The Nonconformist
by Ken Cohen
Chapter 14
Delusions
At Danny's next meeting with Dr. Margol, in late January, they talked about the breakup. Danny cried. He missed Ken and had fallen back into a quiet depression that was affecting his schoolwork.
"My friends have noticed. Mike makes sure I get to the Y. I run with him now, outside when the weather and snow allow, which isn't often this time of year, but it sure gets me out of the doldrums for a while. The Y's indoor track, we run that a lot. Some days I run endless laps there until I exhaust myself. I can make five miles at a time now and when I have the energy I go six.
"I never realized before, I mean, Mike and I have been friends throughout high school and I've known him since primary school. But I never realized until now what a good friend he is. He's gold. He really cares about me.
"Other than that, there's nothing I can do, Dr. Margol, except write to Ken and go back to living my life. I'm hoping he comes back for university next fall. Don't see why he wouldn't. It could happen, he said so. I wish Ontario only had 12 grades, it's unfair the other provinces have 12 but we have 13."
"Danny, your best chance of keeping your relationship alive with Ken is to write to him regularly and stay on good terms with him no matter what happens. Even if he doesn't come back for university. Don't get impatient, don't push him, just keep writing and be the same close friend and more that you've always been."
"Meanwhile, I'm lonely. I miss him terribly. I'm angry with him, but I forgive him. We all have to live our lives as we see fit. I'm slowly getting used to it. Still, it's lonely. They say food and water, clothing and shelter are the fundamental needs of life because we can't exist without them. But if you think about life beyond mere existence, then companionship and ideally love rank next. If you have love, you can feel alive and happy and fulfilled. Without that, everything feels diminished. Like I do.
"I guess one answer is to move forward. Like Kenny said, it's like a new adventure."
It was early April. Early spring in Toronto.
A childless couple, Sam and Annie Crofter, lived directly across the street from Danny's family. They met the Stavros family a month after the Stavros family moved in, back in 1954 when the subdivision was brand new.
Annie was a cheerful sweetheart of a woman. As Dickens might have described her, she was a large lady, or wore a large dress, you couldn't exactly tell because you couldn't be sure which was dress and which was lady. She had a round fleshy pinkish face, small gray-blue eyes and mouth. An ample chin flowed seamlessly downward disappearing inside her blouse, it jiggled slightly as she spoke.
Her husband Sam was a little shorter and quite thin, with a tiny paunch. His head was mostly bald, residual dark hair clinging to the sides and back.
Annie and Sam seemed to like each other well enough, expressed opinions on every subject, agreed on most everything, and were sure they were in the right.
Over the years, they befriended Danny's parents and grew close with them. Annie, like Barbara, was from Montreal. They had a few acquaintances in common and belonged to the same church, which gave them plenty to chat about. They shared similar opinions about most things. And loved classical music and opera.
In their own ways Annie and Sam were kind and helpful to Danny over the years. They had no children of their own but had always been affectionate to Danny and Mary. The children came to know them as auntie Annie and uncle Sam from the time they were quite young.
One weekend that spring of 1967, Annie and Sam had a visitor, a cousin of Annie from Montreal. Gerry, a few years older than Danny, was a junior at McGill University. He had never been to Toronto. Annie and Sam wanted to show him the town. They invited Danny to meet Gerry and asked if he wanted to come for the ride. Danny, with university just over the horizon, was interested in meeting Gerry and talking to him.
The four of them climbed into Annie's new station wagon, Annie and Sam in the front seat with Annie driving, while Gerry and Danny sat in the back. The new car even had seat belts, which Jimmy grumbled about. Why must he pay for something he doesn't want and won't use?
The drive took them down the new Don Valley Parkway on a beautiful sunny day and into the downtown area. They drove through the city's core, admiring two new skyscrapers designed by a famous architect. Annie and Jimmy thought the buildings glorious. To Danny they were stark alien structures of black steel and glass, a pair of giant dominoes standing on end. People believe having such buildings places Toronto in the same class as New York, he thought, but the last thing Toronto needs is to be like New York.
