The Nonconformist
by Ken Cohen
Chapter 26
On the last Monday of June, 1971, Ken Dressen, humble and anxious, heart thumping, walked uncertainly along the side of a shady street lined with aging maples, ashes, elders and lindens, peering at house numbers in midtown Toronto. There it is, he thought, gaping at an old, neglected structure. Is this the right house? He's living here? Please, please, dear God, let him take me back. He stepped onto the shrub-lined walkway toward the front door, past the slim round backside of a stooped gardener planting flowers. Up concrete steps to the porch. He knocked on the old wood door.
From behind, a familiar voice. "Hello, can I help you?"
He knew the voice, turned back toward the garden. Danny Stavros gazed up at him. Ken stood there, mouth slightly open.
It was one of those rare times in his life when Kenny Dressen looked stunned.
"Kenny?"
"Hi. Hi Danny."
He walked back down the steps, past a shrub, into the dirt.
He wrapped his arms around his speechless friend.
Danny slowly pushed him away while stepping back, out of his arms. Studying the soil, he asked, "What are you doing here?"
"I came to see you."
"Why didn't you call me?"
"I got in late last night. The plane was late. I slept at my grandparents. This morning I went to your house. Your mom said you went downtown. She wrote the address for me. She said you don't have a phone yet."
"Why are you here?"
"Like I said, I, I, I came to see you."
"About what?"
"Moving back to Toronto. If you'll still have me. Danny, I miss you. I miss you so much. I was scared to do this, but my friend convinced me to come and find out."
"What, your boyfriend sent you to see me? Go back to Vancouver, Kenny. Go back to your boyfriend."
"No, it's a friend who's a girl. Naomi. She told me. So I could find out."
"Find out what?"
"Danny, I've been thinking about you ever since I left Toronto. Almost five years ago? I never stopped thinking about you. I never forgot you."
"You came to gloat."
"What? What do you mean?"
"You hurt me, Kenny. You hurt me real bad. When you left, you hurt me. When you stayed in Vancouver for university, you hurt me. What you said on the phone after dad died, that hurt me.
"I thought about you many times. Way too many. Not a day goes by. I wished you were here so many times. I wrote letters. I only got Christmas cards. I called and left messages. You ignored me. You stopped writing and sent me fucking Christmas cards instead. I didn't want your Christmas cards, I wanted you. All that hurt me too. So I don't understand why you're here now. What do you want from me?"
"I want to come back. Go to law school, here. I've decided on law, patent law. I want to do that here. I don't know what your plans are, but I would really like to be part of your life again."
"This is bullshit. Bully for you, go to law school, why should I care? Part of my life? Be part of my life? You're dreaming. What, did you bring a boyfriend back with you? So we'll be like old friends? Is that it? Danny the good sport will invite you and your boyfriend for coffee twice a year? We can count the coffee spoons as the years pass and we reminisce about old times?—hang on a minute"
Danny waved at someone. A pickup truck had parked in front of the house and a muscular young man was walking toward them. Kenny noticed him, then looked back at Danny, crestfallen.
"What's wrong, Kenny? You look like you saw a ghost."
Ken seemed stunned. "No, it's… it's okay."
"Good morning, Danny, sorry I'm a little late."
Danny said to Ken, "He's like me, doesn't like to be late."
He turned. "Hi Aldo. This is Kenny. He's visiting from Vancouver. Kenny, this is my contractor, Aldo Taormina. He's here to finalize some things for the house. They're starting work next week. Do you mind waiting? This could take a while. Aldo's here. I can't put him off, it wouldn't be fair."
Kenny looked relieved. He felt confused. Should he leave?
Aldo interrupted. "Sorry to interrupt you guys. Danny, I'll need to get the contract signed today. And the cheque to get started. A construction team's lined up for Monday morning. The bin will be delivered early Monday, we have the street licence from the city, I'll cordon off the space today. I picked up the building permits two days ago. Everything's ready. I brought paint samples, flooring samples and a few catalogs and other things for you to look through."
Ken stood, silent and confused. "Danny, I should come back. Should I? Should I come back?"
"Uh, hang on. Stick around if you like, maybe you have some decorating ideas and stuff. Or you can go for a long walk. We'll be maybe—"
"I need an hour, Danny. We can do most of this in an hour. I have the contract to sign and a form to fill in. It's mostly finishes to go over."
"Okay, Danny," said Ken, "If it's okay, I'll stick around. Can I look at the house?"
"Sure. And maybe help pick out colours and stuff, I have no idea really. Just don't touch any wires, seriously, you could get electrocuted. My decorating skills are nil, whatever I come up with, I'm sure my mom will criticize. Anyway, the house is open, go through it, I want to hear your ideas and decorating insights. Hopefully you learned something of practical value over the last five years which will be a lot more than I learned, they don't teach house renovations in university."
