You Can Say You Knew Me When (16 page)
Read You Can Say You Knew Me When Online
Authors: K. M. Soehnlein
Tags: #Gay & Lesbian, #Literature & Fiction, #Fiction, #Gay, #Contemporary, #United States, #Contemporary Fiction, #American, #Literary, #Genre Fiction, #Lgbt, #Gay Fiction
A few days after dinner with Woody, I was awakened by my apartment’s prehistoric door buzzer, an amplified rattle like a lawn mower revving and dying and revving again. The voice on the intercom announced, “FedEx package for Jamie.” In the hallway stood a fresh-faced black guy in his formfitting indigo uniform. Maybe I was just disheveled enough that my bed-head looked sexy, or maybe my grubby threads—cutoff sweat shorts and a torn T-shirt—presented some kind of come-on, because it was not my imagination that he was holding his stare a bit too long, his eyes flirtatious. Before I could even compute the particulars—such as, who sent this package? what’s in it? and how is it possible that the FedEx guy has already determined, within two seconds of contact, that this is a flirt-friendly environment?—I was nodding back at him, my lips parting, my drowsy voice murmuring, “Sorry, I just got out of bed.” It was not my imagination that he was brazenly looking me up and down as he replied, “No problem for me.” This is the remarkable fact of being a gay guy in San Francisco: Your next sexual liaison might literally be waiting outside your door.
That morning, I managed not to succumb. I averted my eyes, signed my name with the little electronic pen on his portable data box, and muttered a curt thank-you. He sneaked in a final pass—“This isn’t my usual route, hope I see you again”—and I offered a “Yeah, definitely,” as I withdrew into my apartment, my pulse thumping.
The return address on the package was Mountain View. I peeled open the flap and unleashed the smell of old paper. Inside was a stack of envelopes marked by my father’s unmistakable handwriting. They were addressed to Ray Gladwell, care of a San Francisco post office box. Clipped to the top was a four-color postcard showing one of Ray’s landscapes, announcing an upcoming exhibition. I flipped it over.
Dear Jamey,
Your visit stirred up so many memories. David and I spent an afternoon at my storage space. I was pretty sure we’d dredge up something for you, and sure enough! I started reading these letters from Teddy, but to be honest it was a bit too painful to travel down memory lane. They’re of more use to you than me probably.
Fondly, Ray
PS: Please come to my next gallery show in Frisco!
Ray had organized Teddy’s letters for me in chronological order. The earlier ones were handwritten, the latter pounded out on a typewriter.
I’ll read them slowly, I thought. I’ll savor them, one at a time.
An hour later I’d read them all, without even a cigarette break, sitting on the kitchen floor. I got up and paced through the apartment, letting motion do the work of absorption. I’d slipped into a dangerous dream in which the noise of the everyday world had dropped to a hush as a roaring train sped toward me, building in urgency. The train was my father’s voice, on the page, now inside my head—or rather, it was the voice of a young man who would, impossibly, mutate into the man I knew as my father. A voice rising up from history, from secrecy, from the dead.
I brought the stack to my bed and read everything again.
October 24, 1960
Dear Ray,
I woke up this morning and the first thought of the day was lonely because without you. Our hours yesterday came back like a fresh vision for me. Oh how I wish I could have woken up and seen your hair on my pillow. Forgive me for starting with heart on sleeve, but I tell you only because you’ll appreciate how this moment passed very quick, and I took your sagely advice of “do not stay sad long because life is short.” Because my eyes (my “painter’s eyes,” as you told me to cultivate) spied something very nice at the edge of my new orange window curtains, which was the brilliant blue of the sky. It’s a Pacific blue purer than the hazy factorysmoke blue over the Hudson.
When Don brought me those orange curtains I told him he’d make my bedroom look like a whore’s room. Mrs. Casey would look up from her backyard sweeping and wonder what kind of a tenant brings such a color to a respectable Irish house. And would I tell her what Don told me that day? “Bring some contrast into your life, that way you’ll see everything different.” I understand that I never saw the blue sky quite the same until it was up against the orange.