They drove north up University Avenue, the central artery of the city, and ended up in Yorkville, an area rather like a small version of New York's Greenwich Village. Yorkville was part of a neighbourhood known as The Annex. It had a variety of stores, bars, restaurants, and clubs where folk singers like Gordon Lightfoot and Joni Mitchell sometimes performed. Some of the city's oldest neighbourhoods surrounded Yorkville, filled with Victorian era row houses that once housed clerks and factory workers. Those were now being renovated by a burgeoning intelligentsia of professionals, university professors and the like, people who spurned the more affordable rapidly growing suburbs to the north.
Yorkville was reputedly a haven for hippies, American draft resisters and other "undesirable elements" that much of Toronto's prim and proper older population despised. Supposedly there was some dealing of illegal drugs in the area, especially marijuana, and so there were the usual calls from certain politicians to "clean up Yorkville." This meant the entire neighbourhood should be expropriated, razed to the ground, and replaced with an expressway and more office buildings.
There actually was a plan to run an expressway straight through the neighbourhood after demolishing a large part of it. But the disdainful professionals living in the area, under the leadership of a woman named Jane Jacobs (who ironically was from New York), strongly objected and made their views known loud and clear. They were to be among the saviours of the heart of the city.
Yorkville Avenue, one of several streets running through the community, itself was a narrow one way side street filled with stores, restaurants and cafes. It was usually lined with parked cars and crowded with pedestrians. You had to drive slowly along a single lane of traffic.
As the car crawled forward along Yorkville, Annie saw two young guys holding hands.
She cried out, "Look at the fairies holding hands!" She rolled down her window and gleefully pointed a short way up the street while continuing to exclaim at the sight, "Look, look!"
What a lucky find for Annie to show her Montreal guest, a pair of fairies holding hands. Proof Toronto is an exotic place, maybe even more so than Montreal.
Danny saw two guys, one with long blonde hair, the other wearing a baseball cap, holding hands as they walked.
As the car slowly passed the fairies, Annie eagerly asked, "Do you see them, Gerry, do you see them?"
Gerry replied "Mmhm," looking straight ahead.
Sam muttered, "Perverts, they belong in a mental hospital."
Danny cringed in the back seat and wished he weren't there.
When they eventually returned home, Annie parked in front of Danny's house and everyone came in. Barbara had baked a coffee cake and cookies and offered everyone tea or coffee. They sat around the dining room table, seven of them, chatting about the visit downtown among other things.
Annie described their exotic experience in Yorkville, and the usual conversation followed about the "problems with young people today." American cities were burning amid race riots; endless thousands of soldiers were killing each other on distant battlefields; in China millions were being persecuted, maimed and killed in the name of communism; the U.S. and Soviet Union were armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons and ready to blow the world to kingdom come; while Danny's parents and their friends discussed the problem of perverts holding hands in a public place.
Surrounded by an accelerating social revolution, the world of his parents was rapidly changing, but like frogs in heating water, much of their generation had not come to grips with change and some never would. In that respect they were little different from generations past and future. Danny wondered whether he and his friends would be any different as they aged.
In the first three years of high school, phys-ed was a combined course, 50% of the final grade allocated for gym and 50% for the weekly class called "health." Boys and girls took phys-ed and health separately. In grade 12, these 45 minute "health" classes included two sessions near the end of the year allocated for sex education. The board of education considered this an enlightened step forward.
The two sex-ed lessons came near the end of grade 12, by which time about half the students were 18. Someone said they were not allowed to teach birth control, but they were taught about venereal diseases like syphilis and gonorrhea, and that sexual intercourse and baby making take place within the context of marriage.
Each student chose a health related topic from a list, for a 15 minute class presentation during the year. Danny selected homosexuality. It'll prove to everyone that I'm no fairy, he thought. No homo, he assumed, would give a talk on that subject. It vaguely occurred to him that his "reasoning" made no sense, but he wouldn't see it that way. He needed to prove himself fearless on the subject, as though it was nothing special.