While Danny and Aldo spent the next 90 minutes going through details, Ken patiently wandered the main floor, second floor, the sooty, dingy, brick-walled earth-floored basement. Mouse droppings everywhere. He even saw the back yard where a rickety old home-made carport covered half the space. Radiator heating, peculiar ceiling moldings, leaky single pane windows—the place must be freezing in the winter.
What's going on, he wondered. How'd he end up owning a house? Why this ancient place? All the way down here? This place is a dump, hasn't been painted in a hundred years.
The contract was signed, Aldo left lots of samples. There was no need to finalize choices yet, lots of work to do first. He taped the building permits inside a large, front facing window, and said goodbye.
Danny sat at the bottom of the concrete steps and looked at Ken.
"It's a long story, Danny. I came to talk to you."
"Talk to me?" He felt resigned. "Why are you here?
"I have something to tell you."
"You know, I was finally finding some lonely equilibrium in this lonely fucking life." He sounded shaky. "I graduate. I buy a house. And then you show up?"
His voice trembled. "Kenny, if this is more pain, more bad news, get out of here! I don't want bad news. I've just come out the other end of a long, bitter fight with a bunch of establishment con-artists who used me badly, and my sister, my dear mother, even my dad's memory, all of us they used badly, the fuckers belong in prison. The insurance company's being investigated. At least one gay wannabe is on his way to prison. I was starting to see some daylight. I don't want more bad news. So maybe you should leave."
He stood and walked toward the street, turned and looked back at Ken a moment, but said nothing.
Ken followed him.
"Are you attached right now?"
"I'm attached to this house over here."
"Be serious, you know what I mean."
"I just bought it."
They stared at each other. Danny felt the tightness slowly rising in his chest. He took a deep breath. He walked back past Ken toward the house and sat back down on the bottom concrete step, looking up.
"Look, I'm attached to the house, it's mine. I haven't been attached to a person since the day you left. I almost was, but I messed it up and got what I deserved. I'm a stupid fool. I blew it with you, blew it with Alan. And I chased a brilliant straight guy and got shit on real good. I somehow graduated university. Even got into law school despite everything. That's where I am right now, a future lawyer, standing here, my hands full of dirt, feeling sorry for myself for no valid reason, and above all, not wanting to get hurt again.
"So if what you're about to tell me will cause me more pain, please leave. Otherwise, Kenny, what's on your mind?"
"It will take time. I can't explain in two minutes."
"The house is empty, I just bought it, we closed yesterday. I'm sorry, I have nothing to offer you, no hospitality, not a crust of bread or a stick of furniture, not even a place to sit except these bare steps and some bare floors that need re-baring, um, I mean refinishing.
"The water still works so you can have a drink from the tap, but I wouldn't if I were you, Aldo thinks there may be one or two lead water pipes, along with knob and tube wiring that can electrocute you, an antique fuse box, a coal furnace, did you see the coal chute?
"I actually love this house, it's like stepping back into the 19th century. I love history. Gray introduced me to history, I discovered I love reading it. The U.S. Civil War I'm reading right now, Shelby Foote's, I have the first two volumes, the last is due out next year, of course they say that every year. The level of detail is astounding and his beautiful writing, his insight and compassion, I love it. War is horrible, by the way, don't get any ideas about signing up for Vietnam, you won't like it.
"Where was I, now? Oh, yeah. As for the house, it has history too. Much of it's original, the rest patched and puttered with by pros and amateurs alike. It's 100% uninsurable. Not even liability. Not that you can trust insurance companies, by the way. At least, not the one my father was conned by.
"The only buyers for the house were me and one or two possibly fictitious builders—can you believe agents when the first words out of their mouths are, 'other offers coming in'? They always say that. But the professional renovators can't afford to buy because interest rates are high. So I bought it for half of what that lovely old renovated Victorian across the street went for six months ago. Of course, that's all it's worth right now.
"The listing called it a handyman's special—Kenny, do I look like a handyman to you? The last time I used a drill, I nearly put a hole in my left knee. A couple years ago I tried to replace the thermostat in my car, thought I did a good job but lost one bolt somewhere in the engine compartment. The bolt had lodged on the engine fan. I started the engine, the bolt launched into the radiator which burst with a bang, a flood of water and anti-freeze on the road. The new radiator cost ten times what I would have paid a competent mechanic to replace the thermostat, plus the towing charge. I hope I make a better lawyer than I do a car mechanic. Why am I rattling on about all this crap?"
He paused for a moment.
"Because any minute now…". Once the first tears came, he couldn't control them. He cried for maybe 30 seconds. Then he stopped, wiped his face with his bare arm, looked up at Ken, and smiled.
"Guess I'm glad to see you."
He took another deep breath.
