“Something wrong?”

The younger boy nodded and sank down slowly on the edge of the bed, looking sadly up at him. “I know I should have told you before I moved in, but I was scared you wouldn't … you'd be pissed.” He looked up at him, frightened, but honest. He came right to the point. “I think you should know I'm gay.” He looked as though he had just admitted he had just killed his best friend, and Lionel's jaw almost dropped he looked so stunned. How simple it all was. How brave he was to speak up, not knowing what Lionel would do or say. His heart went out to the boy and he sat down on the bed next to him and started to laugh. He laughed until tears came to his eyes, and John looked at him nervously. Maybe he was hysterical, or maybe he just thought it was so disgusting it was ridiculous. It was a relief when he finally stopped laughing long enough to speak, and he was stunned when Lionel put his hands on his shoulders as he did.

“If you only knew the things I've been telling myself since you moved in … I've been torturing myself….” It was clear that John didn't understand. “Baby, so am I.”

“You're gay?” John looked appalled and Lionel started laughing again. “You are? But I never thought …” And yet that wasn't true, there had been a faint, hesitant current between them for the last year and yet neither could accept the possibility that the other understood. They talked about it for the next two hours, lying on Lionel's bed, friends at last. Lionel told him about Paul. And John confessed to two brief, terrible affairs. There had been no love in either of them for him, just terrible, anguished, tortured, guilt-ridden sexual release, one with a teacher from his school, who had threatened to kill him if he talked, the other with a stranger, an older man, who had picked him up on the street. And the only purpose the two affairs had served was to show him what he was. He had suspected it for a long time, but he had always thought it was the worst thing that could ever happen to him. People like Greg Thayer would never have talked to him again. But Lionel was so different, he understood it all, and he looked at the younger man sympathetically now, from his vantage point of nineteen. And John was curious about one thing.

“Does Greg know?”

Lionel was quick to shake his head. “Only my Mom. She found out last year.” He told John how, and it still hurt thinking of how shocked she had been, but she had been wonderful to him since then, understanding, compassionate, she accepted him as he was. “Everyone should be lucky enough to have a mother like her.” She had far exceeded his hopes and dreams.

“I don't think my Mom could accept it … and my Dad …” He almost cringed at the thought. “He always wanted me to be such a jock. I played football for him, and I kept thinking, I'm going to get my teeth kicked out doing this, and I hate it, I hate it.” His eyes filled with tears as he looked at Li. “I did it for him.”

“I wasn't as good as you were. But my Dad had Greg to pin his hopes on. I always let him carry the ball, so to speak.” He smiled gently at the new friend that he had known for years. “It took the heat off me in some ways, but I paid a price I guess. My father has never approved of me. And if he knew … he'd die.” They had so much guilt for so many years, for what they were not, for what they could never be, and in the past year, for what they had done. It was almost too much to bear at times. And Lionel thought of it now as he looked into John's eyes. “Did you know about me?”

John shook his head. “I don't think I did. I wished a lot though sometimes.” He smiled honestly up at Li and they both grinned, as Lionel tousled the damp black hair that framed his face.

“You little shit. Why didn't you say something?”

“And have you knock my teeth down my throat, or call the cops, or worse yet … tell Greg?” He shuddered at the thought, and then thought of something else. “Are all the guys in this house gay?”

Lionel was quick to shake his head. “None of them, and I'm pretty sure of that. You get a feel for that when you live with people. And they all have girls stay here pretty regularly,”

“Do they know about you?”

Lionel looked at him pointedly. “I'm careful that they don't suspect, and you'd better do the same, or they'll throw us both out.”

“I'll be careful. I swear.”

Lionel found himself thinking again of changing rooms to the one that shared the bathroom with John, but he forgot the room and looked up at John instead, lying across his bed, and suddenly he felt relief and desire wash over him, and he remembered his dreams of the night before. He reached out to touch John, as he lay back on the bed, waiting for Li's lips and his hands and his touch, his youthful flesh rippling with excitement and begging for him, and Lionel found him with his mouth, and his tongue danced hot fire up John's thighs, as he groaned, and discovered something at Lionel's hands that he had never had before. This time there was nothing clandestine, nothing frightening, nothing embarrassing about the love that Lionel lavished on him for the next several hours, until satisfied and peaceful, they lay in each other's arms and slept. They had each found something that they had been looking for, for a long time, without even knowing it.





