The Nonconformist
by Ken Cohen
Chapter 23
Failure
It was over a mile walk home from there. Subfreezing cold, a stiff breeze blowing ice pellets into his face. Bare hands in pockets, he began walking, gradually picking up the pace as he gained confidence in the traction of his boots. He shook from the cold but shortly felt himself slowly warming with the effort of plodding through deep snow. The walk took him past the junior high school and the primary school from so many years ago, both buildings only just visible through the blowing storm.
Why is he like that? Mike warned me. He pushes everyone away, Mike said. Has no close friends and never will. Same with girls, they say he fucks them, doesn't care about making love. Some go back for more. God, it's cold. His little brother's dead body at the bottom of that deep hole. Why, dear God? Why do you do this to us?
He remembered after the math exam driving Gray home, the gloom, his sick brother. 'Hi Eddy, this is my friend Danny.' That's why, called me his friend, it's when I first loved him. Only Kenny and Mike ever did that. Broke apart the loneliness, I was accepted, trusted, by a boy I admired so intensely from afar. Should I go back there in a day or two? They said this shiva thing goes on for a week. Someone said Gray has to be back at school before that, don't want to miss classes in med school.
He eventually reached home, frozen stiff but had warmed at the same time. His hands and face were like ice, but the long walk stirred him inside. Like what they say about getting lost in a snowstorm, don't rest or you'll freeze to death, keep going, only way to stay alive. He let himself in the front door. The house was dark, mom must be asleep.
I need to forget him.
But another voice told him, he's being honest with you. He can't love you the way you want him to. He can't give you what you need.
His melancholy mind recalled the song. It was from the Broadway musical "Oliver." He humming it quietly as he undressed and crawled under his blankets. Alone.
Whe-e-e-e-ere is love?
Does it fall from skies above?
Is it underneath the willow tree
That I've been dreaming of?
The next morning, getting ready for school, Danny was interrupted by his mother.
"Danny, I have bad news. More bad news, I should say. I just found out a few minutes ago, Joan Grant across the street called. Sam Crofter died last night. He had a heart attack. An ambulance and the police were at the house, they carried Sam out of the house on a stretcher, completely covered. Their family doctor came to the house in the evening because Sam wasn't feeling well. The doctor examined him and was going to take him in his car to the hospital when he collapsed. The doctor tried to revive him. An ambulance arrived just after he collapsed but he was dead by then. The paramedics could not revive him. They took the body to the hospital but there was nothing to be done. The funeral is next week."
"That's terrible, mom. Poor Annie, she doesn't deserve this, that's for sure. And they have no children. Does she have any other family?"
"In Montreal. She has a brother and a sister there and they have children. I think you met her nephew here once before daddy died."
"I'll go to the funeral with you. Find out when and where it will be."
"Alright. I'm sorry you'll have to go to yet another funeral. It's not something boys your age should be doing. Funerals are for old people. But Sam, he was young, 56 I believe. He didn't smoke, either. You just never know, do you? We just never know."
He had exams to prepare for, but felt restless. One Saturday evening, having spent the day sitting at his desk, he watched a hockey playoff game. Toward 10 p.m., getting bored, he left and drove downtown to an old bathhouse he had passed a few times along one of his lesser used routes into the city. It was a plain old stand-alone brick building. "Russian baths" said the sign over the entrance. "Men only."
The man at the front desk gazed at him. "I don't recognize you. Is this your first time here?"
He didn't seem very friendly. "Yes."
"I'm Harmon Kivo. Here is towel and locker key with the number on it. Cost is $2.00. I require a refundable $3.00 deposit for towel and locker key. We like small bills.
"Leave your clothes in locker. Keep it locked. Do not lose key. We are not responsible for loss of personal belongings. Steam room is through that door, and large sauna. Upstairs are private rooms which cost more. We have canned drinks, coffee, sandwiches, other snacks to buy if you are hungry. If you stay more than four hours, there is $2.00 charge for each extra four hours or less."
The place also had an illegal "bar." It couldn't possibly get a liquor licence. The Ontario liquor board made sure no undesirable person could sell or serve liquor to the public.