"I feel a little better now, Kenny, so why don't you get this over with in one quick sentence. If I have to be executed, do it fast. Not the slow methodical torture of the dentist's chair. If you're getting married, or moving to Japan or secretly working as a Soviet agent, just tell me and may you go in peace. I love you and hate you and wish you the best. I sincerely want only happiness for you. But I don't want to hear the bad news you're about to tell me. And don't fucking apologize because I don't want to hear that either."
He patted the step, there was room for one more. "Why don't you sit? My neck hurts looking up at you."
Ken squeezed onto the step next to Danny.
"It's no execution. It's an apology and a question. I hope you'll say yes."
"I don't want to hear apologies. Proposals I'll listen to, I'm just a student with few prospects but 300 large for which I'm seeking an honest broker if such a thing exists, in case you know of one. One thing I've learned over the years is not to trust agents and brokers. They have to make a living, too. Anyway, sorry to go off on tangents, my mind seeks distractions from reality all day long. Okay then, I'm listening to your question."
"Danny, there's never been anyone but you in my heart. Not from the day we kissed good-bye until this moment. There was a new life, some new friends, new schools, but without you I was always alone. And I still am.
"I'm sorry, Danny. I'm truly sorry. The phone call after your dad died? It was, like, the biggest mistake I ever made. I should have talked to someone first about how I felt.
"I got caught in my foolish pride. I didn't realize until many months later what a bad mistake I made. By then I thought it was too late. I was ashamed, embarrassed, I felt awful. I tried to forget about it and wrapped myself up in school after that day we spoke on the phone. I haven't done much except school work since then. I even worked for professors at school in the summers I was gone.
"I've regretted those phone calls and everything that followed, ever since. I've been lost. I was selfish and blind. I hid my head in the sand. I knew it and I'm so so sorry. But I missed you so badly, it hurt, and the pain kept getting in my way whenever I thought about you. Which I did every day.
"So I hid out in forests of formulas and equations and theories and experiments for four years. But I still love you, Danny Stavros." Two tears slid down his face. "Just as much as that day I left. I've always loved you. I haven't loved anyone else since then. I can't. I tried but I can't because you're still in me and aren't going away.
"That's the apology. The question is this. I'm going to enrol in law school. I just need to accept one of the offers. Should I accept the one here? Or the one in Vancouver? That's my question. Will you still have me? If so, I want to live here. I can live with my grandparents."
"I'm going here. Downtown at the university. I've already been accepted."
"I should have known. We always said you'd be a lawyer."
"Yeah, well, I guess I was the last to know."
"What should I do?"
"You should go to the better school. Whichever you think will be better for you. That's how you made decisions in the past. You moved to Vancouver, you stayed in Vancouver, those were the choices that were best for you."
Silence. They stared at each other for several seconds.
"Okay Kenny, look. I think I still like you. Just as I have since we were young. I might even have some love left for you, I don't know. I tried to love someone else but it didn't feel like you do. But you hurt me. I mean, I'm sorry I didn't call you right after dad died. You were starting university, I couldn't pull you away from that. But there was something else. Another reason.
"The letter you sent me. Not the one after dad died. The one I got the month before. About the scholarship. It broke my heart. It was the worst letter I ever received. I was hoping, expecting you'd come back to Toronto, so I was waiting for your letter. You sort of promised before you left, so I got my hopes up.
"But you'd won a scholarship, you were happy, you forgot about me waiting here for you. I got so angry and jealous when I got that letter. I felt like you'd written me off. Saving money was more important than Danny. I felt like an afterthought in that letter, supposed to be a good sport and cheer you on.
"So, yes, I still have some love for you. But I have to think about this.
"And to begin, you have to promise me you'll never leave again. Never. If we're going to try to do this, you need to promise. Otherwise say goodbye and go home."
"Look, Danny, I have to leave one last time. I have to go back to Vancouver and arrange to move my stuff here. And say good-bye to everyone. It will take no more than two weeks. Then you'll have me for good. I—"
"Okay, okay. You're really back? For good? There's no boyfriend waiting in the background? For some reason I feel like I'm about to wake up and meet your boyfriend."
"I'm back permanently. There's no boyfriend here. There's a boy back in Vancouver who I've been with but never called my boyfriend, I've never said I love him. I've told him over and over I'm still in love with you and he can't have me until I know if I still have you. I'll tell you more."
"Okay, okay. I have to think about it. No. No. This is… sudden. You come back here out of the blue and think we can just pick up where we left off? No. You broke my fucking heart, you have no idea how I felt. You did it in slow motion, it took eight months to break, and everything after that has been slow motion pain. Every fucking day I think about you and wonder why you don't write, you don't call, nothing.
"As you can maybe see, I still love you. But I don't trust you. And the love feels tattered, old, unreliable. You feel unreliable. What do you want me to do? How do you want to do this?"
