Making the Hook-Up (10 page)

I leave my grandmother there with her memories. It is clear she needs to be alone. Todd is nowhere to be found so I crawl into bed and wait for the cool of night. Later, when it seems that the entire world is asleep, I awake and Todd is beside me, wrapped around the edge of the bed. I shake his shoulder and he turns to me.

“Is something wrong?” he asks, groggily.

I press my finger against his lips, hand him his shorts, and motion for him to follow me. It is an eerily quiet night. It is darker than a night ever could be back in America.

“Where are we going?” he asks.

I shake my head and we keep walking until we are at the river. I step into the water and look up at my husband. “My grandfather died here. Thousands of people died here. But my
mother was also conceived here. Strange, isn't it, that this river is both a place of death and life?”

“Yes,” Todd says. “It's such a small river.”

“I thought the same thing this morning.”

He nods, rubbing his eyes. “Why are we here?”

I pull my T-shirt up and over my head, tossing it onto the riverbank before stepping out of my shorts. I stand naked before him. Then I lower myself into the water, and gasp.

“What are you doing?” Todd whispers, loudly.

“Come here.”

He looks around nervously and in the pause I feel terribly alone. I now understand why my grandparents did what they did, anchoring themselves to each other.

“Please.”

He wades into the water. I can feel the silt of the riverbed beneath my body. It has a life of it's own as it works its way around my elbows and into the small of my back.

“Take your clothes off.”

“I don't know about this, Miriam. What if we get caught?”

“We won't,” I promise.

There is doubt in his eyes, but he strips quickly and squats, shivering. I lie back and giggle as the water tickles me. I can feel my hair fanning out. Suddenly, it is as if Todd realizes what I need him to do. He crawls atop me and I sink lower into the river, until only the tips of my breasts and my nipples are above water. The muscles in my neck are aching slightly as I hold my head up. He brushes his lips along the sharp of my collarbone and I look at him, once again marveling at how pale he is compared to me. Shadows from nearby trees cast across our bodies. The night is ever so still. I don't really feel like I'm here. In my mind, it is 1937 and I am cold, afraid, and hungry for this man atop me to commit the act of touch. I clasp the back of Todd's neck
with my hand and press my lips against his, so hard that they become numb. He forces his tongue between my lips—he tastes salty and there is rum on his breath. His fingers press into my shoulders. There will be bruises in the morning. I wrap one leg around his waist and wince as small rocks cut into my back. The water is colder now. I close my eyes for a moment and when I open them, the water is red, almost as warm as blood. I hear screams in the near distance. At once I am alone and with Todd and surrounded by ghosts. He covers my mouth with his other hand and my head sinks into the water. My eyes burn. The water tastes sanguine.

My husband makes love to me in a slow steady rhythm, and I pull him deeper and deeper into me until I'm certain that our bodies will remain forever joined like this. Cool water and soft silt slide beneath me and I begin moving my hips, forcing myself against Todd, urging him to fuck me harder. I want this to hurt. I want to remember him like this, fucking me in the river, tomorrow when I am sitting. He nestles his chin in the space between my shoulder and my neck.

“I don't understand what's happening,” he says, hoarsely.

I don't have any answers for him.

I can't stop crying. I cry enough tears to fill this Massacre River—tears for my grandmother who cannot forget, who will never feel what I am feeling in this moment and in every moment after; for my mother who pretends she has forgotten; for myself, and the burden of this country's grief. I scream into his hand. I hate that this feels so good but I don't want to stop. The sound of his body splashing against mine overwhelms me. When I look at him, I hardly recognize him. His jaw is set with determination, his eyes, almost vacant. I let my head fall underwater and then he looks hazy, like an apparition. My chest tightens but I remain submerged. I allow myself to drown. In this moment, the
ghosts of these waters will breathe for me.

Todd is saying something to me, but I cannot hear him. My ears are filled with water and memory. I begin to shake and as I rise for air, my hair plastered against my face, I throw my arms back, and the upper half of my body floats. I look up and see the moon. My body shudders violently until I feel so much pain and pleasure at once that it is unbearable. I have to push him away from me. We stare at each other and for a moment, we too are strangers in these waters. And then, his arms are wrapped around me, and he is leading me onto land. I know why I needed to be here.

 

 

 

 

 

O
nce you get married and you get busy trying to build a life together, ecstasy gives way to common sense. Working, raising kids and getting them out of the house and off to college, cars that break down, bills to pay, doctors and insurance to worry about, clothes that get grown out of too soon, broken ankles and busted pipes—
life
, you know what I'm saying, just life. All the things your parents used to worry about are suddenly dropped on you, and you have to deal with them. It makes you realize what an amazing job they did, making it seem like they knew what they were doing when, in fact, they were probably just as lost and confused as you. But you keep going, because, well, that's what you do, right? And even though you really do still love your wife, what can I say? Inevitably, the passion cools, you're too busy for sex, or too tired to do anything but cuddle—if that. All those gay people you see on TV now, marching up and down, talking about same-sex marriage? Little do they know that the comedians are right: after about a year or two it turns
into a
no
-sex marriage. I'm positive the inventors of all those porn websites and high-speed Internet access are married. Not that I know anything about that, mind you. I'm just sayin'…get married and your life changes.