So Mr. Kivo kept a few bottles, rye and scotch and vodka, under the counter. Danny only knew of it because when he entered, he noticed a patron, wearing only a towel wrapped around his middle, at the counter just inside the entrance. Mr. Kivo gave him a paper cup containing a pale yellow/orange liquid, and was handed a one dollar bill.
Of course, Danny wasn't yet 21 but no one seemed to be checking. He bought and rapidly drank a couple shots of cheap scotch to bolster his courage (it reminded him of bad cough medicine), then ventured in.
Inside, he stripped, locking his things away. Wrapped in a towel, he wandered through a door into a small room with benches around the perimeter, that was filled with steam. The heat felt almost staggering. He settled on one of the benches and relaxed. Through the steaming heat he noticed a lean, handsome enough man who looked to be as old as his dad had once been. They sat in the silence as the steam billowed up from an unseen source. After a couple minutes, the man asked if he could sit with Danny.
"Sure."
The man stepped across and sat next to him.
"I'm Jeff."
"Danny."
"Haven't seen you here before."
"It's my first time."
"How did you find this place?"
"A guy told me about it a while back. Said I should try it some time."
"Who was that?"
"I think his name was Tim."
"You just here for the steam?"
"Does anyone come here just for the steam?"
"A few, not many. Most are like me. Middle-aged, lonely, guys who spend their weekends staring out of windows."
"You sound like a poet."
"Which one?"
"You might laugh. T.S. Eliot. He's one of my favourites, despite his shortcomings."
"You know T.S. Eliot?"
"Sure, I read him at school. University. I'm pretty young, so I'm still learning. I'm no expert."
"Well, he's an amazing poet, no question about it. I remember reading the Love Song in high school."
"Yeah. J. Alfred Prufrock. My favourite. Easier to follow than The Wasteland."
They sat quietly as the steam hissed and billowed around them.
"So, why did you come here," asked Jeff."
"It's a Saturday night. I spent all day studying. I was lonely. I don't have anyone. So…"
"You look like a beautiful young man. Too young to be here. You can find sex here with no trouble. But you won't find what you're looking for. You'll find lonely middle-aged guys like me and lonely old guys like I will be soon enough. They're only interested in you for your body. Some have come here for years. Their lives are empty. Sad. This is no place for you.
"You'll also find drugs here, easy to buy, easy to use. They'll take you for a hell of a ride if that's your taste, but don't start, it'll be the first step into the gutter. Some of these guys are in the gutter. They'll offer you anything for a price. You seem like a nice kid, and smart, and you're very attractive. This is not a place for you. Find someone real to love you, and stay away from here. That's my advice.
"I would love to play with you now, and I would love it if I could bring you some joy tonight and you could bring me some joy. But don't make a habit of coming to places like this. Once you fall in the rut, it becomes too easy. This place is a dead end. It's for old men with nowhere else to go."
"It definitely feels depressing. The place looks gray and it feels that way too."
"Do you want to go upstairs with me?"
"Upstairs?"
"It's where my room is. I have a small room up there for a few hours."
"Okay."
"First we'll shower."
Jeff stood, Danny followed him. They showered next to each other in a large public shower room. A little later, Danny followed him up a set of stairs to a landing. The floor had a number of small rooms. They went into Jeff's. Danny emerged 30 minutes later feeling better.
He returned to the showers and washed himself again.
So the adventure ended successfully. The afterglow faded soon after when, fully dressed, he stepped out the front door into the cold air and strident lights of the city night.
His car was parked three blocks away. He began walking through a side street past row after row of old homes. At the next intersection, under a street light, a young man sat on the sidewalk. He looked familiar. Danny approached and had a closer look. "Carl?"
The young man looked up. "Oh, it's you."
Carl's eyes looked glazed as though he had perhaps been asleep.
"Are you okay, Carl?"
Carl looked up. "You don't happen to have a couple dollars I can borrow?"
"What are you doing here? Why aren't you at home?"
"I don't live at home any more."
"Why? What happened?"
"It's a long story."
"Where do you live now?"
"Nowhere special. Here and there. You don't happen to have a dollar on you?"
"Uh yeah, okay."
He reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet. Found a one dollar bill.