"Well, look, I need to deal with the law school. I understand you don't want to just jump back in. That's okay, I knew this would be hard. I'll go down to the law school now and speak to them about an extension on accepting their admission offer. I have to do that today. Maybe then we can talk or something."
"I'll lock up, I'll drive you to the law school. You can register today. That's a start. But you're taking a chance. I'm under no obligation here. I may tell you an hour from now, forget it, I can't trust you again, goodbye. You understand? You're taking the risk, now. Not me. Understand? I don't know if we'll still like each other. We don't know each other. How do you know you won't hate me? I don't want to step into another pile of dog shit with this. We have to make sure. I don't want any more pain."
"I understand. It's in your hands. Wow, you talk a lot more than you used to."
"Yeah, well, I've had a lot of experience with lawyers recently. You don't know about that. And I drink coffee now. Those lawyers are too damned smart, I learned to talk fast and listen hard just to keep up with them. Come on, get in my car."
Kenny had the kind of dazzling transcripts graduate schools crave, which helped persuade the law school to give him another two weeks to accept its offer of admission. Danny insisted, nothing was final until the two of them could safely say they were back together. If Kenny stayed and went to law school in Toronto but things didn't work out for them, tough luck.
They went to Hart House for lunch. There were plenty of summer students so they kept the services running. Danny called home from there and Barbara answered, she was finished teaching for the summer. He had a guest for dinner, whom he'd like to bring home, it was a surprise.
She said, "You mean Kenny?"
"How did you know? Oh geez, I just realized, he was there this morning wasn't he?"
"Yes, I knew he was back before you did. So I'll make dinner for four."
Over lunch they talked. Kenny wanted to know how Danny came to buy a house. So he briefly related the story of the lawsuit.
"That's where the money came from. My share from the life insurance. After the lawyers took their fees, we each ended up with about $310,000. This house cost me 35 and I have to put almost that much more into it to make it liveable. You know, going through the lawsuit, watching, listening, learning about it firsthand, I began to understand the attractions of law as a profession. Marvin Kingman and his dad, they were our lawyers, they're two of the smartest people I know. Not just good lawyers, they're actually good decent human beings. I met other lawyers in their office, too, and got a look from the inside at how law offices run.
"They saw a lot of me, I used to just drop in and talk to whoever was around and not too busy. Man, are those guys busy, putting out fires, solving problems, the phones never stop. So I'm a lot more interested in the legal profession now than I was when the lawsuit began. I was just plain scared back then. Of course, we were fortunate. Dad's other life insurance, through his office, paid out right away, no nonsense with them, so we had the money to pay these lawyers with. You know the final legal bill came to almost $40,000! Over 10 for the summary judgment alone. Fortunately we got all that back from the insurance company."
"That's unbelievable. On one case? It's as much money as the average guy makes in four or five years."
"I can only tell you that they work for it. Because of the circumstances, you know what I said about the blackmail, the judge made the insurance company reimburse us for all the lawyer fees, and threw in another $100,000 for something called, get this, 'exemplary damages.' Exemplary: the judge made an example of them, he called it 'egregious misconduct.' It was like punishing them for wasting everyone's time with what he called, I love these ten dollar words, Kenny, the judge called it 'frivolous and vexatious litigation!' Just hearing a phrase like that gets me excited about law."
They giggled and howled over 'egregious misconduct' and 'frivolous and vexatious litigation.'
After lunch, they drove north to Ken's grandparents to pick up his workout stuff. On the way, they got back to talking.
"I can't believe I'm talking to you about this. This morning like every morning I woke up and thought about you and forced you out of my mind so I could think about anything else. Then you show up unannounced. And I'm supposed to do… what?
"We're not what we were five years ago. We're different people. We were very close in those days, but I sometimes used to wonder how long it would last. I thought you could do a lot better than me. I still wonder. I'm wondering right now. If you stay, what if one of us meets someone new and falls in love and—"
"Stop! Danny, you're such a pessimist. Damn it, Danny, you'll make a great lawyer, you see the downside of everything, your clients will have only themselves to blame if they get into trouble."
"I'm telling you how I feel right now, so just listen. I met people, none could fill your place in my heart. I've tried it with other boys. None compared to you. I think I still have feelings for you, but I have serious doubts.
"You hurt me. I figured out why you really went away. You were tired of me, so when your parents wanted to move to Vancouver, you saw a chance to get away—"
"No, that's wrong, it's—"
"Don't interrupt me! Let me finish. You saw a chance to get away from me! I'm not even sure you realized it at the time. You didn't say it, of course, so it took me time to see it.
"Now you're back. You say you're not tired of me any more? What will happen next time you get tired of me, Kenny? What if a new guy throws himself at you? You're smitten, he captivates you, you fall in love and say good-bye to me again? What will you do when some beautiful guy steals your heart 2 or 3 or 10 or 20 years from now?"
