Miles (25 page)

"I'm
almost always right.  Can you be more specific?"

From
behind my back, Brennan snapped the elastic of my underwear.  "One time,
you said you wanted to leave, because you were in pain."  I
remembered.  It seemed like a long time ago.  "I said you'd take
your pain with.  Well, I was wrong."  His voice sounded like he
was going to cry again.  "I've been in pain.  But now that I'm
away from home, I don't feel it, so much."

"Is
it getting bad at school again?"

"No. 
I still get funny looks and smart-ass comments, people talking to me like I was
from Uranus or something, ha, but nothing unusual.  Ozzie almost tries to
talk to me when no one else is around."

I
was lucky.  I had Zane and Farrah to stick by my side, in case I fell out
of the closet or something.  "Well, what is it, then?  We're all
alone, Brennan, right here, in the middle of New Mexico.  We could get
buck naked again, for all anyone would know.  If you can't tell me a
secret here, you can't tell me one anywhere."

Brennan
pressed our lips together and held us still while our eyes opened and relented
to the other.  I felt his trust and love flood into me.  He answered
at once.  It had to be the truth.  "This is the most beautiful
place on earth.  I feel so free here, and I don't want to leave.  I
want to stay here forever, with you."

Flash.

My
voice was quelled with fearful excitement.  "Do you want to get
married, or something?"

"I
don't think we can," he joked quietly, "at least, not in the
old-fashioned way."

"Brennan,"
I said, sitting us both up on the trunk, "do you know what you're
saying?"

"You
don't believe me?"

"You're
the worst liar I know.  Yes, I believe you, but what you're saying is -
"

"Till
death do us part, OK?  That's what I'm saying."

I
closed my eyes.  I had no reference point to this.  Who would, in our
shoes? There wasn't anyone nearby I could ask for advice.  Maybe the trees
or the sky had some views.

"I
didn't think I could say that, before now.  That's the hurt I was moaning
about."

"We
still have a lot of life...left to live."  My alliteration made
Brennan smile.  "Forever is a long time."

"Forever
and a day."

I
laughed out loud.  "
Le jour le plus long
!"  Brennan
scowled, not knowing why I had lapsed into French or laughed.  He didn't
read Graham Greene like I did.

"Well?"

I
got off of the hood and took Brennan by his hands with me.  We stood at
the edge of the overlook, encompassed by the majesty of the Gila and the hushed
wonderment we felt being there together.  Uncle Alex and Zora, the clever
swine, they saw this coming.  I heard his subtle little hints about a
bunch of colleges out west.  And her, starting mile-long conversations over
dinner about happiness, companionship, being married, and love, real love.

"Before
I give you an answer, will you hear me out?"

"I
always listen to whatever you have to say.  You know that."

"Fine." 
I took a deep breath and gathered my thoughts as best I could.  "I'm
assuming you've thought about what you're asking."

"Since
we left home.  No, that's not true.  When you came to the hospital to
see me.  Yes.  I've thought about it since then."

"Brennan,
we've never gone steady with anyone else.  You're only the second person
I've met out of three that are like me.  Like us.  Who knows how many
others we'll both meet or where we'll meet them?  College, travel, or
whatever, there must be a million others out there."

His
eyes didn't waver.  "I don't think I care."

"For
God's sake, Brennan, listen to yourself!"  My voice raised, but so
did the breeze of the early dusk.  "Think about it!  Out of
everything in the world you like in people, out of all the things you want in
someone, whether they're a friend or a lover, and what you know you need, deep
down, can you tell me with a straight face that I'm that person?"

"Yes." 
He closed his eyes for a moment.  Hah!  He looked away first! 
"I'd call the person you just described perfect, but I don't think love is
perfect, any more so than me or you are.  Happiness and friendship aren't
perfect, either."

"We're
talking about the rest of our lives, Brennan."

