Allan Stein (25 page)

"Where's the phone?" I asked.

The boy smiled, and I knew there was no phone. "The post office has phones, which can be used tomorrow. It smells very good, the chicken and the fire."

"Yes." The boy had a fever but he looked fine. I dried his hair meticulously, patting and squeezing it in a towel, and then I combed it back into a ponytail. His blush might have been a sign of good health. "According to Galen, wine is very good for a fever. It counteracts the bile."

"The wine is very good. Serge has this wine sent to Paris especially." With the fire so hot, we unshuttered the windows and could watch snow blow against the glass. I couldn't tell how much had fallen, but a thin drift gathered on the sill. The fire crackled and snapped like a man chewing sticks. The stone walls, no longer cold, were reassuringly solid. We ate the chicken by the fire, then dragged the beds there. They were low and, pushed together, made an island in the flickering light. We traced our route on Per's map: nine miles. It would be nice to walk along it in the hot sun, there were so many vistas we had missed because of clouds. The boy undressed a little as we talked. I enjoyed his pleasure undoing his pants. He pushed his boxers down where the pants opened, proud of his swollen cock, and he smiled. "It is my dick." He laughed, trying out the strange English. I think he was drunk with power. I held it, that fistful of heat, and smiled too. I let go and unbuttoned his shirt, lifting it back off his shoulders so it fell. He was very patient with me. Our shadows on the ceiling billowed and collapsed with the flames. The boy's dick stayed hard up against his belly. I kissed it and then kissed his navel. He pushed me down so I was on my back and he pulled the clothes from me, tugging my pants and shirt off, then lay down flat on top of me, where I held him.

Have I ever stopped describing the beauty of this boy? There was no path away from it; the image kept turning back in on itself.

It was not enough to say that his ribs moved like birds lifting off as he breathed, or that his heart thrummed beneath his skin. He reclined beside me. I put my hand on his chest, meaning stay, and poured his bowl of dinner juice and wine in a stream from the divot of his chest down to his navel. He arched his back up from the bed, lifting from it, spilling the pooled juice and wine, so his swollen cock formed a pinnacle, a summit, as if he hoped to complete earth's globe by providing this natural conclusion to it. I planted my mouth there. I might have fallen asleep. He whispered. We kissed. His teeth were small and even, like rows of young corn. I tasted wine and dinner and a musty sugar that seemed to hide in the hollows beneath his tongue. We moved more and more slowly. We fell asleep this way.

In the dead of night the stone walls were still warm because the fire had burned so long and hot. There was no light. I felt the boy beside me, curled around his pillow with my leg drawn between his. I wrapped myself around him. Time and space are so flimsy. This moment cupping my body over his continues, it persists so that we lay now together in Colmars in bed back home in my theatrical city so dark in Paris with Herbert at Boy over dinner under Harry's canopy and slats prone in the courtyard of my school. I laid my arm over his, my chest to his back, and felt him breathing: now, then, now, then, now, then. What kept me in my place, my isolation? The boy shifted, drawing my arms around him tighter, resolving nothing, and the question dissolved into the warm, close air.

"My stomach hurts," the boy whispered, waking me. Still no light. His body burned with fever, so beneath the covers it was very hot. I shifted my head from the pillow but could see nothing.

"Your stomach hurts?"

"Yes, very much."

"I could get a doctor."

"There is no doctor."

"Do you feel nauseous?"

He groaned and said yes. I held my hand on his belly, hoping that would soothe him, but the boy was inconsolable. I made a cool washcloth and looked for more aspirin, but there wasn't any. There were no pills or medicine and the boy wouldn't take solid food, so I gave him water and wine, and he seemed to feel a little better. I kept the washcloth in a bowl by the bed and put out the light again. I talked to distract him from his pain.

"My mother used to make scrambled eggs in the middle of the night, and she'd wake me up and we'd eat them together. I wish we had some eggs."

"I don't like eggs."

"She put cream cheese in them and beat them so they were fluffy. We ate by the window so I could watch the street. It was the middle of the night; there was no one, just cats or sometimes a car that looked lost." I heard no snow against the windows, and where the snow had been it was black. "Do you think it's stopped snowing?" But the boy had fallen back asleep, and soon I did too.