"Well, no. That's wrong. Your assumption is wrong. I was never tired of you. Never! I genuinely wanted to stay with my parents. I did not make that up. I'd just turned 18. I wasn't ready to leave them even if they supported me. I loved them and they loved me. Living in residence was fine because I didn't have to waste time commuting in Vancouver and didn't need a car. But I came home almost every weekend. It was a relief to get away from the residence and all the kids there, the parties, the noise, the chaos.
"You know, I graduated last week with an honours B.Sc. magna cum laude? You think I got that by partying every weekend the way so many of them did? Screwing up my brain with booze and the drugs and orgies like some guys I knew?
"I got it spending most of my waking hours in classes and the library and tutorials and talking to professors and grad students. And the rest in the gym because I needed exercise. When I got to Vancouver, I worked 10 to 12 hour days to get caught up and then get into the science program at the university. I kept it up when university began. It's the hardest work I ever did in my life. I put everything into it, trying to ignore the loneliness I had because I missed you so much.
"I love my parents, Danny. I'm a lucky man. I told them about myself when I was 12. I wasn't afraid of being harmed or hated or thrown out. They tried to understand and they succeeded. They never stopped loving me. I sure as hell wasn't going to repay them by wasting the college years I worked so hard to reach.
"Sure I need sex, who doesn't? I ain't no pseudo-celibate priest. I did sex with my original roommate, but he wasn't gay, just wanted to use me for blow jobs, as I quickly figured out. I went on to another guy and it was a little better, not much. After going through a few of them in the first few months, I just relied on my hand. I wasn't going to waste time on those guys, it was mostly humiliating, they used me, most of them preferred girls. It was temporary relief. I always ended up alone.
"So I worked hard and helped other kids with help or advice. It's amazing how much support you get from peers who are on your side, when a vindictive former sex buddy spreads vicious lies about you and is met with a storm of anger from people you've befriended by being generous with your time and effort. That happened.
"It wasn't until fourth year last fall, after a prof asked me to tutor a couple of second year kids in statistics. One was Chris. He figured out I was gay and began coming on to me. I couldn't resist him so we had an affair but to this day I haven't told him I love him. He did well in statistics, though. I told him he's a sweet kid, I like him a lot, but I have a friend named Danny in Toronto who I still love, and until I know that's over, Chris will have to wait for my heart and soul. Before I left, I told him I'd have an answer for him when I return. He's a patient boy and a nice kid. He said he'd wait. I'm going home to tell him he needs to find someone else. He won't be too hurt because I've always been honest with him. Ultimately he wants me, but more than that, he said he wants to see me happy. I guess that's a definition of true love, when someone places the happiness of the one they love above their own.
"But Danny, you were wrong. I wasn't tired of you. It was something else.
"When my parents wanted to move to Vancouver, I'd had something on my mind for a while. Neither of us had sexual experience with other guys. I thought about that a lot and it worried me.
"If we'd stayed in Toronto instead of moving, it was inevitable one of us would be tempted. We never had a chance to meet other guys. I know I always would've wondered if I had missed something. I thought the time might come when I began sneaking around. Or I might be enticed away. If I were smitten with someone and asked you for the freedom to try it with them, that could've torn us apart for good, because you'd be right there, it would practically be going on under your nose, it would hurt you so much, we'd fall apart. And the reverse would be true, too, if you started wandering, I'd feel the same way. We wouldn't trust each other any longer.
"I had to move with my family, that was why I left. I didn't want to go, but I didn't want to be separated from my family. It was way too soon. But once I knew I had no choice, I thought, if I have to go, well, we'll probably both meet other guys and then see what it's like. And maybe, just maybe, we'll survive that.
"It's real life, Danny. After high school, it's unlikely we'd have remained faithful, and that could have ended things. But if we had to be apart, and went through that and still wanted to be back together, still in love, I thought we'd have a better chance of staying together for the long run. It was a gamble I had no choice about. It was our only chance to eventually be together again. It kind of happened that way. I never stopped loving you.
"But I couldn't tell you that. You'd see it as me making an excuse to have affairs. It would've blown things up between us for good, you'd never have trusted me again.
"Didn't you ever wonder why we didn't actually talk, before I left, about having sex with other guys once I was gone? Maybe we could have agreed on it, that might have worked, but I was afraid to bring it up. I thought you'd see even that as me leaving because I wanted to find someone else. You didn't bring it up either.
"So I've been through all that, I've tried other guys, but I haven't actually fucked another guy except for Chris, and I've never told him or anyone I love them, because I never felt that way. At the end of the day, I don't feel for Chris what I feel for you.
