... Five For Change ...
Stewart
He was lean, tall, the kind of guy who always has a crack in his bottom lip during the winter. There were full lips beside hollow cheeks, dark eyes that were always looking slightly down. He had short blonde hair that perpetually looked as though it needed a trim and framed his face imperfectly. Long black eyelashes, they were the only soft thing on his body. He was all angles, lines and corners.
Stewart was my boyfriend's best friend. So, we were together all the time by default. Kelly, my boyfriend, forgot everything - even me. It was Stewart who picked me up from school, answered my calls late at night when I couldn't sleep, listened to me when I spoke of things my boyfriend didn't want to hear. So - when Stewart lost his temper, which he did frequently, it was me who went after him. Down a gravel road one night - the boys wouldn't follow because Stewart would have threatened them but I went. He wouldn't speak when he was angry, not even to me, but he would take my hand and fiddle with the ring that Kelly had given me. We would sit there until we were too cold to feel our hands anymore and walk back to the voices - hands jammed in our pockets.
One night, there were too many drinks. Stewart was angry and stormed off in to a back room. Kelly opened the door and pushed me into the room to settle Stewart down. I think Stewart Kissed me first but it was me who licked that bottom lip I had stared at for two years. It wasn't me who pulled back first. It was me that snaked my hands down toward his hips then his hands that stilled mine. It was him who moaned first; me who stepped back; both of us who realized we had crossed a line.
Things were never the same after that night. There was a secret boundary between us, a personal space we agreed silently never to violate. When he looked at me he would roll his bottom lip under his teeth and lower his head - staring through his lashes. When I hugged him goodnight I would always let my hands rest on his hips.
Brett
"It's not fair," he said as he slammed down his coffee cup on the cafe table, "You should be a gay man or I should be straight." And I believed him.
I also believed him when he promised me that he wouldn't die before me. I didn't attend his funeral, too emotional to travel and too pissed off about his lie.
Richard
Richard wanted to know my name before we'd been introduced so he phoned the office where I worked because he knew I gave my name out when I worked reception. When I answered the phone and gave my name he said, "And now, I know who you are." He had a beautiful voice; silk over concrete. I never heard him raise his voice once.
Richard gave blow jobs and let men fuck him for money. The money was to put cocaine in his veins. I don't remember being bothered by it - he was too beautiful to seem filthy; too bright to be dulled by my speculation.
We became friends. He wanted more because he could be clean, he told me, if I were with him. Something in my head walled off my heart. No. Something in my head walled off my body. My heart had been a casualty since the first day he spoke to me.
I cried one night across the table from Richard. I had stories to tell about my relationship. A boyfriend was horrible to me. He didn't care about me - I was a convenience to him, he a place-holder to me. Richard listened, eyes glassy, rubbing his fingers in small circles on the back of my hand. Finally, he said "I want so much to help, to say the right thing... but ... all I can think about is having sex with you...right now." It was how he would show me he cared, it would be real to him, connected rather than disconnected. He would feel it and he would care.
I pulled my hand out from under his and laughed softly, pretending not to see that something within him had just broken. I pretended the conversation had never happened.
When we said Good-bye years later (I was moving and he was staying) we talked in my living room until the sun was just below the horizon. He had been there with me for hours when I finally walked him to the door. He held my hand as he walked down my hallway, never once looking at me. Goodbyes were said at the door and he pulled his hand from mine as he left. More years passed and the phone call came. Richard was dying and he was asking for me. I don't remember how I got there. Did I drive? I must have. I was in another province at the time. When I arrived his wife greeted me at the door and told me he was in their bedroom. "Go to him - he's waiting," she said, "it was always you... never me." There was a sad look in her eyes.
He was so thin, his skin pale. He'd taken out all his piercings and pressed them into my palm and closed my fingers over them. "The only other thing that's really mine," he said letting go of my hand quickly. I sat on the edge of their bed and we spoke of all the things that didn't matter. It didn't matter because he'd known all along.
He died two days after I arrived. The last thing I said to him was "see you later."
Eddy
A beautiful soul, black hair, dark French-Albertan skin, soft accent, gentle spirit, dark brown eyes that always gazed into mine. He smelled of leather and soap.
A sunny summer afternoon led us to the ancient ballpark down by the curve in the river. It was always deserted, hot; we could sit in the grass and talk for hours.
He sat behind me, knees on either side of my hips propping up my arms. His arms rested over my shoulders, one hand tangled in my hair. I let my head fall back onto his shoulder, pressed my cheek against his and watched the clouds pass by. The words were unimportant but, right there, being held that way was perfect.
Terry
The handsome, loved, crazy-enough-to-be-admired teacher sat across from me at a party. We had retreated to the patio chairs on the back deck. He told me I needed to leave the small town I grew up in because I was meant to do so much more and to be someone different than the people I spent all my time with. There was a pattern to things he had told me. It was ready to happen - I just had to let it.
One night in a restaurant he insisted that we all grab our fortune cookies off the dessert plate at the same time. It worked. We all reached for different cookies.
But, the deck, sitting in the chairs late at night, facing each other and talking about me leaving town. He leaned forward slowly, licked his lips and looked at me with an eyebrow raised. It was a question. I nodded and he leaned closer - his lips almost touching mine. The door opened and some of my classmates tumbled drunkenly out the door laughing and falling over each other. Terry retreated casually, pulling out his cigarettes and lighting one. He took a long draw on the cigarette, the burning end lighting his face - passed me the cigarette, brushed his finger against my cheek and left.
story and words and photos Copyright Charlotte Kinzie 2009.
email for permission to use my stuffs.