W
hen he woke me the day was bright and sunny and the small room was warm because of it. The boy had made coffee with hot water from the heater and poured bowls of cereal for both of us. "There are letters from Miriam," he said, handing a square blue envelope to me. Letters from Miriam. My heart sank. There were two. Why should she send two? It was a relief to see mine was addressed to
Herbert
. I wondered if the boy had been to the post office and telephoned her.

"Have you gone out?"

"No. The letters came through the door and woke me. I've been up only a little." The boy was pale and his eyes were shadowed; still, he seemed to have gotten better. At least he was cheerful.

"Thank you for making breakfast." The coffee was hideous, tepid and oily, but the milk made it drinkable. "We both got letters?"

"Yes. I have not read mine." He pried at the flap of his envelope.

I took a few spoonfuls of cereal but the milk was warm and thin and I pushed it away. The boy was reading his letter contentedly. I opened mine: "Dear Matthew,

"It is with a kind of vertigo that I address you, since there is no one I know by that name, no man in this world to anchor the name to, and so I feel myself floating just to write it: Matthew. Who is that? My friend, a good friend, Herbert, has been taken away, and I blame you for it. Denis and Hank have been here all morning, and I don't know what to say to you. I'm so angry about Stéphane . I have asked him in his letter to come home at once. It isn't possible for me to come get him from you, but I would do that. You have been selfish and stupid. I did not tell him about your deception; you will do that yourself before he leaves. In any case we will presume he knows when he gets home.

"I can forgive Denis because he has been our friend for so long and he's like this; he has never had good judgment. But you were a guest. You lied your way into our home. We trusted you, we became friends, yet I don't even know who you are. I cannot imagine the arrogance. What right have you to make what you have of our family, to take our son whom you do not even know and use him in this absurd fantasy?

"Your friend Hank thinks it is some adventure made up by you and Herbert, whoever he may be, to get drawings that are apparently the ones you say you're looking for. I'm unable to think of another Herbert, a real Herbert, now that you have erased the one I knew. What do I put in his place? And you, are you the man I knew? Have I only misunderstood your name? That is not so terrible a man to be. I would not be upset by this trip with Stéphane if
I could let myself believe that he was with you, with Herbert. But that has become impossible.

"I assume Stéphane is happy. He genuinely liked you. I'm astonished how pigheaded you are to have thought this would lead to anything but disappointment. I don't know how you will explain your lie to Stéphane , but I trust you won't make a burden for him. Just tell him you lied and you're sorry. We'll continue with our lives when he's home, and I'm glad for him to forget you."

The boy had stuffed his letter back in its sleeve and was frowning. He drank the cereal from his bowl and exhaled sharply when I looked at him. "What did your letter say?" I asked.

"She would like me to go to Paris right away. There is a misunderstanding. I am asked to go home."

"I'm sorry. What is the misunderstanding?"

The boy shrugged. "She said the arrangement with you was not understood by her and that I'm to spend the vacation at home. I think it is stupid."

"Mmm." I could not meet his eyes. "I'm sorry," I repeated.

"We will go to Agay. There is no reason to go right now to Paris."

"I don't want you to get in trouble."

"It is fastest to go through Marseille. Who is to say how long we will take, or at what time I read my letter?"

"Yes." I felt myself sinking back again and could not resist it. "It's a miracle the letters even got to Colmars, with that snow and all."

"Who is to say?" The boy flipped his letter from the table, and it helicoptered to the wall. I had already stuffed mine deep in my pants pocket and was glad he didn't ask to see it.

The grocer knew a man who was driving to Nice, and we got a ride in his 2 CV. The boy slept in the back with boxes of almonds and lavender, while I sat up front and listened to the driver talk. It
was all in French. I was tired and distracted. The car was pungent with the acrid nuts and dusky flowers, and the bright sun through the windows warmed them, making the odor stronger. There was no sign of yesterday's snow. We were in Nice in a little more than an hour, and he dropped us at the train station.

The boy looked sick and tired. His color had gotten worse. He put on a show of teenage cool and wore the sunglasses to hide his eyes, but I knew he felt poorly. The train to Agay was plush, and I got us seats in first class so the boy could rest. He fell asleep at once. I went to the dining car and ate a sandwich with some wine. There were decent chocolates and oranges, and I took a few of these to our seats with a bottle of water. The boy was awake. The train slowed and stopped in the shade of a station. Cannes. The oranges smelled terrific, clean as fresh air where the peels sprayed their oils. The boy looked better, refreshed by sleep but still very weak. He put his tape machine away, and I was glad.