His presentation would be part of one of the sex-ed classes. He was happy with what he prepared, but it seemed pretty conventional. It was based on Sigmund Freud's theory of homosexuality of developed about 60 years earlier. Danny thought Freud's theory had no credible evidence to support it. The fact was, no one seemed to know why between 5 and 10 percent of the adult male population were homosexuals, or for that matter why the same proportions applied to left-handedness. Most people actually believed no more than one or two percent of men were homosexuals and that most of those were marginal criminals. It was unthinkable to even ask such a question about women.
I'm nervous, he thought. Maybe I should disclose my own sexual nature to the class? I'll talk to coach Taylor after school.
"Hello, sir. I'm doing a presentation on homosexuality. I'm, uh, a homosexual. Well, not quite, because I can do it with girls as well. At least I think I can. I hope you're okay with it. I mean, with the first part, you know, the homo part, the girl part is okay. If you know what I mean."
"Danny, I'm surprised you have the courage to tell me this. I have no problem with it. I admire you for talking to me about it. Please keep our conversation between the two of us. If anyone finds out I did anything but insist you follow the normal path, I would be fired."
"Okay. Well, um, don't worry about that, I know how to keep my mouth shut. I can keep secrets. Really, I can. I was, um, going to tell everyone I'm attracted to other guys. I really don't have any attraction to girls. That's what I wanted to ask you about. Whether I should actually say that about myself in my presentation."
"I don't see what you will accomplish by talking about yourself during a presentation that's supposed to teach facts about a perverted lifestyle. Your teacher expects you to talk about a perverted lifestyle."
"You're saying I should stick to the facts?"
"Yes. The first 99.9% should stick to the facts. If you want to spend the last few seconds of the class talking about yourself… I wouldn't advise it."
"Okay."
I'm a nervous wreck at the front of the class. I look at 24 boys. We've taken showers. Um. Together. Mmm. I begin to speak. Pretend you're in court talking to a judge, Danny. Um, no, not that, not a lawyer.
"This presentation is about homosexuality. I will explain what it is, its causes, how Canadians view it, what it's like to be one in our society.
"A homosexual is sexually attracted to other people of the same sex. In the late 1940s the Kinsey report estimated 10% of all men are attracted to other men and some others are attracted to both men and women. If any of that 10% have sex with another man, they become criminals. That's because sexual acts between men are against the law.
"The Kinsey report says a person's sexual feelings are like a spectrum. You can be homosexual or heterosexual or somewhere in between. Most people are heterosexual. But some experiment when they're young. Also, about half of prisoners in Canada have sex with other prisoners. They have no other choice. Any sex is better than no sex.
"Some doctors believe homosexuality is a mental illness. Some religions say homosexuals should be put to death.
"No one knows why some men are attracted to others. Sigmund Freud, who founded modern psychiatry, had a theory that makes no sense. It was about so-called inverted personalities, boys who are dominated by their mothers or fathers.
"I myself am either a homosexual or bisexual, I'm really not sure which. I've had sexual relations with people of both sexes. But I prefer males, that is my natural attraction."
There wasn't a sound. 24 boys stared at him.
"I never decided, I never chose, any more than any of you ever decided or chose. I never thought it might be cool. It just is.
"Look, suppose you were born left-handed. Your left hand is dominant. It's not a choice, it just is. Whichever you are, you didn't choose that. You were born that way.
"Some doctors say most of their homosexual patients are unhappy people. They conclude homosexuality must be a mental illness. But doctors see mostly sick people. When a happy healthy homosexual man comes to them for a routine checkup, he has no reason to tell the doctor about his sexuality. So doctors only know about homosexuals with problems, not the healthy, happy ones.
"Also, in our culture, homosexuals are disliked and discriminated against. They can't live their lives the way heterosexual people can. They can't date, dance together in public, get engaged, marry, or have a—"
Mr. McConnell interrupts: "Mr. Stavros, you were allowed 15 minutes, you're now over that. Your presentation is finished, take a seat. You disgust me. You get an F."
F!!! Failed. I failed. No, no, no…
I got an F. Mike's staring at me. "You're what?"
Annie is cackling and cheering. Sam is muttering "pervert." A Soviet bomber appears in a cloudy sky flying toward me. Help! Wake up!
It was a dream. Just a dream. Shit! An F!
Why do I dream about failing? People in my dreams laugh at me. I'm a failure.