"Here." He bent down and handed the bill over. Then he straightened up, turned away, walked quickly. He walked faster and faster. Then he was jogging. He finally reached his car. He needed to get home. Carl. A kid he knew in high school. Was in his gym class one year. Short, thin, grim, quiet like so many others.
He drove home rapidly, breaking speed limits where he thought he could get away with it. Back home, he shed his clothes. He brushed his teeth, crawled straight into bed. He wondered where Carl was now.
When he awoke, it was Sunday morning. Barbara said goodbye, she was leaving for church. He looked at his desk. Books and notes everywhere. He needed to study today. He planned the day. Study a few hours, go for a run, return for lunch, study 'til dinner, and later, deep into the night when he could no longer stay awake.
Diary, May 5, 1970 - Unbelievable news this morning. Four students shot dead by soldiers at a university called Kent State in Ohio yesterday during a war protest. And more injured. They say one is paralyzed. What is happening in the U.S.? Since JFK was assassinated, everything has gone wrong. Is this an early stage of disintegration of their democracy? Was it ever actually the democracy they claim it to be? Or just a country with free elections that beneath the surface is run by powerful people with money and influence?
Diary July 4, 1970 - Gray isn't working this summer. I've seen little of him since that night last February. He no longer calls me, don't see him at the Y. I'm afraid to call him. John said Gray and his cousin Josh bought Honda 450 motorcycles and went on a camping trip across the continent to San Francisco. There they'll no doubt find drugs galore and lots of pretty girls offering free sex for the taking.
He didn't tell me he was going. Didn't ask me to come. Not that I could have. I have to work. And who can afford a motorcycle?
I miss Kenny. I've lost him and Alan both.
Danny's obsessions and neurotic fears affected him in school. In second year university, he failed a course. That ended his notion of getting a master's degree and making a career in what the Economist magazine self-deprecatingly called "the dismal art."
The only person who was to know he failed was his mother, who at his request opened the envelope from the university when it arrived, phoned him at his summer job and told him the bad news. She first read him the three A's and one B in his four other courses; then her voice broke softly into a tone he could not remember ever hearing from her; she whispered the unspeakable words into the phone—"and I'm sorry, Danny, but …"—and he knew. An F.
Danny resented her sadness. He saw her as responsible for what he had become. But she didn't seem so hard on him now. Especially since dad died.
So the law school default Danny assiduously resisted since childhood loomed before him. He saw no other way forward. He could never do a master's in economics with a failed course on his transcripts. Still, the uncertainty grew as he continuously asked himself, what law school would accept someone with a failed course? And why would he want to spend his life as a lawyer?
He remembered Robert, and thought, I can't become like him. Is that what lawyers are like? Preening aggressive braggarts who push everyone else out of their way?
Although Mr. Kingman was something else. Nothing like Robert.
Danny was a young man with little confidence, studying at an institution that assumed certain essential qualities of its students. He seemed to lack those qualities; these days, he sagged like a plastic bag under the burdens of life, instead of defying them.
Why did he fail that course?
Certain students reminded him of the boys who bullied him all those summers ago. These students sat at the front of the classroom. To Danny they were self-important sycophants who ran the show by answering the professor's questions, asking their own, monopolizing his attentions after each lecture without a moment's doubt of their entitlement.
Danny had never spoken to any of them, yet he feared and resented them. He became obsessed with them. He would not challenge their right to dominate. So, how could he ask basic questions that should have been raised in the first week of the course instead of months later? They would then see him as a failure, his weaknesses exposed. An easy target to be mocked and belittled in their gossip sessions. Nice boy, very nice…
And the professor seemed cold and remote. Surely by the time those students were through asking their questions and presenting their views, he'd have no time for Danny, a sad-faced lonely figure falling farther behind in the course.
He was so needlessly self-reliant and fearful that he could not share the dark and awful fact of his failure with anyone. Its mere existence exposed his personal failings. It had to remain hidden along with so much else about him.
The failure was symptomatic of more than just one course gone wrong. He'd feared the mockery of the domineering students, whom he assumed were bullies somehow placed there to humiliate him. He was intimidated by memory and imagination. So he couldn't ask for help.