Lynn and I do it once a month now—maybe. Most of the time we have to make an appointment, which I hate. I mean, yeah, sure, it's great to have her look over at me on Friday evening after we've both come home from work and suddenly reach over, squeeze my dick, and say, “I'll see you tomorrow night,” and know I'm going to get some. But I miss being spontaneous. Like when we first moved into our townhouse and were hitting it right and left because we wanted to “christen” every room: doing it on the carpet in the living room during yet another “Law and Order” rerun, playing Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange in
The Postman Always Rings Twice
on the kitchen table, getting between her luscious brown legs and eating her pussy on the stairs, or doing our own version of
Jason's Lyric
out in the backyard in the middle of the night, hoping none of the neighbors were watching. Now that was fun. But you know…life happens and things change. Suddenly you're both older, thicker, and you're not kids anymore. That's just the way it is. You seem to forget that a finger slowly run up her inner thigh always gets rewarded with a shudder and wetness between her legs. Somehow you put away the fact that it is her
left
nipple and not the right one that is more sensitive for that fuck-filled tomorrow that doesn't come as often as it did. She no longer scratches you behind the ear like a pet, causing the skin on your arms—and your dick—to stand at attention. All these things get lost as Life Happens, and a quick trip around the Internet becomes the easiest way to get rid of a morning hard-on. Not that I know anything about that, of course…

Sometimes you need something to remind you of what's what.

“Have you met the new guys next door yet?” Lynn asked me one night.

I put down the remote and called out to her in the next room. “What was that? What did you say?”

“I said,” she repeated, wiping her hands as she came into the room, “have you met our new neighbors yet?”

“No, not really. I mean I saw them when they moved in, we both did, you know, with all their boxes and furniture. Brian and…uh…Joe, right? I might have seen one of them a few times as I was on the way in to work, but I can't say I've met them yet, no. Why?”

“You know they're gay, right?”

I looked at her. “Gay? What do you mean ‘gay'?”

“You know. I mean ‘gay.' They're, like, homosexuals.”

I shook my head. “Get outta here—those guys? Come on.” Brian, light-skinned, bald and thick, and Joe, the shorter, darker of the two with longish dreads, seemed like just average brothas to me. I thought they were two young guys who'd maybe been friends or roommates in college and were sharing a house to save on expenses until they could get places of their own. “How do you know?”

“I was running a little late today leaving the house, and they were leaving too. And I saw them kissing each other in the doorway, and then they both left together. I don't think they saw me until they got to the end of the walkway and waved to me as I started to drive off.”

“Kissing? Like out in public? In the open? On the porch or what?”

“Not completely in the open, no, in the doorway. There wasn't anyone else out on the street, but even if there were I don't know if anyone else could have seen them.”

I shook my head. “I'm not sure that this neighborhood is
ready for two men kissing on the front porch.”

“I thought it was sweet.”

“Yeah, well, you would. All that running around with your brother and his friend and your cousin Derrick… You're used to that kind of thing.”

“See, I always knew you were homophobic.”

“I am not homophobic! I just…I'm not sure how safe it would be for them to be doing that in public around here, that's all.”

“What do you think? That somebody's going to do something to them? A mid-morning mid-kiss drive-by or something.”

“No, no, of course not, this isn't that kind of neighborhood. Most people don't care. I don't care. I mean, look at those two lesbians down in the next block—everyone's fine with them.”

“Everyone calls Lisa whenever their drains clog.”

“Well, she does advertise herself as ‘Ms. Fix-It.' She's a terrific plumber, what can I say?”

“I'm surprised this bothers you so much.”

“I'm not bothered. I'm just…I don't know.”

“Homophobic.”

“Stop saying that!” I slapped the couch. “I'm not no homophobe. I'd just…I just rather not see them doing anything that's all. I'm sure they're cool guys and all, but they need to keep it inside.” I picked up the remote and turned up the volume on Sports Center. Lynn looked at me for a while and then went back into the kitchen.

And that should have been the end of it, right? We had new neighbors. They were quiet and kept to themselves—no problem, right? Gay? No big deal, I couldn't care less. But then, later on that week, Lynn and I were upstairs in the bedroom. I was just about to fall asleep when she poked me in the side.

“Did you hear that?”

“What? Hear what? I don't hear anything.”

“Listen.”

I listened. “I still don't hear anything.”

“Wait for it…”

And then, yes I heard it. Squeaking. But not like a mouse or a floorboard. Squeaking springs. Rhythmically squeaking springs. And then an occasional knock or tap on the wall of the bedroom opposite our bed. There was no mistaking it: the guys next door were having sex.

“Oh, man, I
don't
want to listen to this,” I said, moving to get out of bed.

“Wait a minute, Roy, where are you going? What are you going to do?”

“I…I don't know. Knock on the wall or something. Let them know we can hear them and that they need to keep it down.”

“You can't do that!”

“And why the hell not?”

“It would embarrass them.”

“Embarrass them? What the fuck do I care if I embarrass them? I don't want to listen to buttfucking in my own bedroom!”

Lynn harrumphed. “You didn't object to that the time you asked
me
to do it.”

“That…that was different. That's you and me, a man and a woman. I don't want to hear two guys going at it.”

The rhythm got faster and the tapping became a knocking. A muffled, husky “Uh, uh, uh, ooh…” drifted through the wall.

“Oh, shit, here we go…”

Lynn sighed. “I remember when we used to knock headboards against the walls.”

“Yeah, well…it's been a while.”

“I know. I hope we didn't wake our neighbors when we did it.”

“There's nobody on this side,” Lynn said, reaching back
and touching the wall behind the bed. “So no one would have noticed. Truth is, you just like it quiet.”

“And you don't?”

Lynn shifted a little in the bed, the strap of her nightgown falling off her bare shoulder. “Loud can be fun, sometimes. But quiet is fine… You remember that time in New York? In the rain, after that horrible trip up?”

“And the cheap-ass hotel…” I laughed and moved closer to her. “Yeah, that was wonderful. Who knew? Maybe we should check into no-tell motels more often.”

“That would be great. ‘Mr. and Mrs. Jones' like a couple cheating on their spouses.” Lynn laughed and moved into my arms. I held her tightly and kissed her on her forehead.