"Which
may end tomorrow, for all we know.  Look what happened to your mom and
dad!"  I looked away.  Brennan held my shoulders in place, in
case the rest of me tried to make off.  "Look what we let happen
between us.  Hell, look what happened to me, because of my big
mouth!  Before those kids found me, I thought I was going to die.  It
felt like I was going to."  I saw tears begin to fill up in his eyes,
but they didn't fall.  "I thought I was going to die alone, sprawled
out in my own blood in that alley."

Alone. 
My God, I dreaded to myself, alone.

Brennan
touched my face with his lips for a moment.  "But I didn't, and we're
here, now, together."

"There'll
be a lot more tomorrows before either of us die, Brennan."

"You
don't know that, any more than you know how to ice skate."

"Nope,"
I admitted, "I sure don't."

Brennan's
soft hands touched my face again.  The tips of his fingers followed the
lines of my cheeks, my nose, my chin, and my lips.  It made me
tremble.  Everything was making me tremble, either from fear or
excitement, I couldn't tell which.  "I'll tell you what I do know."

"What's
that?"

"I
know I like you.  I like you as a friend, and I like you as a
lover."  He smiled shyly.  "I desire you, too.  But
most of all, I need you."  Brennan nodded his head with
confidence.  "I know I need you.  It took being apart to realize
how badly."  We stared at each other the same way we did on my porch
almost a year ago, seeing and feeling the other through our eyes, as if for the
first time.  "I need you to love me."

"I
do, bro."

Snap!

He
broke the spell.  Brennan broke the fucking spell by pointing at me with a
shit-eating grin on his face.  "Ah ha, you said 'I do'!"

My
eyes narrowed with slight stage anger.  He folded his hands together and
put on a good look of contrition.  I let him continue.

"I
need you to let me love you."

"I
will."

"Then
marry me."

My
head shook involuntarily.  "Marry you...here and now," I
mumbled.  "You have a priest in your duffel bag?”  OK, don’t
laugh.  “We're not even eighteen."

"Hey,
it's a tradition, south of the Mason-Dixon Line."

"Forever,"
I said, continuing to mumble.

"Right
here.  Together.  Till death do us part."

I
scarcely believed we had come to this point.  I struggled to understand
what I was hearing and feeling.  There wasn't much consolation in knowing
I couldn't be alone, drunk from head to soul in some incarnate daze.  I
looked out across the valley and pictured the entire world turning upside
down.  What would we grab on to?  One of the pinon?  Or would we
be swept into the stratosphere, clinging to the Bug’s dented bumper? 
Maybe this was what heroin is like, I thought.  I kept shaking my head,
but finally smiled.  Our epic exchange was every bit the ringing equal of
even the mightiest Shostakovich symphony.

"I,
Brennan Andrew DeVere, in good health, clear mind, and pure heart, do solemnly
swear, in plain sight of God, to take you, my most treasured friend and lover,
into my hands forever, as one...married, married as the rest of all the jerks
out there who don’t have half the love we do."

Out
of the blue, a pick-up clattered down from the deeper interior of the Gila. 
Brennan glanced at it anxiously as he waited for me to say my bit, which was
hard, because my half-opened lips were frozen, just like my heartbeat.

"If
I can say it, so can you," Brennan stated quietly.

I
privately appealed for sweet baby Jesus to give me the words.

"I,
Miles Frederick Strasse...call the gods to witness...one feast, one house, one
mutual happiness...with Brennan, my friend and lover, my heart and soul, who I
will love, cherish, and hold,
le jour le plus long
, forever and a day,
till death do us part."

A
single tear rolled down Brennan's cheek.  Hah!  Game, set, and
match.  I may have said ‘I do’ first, but he not only blinked but cried
first!  "Yours sounds better."

"I'm
the smart one."

"Good. 
Then you can think of what to tell Felix when he asks what we did up
here."

Our
arms brought our bodies together, for the first time, again, forever.

Epic,
indeed.