CHAPTER 20




School began in the fall without event. Lionel and John had never been happier, and no one at the house knew. Lionel changed rooms before the others came back from their summer plans, and the arrangement worked out perfectly. John and Lionel both locked their doors at night, and no one had any idea who spent the night in whose bed, as they tiptoed back and forth stealthily, whispering late at night, and keeping their moans of ecstasy dimmed. It was only on the rare nights when no one was there at all, sleeping at girls' houses, or going skiing over a long weekend, that they allowed themselves a little more liberty. But they were cautious that no one should know, and for once Lionel didn't even say anything to Faye. He just said that school was going well. He didn't offer any romantic news, and she didn't want to pry, although she suspected there was someone in his life from the happy look in his eyes. She just hoped it was someone decent who wouldn't make him unhappy eventually. From what she knew of the homosexual world, there seemed to be so much unhappiness and promiscuity and infidelity, it wasn't a life she wanted her oldest child condemned to. But she knew that there was no alternative for him, and she accepted that. And in November, she invited him to the premiere of their latest film. He accepted with delight, and she wasn't surprised to see John Wells with him at the premiere. She knew that John was renting a room in the same house as Lionel, and going to UCLA as well, but at the end of the evening when they went to Chasen's for supper and champagne with the twins and a number of business associates and friends, she suddenly wondered if she didn't see something special pass between their eyes. She wasn't quite sure of it, but she sensed something, and she thought John looked much more mature than he had in June, as though he had grown up a lot in the last few months. She suspected something, but she said nothing to anyone, of course, and she was startled when Ward questioned her as they got undressed that night. She was talking to him animatedly about the film, the audience response, the favorable reviews they hoped to get, and she was stunned when he interrupted her with a worried frown, standing in his trousers with a bare chest.

“Do you think John Wells is queer?”

“John?” She looked amazed, but in her heart she knew she was stalling for time. “My God, Ward, what a thing to say … of course not, why?”

“I don't know. He looks different to me suddenly. Didn't you notice something about him tonight?”

“No,” she lied.

“I don't know …” He walked slowly to his closet and hung up his jacket, still wearing the same frown. “I just get a funny feeling about him.” Faye felt her whole body grow cold. She wondered if he had the same suspicions about their son. And like Lionel, she wasn't at all sure he could survive knowing the truth, although maybe he would have to one day. In the meantime, she was dedicated to keeping the truth from him. “Maybe I should say something to Lionel. Warn him … he may think I'm nuts, but if I'm right, he may thank me someday. Greg thought there was something wrong with him when he turned down that scholarship at Georgia Tech. Maybe he was right.” It was their ultimate criterion, much to Faye's chagrin.

Faye looked suddenly annoyed. “Just because he doesn't want to play football doesn't mean he's gay for chrissake. Maybe he's interested in other things.”

“You never see him with girls.” They didn't see Lionel with girls either, but Faye didn't point that out to him. And she knew Ward just assumed that Lionel kept his love life to himself . He did not assume he was carrying on with men, just because he didn't see the girls. But she didn't point that out to him.

“I think you're being unfair. It's like a witch hunt, for God's sake.”

“I just don't want Lionel living with some damn queer, and not realizing it.”

“I'm sure he's old enough to figure it out for himself. If that's the case.”

“Maybe not. He's so wrapped up in those crazy films of his. Sometimes I think he's completely lost in his own world.” Well, he had noticed that much about his oldest son at least, she told herself.

“He's a remarkably creative boy.” She was anxious to get Ward off the subject of John. And she had to admit, there had been something different about him tonight. But instinctively, she felt a need to protect him. She suspected that he was involved with John. Only Lionel still didn't look like what he was, and John was beginning to, and he had talked a lot about decorating and interior design. Maybe it was time she said something to Lionel about him. “Have you seen Li's last film, sweetheart? It's beautiful.”