Danny closed his eyes and tried to sleep.
He had to give the talk that afternoon. He was glad he didn't write it that way, stand up there like he did in the dream and announce he's a homo. The class pervert. Stupid idea. Just the facts. He regretted choosing this topic instead of his original idea, nutrition, but it was too late to change.
The presentation went okay. Freud can put everyone to sleep, he thought, but that's okay. He didn't try to convince anyone of anything. He figured a couple of them would associate him with homos anyway, just because he did the presentation.
He got a B. The teacher said it was good but should have included Freud's explanation of homosexuality in more detail. Even if it makes no sense.
When Danny first knew Gray Samuelson, he didn't yet know how alluring the boy could be. He didn't realize how deep his own feelings might go because he'd never had feelings of that kind for anyone—feelings different from the love he felt for Kenny. The attraction Gray would have for him would be magical, irresistible, profound and painful, beyond anything Danny could have imagined.
Until June of that year, at the end of grade 12, Gray was for Danny a school friend and athletic rival who was a little crazy but part of the same social group, an unusual guy who had been in Danny's class for three years.
Lately, with the departure of Kenny, a kind of emotional vacuum had formed in Danny's mind.
Danny initially felt no attraction to Gray, was an accomplished student in a class of high achievers. Danny noticed him, though, and paid attention. Smart people attracted Danny. Gray initially was part of the competition and an interesting guy.
Gray first paid attention to Danny on the occasion of the Fanny Hill book report. Later he brought himself to Danny's attention with the celebrated pencil throwing incident.
Gray emotionally was a late bloomer, a teenager who didn't yet date. High strung, sometimes assertive, he might also disappear inside himself for a time. When he did speak, he could seem arrogant because he knew he was smart and wasn't shy about it. But usually he had little to say.
Until the day of the grade 12 math final, he had little out of the ordinary to say to Danny. He just watched and listened.
All grade 12 students had to pass a special math exam set by the province of Ontario in order to qualify for grade 13. Danny drove to school that day.
Before the exam, Gray saw Danny.
"Hey Danny, did you bring your car today?"
"Yes I did."
"Any chance I could get a ride home after the exam?"
On the surface it was simple. You ask a casual friend for a ride home, he indifferently turns you down, so you shrug and walk home. What's the big deal? You know then that he's not your friend, not someone to trust or depend on.
Danny and Gray only knew each other casually. Danny owed him nothing.
Gray didn't easily leave himself vulnerable to being turned down. But he found Danny nervy, precocious, out of the ordinary. And he sensed Danny would not hurt him. So he risked trusting Danny with his simple request, and therein lay the invitation.
Gray in Danny's eyes was beautiful, remote, sad, within a solitude of his own making. A chance to get closer was unexpected, a chance to gain Gray's trust. Saying 'yes' was automatic.
"Sure. Meet me outside the classroom after the exam."
Danny felt an attraction to Gray. It was different from the attraction he felt for Kenny, for there was no underlying certainty of a shared sexuality with Gray, only a slight, vague hope.
After the exam, as they walked to the car, Gray asked, "Wanna go to the Y this afternoon? Shoot baskets?"
"Sure. Just keep your elbows to yourself."
"You know me, I can't help myself. Anyway, I've noticed you can take care of yourself on the court."
They talked easily about the exam and a few other things as Danny drove. They arrived at Gray's modest home. Gray invited Danny in.
Gray was anxious to see his brother, who was in bed recovering from treatments he had been receiving for weeks at the children's hospital downtown. They greeted Gray's mom. Danny followed Gray through the hall to the rear of the house.
When they reached his brother's bedroom door, Gray knocked gently. He spoke softly and tenderly. "Hi Eddy, it's me, can I come in?"
Danny heard a younger boy's soft voice respond distantly "uh-huh."
Gray opened the door. They looked in. The bedroom was dusky dim, a blind and curtains blocking most of the midday sunlight. Eddy, 14, lay in bed under blankets. His head rested on a pillow. He barely moved.
Gray said, "Hi. This is my friend Danny."
"Hi, Eddy."
"Hi."