"Stéphane ." Here I paused, wanting him to look at me. He was watching a comedy on the platform, a man struggling with two burst cases of clothes, which had been strapped together with belts and which the porter was refusing. I looked out there too, then touched his arm. "There's something I need to tell you."

"Mmm." The train lurched and began pulling away from the platform.

"I'm not here to find drawings or do research like I said I was." The boy made no sound, nor did he shift away from me. "I mean I'm doing that, but it's sort of a masquerade. I don't need to do it."

"What." The word was soft and flat.

"I'm not Herbert Widener. Herbert is my friend in America. I'm just pretending to be him."

"What?" Now he drew away slightly and turned toward me. The sun flooded our seats as we cleared the buildings of the old town.
I could see the ocean spread out, deep blue and shimmering toward its curved horizon.

     
"I'm Matthew. My name is Matthew." The boy shook his head and pushed it back against the seat, saying nothing. "It's important that you know who I am."

     
I watched his eyes, which were dull and unfocused, and beyond him the sea, which had become busy with great phallic yachts, bright white yachts filling the rocky harbors that sped past our window at an increasing speed.

     
The boy glanced up at me. "What is 'Matthew'?"

     
"My name. Do you understand?"

     
"No." He turned away.

     
"I only used Herbert's name as a way to get here, but except that, everything we've said and done I really mean. None of it is lies."

     
He turned his back to me, drawing a pillow up to his chest, and said nothing. I put my arm on him, but he clearly didn't want it.

     
"You can't do this," I said. "You have to know who I am. None of it was lies. I don't want you to think I lied."

     
"It doesn't matter," he answered into the air. "Leave me alone to sleep now." After that he said nothing. I sat beside him watching the sea until the train reached Agay and I got off. The boy did not follow. I stood on the platform and watched the train disappear around the headland.

I
gave my bags to an old woman who said she worked for the hotel. She had a pushcart littered with dried flowers, and I put my bags on that, then she disappeared down the one narrow road toward town. I went to the wall of the stationmaster's office and sat on a slatted bench in the shade. The hum and clatter of the rails, transmitting the train's prolonged departure, diminished to noth
ing, so that insects could be heard, together with the waves collapsing on the shore. I ate the last of the chocolate but was still hungry and went into town to find a café. I wandered the small town looking for the hotel of Allan Stein; a woman at the post office gave me directions.

     
The hotel was now a private home, turned into apartments or condos. In any case it was shuttered and the grounds were in disrepair. I found the terrace where the group had had their dinners, the slope of lawn where Allan had sat beside Sylvia with his great wide watch shown proudly, the sleeve of his summer jacket pulled up. The lawn was overgrown, and the view was obstructed by brown rushes. I ate, and then I walked down the road to the river where the maids had washed clothes. There was no one there. A path wound its way through mimosa and pine along the southern bank and I followed it, searching for any trace of the disappeared boy. The valley it led to was flat and verdant. Horses cantered in a wide green field. Their range was bordered by forested hills and the river. The sun was low enough to lose its strength, and I felt chilly walking through the brush. I was a little drunk already, and the waiter had sold me a second bottle of the mandarin wine I'd been having, a specialty that Allan liked and had written of in his letters.

     
I lost the trail, then found it again, rounding a great bend in the river. Through the trees a clearing opened up, with a squat, stuffed recliner stuck in the muck of the riverbank. I sat there and drank. The wind blowing on the river made me cold. I wanted the boy back in life with me, just to talk for a while. He'd kept his secrets, even from himself, and I guess he would have had nothing to say to me. It grew dark and stars appeared. Was it safe here? I was tired enough to be overwhelmed by anyone. It wouldn't have mattered. In the clean black night with the refreshing cessation of the wind that convinced me it was summer when actually winter was still transpiring just over the next ridge, I wondered where the boy had gone, 
dispersed into the air or locked in the ground in a crowded box? I have imagined that whole worlds dwell in the body of a boy and have pried with words to relax these meanings from their hiding place, to coax the boy into the open. He stood still for a moment, caught in the warmth of my regard, and when I reached for him he was gone.