* * *

In dreaming, the clouds methought would open

and show riches, ready to drop upon me,

The Tempest

The
naked olive-skinned teenager sighed.  "Epic...”

Shant
Nakhararian folded the portfolio against his chest with arms that were crossed
as much in despair as controlled anger.  He had heard Miles’ soft voice
reading his own handwritten manuscript in the tiny attic room, every page,
every word, while the streets of Hollywood rattled away without being seen
outside the church-shaped window.  Shant could still hear the voice,
whispering in his ear, close enough to feel the moist on Miles’ lips, still
cruelly determined not to touch him.

It
was Shant’s first home-cooked meal at the decrepit old manor when Brennan had
told him what happened after he and Miles married each other.  They’d come
down from the Gila and went back to Felix's, who burst into tears seeing the
newlyweds on his doorstep.  Miles didn't tell him they were coming. 
It was Felix's Christmas present.  Shant stopped wolfing down his
bratwursts to laugh at that.

"The
Cromwells treated us like we were long-lost family members, as if nothing had
happened,” Brennan had said.  “You should see their house.  It looks
like a ski-lodge.  Jason built it right in the middle of a pine tree
thicket, next to a little stream where they let their horses roam freely. 
What a place, so full of love."

Shant
remembered not thinking he knew what any such place could be like, before Miles
had wheedled him off the boulevard street corner, away from the adjacent alley
where Shant usually plied his meager trade, and often slept, and sometimes
ate.  He’d taken the walk off the over-lit big street into the strange
leafy neighborhood sullenly, suspiciously, expecting the young guy in the
Chicago White Sox jersey to turn on him with a blade or needle.  But all
he got was a big wing-backed chair that looked antique pulled up to a battered
dinner table, some spicy hot goulash, and some discreet fussing from another
young guy with crazy long hair.  Shant had figured some three-way action
was coming but didn’t care. He just kept eating, inaudibly separating himself
from his surroundings, his company, and his own body to get ready, as he’d
learnt to do the hard way.

"And
we lived happily ever after," the White Sox guy teased.

Brennan
gave Shant a large slice of strudel, which he had never had before. 
"We found a real nice house in Silver City, further down the road from
Pinos Altos and the Gila.  It was built up on a hill.  You could see
the whole town and all the surrounding mountains from the living room
window."

"It
sounds nice," Shant mumbled.

Weeks
later, after Shant had grudgingly decided he wasn’t going to wake up tied to
his bed, or re-hooked on some smack, or be starved into making videos until his
body gave out, he let Miles give him his first bubble bath.  It was the
first time anyone had undressed Shant as if there were a human being under his
baggy jeans and used t-shirts.  It was also the first time his skin didn’t
crawl when someone else touched him, Shant was certain of that.

“Brennan,
Felix, and I all went to college together,” Miles told him, scrubbing away as
if the gesture might erase the various now exposed signs of abuse strewn across
Shant’s body.  “There was a small state university there in Silver. 
It wasn't a very good school, but at least we were together.  Felix and
Brennan became close friends on their own.  Brennan always thought Felix
secretly wanted to have a ménage-a-twat with us.  I couldn’t tell." 
Shant had stared at the bubbles wafting under him, the bright morning sun
reflecting off the foam like diamonds.  He felt as if Miles had been
telling him a science fiction story.

That
was before he couldn’t catch his breath.  Or something was caught in his
throat.  Had Miles sucker-punched him?  Was he slipping below the
bubbles, into the steaming bath water?  Shant’s body shook like a wet
leaf, despite Miles’ strong grip on his forearms.  Then he screamed out,
once, terribly, against his will, making the awfulness trying to claw its way
out of his gullet that much more wicked.

