Another night. The glow of the television upon his forehead. Radiation poisoning, he thought. How far was the set supposed to be, in order to be safe? Safety, comfort, security. This, his apartment, was everything he ever needed, a kitchen, a bathroom, a couch, his laptop and his TV. Here, he could spend the rest of his days and there was a tremendous sense of accomplishment accompanying that thought. He relished coming home some nights. To exit the loud, crashing world, after being pushed and pushing this way and that, battling others for space, for money, for survival only to return from this unceasing war for a few hours of peace until he was called to action, once again, in the morning, around 5:50 AM. Yet, some nights felt like just another night. Those nights, he wanted to never return to that stupid, cramped apartment in Harlem, East 133rd St, to bypass the hot, crowded, jerky six train. He didn’t know where to go, or what to do, not that he would have anyone with whom to do anything with anyway, but he longed for the days of old. Of college, when the end of the day signaled the beginning of something. Where friends were across the hall, or a flight of stairs away. He could go to bed at all hours of the night and still wake up for class the next morning, or not. There was a freedom to those days that he had failed to realize, at that time, existed. All there was, he remembered thinking at age nineteen, was class, more class, a part time job and homework. It was slavery to the university system, was it not? He anticipated the end of college, the end of schedules and routine. But, with college’s end, came the end of carefreeishness. Should that ever be considered a legitimate word. The hours of the day blended into subway rides, coffee runs, data sheets, phone calls, blah, blah and more blah til he could scarcely remember what he had even accomplished earlier. Who was he kidding, he thought. Nothing was accomplished today. Or yesterday, the day before, etc, etc. And nothing will be accomplished tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after, in continuum, forever and ever until he dies. At his desk, or in this apartment, which was not as safe and comfortable and secure as it had been a minute ago. Now, it was suffocating. Confining.
Outdoors greeted him with its mild indifference, blowing gently through his open jacket. Still undecided about where he was going or what he was doing, Adrian walked to the subway. There had to be somewhere that mystical tube could take him. Eschewing his headphones and obligatory reading material, Adrian rode the six train. He wanted to feel, to experience the train, naked of his usual securities. Once the train arrived, the initial rebelliousness of this act crumbled into anxiety and he spent the entire ride down to Union Square with his eyes alternately buried betwixt his legs, or angling up at the ads for skin care treatment with an ethereal fascination. Union Square seemed the logical choice. He had spent many a night there in his youth—was his youth over, was that why he referred to it in the past tense?—and there was always something going on around there. He reached for his phone. Maybe he could give an old friend he hadn’t seen in ages a call under the pretense of catching up. Really, though, he was lonely and it was destroying him. He needed to be in the company of others just to feel all right again. Though he hadn’t felt all right since probably junior year. That was the last time he and Simon had last been together. They had dated since senior year in high school, after a few years of mild adolescent curiosity had matured into a shared understanding and appreciation. They both left Jersey to come to the city for school, Adrian downtown, Simon, uptown. Freshman year was the happiest time in his life and would remain so, he knew rather than thought. Everything was so new! He and Simon had a freedom to be with each other that they had never experienced in their smallish town and the city was their playground. Adrian’s grades suffered as a result of how much time they spent together, but he felt like a fictional character made flesh. Their love affair—for it must have been love…?—was too idyllic to be completely real. Even if the past is the best kind of cosmetic, embellishing and concealing. To return home to Jersey that summer was to wake up from a pleasant dream one knew eventually had to end, despite one’s best efforts to persist in sleep. They barely saw each other, Adrian and Simon. Adrian waited tables while Simon was a counselor at a day camp. And god did he hate children. The job was torture for him and barely paid minimum wage, but it was the only thing he could find. If he had been searching, as Adrian advised him, in April, like he had, then he could have avoided that post. But Simon never did listen, not out of spite, only because it was not in him. He was a talker and loved to share his opinions on everything, whether his interlocutor wanted to hear it or not. Still, they found time to be with each other. Almost every Friday, they would take their paychecks and blow it all in the city. Adrian sighed. He hadn’t indulged in anything in so long. Not even a new jacket, which would have proved rather essential considering the condition of his present one.
