Second You Sin Read online

  “Wel , at least I get my kid fix at Sunday school,” I said, ready to change the topic.

  “It’s great that you do that.” Tony kissed the back of my neck. “I’m real proud of you.”

  Tony was one of the few guys I’ve ever been with who I couldn’t wrap around my finger, and I had to admit it was part of his appeal. He knew his own mind and he let me know, too. He was always honest with me, even when he knew I wouldn’t like his answers. I loved that about him.

  Tony flipped me onto my stomach. He straddled me, but sat high on his thighs, afraid to rest his ful weight on me. “How about I get you nice and relaxed again?” Tony took the bottle of peppermint massage oil I strategical y keep on the nightstand and rubbed some oil into his palms. The scent of candy canes fil ed the air.

  Tony’s hands are strong and talented. I melted like butter beneath his touch. Which is why the next thing that happened sucked so much.

  7

  Mother

  Tony’s cel phone chirped three short beeps. I silently vowed to kil whoever was interrupting our moment with a text message. Tony stretched a muscled arm across me to retrieve the offending device. He flipped it open and read the message.

  Tony scrunched one almond eye to show his displeasure. “Bad news, sport.”

  “You have to go?” I whined piteously.

  Tony leaned over, gave me a quick kiss on the top of my head, and jumped out of bed. “I have to go.

  They just picked up someone I need to question.”

  “Can’t he wait?”

  “Maybe. But his lawyer can’t.”

  I scowled. “I hate his lawyer.”

  Tony laughed. “Me, too. It’s gonna be a long night.

  I’l give you a cal when we can get back together. I know tomorrow’s no good.” Tony was just about to step into the bathroom for a quick shower.

  “I have a date tomorrow, anyway,” I told him. I loved tel ing Tony I had dates. He hated hearing about them. But, hey, he was the one who didn’t want to commit. So, hah.

  “Oh,” Tony said, stopping for a moment in the doorway to the bathroom. The tips of his ears turned red, always a sure sign he was angry. He opened his mouth as if he was going to say something, then reconsidered, shook his head, and the next thing I heard was the creak of the shower door opening and the rush of water as Tony washed away the evidence of our love.

  “So,” Tony said, in an exaggeratedly cheery tone, as he dressed in one of the three business-appropriate suits he kept in my closet, “how about Tuesday night? Wanna get together?”

  I got out of bed, stil naked and a little sticky.

  Tony was usual y content to cal whenever he was free and we could get together. I knew it was my mention of a date that had him booking a reservation.

  “Sure,” I said, happy to have rattled him. “That’d be great. How about I order in and we watch Lost?”

  Tony had never seen the show in its original run and I was watching it on DVD with him. Although he found it tedious at first (“I get enough senseless mysteries at work, thank you.”), now he was total y into it and we were halfway through season four.

  I loved watching the show with him, despite his frequent exclamations that “Kate’s hot!”

  I’d always respond, “Yeah, and check out Sawyer’s ass.” That shut him up.

  “Sounds like a plan,” Tony answered. He was ful y dressed now, just strapping on his holster.

  I’d have hugged him good-bye if I weren’t so greasy. Instead, I just waved and hopped in the shower when he left.

  I was just drying off when the phone rang. Cal er ID

  announced it was my mother.

  I loved my mother, but to say she was a handful would be like cal ing King Kong a cute little monkey.

  I once asked my father how he put up with a woman who, not once to my knowledge, ever went a day without nagging him about something or reminding him of the six other marriage proposals she turned down in favor of his.

  “Three little words,” my father answered.

  “‘I love you’?” I asked.

  “ ‘Yes, dear.’ No matter what your mother says, I just say ‘yes, dear.’ ”

  “That’s only two words.”

  “Wel ”—my father winked—“the third word I say to myself.”

  My father came from a reserved German family of some nobility. Every one of his relatives was blond, gorgeous, and looked like they stepped out of the pages

  of Aryan People. Family get-togethers resembled a casting cal for The Sound of Music. If any of them ever had a pimple or a bad hair day, it wasn’t around me.