"Eddy, after lunch Danny and I are going to the Y to play basketball. So I'll see you later, okay?"
Gray turned and quietly closed the door behind him. "He's very weak. He's getting chemotherapy and radiation treatments. He has leukemia."
"Oh. Gee, I hope he gets better."
They walked together back to the front of the house. Danny asked, "How about I pick you up in an hour?"
"I'll be waiting for you. I'll bring my basketball."
"Okay. See you then."
As Danny drove home, the memory echoed in his mind. 'This is my friend Danny,' Gray's soft voice speaking to the brother he loved. Anxiety gently imbedded in affection. A compassion seldom revealed to outsiders.
To Gray, he and Danny were friends, which for him implied mutual loyalty, affection, trust, shared interests, the potential for emotional intimacy of a kind not common between men.
To Danny, it might be something more. To be accepted as a friend by this demanding young man felt gratifying and momentous. His attraction to Gray crystallized in Danny's mind and was deeper than he had recognized. Danny's sexual yearning for Gray clouded his thoughts. The fact was, the friendship could only deepen, and Danny could only learn whether Gray shared his sexual interest, if he were first honest with Gray. Gray had trusted Danny. Now it was Danny's turn to show trust.
Without that, the friendship could not go beyond the intellectual. It was Danny's turn to trust, to tell his new friend who he really was.
Danny had done it with Kenny. It took him a year after they first met. Kenny was patient. But Danny knew Kenny was gay, so the decision to reveal his sexuality to Kenny actually carried almost no risk.
Could Danny trust Gray to that extent? The question didn't enter Danny's mind. Gray's nature was to judge people. Not to hurt them, certainly never to bully. Rather, Gray by his nature sized up in the back of his mind the people he met.
But Danny had been burned by the warped hatred of people who had judged him in the past. Revealing himself to Gray could repel Gray and destroy their friendship. Then the knowledge could spread to other students and even teachers. Danny had witnessed the revulsion other people felt for him without his ever saying a word to them about himself. With that experience always in the background, revealing his sexuality to Gray was out of the question.
He picked up Gray and they went to the Y. They spent most of the afternoon at the Y shooting hoops and playing two on two against a couple other guys.
Danny felt their new closeness. Gray's trust was a connection Danny was strongly aware of. Somewhere deep in his subconscious, though, was his reality that he could not reveal himself to Gray unless Gray were first to offer Danny a sexual relationship.
There might be only one barrier remaining between Danny and Gray, but it was insurmountable. And in the end, futile, for Gray was interested only in girls.
Being alone with Gray was a new experience. They talked about the war in the middle east, the history of warfare, other things. Gray was as interested in history as Danny, and was reading books on his own.
It would quickly become possibly the most interesting and challenging intellectual relationship Danny had ever encountered, one he had unknowingly yearned for, and it was a sparkling challenge which he took up with relish. Gray's independent reading of history, philosophy and literature outside school was a possibility new to Danny that he grasped immediately. Gray lent him William Shirer's second masterpiece, The Collapse of the Third Republic, a history of France in the decades leading up to World War II, which had Danny enthralled for weeks. Gray had even bought his own stereo system, and invited Danny to listen.
Gray was smart, knowledgeable, had a magnetic aura. Charisma. Danny felt it without knowing what it was. He needed Gray to like him. He wanted to know Gray better. But he had to be careful. These feelings he had for Gray were nothing like they were for Kenny. He couldn't yet trust Gray with that part of him. All he could do was hope.
Nevertheless, Danny thought, now he knows he can depend on me. I'll do anything for him. I think he really likes me. He really likes me.
A letter finally came for Danny in the mail from Vancouver. It had been over two months since he replied to Ken's last letter. He lay down on his bed, opened it and read.
June 30/67 - Dear Danny, it's official, I've sent in my acceptance and will start university here in the fall in first year of the advanced science program. And I have a full scholarship here, including residence and meals, so I can live on campus in the dorms—my parents pay nothing.
I'm thrilled. They're ecstatic, not about the money but the honour. The course is officially called first year science but it's exactly the same as what other schools call math, physics, chemistry - "MPC". It's a four-year degree and if I do well in it, I'll qualify for all kinds of possibilities. They say they have the best MPC program in the country. And when it's finished I'll be able to choose from engineering, medicine, or possibly a master's degree of some kind.