He filed through the names in his cell phone twice, avoiding then lingering on S. He realized then that he had no real friends. Not anymore. Once, he was never want for activities or activity partners. He and Simon would go out every night of the week, either by themselves or with a group. Sophomore year, both faced with sagging grades, Adrian and Simon decided to cut back on their time together, but still went out a few nights of the week. A day could not go by without an hour-long phone call or a few dozen text messages or a couple hours chatting online. If not one then all of the above. Then with midterms, the calls became shorter, the texts and chats fewer and suspicion greater. They had their first fight on Halloween. When later pressed, neither could remember what the fight was entirely about, but it was the first of many. During winter break, they mutually decided to see other people, only to hook up with the assistance of free rum and burning loins, at a party celebrating the return from vacation to the rigors of university life. Officially back on, everything was good again, but the impending shadow of doom was easier to notice now that it had encroached upon their happiness. Their relationship was dying, only Adrian did not know it at the time. Yes, tensions might have been slightly higher, but if it was truly love—for it must have been love—they would work through their problems. The uneasiness between them, the forced kindnesses in hope of avoiding any conflict, the quick capitulation resulting from any conflict unsuccessfully avoided. By junior year, happiness was a façade, replaced by jealousy, bitterness and uncertainty. They broke up, this time not as mutually, with Simon dealing the deathly blow. Adrian did not take it well and most would say he never quite recovered. He never dated anyone after Simon, who seemed impervious to Adrian’s pain. Except once. A drunken phone call. Do you miss me? I’ve always missed you. Can I come up...? Sure. That was the last time Adrian had sex, a year after it had all ended, five years from the dreary existence he had cultivated for himself. He didn’t want to hide, but he could feel the hot tears stinging his eyes. Ducking into a bar, he bolted for the bathroom, locking the door behind him, stared into the mirror and wondered why he had let himself fall so hard. Fall so hard in love, fall so hard out of it, then fall so hard into nothingness. The friends he had once had, alienated by his morose behavior and refusal to give up the ghost, stopped calling. He imaged that there was a moment of indecision, whether to side with him or Simon. After all, they had the same group, thus someone had to be the loser. And Adrian played the role well. Too well, in fact. He pushed the devoted ones away, Chris, Sandra, Frankie, now he missed them and needed them so. He hadn’t seen any of them in years, too busy with work and self-pity, would they care to hear from him? Were there numbers still the same? He knew Chris had moved back to Cisco, out of necessity not choice. Perhaps, he thought, they could meet up just this once, for old times’ sake. He almost dialed Sandra, who was the last to leave. She indulged in his morose wanderings of the park, his pitiable poetry and his self-imposed exile, but even she, patient, understanding if a bit harsh, Sandra, could not fight to love him. He had to love himself….And Frankie. A rush of blood below the belt. He wondered if Frankie was still as beautiful. When he and Simon broke up for the first time, Frankie was quick to move in. Herding Adrian to bars and clubs, out to parties, bringing over movies and wine. Before he and Simon reconciled, he and Frankie, with the aid of cheap wine and “The Lady Eve,” made out sloppily, but passionately, before Adrian called a cease and desist. Frankie, although miffed, understood and respected his decision. After he and Simon, broke up for the last time, Frankie was in a relationship of his own, a fact that Adrian tried to overlook. After making an ass out of himself, in front of a few familiar faces no less—at one point proclaiming how “pathetic” Frankie was for missing out on an opportunity to have his way with him then spilling his drink on Frankie’s then boyfriend—Adrian withdrew from further contact with him. In the mirror, he saw a young man of twenty-six, a little overweight, in need of a haircut and a shave, but otherwise, passably attractive, laugh in spite of himself. Then, noticing the posters of a naked Josephine Baker on the walls, he knew he had been here before. A home away from home, it once was. Every Thursday, Friday and Saturday night for three straight years. Wiping his face, he decided it wouldn’t hurt to have a drink, for old times’ sake, at his old haunt. He was already there, after all.