A
sirocco of tears and tiny shrieks followed, until Shant was all but
unconscious.  He woke up later that day, neatly tucked into the small but
comfortable day bed that had been his since arriving, in what was once the
attic of the house and now was fashioned into four tiny bedrooms, private
places, with doors that locked from the inside, not out, and shelves of books
and records and the kind of hand-me-down gym shoes, t-shirts, loafers, shorts,
jeans, sandals, sweatshirts, and sweaters a teenager might wear even if they
weren’t penniless or plucked fresh off the street.

He
found Brennan and one of the other guys planting a small palm tree next to the
front porch.  His doting smile all but made Shant tremble.  “Hey,
Saltwater, how about a hand or two here?”

*

The
shabby manor became the first home Shant Nakhararian had ever known, what with
being dumped on his violent immigrant peasant father by his vagabond birth mother,
then fobbed off on an disinclined uncle, then cast off altogether almost the
day his voice broke.  At first it was just a terrifying adventure, and
then it quickly became simply terrifying and downhill from there.  How he
made it to what he thought was possibly his seventeenth birthday, Shant didn’t
know.  He only began to care after Miles and Brennan made him believe they
cared, too.

Shant
was dumbfounded at the skill and complexity of both his guardian angels’
ability to keep secrets and lies from one another that even more bizarrely all
seemed to be confided into him.  Most Shant found silly, stuff not worth
lying about, except for all the out of the ordinary technical classes Miles was
taking instead of the literature stuff everyone thought he was studying, and
Brennan’s tremors.  More and more, Brennan had motor and memory problems,
but somehow hid these whenever Miles was around, which, because of the
university, his job there, and the long commute to and from, wasn’t very often,
to everyone’s relief at the time.

It
got to the point Shant had to help Brennan dress, and eat.  Only after
they’d visited the nearby clinic for the umpteenth time did the male nurse take
Shant aside and explain Brennan’s dire condition: the multiple concussions he
had gotten in the attack many years prior were lingering with a
vengeance.  The specialist Brennan finally got in to see confirmed there
were severe internal bleeding issues in his brain that only a chancy surgery
could fix, as if they had the money for it in the first place.

Shant
hadn’t been to church, any church, in his life, but went to a beautiful tiny
Catholic place not too far from the house, steeled only by one of Miles’ modest
secrets only recently divulged: though not religious in the sense Shant understood
that to be, Miles admitted he believed in the intercession of saints. 
Something
else
Miles talked about that Shant had trouble figuring
out.  But, in that church, Shant tried to talk to a saint, any of them,
maybe all of them, not knowing exactly how many of them there were or were not,
or which one he should try and call on.  He did light a candle and felt
good about being able to put a few dollars in the collection box.  He was
weirded out by the holy water, but crossed his wet fingertips nevertheless,
just in case, just to make sure.

He
found he couldn’t wait to tell Miles about what he’d done, but suddenly felt
trapped by the inevitable ‘Why?’ that would follow.  He would keep
Brennan’s secret.  That was more important than anything he felt.

Worse
than living with his birth father, worse than being forsaken by him, even worse
than the final heave-ho, Shant watched the ambulance take Brennan away from
behind the unlit shrubs of a neighboring home.  The other guys watched
helplessly from the porch.  Miles wasn’t home yet.

The
cerebral hemorrhaging killed Brennan before Shant had got to the
hospital.  But he was there to greet Miles, who just seemed to turn into a
waxwork figure while Shant wept uncontrollably.

They
took part of his remains to an obscure beach hours north of
Los Angeles
. 
The smell of the ocean, the feel of its spray, the warmth of the sun and its
brightness on the water, the sound and power of the waves became deafening as
they deposited the heavy grained ashes into the surf.  Shant pictured
Miles and Brennan swimming naked on this very seashore (which they had, once,
with their friend Felix, until they all realized how cold the Pacific usually
was and ran right back out, Brennan said laughingly, satisfied in being able to
say they’d skinny-dipped in the ocean together).  Barefoot and shivering,
shoulder to shoulder, Miles and Shant began the long walk back toward the small
cluster of buildings that made up the remote but alluringly picturesque State
Beach's meager facilities, then drove back to the city in worn-out silence.