"It's my friend Naomi who yelled at me to come back here and see you. I'd chickened out of going back to you. Because when I went to Vancouver, I didn't anticipate what happened to us after your dad died. I didn't foresee that my selfish feelings could nearly end us. Over time I came to feel so guilty about it that I was afraid to face you. I couldn't write to you, I was afraid to speak to you, because I felt so guilty. I know it went on for years. It took every ounce of courage I could muster, to come here today, because I know I screwed up and nearly destroyed us. And I can't bear the thought of losing you.
"She pointed out, if I didn't come back and find out if you still had feelings for me, I would spend the rest of my life wondering and maybe regretting not trying to get us back together, and you might have felt the same. That's why I showed up here this morning. Not for the law school. I came to see you, to know whether I still have a chance with you."
They'd arrived at Kenny's grandparents home and were parked in the driveway when Ken finally finished talking.
Danny's eyes were swimming.
"I need to think about all this. You don't see it. What you did. You're blind to it. You're making excuses or rationalizing or something. You don't see it at all.
"And we have another hurdle in front of us. We can't pick up where we left off. We're both different. So we have to start over. Get your stuff, let's go back to my place and go for a run, okay?"
"Hi mom," Danny called as they walked in. Barbara came from her bedroom.
"Ken. For the second time today, welcome back. I didn't ask you before, are you just visiting?"
"Not quite sure, Mrs. Stavros. Maybe permanently. Maybe not. Might be going to law school here. We'll see."
After talking for a few minutes, Ken and Danny went to Danny's bedroom to change. Barbara told them dinner would be about an hour.
They sat on the side of the bed.
"Your mom seems different. Relaxed, maybe? She's nice to you, and the two of you are talking to each other."
"Yeah, I know. I don't flaunt myself, but, well you, she's known about me since I was 16. I guess she started to accept things after dad died. It came out during the lawsuit, and she said things a couple times that were almost protective of me. So I guess she tolerates me and a little more. Best I can hope for. It's all sort of an understanding. I'm not the child molesting pervert she imagined."
They sat quietly. Danny felt tense.
Ken's knee tapped his and stayed there.
Ken's voice came softly. "Danny?"
"Yeah?"
Danny's left leg and Ken's right were touching.
"Uh…"
"Kenny, what are you feeling right now?"
They sat in silence for a long while.
Then, "At this moment, I feel consumed with a need to hold you, kiss you, love you. Right now."
Danny shifted slightly away.
"No. That's not going to happen.
"It hurts so much, what you did. I wrote you letters, you didn't reply. I phoned you, you weren't there, didn't call back. I ached for you. I yearned for you. Every single day.
"So how can I trust you now? You show up here like this and…"
They sat in silence.
"You have no answer. I guess you must love me. You must feel something. You wouldn't be here otherwise. You say you're willing to commit to living here for the next three years while we go to law school. Together, I hope. From all that, I guess you must still love me. Or…"
"Or what? What more can I say? The light never came close to going out. I've always loved you. I buried myself in school for four years so I didn't have to feel the remorse, the guilt. I used to cry myself to sleep sometimes."
"I believe you. But it will take time. I don't trust you. It's gotten lost. I have to learn to trust you again.
"We were natural together back then, Kenny. A natural fit. I never needed to think about trust, it came naturally once I really knew you. I need to recover that feeling. It's gone. I want it back. When we both feel that, that's when I'll make love with you, Kenny. It may take days or weeks or months, I don't know.
"But I need you to commit to living with me and loving me and caring for me, the way I want to live with, and love, and care for, you. And that takes time. And patience. And trust. For both of us.
"So I can't just jump into bed with you, even though I want to. We need to know each other first. I need to feel natural with you again. To trust you again.
"I believe you always loved me. I know that now. But I didn't know over the last few years.
"What happened really was a huge misunderstanding. When people are separated for years by 3,000 miles and need to do everything with letters and phone calls and gradually begin to drift off in other directions, misunderstandings happen. It seems almost inevitable it won't last. Especially when something terrible suddenly intervenes."
The tears filled his eyes.
"When he died, you said I should have called you right away, Kenny. You said I should have trusted you. You got mad because I didn't. You didn't see it as I did. You still don't see it.
"I no longer trusted you by then. Just six months after you left, the trust vanished one day.
"Weeks before the accident, I got the letter about your scholarship. Full of joy. I was an afterthought. Expected to be a good sport.
"That broke something between us. I hated you for staying in Vancouver because you promised me you'd return. Not a full promise, a half-promise. You didn't bother to mention that uncomfortable fact. You didn't apologize. You did not explain why you decided to stay.
"You could've still gone to school in Toronto. Your dad had money. You could have gone anywhere. That's what you'd said. You didn't mention any of that.
"The implication was, the money you saved with the scholarship was more important than me. That's how it was. There was no reason to return to Toronto once you had a free ride in Vancouver. No reason! No fucking reason!