After the failure, he couldn't turn to those closest to him. Not his friends, not Dr. Margol, not even his sister. He wouldn't trust them with the knowledge of what he imagined the failure had revealed about him. He might have told Kenny, but… He decided he'd call Kenny, he had to talk to someone. When he called, his brother said Kenny was out. He asked Manny to have him call.
He wondered which took more courage? To self-destruct? Or continue on?
He had only one real choice. He had to maintain the charade. He had his role on the stage and had to play it out, wherever it took him. Self-destruction was not a genuine option for a coward.
One day, in something close to a hypnotic state, he walked like a doomed man from his summer job to the university's admin centre and found a clerk who indifferently explained his options. He would need to take extra courses in third year to make up the failed course. If he could handle the extra load and pass everything, his problem would be solved and he could graduate with his degree after three years.
He could now see a light shining down a long and lonely corridor that lay ahead. It would mean an even greater workload to make up for the failed course. So what? He could handle that. It would be his route. He would finish university in the third year, get his degree, and go to law school if one would accept a failure such as he.
He felt better. There was a way forward. The hell with Gray, Kenny, all of them. He didn't need them. He could do this alone. He'd made a mountain of a molehill.
A couple weeks after Gray and Josh returned home mid-August, Danny went with Jonathan to Josh's place one Saturday night at the end of August. The parents were away, the house full of kids smoking weed and drinking screwdrivers. Some he knew from high school, others were friends of Gray and his cousin including new ones from the university. John said to come, Gray wouldn't care.
Danny described the evening to Dr. Margol a month or two later:
"Well, stupid old me, I went. Had a few drinks which loosened my tongue. Began talking, made a political speech to some of these kids. About the beauty, the fairness, equity and brotherhood of socialism. It was all bullshit, I know practically nothing about socialism, but it seems like, if all human beings were good people who could be trusted, then socialism might work. A bunch of us sat in the kitchen talking about the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia, why the U.S.S.R. sent its army to break it up. Gray was high, drinking, smoking weed, who knows what else. I guess he could no longer stomach my nonsense so he interrupted.
"'Daniel believes in international brotherhood,' he said. 'How does he come to believe this? He's usually so quiet. Well, it's because he's a good boy. He wants to help the world get ahead. Forget that the communists, those self-proclaimed true socialists, want to slit our throats, let's link arms with our socialist brothers,' says Daniel. 'Then they can send us, the ones they can't control, or who are ambitious or smart, or they plain don't like, to prison camps or to be shot in the back of the head and dumped into another mass grave. Only a good-hearted boy like Dan could dream up such a load of bullshit.'
"A minute later he's loudly telling the story of some guy they met in California. 'Josh and I are high and walking around in this seedy part of San Francisco late one night when this pretty blonde boy, a cocksucker kid maybe 16 or 17 walks up and says, 'howdy, boys, Bobby-Lee Anderson's the name, sucking your cock's the game. Want a favour, boys? I'm your man.' So I say to Josh, this I have to see, and I tell this cocksucker guy Bobby-Lee, 'okay, Bob, you really want to suck my cock?' Bobby's getting all excited, so I unzip my fly and take out my little dick. That little cocksucker kneels down right there on the sidewalk, starts sucking for all he's worth and wouldn't you know it, he's a much better cocksucker than any girl who's ever given me head. After I shoot in his mouth, he does Josh too! And Bobby-Lee, he didn't miss a drop, he swallows all of it. We handed that cocksucker a pair of fives and thanked him for showing us a good time.
"'Now Dan here, he's familiar with stories like this. Aren't you, Dan? You're jealous, aren't you? Jealous of Bobby-Lee, huh? Huh, Danny boy? Tell you what. Do me right now. I don't mind. There's a tenner in it for you. Just kneel down right here and I'll whip it out for you.'
"I was staring at Gray, the room looks to me all wet like rain falling on a window, I couldn't stop it, too much to drink I guess. I'm getting ready to leave, my tee all stained with tears. I felt like I did in Greece, scared, speechless, like I didn't belong. My friend has turned into one of the bullies. Josh was pissed off. 'Gray, shut up. Danny, don't listen to him, he's being a jerk, you should just go on home. Find someone else to hang out with, my cousin I'm ashamed to say is bad news.'
"Gray says 'Shut up? Fuck you Josh, it's a free country. Hey Danny, you like sucking dick, after you do me, go hang out with Tim and John over here. You can do them too.'