My final average in grade 12 is 93%, not bad for a guy who transferred in halfway through the year. They gave me full credit for the first semester of grade 12 in Ontario as part of that. The grade 12 teachers here were terrific. Once they got to know me, they went out of their way to help me when I needed it. Naomi finished with 91%, second in the graduating class.
They awarded me the valedictorian address but I told them it wouldn't be fair to her for someone who just came along six months ago to get that honour. So they agreed to give the honour to her. Everyone I know here and kids and teachers I didn't know have been thanking me for that. It's the first time in my life I've felt popular, and I like the feeling.
Anyway, Danny, I am so excited.
I haven't heard much from you lately. Let me know how you did this year. I guess you're going to work at the same place as last summer? It reminds me of the time we spent together last summer which makes me feel very sad. I really miss you. And I still feel the same way about you as I did when we parted six months ago. With all my love, Kenny.
After he read it, he turned over and cried into his pillow, pounding it in anger and frustration.
He began talking softly to himself.
"So much for returning to Toronto for university. He'd said 'might' or something like that. What did he say?"
He concentrated his mind for an instant.
"He said something like, 'I can still go to university here.'
"But he wouldn't promise. He, um, what's that fancy word? Pre- something. Shit. I don't care.
"Something about his dad making more money so he could go to school anywhere. So he could come back here for university. Something like that, he led me on, he wouldn't tell the truth. He could, he might, maybe.
"He lied to me. Fuck! His dad wouldn't spend the money after all! He got it for free! So why send him back to Toronto?"
He looked at the letter again. "It doesn't even mention his promise. It's the elephant in the room! He forgot about it! Or is conveniently ignoring it. Does he even care? Does he understand what this is doing to me? He didn't mention me, or how I would feel about this, or what we talked about before he left."
He mumbled on. "He doesn't care. He's through with me. Lots of new friends. Moving on. Mr. Popularity. Fuck off."
Something new: paranoia. Burning jealousy and black anger and blind irrationality blended together. He felt it rising straight out of the bald-faced lie from his former lover which was now being thrown back in his face without a care in the world. He's written me off!
He calmed down and thought hard. A streak of paranoia spoke in his head to him.
Kenny knew when he left that he wouldn't be back. He lied to you. He's lying in the letter when he says he hasn't heard from you lately—it's taken him over two months to answer your last letter. He ignores his almost-promise to come back for university. He's done with you. Read between the lines. He has a new life. New friends. Freedom. He'll make some irresistible guy happy, some irresistible guy will make him happier than you ever could. He'll be living in residence with all kinds of boys looking him over. The two of you are through, and you know it. You fucked up. You were never good enough for him. He's a beautiful brilliant god, you're just a second rate piece of shit. Why would he care about you any longer? He doesn't need you now, he's found a better life.
Grade 12 ended. It was July. Danny returned to his summer job. He knew he was again in for a slog. He didn't care. He needed to work, it would help him forget. At work he had to place his feelings about Gray and Kenny in the background and put his nose to the grindstone, as the saying goes. But it felt good to see Joe and so many of the other people he remembered from last summer. It was like a reunion for the first ten minutes, then back to hard work. Hard, but the money was worth it.
That summer when he wasn't working, Danny saw a lot of Gray. His new friendship helped fill the yawning painful vacuum left by his loss of Kenny. He felt depressed by his memories of Kenny but encouraged by his new friendship with Gray.
Yet, in the three years Danny had known Gray, the boy never so much as hinted at any physical attraction to Danny or any other male. In sexual terms he only talked about girls. That would continue unchanged. Danny tried to ignore it. He was living in an emotional vacuum, tolerating the deep loneliness he felt every day, even as he found an intellectual world awaiting him in Gray.
His new closeness with Gray grew intense as the weeks passed. He needed Gray. They spent much of their free time together. Weights, basketball, even self-defence classes at the Y, pickup touch football in the park, listening to music on Gray's stereo. History. Politics.