When
Shant woke up in Miles & Brennan’s outsized bed the next morning, Miles had
gone.  His Dear Shant note read like a cold set of instructions, what to
do, who to call, who to trust, where to send one last part of Brennan, when
Felix would pick up the rest.  Shant did as he was told, and then ran the
house for the other few guys all the while, as if he’d been doing it all along.

Shant
found the manuscript, along with Miles’ dog-earned and nearly unbound Complete
Shakespeare after all the stomach-churning rigmarole was at last behind
him.  Inside was the personal note from Miles that Shant had longed for.
  

On
pure animal instinct Shant had learnt out on the street how to hide and
safeguard the little boy cowering deep inside him.  And, if not cleverly
but at least instinctively, Shant had quickly recognized Miles had been doing
the same thing.  Playing hide-and-seek, even recoiling, not from an unkind
world or rotten people but from something deep inside, something Miles himself
didn’t know from any of the saints, but something he undeniably felt,
germinating within.

Shant
slid on one of Brennan’s jock straps - he’d stopped wearing underwear after a
trick had once tried to strangle him with his - his first new pair of jeans
Miles had bought him for no good reason, and one of Miles’ red White Sox
jerseys before heading downstairs to deal with whatever was causing a lot of
racket.  It was nothing, just squabbling over one of Miles’ many thousand
books.

He
sat down on the large wrap-around front porch, right where he had slept the
first few days at the house, unwilling and downright afraid to go in, huddled
in a thick woolen blanket Brennan treated like a magic carpet.  The
immediate block was always quiet, but the nearby rest of the city was
remarkably still.  He could even make out a few far-flung stars beyond the
orange streetlight vapors.

Shant
was certain Miles wasn’t going off to kill himself, even to be with Brennan in
the next place.  Shant smiled, still a slightly unnatural reflex for
him.  Miles might go off and kill somebody else, him and that little
Beretta of his (which, to Shant’s delight, Miles had once ground into the
cheekbone of a rat-like Korean pimp who tried to stop him from taking a boy
Shant knew out of his grips).

No. 
Shant let out a long, audible breath.  Miles may have disappeared, but he
wasn’t gone.  Like he’d read (and re-read almost every night thereafter)
in the manuscript, Shant didn’t know if what he felt, could still feel, was
love, but he knew he wanted it to be.  Not just to prove he actually could
love someone or something other than simple survival, but to try and catch up
to where Brennan and Miles had been, so inexplicably early, so breathtakingly
much, so wonderfully shared with the most desperate and truly alone.

Shant
knew the
Alone
Miles had written about, he knew it agonizingly
well.  But for the first time in as far as he could remember, perhaps most
queerly - or least so - in light of Miles’ vanishing, Shant Nakhararian did not
feel alone.  That wall had fallen.  His love for both Brennan and
Miles filled him that hushed night.  It stayed with him at the slightly
less scruffy manor long after, like a lowered rifle that turned out to be empty
in the first place.

“Please,
Saint Christopher, watch over Miles.  Saint Joseph, help me show his love
to the guys here now, to anyone else that might come...”

A
small dog scurried out of the darkness right up to the porch, his wide black
eyes boring into Shant’s.  For weeks, Shant has seen the dog darting in
and out of the yards all along the block, but had no idea who if anyone it
belonged to.  It was a he, and had no collar or tags and looked hungry,
coat akimbo, and smelt a bit.  Wow, Shant thought, just like I’m sure I
had.

“Come
on, you.”  The dog followed Shant into the house.  “Thanks, Saint
Francis,” Shant murmured.  The dog’s dark eyes floated around him, not
quite sure if the warm house was a trap or Heaven.  Shant laughed to
himself and said aloud, “I know how you feel, little guy.”

* * *  F i n  * * *