I think Ray maybe you put a spell on me and now the sights are all changed. Come back soon, if you can stand me gushing.
Teddy
October 26, 1960
Dear Ray,
All my thoughts are about you this fine day, hotter in October than it was in the foggy summer. But before you think, Here he goes again, Teddy Garner the Sadsack, you’ll be happy to know that I’m not sitting still, longfaced with empty pockets. I’m doing something important.
Yesterday morning, first thing I heard was Mrs. Casey in the alley with her infernal broom, yelling about overdue rent and wanting to know who was it I had coming down the stairs after midnight? How could I tell her it’s been a week since the tool and die job and if it wasn’t for your groceries I’d be hungry and miserable instead of just miserable?
I walked toward the ocean hoping for an inspiring idea though I never made it to the dunes, because there’s Don outside the Hideaway with some big news—“I fired The Cyclops.” Remember him? The big Neanderthal with eyes too close together, who flipped burgers like he was playing scales on the piano but also siphoned off beer from the tap. Don finally had enough of his drunktempered antics. So I’m the Hideaway’s new shortorder cook! I work ten through two, then four thirty until close. I can kiss factory work goodbye.
With my new job and my new curtains and my new you, I’m full of inspiration. I woke up today and guess what, I started painting. I set up for the first time the easel which we purchased together, got a shirt cardboard and painted a landscape of the curtains, the window frame, the sky behind them, and rooftops. A whole hour passed right by before I took any notice, just like you said happens. It’s probably no good, and the blue’s not right, but it’s a good first try I think.
Ray, you have blown in like an angel and kept me from harm during a time of aimless worry. Please write and say you’re coming back up here soon, my magic girl! Even a postcard is great.
Teddy
November 10, 1960
Dear Ray,
High spirits at the Hideaway these days. We had a crowd on election night sitting around a television set which Don brought in for the occasion, all of us cheering on Kennedy. The lunch regulars are friendly and like to pick on me for my New York accent, but it’s all oldtimers so I can handle them. At nights the beat crowd spills out onto the sidewalk, one hamburger split for every two of them, and always the jugwine in a juice glass. I get the feeling they think I’m deaf or speak only a foreign tongue and can’t understand their intellectualism. Excuse me Mr. Bearded Artist while I wipe up your spill but I happen to be a painter too and for your information I have so read “The Stranger” by Albert Camus. One of them left behind a copy of “Tristessa” which I’m reading but it’s full of junktalk and nowhere as good as “Subterraneans.” The word from Don is that Kerouac is a drunkard and past his prime and the writing of this book might prove it.
I am sad your visit was delayed again, I guess it never sinks in for me the life you’re leading down there in the mysterious wilds. Here’s the phone number of the Hideaway where you can leave me a message,
please
: Judah 5-1124.
With you on my mind—Teddy
November 15, 1960
Ray,
Today I am lonesome remembering the shouts between us at the end of the night and worst of all the shove I gave you. I may be a meantempered jealous Irish fool but you know I’m crazy about you, so forgive me for that reason, which I swear is true.
After you left Don said to raise my spirits he’d take me out to a “mixed bar” which I figured meant white and Negro but when I got there it was full of fairies and Don knew them all. The name of the bar was “The Who Cares?” with a sign that says “Leave your Cares at the Door.” Don introduced me to the fruits, each of them giving me eyes up and down like cops with flashlights. One even had the nerve to call me handsome, so I said “Watch it!,” then Don said, “He gave you a compliment, say thank-you.” That’ll be the day!
My mind was full of confusing thoughts such as the $64,000 Question, “Is Don one, too?” And should I be his friend knowing now what I think I know? Do you pick your friends because they are the familiar type, someone regular like you? Or on the otherhand when something is new and different do you take a chance because that’s what makes life a kick? By which I’m trying to say, I figured I’d stick around instead of heading out the door. For the kicks. Plus where did I have to go anyway?