"I felt naked in front of all these guys. I got out of there and somehow managed to drive slowly home without smashing up though I could barely walk. Had to creep into the house, got my clothes off and crawled straight into bed. Didn't get up till noon the next day. Josh called me the next day to apologize.
"Anyway, these feelings for Gray are pretty well gone, I guess. I don't know if I hate him, but I don't love him any longer. I'm haunted by loneliness. Kenny left, I blew it with Alan, never had a chance with Gray. Other than that night I've seen almost nothing of Gray since his brother died.
"I was in love with a guy who couldn't love me back. I don't know what I want. I'm a fake. I never should have gone near him, right from the start I should have kept away. And I knew that. I just couldn't help what I did."
He didn't speak to Gray again for months after that August. The attraction to Gray disappeared. By early 1971, he would be occupied with far more important things, and Gray's influence on him would be gone. Their friendship would resume. Gray would remain one of the best friends he would ever have. But they never talked about the past. And Danny's sexual yearnings for Gray were gone forever.
Diary, Sept 19, 1970 - Jimi Hendrix is dead. Drug OD. How can this be? It seems so unfair.
Diary, October 5, 1970 - Janis Joplin, dead. Drugs? What an absolutely horrible year this has been. A year of death.
I heard someone say once, she was bullied in high school.
I hope you find peace, Janis. You were the very best.
On a Tuesday night in the middle of January, 1971, in the middle of a blowing snowstorm, Danny received a phone call.
"Hello."
"Hi." He was stunned. It was Gray.
"Hi."
"I want to tell you, I'm sorry. I truly am, and I miss you. Can we get together and talk in the near future?"
"What are you doing tonight?"
"I'm at home. Lots of schoolwork to do. Can you come over?"
"Sure. Give me about half an hour."
"Okay, I'll see you then."
His car wasn't happy with the weather conditions. He drove slowly. He arrived, struggled up the snow covered steps and knocked on the door. Gray opened it.
Danny stepped inside. They gave each other a little hug.
It was warm inside the house, a blessing after being out in the car for just two freezing miles, the engine finally starting to warm up just as he pulled into the driveway.
They went into the den and sat.
"Again, Danny, I'm sorry. I had a hard time of things but that's no excuse, and neither was the fact I tried to bury my pain with Scotch and weed. I treated you badly, I must've really hurt you, and I shouldn't have. It was me at my worst. So here I am figuratively throwing myself on the floor before you and asking your forgiveness."
Danny thought about it. "Yeah, I do. Forgive. I can't carry grudges, it's pointless. I'm glad you called me. I've had a lonely time of things for the last couple years. I need a friend."
"Well, thanks, I appreciate your being so magnanimous."
"You might even do the same thing if the roles were reversed, Gray."
"Yeah, I would. Anyway, take it on faith that I won't do that again. So, knowing I don't share your sexual interests, maybe you'll share with me the secrets you've held back from me for so long. Because I would sincerely like to know you better and I think you owe it to me after all this time to trust me with whatever it is that troubles you."
"You're right. I should've trusted you a long time ago. It's just, well, listen and I'll tell you about me."
For the next half hour or so, Danny narrated his personal emotional history including some of his history with his mom, the trip to Greece, the love affair with Ken, the endless sessions with Dr. Margol.
"And since you've listened to all this, I need to add at the end, I try hard not to turn all this shit into an emotional crutch by feeling sorry for myself or angry at the rest of the world. I have to put it all aside and as they say, as the stupid cliché goes, get on with my life because there's no other choice.
"So you might as well know what a couple of other people know, which is, I'm taking the fatal step of applying to law school despite my crummy marks. If I get in, who knows, and get through it, which won't be easy, I'll come out the other end a full blown lawyer on a mission to make the world a better place. A cynical statement which I know you will not take seriously."
"What you just told me, huh, I guess it explains a lot. I knew there had to be something like that. The lowlifes tried to hang you out to dry but it sounds like you're now defeating them. Don't let them ruin your life. You'll never forget it, all that shit that happened to you, but I think you can learn to disregard it. I went through something a bit like that when I was younger, too. And by the way, how's your friend Ken? How's he doing in Vancouver?"