  How he came to marry Sophie Gerstein, a top-heavy Jewess from Flatbush, NY, who was voted

  “Most Likely Never to Shut Up” in her high school yearbook, was not only a mystery to everyone they met but, I think, to him, too.

  In any case, as I had only too recently learned, ignoring my mother’s cal s was more perilous than dating Chris Brown.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  “Darling,” she said, “how are you?”

  “I’m fine,” I began. “I was . . .”

  My mother cut me off. “That’s wonderful, darling, I’m so happy for you. Now, ask me how I am.”

  “How are you?” I dutiful y asked.

  “Darling, I’m going to be a star! I’m going to be on Yvonne!”

  Although I didn’t watch her show, everyone knew who Yvonne was. Not quite an Oprah, but bigger than Tyra, Yvonne Rivera was the hot Latin American hostess of That’s Yvonne, a daytime talk show about, wel , Yvonne. No matter who the guest or what the topic, the center of the show’s attention was always on Yvonne. Her ful figure, throaty laugh, and often outrageous comments made her the favorite of housewives everywhere.

  Yvonne’s biggest claim to fame was her genuine niceness. She was incredibly warm and empathic, and whether she was sitting on the couch with Julia Roberts or a woman who sold crystal meth to preschoolers, you could tel Yvonne real y cared.

  The thought of my mother on That’s Yvonne fil ed me with dread. What could the topic be? “Women Who Scare Their Kids to Death”? “Ten Ways to Make Your Children Neurotic”? “My Son’s a Male Prostitute”? I shivered and wrapped the towel around me.

  “That’s, wow, that’s just . . . So what are you going to be doing on the show?”

  “Hair!” my mother enthused. “They’re doing a series of makeovers for Yvonne and I’ve been chosen to give her one of my Mile High specials!”

  My mother owned the, in my opinion, tastelessly named Sophie’s Choice Tresses, one of Long Island’s premier beauty parlors for women of a certain age who wanted hairstyles that have been out of favor for at least thirty years. Her Mile High special was an impossibly tal beehive that she was able to coax from even half-bald clients like Mrs.

  Shingles, my third grade teacher, who once said to me, “Your mother makes me feel like I’m ten feet tal !”

  No, I wanted to tel her, that’s just your hair.

  The idea that someone like Yvonne would even want one of my mother’s towering creations seemed preposterous. The only people who wore their hair like that were eighty-year-old women and drag queens. Either Yvonne was a lot older than she looked, or she had a cock. More likely, the selection had been made by a producer who hated her.

  “That’s great,” I said. “You must be excited.”

  “You have to come to the taping,” my mother said.

  “Promise me. I wanted Kara there, but she told me she’d bring the boys, and there’s no way I’m having my TV debut ruined by those three little monsters.”

  I loved them to death, but my sister’s triplets were infamously wild.

  “When is it?” I asked.

  “Tuesday! They’re coming to the shop at eight in the morning to set up and Yvonne”—my mother whispered the name as if addressing a deity—“is coming around noon. Can you believe it! In just two days, I’m going to be a star!”

  I expected that my mother had an exagge
rated sense of what one appearance on That’s Yvonne was going to do for her career, but she was never one to let reality distort her view of the world.

  “That’s seems like it came together pretty fast,” I said.

  “I know, ” my mother squealed. “The producer I spoke to told me they had another stylist cancel on them and needed to make arrangements right away!”

  My mother wouldn’t normal y settle for being anyone’s second choice, but I guessed Yvonne was special.

  “Dad must be excited,” I said.

  “Your father.” My mother’s voice was flat. “Your father.” She paused and took a deep breath, as if gathering the strength to tel me some long-held secret that threatened to tear our family apart.

  “Your father,” she final y hissed, “didn’t even know who Yvonne is. When I tried to explain that this could be my big break, he told me, ‘Sophie, you’re an old lady. The only big break you’re going to get at this point is, God forbid, your hip.’”

  I let a little laugh escape before clamping my hand over my mouth.