No secret I am shy with strangers (boy, were these
strange
rs!) but Don got me soused enough to stop feeling so funny among a crowd of that kind. It was very peculiar knowing that some fellow regular enough in conversation is actually an invert who might be looking at you with unholy thoughts. In particular a brawny one a few barstools away staring at me with a severe look in his eye. He’s got his own flock of queens surrounding him because he’s the matinee idol of the bunch, a ringer for Rock Hudson, with possibly the largest chest muscles outside of Jack LaLanne, I kid you not. On the way out, I passed directly alongside this big guy and I hear him call me “trade” which was explained to me by Don and is unsavory. I was furious and demanded of Don, “What’s the big idea bringing me there?” and him saying, “It’s a fun place you never know what type of crowd you’ll find,” and me saying, “It was a fag crowd,” and him saying, “The beer’s the same as any other place.” He had a furiating answer for everything.
I didn’t want to even take the ride back from him, but we were in a fringe neighborhood full of spades, somewhere on Haight Street. And in the car I asked him “Are you one of them?” and he just dragged on his Camel and kept his eyes on the road and said very sagely “I supposed I’ve just learned to live my life.” To which I asked, “Don’t you worry about a black mark on your soul?” (him being from the seminary and so forth) and he said, “I worry about the cops arresting me. I worry about the newspaper printing my name the next day. I worry about the drunken sailor out looking for a fistfight because he didn’t find a whore who might relieve him of his suppressed tension” and so forth with concerns that are not about God but about Man. When he finished I said, “Well, Don I guess you’re all right by me.” Though I wonder if I can look at him the same.
That’s why to sort all this out I have come to the typewriter to you Ray because you are the one person who has been very straight with me and also you knew Don before I did. Even though I was a foulmouthed roughneck with you, I know you have a way of never holding a bad opinion about anyone. Sorry for the lengthy and lurid atmosphere of this letter, I hope it didn’t upset you.
From Frisco, Soaked in Ale, Teddy
This next note was on a postcard with an image of the Sutro Baths. It was undated but seemed to fall into sequence here.
Your probably still laughing at that last letter of mine. Boy I sure do run at the mouth after a couple too many. Just forget about all that. Don and me are pals, and we have an understanding, he’s that way and I’m not, so what’s the worry? Today he drove me up the Highway past Playland to show me Sutro Museum. What a nuthouse! More wild junk than you’ve ever seen before, including every stitch of clothes ever worn by Tom Thumb the famous circus freak. Plus actual mummies and other curiosities. Ray, phone me up I miss your voice. Maybe you’ve tried but I don’t always get the message. T.
November 28
Dear Ray,
It’s been so long since I’ve heard from you, you must still be mad. Well I know your busy with family kids & the mean ogre husband but gosh Ray just a phone call is all I’m asking.
I thought of you on Thanksgiving, which Don used as a chance to close the Hideaway and cook a turkey for me and some other “orphans” as he called us, all a fine bunch. (Except for one clownish queen name of Benjamin but known to all as Betty. The worst of That Kind. A fineseeming fellow until he opens his mouth and then just a showering of womanly fussing and flirtation.) Best of the lot was Don’s old pal Chick, who like Don fled from the seminary, and talks now of Buddha. (He says, “Read
Dharma Bums
. It’s all in there, man.”) Chick’s lady is Mary, they’re a couple of beat poets moving out of the city for a cabin in the mountains to the south. Mary seems sad and remote but she lights up after some wine with a face that’s almost beautiful—don’t get jealous Ray she’s nothing compared to you! Chick and Mary told grand stories of San Francisco before Urban Renewal and they got a kick out of me listening to every word. Mary was at The Six Gallery the night of Ginsberg reading “Howl,” and she claims to have conversed with Kerouac, Cassady, McClure, everyone! Mary and Chick say the best of San Francisco is past, but I think of you and how you see everything as hopeful.
Mr. and Mrs. Casey are leaving to visit “the relations” so I will have the place to myself for two days, maybe you can sneak up to visit and I’ll show you my “masterpiece” which needs your advice as I’ve gotten stuck. Honestly Ray I can’t bear too many more nights with nothing but booze for company. Please call!
Teddy