My Friend Leonard Read online

  I have an idea maybe he’s alive, maybe he’s alive. I smile, you motherfucker Leonard, why did you wait so long, I smile.

  I turn it over. It has my name on it, the address of the hotel where I’m staying, there is no note, just another address in the section where a note would be, an address in San Francisco.

  I smile.

  You motherfucker.

  Why’d you wait so long.

  I smile.

  san francisco

  I pack my shit there isn’t much. I’m leaving Seattle as soon as I can. Danny can handle the rest of the work without me.

  I drive south through Washington, Oregon, Northern California. Bella rides shotgun, we stop for food, coffee, cigarettes, a walk every few hours, a bathroom break every few hours.

  I cross the Bay Bridge into San Francisco. I’m staying with a friend from Paris, a woman named Colleen. Colleen has black hair, black eyes, always wears black clothes, looks like a movie star from the forties. She’s seven years older than me, works at an Internet company during the day, makes paintings and collages at night. In Paris she made hats, shoes, clothes, worked at an advertising agency, and she was my only friend who wasn’t a degenerate.

  I find her house, which is in one of San Francisco’s valleys. She gives me a hug, a big kiss, says James is in San Francisco, I’m so happy to see him. I laugh give her a hug, a big kiss. I drop my bags in her place, she wants to take me to lunch I tell her I need to go somewhere first, I give her the address. We get in my truck I bring Bella with us she’ll be happy to see Leonard he’ll be happy to see her. The address is on the other side of town, Colleen knows the general area. We drive up hills and down hills, up and down up a hill. We’re on the street I look at the numbers on the houses. We’re two blocks away, a block away. I see a white Mercedes sitting in a driveway I laugh. It’s an old Mercedes, from sometime in the fifties or sixties, it’s a small convertible in perfect condition. Colleen asks me why I’m laughing I just smile.

  I pull over. I tell Colleen we may have to delay lunch, or at least switch the venue, I tell her I’ll know in a minute. I get out of the car, Bella comes with me.

  We walk toward the front door. The house is a small, two-story, white frame house with black shutters. The lawn is well-tended, there are flower beds on both sides of the front door. It is a nice, clean house, it’s inconspicuous, there’s no reason to give it a second look.

  I step to the door, ring the bell. I’m excited to see my friend, my old friend Leonard. I wait for someone to answer, push the bell again. I wait, wait, no one comes to the door. I wonder if the bell is broken. I close my fist and I knock. I wait, nothing, knock again, nothing. I think about leaving a note, decide against it, I don’t know the details of this situation. Bella and I walk back to the car. I’m not disappointed, I know he’s here because of the Mercedes. I’ll come back until someone answers the door. I’ll keep coming back.

  We go to lunch. I try again after lunch, there’s no one home.

  I try again before dinner, there’s no one home.

  I try again after dinner.

  No one home.

  I leave Colleen’s house I tell her I’m going back to Los Angeles. If I don’t find Leonard, I will go back, wait a few days, come back here.

  I pull up to the house. It’s a beautiful, clear, warm, sunny day. The convertible is sitting at the curb the top is down.

  He’s alive.

  I look toward the front door it’s open. I can see through a screen door into the house.

  My friend Leonard is alive.

  Windows are wide open.

  Motherfucker disappeared for eighteen months, didn’t say shit about where he was or what he was doing, I thought he was dead.

  Curtains fluttering.

  He’s alive.

  I hear the faint sounds of classical music. Bella’s on a leash we walk to the door I press the bell. I wait. I see movement.

  I smile, my friend Leonard is alive.

  A man comes to the door. He’s not Leonard. He looks like he’s about thirty. He’s tall, thin, has short blond hair parted to one side. He’s wearing khakis, black leather sandals, a white oxford. He looks very clean. He stands at the door, speaks in a bitchy, effeminate way.

  May I help you?

  Leonard here?

  How may I help you?

  I have the postcard in my back pocket, I take it out, hold it up.

  I got this postcard in the mail. It has this address on the back, I thought it might be from my friend Leonard.

  May I see it?

  Sure.

  He opens the door enough for me to pass him the card. He looks at it, looks back at me, speaks.

  Your name is?

  James.

  He motions to Bella.

  And who is that?

  Bella.

  He looks at Bella, speaks.

  Hi, Bella.

  She wags her tail.

  Isn’t there another one? Cassius?

  He died.

  I’m sorry.

  It sucked.

  I’m sure it did. I know you loved him.

  Who are you?

  He opens the door.

  My name’s Freddie. I sent you that card. We’ve been waiting for you.

  Is Leonard here.

  Yes.

  I step inside the house. There are pristine, pale wood floors. All of the furniture is white, there are thick, soft, white couches and chairs. There are impressionist prints on the walls, there are flowers everywhere. Freddie leads me through the foyer, the living room, I can see a deck. I can see Leonard, or what appears to be a faded version of Leonard, sitting on a chaise lounge on the deck, he’s wrapped in a white cotton blanket.

  As I walk toward him he turns to me. He smiles, lifts his hand, speaks, his voice is weak and scratchy.

  My son. My son has arrived.