  “Oh sure,” my mother responded, “very funny. But you wait and see—Yvonne is probably going to ask me to be her personal stylist before the day is over.”

  “I bet she wil .”

  “Oh,” my mother added. “I almost forgot to tel you.

  That producer who cal ed me? He said he knows you.”

  I didn’t think I knew anyone who worked for America’s third-rated talk show, but I asked his name.

  “I wrote it down, hold on. Wait, here it is—Andrew Mil er. Ring a bel ?”

  The bel s were silent. “Nope.”

  “Nothing?” my mother asked.

  I thought for a moment. “No, sorry.”

  “Could he have been someone you, oh, how do I put this delicately?” She hummed to herself in consideration. “Maybe one night, at a bar or a park .

  . .”

  “Mom!”

  “Or maybe the beach? On the subway? Wel , not on the subway,” she continued, as she couldn’t see my pained expression, “but someone you met on the subway. Or in a men’s room, like that Republican senator . . .”

  “I’m going to hang up,” I shouted. I had to speak up as I was holding the phone at arm’s length from my ear.

  “Al right, al right,” she said. “I don’t know what you’re so sensitive about, though. I’m a hairdresser, darling. I know what you people do.”

  “What ‘you people’? I’m your son; I’m not from Mars.”

  “The gays, darling. I went to that PFLAG meeting once. I know the score.”

  “Listen,” I said. “I’ve never had sex in a bar, or in a park or a bathroom or, for that matter, on the subway. Half the time, I can’t even get a seat on the subway, let alone . . . oh, never mind.” I was hoping she missed that I didn’t deny the beach.

  “Darling, it’s the lifestyle. I understand these things.

  You forget your mother is a very sophisticated woman.”

  “Just because I’m gay doesn’t mean I’m . . . easy,”

  I pointed out petulantly.

  “I’m not accusing you of anything.” My mother attempted to be conciliatory. “There’s nothing wrong with a little kink. Once, on the Long Island ferry, your father and I snuck into the . . .”

  I hung up the phone, counted to ten, got a pen, and cal ed her back. “Sorry, I hit the wrong button with my chin.”

  “That’s al right, darling. I was just going to tel you about the time your father and I . . .”

  I hit the phone with the pen. It made a satisfying clack.

  “Damn,” I said. “That’s Tony on the other line. I have to take this.”

  “How is that handsome Tony?” my mother asked.

  Ever since she caught sight of him bare-assed a few months ago, I think my mother has had a bit of a crush on Tony. “Are you two stil . . . ?”

  I hit the phone again. Clack! “Sorry, I real y do have to get this, Mom. See you Tuesday.”

  “OK,” my mother shouted. “Be there at noon! Bring Tony!”

  I hung up and said a silent prayer for Yvonne, for whom I suddenly felt a great rush of sympathy.

  Now that Tony was gone, I wasn’t sure what to do with my evening. There was laundry to be done, and bil s to be paid, but my mind kept returning to Randy, lying in his hospital bed, alone. I didn’t know if he had any family or real friends. The only person I could think of we were both close to was Mrs. Cherry, the slightly demented but charming drag queen who ran our escort service.

  Mrs. Cherry! I had to tel her. She picked up the phone on the first ring.

  “My favorite boy,” she greeted me. “To what do I owe the great—no, the orgasmic pleasure—of this cal ?”

  I told her what happened to Randy.

  “Oh my dear,” Mrs. Cherry said when I was done.

  “The poor, poor lamb. I must cal his clients and cancel their appointments. Would you be interested in perhaps picking up some extra work? Oh, wait, that won’t do, wil it?”

  Randy was the imposing muscle stud of legend; I was the cute boy-next-door type. We didn’t share the same clientele. “Probably not,” I agreed.

  Mrs. Cherry asked me the name of Randy’s hospital and doctors.

  “Don’t you worry,” she told me. “I’l make sure that Randy has everything he needs. Momma wil take care of the bil s.”

  Mrs. Cherry always looked out for her boys, which is one of the reasons many of the city’s top hustlers worked with her.