"I wasn't a factor any more. 'Danny's far away, not important now. Just a guy I was close with once, but that's over.' We're not spending money to send Kenny back to Danny—that didn't seem to bother you at all. You'd gone on to bigger and better things than Danny. You figured old Danny would be happy for you. Mr. Popularity. That's what I got from that letter. You were right, I guess. I should have been a good sport about it. But I couldn't. I loved you too much. You'd set me up to hope and pray and expect you were coming back to Toronto for university. Dad had the money so I could expect you to come back.
"That broke us, Kenny. That letter.
"Two months later, I didn't call before the funeral because I no longer trusted you. If I'd called you, I'd just get another shock—yet another no. The third one. No I'm not staying in Toronto. No I'm not coming back even if I promised. No I'm not coming for any funeral, I don't have time.
"I didn't know what I'd hear if I called you. I was supposed to trust you? A few weeks earlier I no longer mattered to you, I was an afterthought. From the day that letter came, I was sure I'd lost you. You were living another life, loving other guys for all I knew. I was dying of jealousy here and angry. Very angry.
"Then dad dies in my arms one horrible day. I'm supposed to call you, assume you'd drop everything and come for the funeral? to be with me and hold me in my grief? How? I didn't trust you. Suppose I did that, but you, happy you, said no, you couldn't, too busy or whatever. From the tenor of your letter, that's what I feared.
"A third 'no' would have been the end, Kenny. The complete and absolute end. I couldn't have loved you after that. The love would have turned to hate. That happens, you know. And once love turns to hate, the love isn't coming back.
"If that had happened, there's a good chance I'd have done something drastic. Something I was already thinking about after your happy letter. Maybe not finish high school. Maybe enlist in the Canadian army. Or one of the American services, like the air force. I always wanted to learn to fly. I could have started a new life that way. And that's how I would have been thinking. It would get me away from my mother, and from my memories of you.
"It would have been either something like that, or suicide.
"So it was best I not call you 'til afterward.
"Dr. Margol told me after you left, be patient. Say nothing irreversible. Play the long game and see how it worked out, because it was my best chance of keeping you. I guess he was right, except neither of us anticipated that you would send me a letter like that.
"So I couldn't take that chance, inviting you to the funeral. Doing that would have risked everything I felt for you. I was protecting my feelings by not taking that chance. So I didn't call you 'til after the funeral. There was way less risk that way.
"You know, when you left with your parents, and later wrote me about the scholarship, you were saying 'no' to me both times. You placed your own needs ahead of me. There was nothing wrong with those decisions, they were the right decisions for you. Both times, the right decisions for you.
"I can't argue with that. I can't expect gifts, I don't deserve them. Your love for me wasn't strong enough to keep you in Toronto, or to pull you back to Toronto. I couldn't expect you to make sacrifices for me, like spend unnecessary money on tuition. We weren't married. There were no vows. There had only been love and trust to bind us. No contract.
"Well, that trust evaporated four years ago. What's left is the tattered remains of the love. How strong is it? Am I supposed to trust you now? Based on promises?
"Today you magically return from the wild blue yonder and expect me to stand here with open arms saying, hey, Kenny, good to see you again. Thanks, let's jump into bed and satisfy all this lust we both feel.
"Well, no, because I need to learn to trust you again. If I still can.
"Otherwise, we jump into bed and make love, and then what? For all I know you'll get out of bed and go off somewhere and while you're not here I'm back to square one wondering when the next heartbreak will happen? That, Kenny, is what happens when you still love someone but no longer trust them. The love isn't whole. There's no trust, nothing, to back it up. So every tiny thing becomes something more to feel anxious about.
"I don't trust you right now. And I don't know how to get that back.
"I had great hopes you'd return to Toronto for university, that you'd do that for me. I could never say that to you back then, because inside I didn't feel worthy of you. I would have sounded like a bitchy boyfriend putting pressure on you. I didn't feel I deserved it, but you had half way promised you'd return and I had great hopes you would do that for me. Money was no object, you said, school anywhere would be okay.
"I guess I see now what you were trying to do. A test of time to see if the love we felt could survive for some indefinite period through various love affairs that either of us might or might not have. You should have thought that through. There were too many things that could go wrong. And they did go wrong, in ways even you couldn't anticipate.
"It's just, I never had doubts about you being the only one for me. I could look at lots of beautiful guys all day every day. As long as I had you and your love at the end of the day, none of those pretty faces ever tempted me away from you. You didn't need to worry about me cheating on you. You only had to worry about yourself. And I don't want to pursue that thought any further because I can't read your mind. Only you know.
"I'll just leave that for you to think about. Because it's still the case for me. I would never cheat on you. Nothing could tempt me away. And if we get back together, you can count on it still. But can I count on you? Can I trust your big ego?
