the gay market, actually.”

“Really? Any famous titles?”

I tried to remember the few I'd heard. “Let me think.
Bathhouse Fantasy
was one.”

“I know
Bathhouse Fantasy.
”

“You're kidding. Really?”

“Intimately. It's very good. Excellent production values, and some exceptionally well-endowed actors. There's a real favorite of mine in it, a certain man of color who wears a bow tie.”

Oh, my. Mr. Bow Tie certainly got around. “I hope the movie had lots of condoms,” I said firmly. “My friend's father was very big on condoms.”

“Thousands of condoms,” Cleve said. “Condoms on everyone.”

“It
is
a bathhouse fantasy.”

We both chuckled.

“I'm glad you have a sense of humor,” Cleve said, shifting in his chair. “That'll help me. I'm not known for it myself.”

I thought of his tirade-laden articles, the picket lines he'd organized outside selected restaurants unfriendly to gays, his “gays and druggies walking hand in hand with their executioners.”

“I try,” I said.

“I hear you're the best.”

We looked at each other again. I shrugged. “Thanks,” I said. For some reason, tears came to my eyes.

“ IT ' S NOT BEAUTIFUL, the cottage I mean. It's cinder-block with a metal roof, but it's responsible, it's nearly fireproof, we'll never be calling in the forest service to rescue us if there's a fire. And we've already got ideas for the house.”

“A fire? You're in Idaho, Sally, not L.A.”

Sally laughed. “There are lots of fires up here. It's all national forest, and there's been a drought for years. If lightning hits or someone tosses a match, things just go. There's this whole urban-outcasts group up here—urban outcasts with money—and they build these big wooden houses with cedar-shake roofs up one-lane roads, just asking for it, really—tinderboxes—and when the fires hit, they go crazy and want firefighters helicoptered in. It's like you'd say, they don't believe in natural consequences.” Sally laughed a bitter laugh. “But who does? Not when it's us. But our new house will be fireproof.” She laughed again. “A point of pride, of course.”

“You sound happy,” I said cautiously.

“The scenery is gorgeous. And the kids can walk down to the river and fish a mile away, and there are all sorts of trails, and the school bus is a converted minivan.”

“I'll have to come out and visit you.” I didn't really want to.

“Oh, you will! It's idyllic. It's paradise.”

Was it? It didn't sound like paradise, with its prideful residents and antagonisms and competing houses. Probably Range Rovers roving down dirt roads, and fax machines clicking away in kitchens-cum-offices. Why should I want to see such people? Why would Sally want to leave Los Angeles for such pretensions? At least in L.A. the pretensions were up front.

 

 

 

“ COLORADO AGAIN?” I said, swallowing.

Ted paused, looked over at me: “I thought you might agree to two weeks this year.”

We were back at our Burger King. Stephanie, Ted and Mary's oldest daughter, was wearing lacy nylons and little heels. The younger girls were just as fancy. Whatever their mother's idea of style was, it wasn't mine. “I want a salad, Daddy,” Stephanie said. “No dressing. And iced-tea with a sweetener.” Stephanie was a good year younger than Aury. I looked at Ted with alarm, but he didn't seem to notice.

“Aury will have a Whopper meal with milk,” I said.

Ted turned to face his fancy daughters. “How come Aury eats and you girls don't?” he teased, turning away before anyone could answer.

 

 

 

“ TWO WEEKS! OH, CLARE. Did you feel forced to agree to that long?”

“He
is
her father. And she really enjoyed Colorado last year.”

“Why don't you come to Idaho when she's there?” Sally said. “The house won't be done, but you can see the construction.” They were building a glorified log cabin, with a two-story living room, dorm rooms for the boys and girls, a master suite with a deck, and a spare bedroom for me.

“I don't know, Sal, I've been so busy.”

“You always made it to Los Angeles.”

“I know, I know, but it seems like every weekend now there's something, I'm transporting Aury back and forth to Pennsylvania, or she's got a swim meet, or . . . I don't know. It's really busy. And I'm seeing more patients than ever.”

“Even a couple days,” Sally said. “It's been months. I miss you. I want you to see Idaho.”

“You could come here.”

“With almost six children?” The baby was due in four months, although why Sally was having another one after her experience with Linnea, who still awoke screaming at night, was something I would never understand.

“You wouldn't have to bring your kids, Sally. You could come yourself.”

“Come on, Clare. That's not me. I wouldn't be myself going somewhere without my children. I'd feel empty.”

 

“ HOW WAS IT, HONEY? Did you really have a good time?”

Aury nodded. “It was great.”

“Good. I'm glad.” I patted her bony shoulder, made a joke of pinching her skin under her shirt. “Did they feed you enough?”

“Sort of.” Aury grimaced and confided, “All they eat is canned fruit and chicken!”

 

 

 

“ WHAT DO YOU MEAN, not meet again? We're always going to meet again. We have a child together.”

“Clare, you know what I mean. I mean not meet like this. I mean not meet in hotel rooms. I'm a married man. I have responsibilities to my wife, to my children, I—”

“Aury's your child!”

“Of course Aury's my child. Clare, what are you saying? I'm talking about responsibility to Aury too. She's very attached to her sisters now, and it's not going to do her any good to break up the girls' and my and Mary's family unit.”

“Family unit? Family
unit
? ”

“You know what I mean.”

“What is this, newspeak? Are you going to tell me next how sleeping with me has
impacted
your life?”

“Clare, please. I don't want to argue about my language. I'm trying to think of the children.”

“How nineties of you.”

“I'm trying to think of you too.”

“Oh, right. Take away my one joy, and you're trying to think of me. I don't ask for much, you know. I see you, what? Every six weeks? Every two months? Am I calling you in between times? Am I writing you letters?”