Had he been more mature and experienced, he might have recognized from the start that one aspect of this was hopeless for him because it could never become what Danny yearned for.
But he was innocent and fell into it faster than he could resist. So, over time, he would stand by and witness Gray's cruelty, his ego, his controlled anger. His superior intellect and arrogance. His frustration. His constant worries for Eddy. The joy he found in athletics, music, literature. All that, concentrated in one charismatic young man, just seemed to heighten Danny's feelings. He hadn't experienced a friendship that could be both appealing and painful.
The only homosexuals in most people's lives were the occasional effeminate men they might meet, or notice in the entertainment world. Beyond that, homosexuality was a word most adults had long ago learned to denigrate in their minds as something undesirable. Gray himself displayed no hostility toward effeminate guys, but wouldn't pretend they were like everyone else. He made occasional comments about a student, Steve Goldman, and about one teacher, who both displayed effeminate tendencies. He apparently invented his own special term for such men: gearboxes. Never homos or fags or queers, they were always gearboxes.
When Gray said 'gearbox,' he voiced it lightly, in a teasing way. There was no hatred or sneer of the kind he heard when someone like Gerald Borstin uttered fag or fairy or queer. He never knew Gray to throw any such ugly label at anyone. "Gearbox" only came up in quiet conversations with his close friends.
What homosexuality had to do with the device that changes gears in cars, Gray never explained. When asked, his only reply was to glance at Danny for a fraction of a second, then quickly look away. Perhaps Gray sensed Danny might be different, and was warning him away, clarifying a boundary. But it wasn't in Danny's nature to perceive hidden meanings.
Johnny, who had known and been close to Grey longer than Danny, took Danny aside one day to explain "gearbox" to him.
"Look," he said, "suppose there were a group of homosexual friends who get together for dinner one night. A whole bunch of guys. And suppose one of them has invented a nickname for heterosexual people. Like, for instance…"
He seemed stumped until a light went on in his head. "Oh, I know. Suppose one of them came up with the nickname 'baby-maker.' Then they might use it in casual conversation. So it might go like this:
'Did you see that new kid at school? That beautiful blonde haired boy?'
'Oh, yeah, he already has a date with one of the girls. Sorry, he's out of reach for you, he's a baby-maker.' That's kind of what 'gearbox' is about. A light-hearted jibe."
To maintain his cover, Danny feigned amusement at Gray's mockery. He would smile or even snicker when Gray used "gearbox." He knew from his experiences long ago the risk he ran if he remained impassive. So he contrived to seem like one of the boys. This despite his aversion to doing that. For, he couldn't risk losing Gray, or even becoming a target of his humour. In just a few months, his feelings for Gray had grown too strong for him to risk the pain of rejection.
The attraction included an element of submissiveness. Gray's jumble of novel behaviours included occasional diatribes against all and sundry identifiable groups from women to people of colour to Anglos to his fellow Jews. They were repellent, yet Danny could neither ignore what Gray said nor cut off their friendship. His sole course of action was to defer with silence. He rationalized that his silence was not assent, despite what most onlookers would conclude. This was what his friend was. An occasionally intolerable misfit with a whole spectrum of interesting qualities. As he told himself, if you want the friend, you have to accept the whole package.
More than once he wished the attraction he felt for Gray would disappear, but that wasn't happening. He was into Gray for the long term. It was beginning to dawn on him. Gray was a living, breathing misanthrope who might be the love of his life.
It was a dangerous delusion.
Authors deserve your feedback. It's the only payment they get. If you go to the top of the page you will find the author's name. Click that and you can email the author easily.* Please take a few moments, if you liked the story, to say so.
[For those who use webmail, or whose regular email client opens when they want to use webmail instead: Please right click the author's name. A menu will open in which you can copy the email address (it goes directly to your clipboard without having the courtesy of mentioning that to you) to paste into your webmail system (Hotmail, Gmail, Yahoo etc). Each browser is subtly different, each Webmail system is different, or we'd give fuller instructions here. We trust you to know how to use your own system. Note: If the email address pastes or arrives with %40 in the middle, replace that weird set of characters with an @ sign.]
* Some browsers may require a right click instead