"I don't know. I get Christmas cards from him which say basically the same thing every year. I send him one letter a year bringing him up to date. I don't expect I'll ever even see him again. That's how it goes.
"What you said about going through something, that was at your old school? I heard a bit about that but you've never said anything."
"Nothing to say. It's long gone. The idiots who tried to push me around got plenty back from me. I expect today they're digging ditches somewhere and spending what they make at the nearest bar. That's what they were good for."
In third year university, his heavy course load included nothing he would have trouble coping with. It was a massive undertaking because of the extra makeup course, but he would do the work, and this time he would make sure he knew it and was prepared for whatever the exams threw at him.
In the process he also wrote the law school aptitude test and awaited the result. He had no expectations of what the LSAT result would be. He felt indifferent to the outcome. Whatever would happen…
To those who knew Danny, he continued to radiate an image of self-sufficient perfection. He still pretended he required no one's help. He would manage it all alone. His steady quiet sadness remained hidden behind a picture of calm indifference.
But beneath the surface…
There is deep-seated emptiness, a solitude, in the life of a man who is alone. When such a man sees men and women enjoying life together, he masks his face with a dull, desperate smile, and goes on. He learns to seek escape as a temporary way out, because that's all there is left to do.
He saw the world around him changing rapidly. Kids he had grown up with now seemed more like adults as each week and month passed, while he felt left behind, mired in depression, unable to extricate himself from it. He could perform well on the surface as long as he kept his eye on the ball. He would not let the depression interfere with his progress through life. He would mask it, put his head down and bull ahead. He would use anger and would assert himself. He would try because he had to. Regardless of what he felt inside.
He'd resigned himself to remaining alone, despite what he foresaw in his future.
A vast abstraction stared at him. What was the meaning of his life? What his purpose? Who was there to love him in all of human existence? Maybe love wasn't for him. He couldn't navigate the currents of the gay community. Shit, he could barely understand what was expected of him in the conventional world. Anyway, how could a law degree help him if he remained alone in the world? What did he even want with a law degree? He had no interest in the legal profession or the law. And yet he chose it. It was the default setting he was taught as a boy, and he wouldn't try to change it.
Applying to law school was a surrender to what his parents used to call "reality." He filled in the applications and mailed them.
In early February, he drove to Dr. Margol's office for an appointment about the nightmares that were disturbing his sleep almost every night.
"First, doctor, I'll tell you the good news. The lawsuit has come to life. It looks like it's going to be resolved one way or the other in the next few months. That's all I can tell you right now because it's all I know. But having that awful thing finally coming to an end will be a relief for all of us. Whether we win or lose or something in between, it will be a relief. It's just a lawsuit, but it feels like it has a life of its own. We thought it would be take maybe a year. We didn't understand what the legal business is like."
Then he talked about his personal life, because there was a stark reality that he couldn't ignore. He'd learned from reading Chekhov. And he'd read a novel someone else had recommended, another translation, from the original German, of Thomas Mann's Death in Venice. Now, in mid-March, two months before he would finish university, the Luchino Visconti film based on the novel appeared in a Toronto movie theatre and Danny had seen it with Gray.
As he described it to Dr. Margol, "I emerged from the theatre, dumbfounded, stunned, there was no sufficient adjective. I was embarrassed by my tears and kept wiping them away. Gray said not to feel embarrassed, he understood. I mean, the Adagietto movement from Mahler's Fifth Symphony itself was new to me, it's emotionally overwhelming music even without the story. Dirk Bogarde's acting was excellent. The film will win many awards.
"But aside from how I felt, what I was thinking when I emerged from the theatre was that its appeal is to people like myself, who hide from themselves, won't live as who they are so never have a chance to find what they need. People who live conventional lives to satisfy the perceived demands of the societies which surround us.
"I'm only 21. I already see myself becoming Gustav von Aschenbach. He's a lonely, aging, accomplished man. On his trip, he becomes obsessed with the beauty of a young man, barely more than a boy, who he can never have or know or love. He follows the boy around Venice but never speaks to him. He's ensnared in the never ending obsessions of a life he lived without real passion. It's the culmination of a cold existence he undertook for the sake of convention and conformity. He dies sitting on a beach watching this wondrous beautiful androgynous kid, who glances curiously, innocently at him as he plays in the surf.