  I gave Mrs. Cherry al the information I had.

  “You’re such a dear,” she said. “Now don’t forget, tomorrow afternoon, you have that client from West Eighty-second Street. That very nice, very rich one.”

  In Mrs. Cherry’s eyes, I knew the two qualities were synonymous.

  I told her I’d be there.

  “You’re perfection!” she exclaimed.

  I ordered in Chinese food and channel surfed until I found What’s Up, Doc? I watched the movie, ate my steamed chicken, and tried not to worry about Randy.

  8

  Send in the Clowns

  The next morning, the phone awakened me at 6:30, which pissed me off until I saw who was cal ing. I hit

  “talk.”

  “Hey,” I said sleepily. “What’s up?”

  “You stil in bed?” Tony asked leeringly. “Nice picture in my head right now.”

  I sat up. “You’re pretty chipper for a guy who just woke up.”

  “Never went to bed,” Tony answered. “At the station al night. Driving home now to crash for a few hours.”

  He sounded tired.

  “You should have stopped off here,” I told him.

  “Then I wouldn’t be getting any sleep, would I?”

  I had to admit that was true.

  “Anyway, I just cal ed to say I was sorry I had to run out on you last night. What did you wind up doing?”

  I think he was trying to see if I went out. Tony was enjoying his freedom, but not mine. I told him I spent the night watching TV and went to bed early. A slight edge in his voice made me think he didn’t believe me, but it might just have been his exhaustion.

  We talked a little more until Tony told me he’d arrived home. “I could sleep for a week,” he said.

  “Old man,” I teased him.

  “I’l show you who’s old—I’l cal you soon, OK?”

  Define soon, I thought.

  “Yeah,” I said. “Talk later.”

  “Over and out, Kevvy.”

  I went to the gym, had a protein drink and a shower there, and then headed to my volunteer job at The Stuff of Life. It was another warm-for-November day, and I wore baggy black Abercrombie & Fitch corduroy pants, a gray hoodie from Target, and my black leather jacket.

  One of the best things about being a hustler is only having to work five or six hours a week. That left me plenty of time for my studies. Or it would if I were actual y stil in col ege. I dropped out early, but I’m going back.

&n
bsp; When my friend Al en Harrington died, it turned out he left me a considerable inheritance. Unfortunately, due to the unusual circumstances of his demise, his wil was held up in probate. When that money comes through, though, I’m returning to school.

  Until then, I fil a lot of my free time volunteering at The Stuff of Life, where I supervise the lunch shift, making home delivery meals for people with AIDS.

  On the walk over, I cal ed Freddy and told him about my mom being on Yvonne.

  “You’re shitting me,” Freddy said. “That girl does not know what she’s getting into with your mother.”

  Every day, another church or community group came to help with meal preparation at The Stuff of Life. On Mondays, we were graced by the company of volunteers from the New York City Jewish Home for the Aged, or, as I like to cal them, the Super Yentas. Depending on the particular week, and on what percentage of the group were having issues what percentage of the group were having issues with their blood sugar, the Super Yentas were fifteen to twenty women in their seventies or eighties who shared the desire to do good works, moderate to severe hearing loss, osteoporosis, and very poor short-term memories.

  “So,” Mrs. Epstein asked, as she, along with the rest of her crew, stood at the long metal table where they passed to each other the brown paper bags that they loaded, assembly-line fashion, with today’s lunch menu. “Have you found the right girl yet?”

  “Not yet,” I answered distractedly.

  “I don’t understand.” Mrs. Fishmeyer turned to Mrs.

  Dreckeri. “Such a good-looking boy. What could be the problem?”

  “It’s these modern girls.” Mrs. Dreckeri nodded wisely. She picked up a banana and put it in a bag.

  “They’re al so busy with the working and the careers and the Pilates. Whatever that is. In my day, we didn’t have al this nonsense. We knew what was what.”

  “What?” Mrs. Fishmeyer asked. She tapped her hearing aid. “I didn’t get that.”