“Rum and coke, please.” The bartender, short, gruff, muscular and handsome— “Actually, could you make that a diet coke,” Adrian added with a smile—had been there during his glory days. When he and Simon and their coterie of fabulous friends, drinking with fake IDs, would spend all night dancing and singing along to the jukebox. As the owners seemed perfectly adamant about adding any songs released after 1983, disco lived a life long after its supposed death. Drink in hand, Adrian perused the selection. Disappointed to find a few of today’s hits sprinkled through, he finally settled on the Emotions, “Best of My Love.” The song started, almost immediately, as if it had been waiting for him all along; a welcome reprieve from the time when one could and would wait an entire night to hear their song, but then again, the bar was a lot more crowded back then. That Tuesday night, there were only a handful of boozers and cruisers out. But it was early still. Adrian glanced at his watch. 9:45. Yikes, he thought. And he was already getting tired. His youth, as he had known it, was indeed over. Then what was this that he was doing now? Not middle age, it was too soon for that. What was this, this grey area? He was nearing thirty and for the first time the idea frightened him. What if he never had sex again? What if he worked at the same company, hating his life everyday for the next forty years until retirement? Then what? He already felt life was at an end at twenty-six, what of sixty-six? Seventy? The thought was too great for a sober mind. “Another, please,” Adrian politely asked while extending his empty glass.
Countless rum and diet cokes later, the room was a crowded, sweaty disco-fueled orgy. Adrian’s shyness, melancholy and misery dissipated and he danced erratically, but joyfully, to Cheryl Lynn’s “Got to Be Real.” He remembered last when he danced like this. It was with Simon. They always moved so well together, vertically and horizontally. He missed him desperately then, but he was also happy, he realized. He was happy he had been able to feel love and to feel loved, even if it didn’t work out. Then he felt impossibly silly that he had let this relationship, albeit a very important relationship, rule his life for the past ten years. He threw his head back and laughed loudly, the sight of which confused everyone around him. Adrian did not care. This. Yes, this was the first time in a long time he had felt so free and he would have no one encroach upon this freedom. Freedom, happiness, and all they entailed must be fought for. That was life. The struggle—that was life. “But what am I struggling for?” Adrian stood in the middle of the dance floor, his head slightly cocked to the side, wondering just what he had been doing with his life for the past five years.
He returned to the bar, his island in the sea of thumping tones and humping bodies, the dancefloor. He ordered another drink, but wished for something stronger. Something that would take him away from all of this. Suddenly, he saw a handsome, muscular stranger at the end of the bar. He sought to meet his gaze, but the man was too busy staring at his own reflection in the mirror directly behind the bar. Adrian turned to face himself in the same mirror and saw only a miserable, sloppy drunken mess returning his gaze. The loneliness in the reflection's eyes caused his entire body to quiver and he collapsed in tears, knocking his drink off the bar. Others turned to see what all the commotion was, but no one endeavored to help or ease the situation. The bartender gestured to the doorman, who, with surprising tenderness, escorted Adrian out of the bar. Propped against the wall, Adrian struggled to regain his composure. He inhaled the cool night air with a full mouth, as if the air were the only thing that could possibly save him now, bring him back from the barren fields of his depressed mind.
"Cigarette?" The doorman asked. Adrian didn't smoke, but it occurred to him that he really didn't care and he just wanted some sort of interaction of any kind to break the cycle of loneliness and self0-chastisement. He clumsily accepted but was far too inebriated to work the mechanism of a lighter. The doorman obliged.
"Thank you..."
"Steve."
"Steve."
Silence loomed over them. The night was winding down, approaching that magical hour between too late and too early, when the sky has hints of color and the air tones of familiarity. Adrian suddenly thought he'd probably have to call in to work tomorrow. It shouldn't be a problem, he thought, he was always at work, no matter how terrible, how sick, how exhausted with life he felt, he was always at work. What difference would one day off make. He took another drag of the cigarette and enjoyed the shared silence with Steve, the doorman. Wrapped up in the armor of night, he found his way home and passed out on his solitary twin bed.