"It's as though the film is a timely warning to me about what my future holds, a future utterly bleak unless I can find love to last a lifetime. How I can find such a love now, I have no idea. I had my chances. I understand now, I could have learned to love Alan. But it's too late for me. Alan was probably my last chance, I was too stupid to understand that 'til it was too late. I've had too much good luck. It's run out, now.
"Chekhov's Alekhin couldn't break free of social conventions once he fell into the trap he set for himself. So he spent his life in a cage of his own making, unable to break with convention, frantically desperately trying to pretend all was well even as he ran in circles on his estate justifying his existence. That'll be me, I see it coming right at me.
"But as with so many others, I never understood how to find the love I'm looking for. So when I got lucky and it found me, well, it didn't work out. My only escape from Alekhin's fate is, like his, a kind of love that repels the conventional world around me. What would have saved him was a new life with a married woman, but neither of them could do that. For me, it's something else, but the same problem. So it could very well go for me the way it went for him, living my busy life amassing wealth and friends and a pocket full of status symbols. With no one for me to love through the long, lonely nights of winter or the sweet, warm nights of summer.
"Instead of love I'll end with a lifelong series of physical acts acted out in secluded parks, corners of public baths, the washrooms of certain taverns, the rented room of one of Eliot's 'lonely men in shirt sleeves leaning out of windows', without intimacy or feeling, each time followed by days of depression until the next episode. A life whose truths will be hidden under a web of secrecy and lies.
"One thing's for sure. If I don't break free soon from the path of convention, I'll never will have another chance. I don't want to live a life of complete loneliness. I need to find someone.
"So I'll get married and follow the same course as everyone else. I'll fall in love with a woman, learn to love her and have a good, safe, contented life. I'm lucky that way, I think I can somehow do that. But this sadness I feel will never completely go away. Deep down, a woman isn't what I need. I just have to live with that. It's the hand I've been dealt. Most of those who have lived across the course of human history have had nothing like what I've had and what I will have. So what if it isn't perfect? There is no perfect life."
And what he faced if he did nothing at all, if he lived his life alone, a "confirmed bachelor," was a life of wasted days and years, a lifetime running in circles, playing out the string, waiting for death.
He finished third year on schedule with a B+ average. He received his bachelor degree in June, 1971.
In spring of 1971, Danny received acceptances to four law schools in Ontario. With an F in his transcripts (made up for, but still, it was there) he expected only rejections. But his LSAT result was in the 91st percentile. He visited one of the Toronto law schools to accept its admission offer in person. The woman he talked with in the office said a high LSAT score was the predominant factor in gaining admission and supposedly meant he had a sharp analytical mind suited for the legal profession.
For many, an acceptance was cause for celebration; for Danny, business as usual.
It was a good thing law schools didn't require a personal interview, essay, or some other subjective means of testing. He could not pretend his whole life had been leading to the climactic moment of discovering some shining doorway to his future; nor could he with a straight face tell an interviewer that he wanted to help other people, or somehow to "make a difference," by becoming a great lawyer. Those were possibilities he would eventually realize were available in law practice, waiting for him. But right now they just looked like clichés in a resumé, presumptuous thoughts he couldn't express. He couldn't take himself that seriously.
Even formulating that kind of goal felt like an arrogant affectation. He wondered, what's wrong with me, why do I think this way? Others seem to have no problem showing off. I criticize myself for even thinking that way.
He wanted a life that might lead him to independence, so he would no longer have to rely on anyone else for anything. Becoming a lawyer seemed as good a solution as any. He felt as alienated as ever from the society around him, with its demands for conformity and its standard rejection of those who were different. His primary goal in life was focussed on achieving financial independence so that he could ignore that society to the extent possible. If he had to do it alone, he would. He felt he could attain independence alone, through perseverance and hard work. He had learned good study habits and work values, and had developed the core of financial self-discipline.
And he knew the pain of loneliness all too well. He didn't want it that way. He did not want to be alone. He needed to share his life with someone, it would make living far more bearable if he could find the right person. So now he was thinking, maybe he could find the right woman.
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