"So think honestly about your own feelings before you jump back into getting together again. Make sure this time you won't want another time out. I was ready and happy to spend the rest of my life with you. That's what I felt and what I said to you one day the summer before you left, lying with you next to the stream down in the ravine. I don't know why you thought I wasn't being honest about that.
"What's love without trust? It's what we have right now, except we have a chance to restore the trust. Without trust, love is pretty awful. It's almost like endless grief. It's a kind of silent, daily yearning that won't go away. Full of worry and jealousy. A hard kind of love, flimsy, weak, with no backbone. Not the kind of love that will last. It's intolerable. It has to end. There's no happiness from a love like that.
"You know how many times over the last four years I asked myself, 'Kenny, where are you? I need you so bad.' But here I am, still hanging on.
"If you think I was unreasonable after I got that letter, if you think I should have been selfless and rejoiced with you in what looked like the end of our relationship, well, I can't sacrifice my feelings every time you decide I should. You need to learn to see things from the perspective of the one you're with, the one you're committed to, before you jump into something new.
"So I need to restore the natural feeling of trust in you. And the love, too, some it is gone, too.
"It will take time. You have to prove you'll honour your promise to stay here and love me. So let's do dating and stuff like that, socializing, talking. Get to know each other again. Because I don't really know you any more. How can I trust someone I don't know? At least while you're here now, we can do some of that. And more if and when you return from Vancouver for good. Which, by the way, I'll believe when I see it.
"And I can't guarantee all those deep feelings will return. I might reject you at some point. I'm being honest here. I just don't know. If you come back here, that's no guarantee of anything. We have to take it one step at a time. Give me a few days, a few weeks. Give me time. Let me get to know you again and feel my love for you again.
"So it's time for you to take a risk. I hope at some point very soon, we'll both know it's all for real, that we're back where we left off, and then I'll make love with you just as much as you want. And I'll do that with all the joy in my heart, all the love, all the trust. I'll give everything I have. But you put us to the test all those years ago. Now I'm putting us to the test."
He had nothing else to say, so he stared at Ken.
"Okay. You sure drew the picture for me. I never thought about some of that stuff. I, I… I love you. I know it. I want to stay with you forever. I understand everything you said. I'll do anything to prove you can love and trust me again. There's no risk in it for you.
"I'll schedule the return flight before I leave so you'll know when. And I'll only go for a few days, I don't need more than that. I swear to you Danny, I'll never hurt you again."
"Really, Kenny? Really, really, really? I'm hanging out there again, I'm taking another chance here, just talking to you like this. You're going back to this sweetheart kid you're with in Vancouver, telling me you're just saying goodbye? Nothing else? No last nights together that change your mind? Don't break my heart again, please! I really can't take it again."
"I swear, I won't be doing that. I'll be telling him I'm leaving. I won't even kiss him. It'll be goodbye. He's already accepted it. He knows it'll probably be that way. He knows how I feel about you. And I know. You're the only one who doesn't know that. And I mean to show you that you can trust me again, even if takes a whole year, like it did back the first time. I waited then, I'll wait now. I swear."
"What happens if you get some fabulous job offer far away? You know, when you're a big shot out in the wide open world?"
"I won't go without you. I trust you'll be reasonable, just as I will be with you. In everything we do as we go through life. We have to talk more about this."
"Yeah, we will. I guess living together will need compromises."
"Give a little, take a little."
"Who do you have to say good-bye to?"
After a moment, "Why?"
"Because I'm paranoid. I'm not sure I can even believe what you said about your love life in Vancouver. The first time I remember feeling paranoid was when I got your letter about the scholarship. Then more of it when dad died, after the phone calls. I used to feel paranoid sometimes just sitting alone in my bedroom. Now it just sometimes happens, I guess. I hate feeling that way, paranoia, it's an ugly feeling, but that's the honest answer."
"You have nothing to worry about. I have to say bye to Chris. Just goodbye, nothing else. There are no other lovers, there never were. And Naomi, Ronnie, a couple other friends there. And a few of the profs from school if they're around for the summer. And of course my parents and brother. And pack my stuff and ship it to Toronto. Then I'll be back. Maybe we can even live in your house before the summer's over."
"Maybe. We'll see. I hope so. I want to."
Ken whispered, "I don't know about you, but I still love you as deeply as I can. I want to spend the rest of my life making love to you. I know I've always felt this way, since that day we met. I never felt like this about anyone else, and I never will."
"I know. But like I said, all this pain is kind of mixed up with love right now. I need to overcome a lot of stuff. It will take a bit of time. Mistakes were made. We need to overcome them together. It's hard for me even to say intimate things like that to you now. You'll need to be patient, Kenny. Be patient and we'll see."
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