  I walk onto the deck. Freddie stays behind, leaves us alone. I look at Leonard I’m shocked, speechless. He’s lost thirty or forty pounds. There are open sores on his arms and neck. His hair looks dry and brittle, his skin is gray and sallow. He looks like he hasn’t eaten in a month, like a skeleton, like a dead man. The only thing that remains unchanged are his eyes, which are clear and fixed, dark brown, alive.

  My son, you found me.

  I’m happy to see him but shocked. I smile.

  You sent for me.

  I lean down to hug him.

  You don’t have to touch me if you don’t want to.

  Fuck that, Leonard.

  He laughs, I give him a hug, a strong hug. He feels small and fragile in my arms, feels like a child. He’s skin and bones, smells like medicine, sickness, decay. He hugs me back, his arms are weak, incredibly weak.

  It’s good to see you, Leonard.

  My son. It’s good to see you too.

  I pull away. Bella puts her front legs on the edge of the lounge, kisses Leonard’s hand. He looks down at her, smiles.

  Ooh, Bella, you little angel.

  He leans down, she kisses his face.

  Where’s your brother? Where’s the Big Boy?

  He died.

  Leonard looks up. He looks hurt.

  What happened?

  I shake my head. Leonard speaks.

  Bad?

  Yeah.

  And how’s Allison?

  I laugh.

  That was bad too.

  She’s okay, isn’t she?

  I assume so, though I haven’t spoken to her in a while.

  Big changes, my son.

  I’ve been through worse, but it wasn’t fun.

  Big change never is.

  Looks like you’re experiencing some big changes too.

  He laughs.

  That’s one way of putting it.

  What’s going on here, Leonard?

  He laughs.

  What’s going on? Isn’t that the fucking question.

  You look fucking awful.

  He laughs, coughs, speaks.

  Pull
up a chair.

  I look around the deck there are a couple of other chairs I pull one of them over sit down.

  You want the long version or the short version?

  I’m not going anywhere.

  He laughs, coughs, the cough gets worse. I look at him and I’m scared, I put my arms around him pat him on the back. He stops coughing, I pull away, he spits something unpleasant off the deck and into the yard. He laughs, speaks.

  Pretty nice, huh?

  What’s wrong?

  You ready?

  Yeah, I’m ready.

  He looks at me, takes a deep breath.

  I’m gay, and I’m dying of AIDS.

  I look at him. I don’t know what to say. He speaks.

  You okay?

  I nod.

  Yeah.

  I’m gay, my son, and I’m dying of AIDS.

  I heard you.

  Surprised?

  That would be one way to put it.

  You can leave if you want.

  Why would I leave?

  I don’t know what your position is on being gay, and I don’t know what your position is on AIDS.

  My position is that you’re my friend, and if you’re gay, you’re gay, it doesn’t make any difference to me, and if you’ve got AIDS, I’m sorry, and I’m going to do whatever I can to help you.

  He smiles.

  Thank you, my son.

  You gonna give me the long version or the short version?

  He smiles again, looks away, looks out across the deck. He closes his eyes, takes a deep breath as if he’s gathering his strength, looks back.

  I’ve always known. For as long as I’ve had memories, I’ve known. When I was a kid, I liked playing with girls more than boys and liked looking at boys more than girls. At the time I didn’t know what that meant, though I did know that in a Roman Catholic Italian family, it wasn’t considered right. As I grew up, got older, whatever it was I felt got stronger, and I had to work harder to ignore it. I went on dates. When I was old enough, I slept with women, I got engaged a couple of times, and just kept putting the weddings off. Although I love women, I love their company and their beauty, and could perform with them, I just couldn’t follow through because it wasn’t right for me. All the way through I overcompensated for what I felt, which was a love for men, by being the meanest, craziest, most violent motherfucker anybody knew, that way nobody could question me or doubt me or even suspect me, because a person who did some of the things I did could never be a fairy, even though I was, and I am. What happened, because of the world I lived in, was that my violence made me more respected, and ultimately, more successful. That success locked me into my charade even more, because I was around more people, and they watched me more carefully.

  I was in my early twenties the first time I slept with a man. He was a cab driver in New York. We were driving, talking, and he could tell somehow, and he propositioned me and I accepted, and it happened in the back of his cab, which we parked in an alley. I hated myself for it, fucking hated myself, and I hated him for being with me. I knew, though, that I would do it again, and I did, over and over and over, for the rest of my life, always with random men in random places, always with men who had no idea who I was or had any connection to me. I kept hating myself for a while, then I just accepted what I was, and I also accepted that I could never be open about it. If I was ever open, or if I got caught, I would get killed, because my business doesn’t allow for weakness. Even though being gay isn’t weak, that would have been the perception. Violent men, criminals, people like me, would have never allowed or tolerated or trusted or respected me, and at the first chance they got, they’d have put me in the fucking ground.

  Somewhere along the way I picked up HIV. I have no idea from who or when. About six years ago I woke up one day and felt like something was wrong, so I took a test and it came back positive. When I got the result I left the doctor’s office and I never went back. I know there are things I could have done with a doctor and drugs and combinations of drugs I could have taken to slow down the virus, and at this point they say there are things that can almost stop it, but if I had started going to a doctor, and had gone on a drug regimen, people would have found out. And again, if my associates had found out, they would have killed me.

  I started thinking about what I have done, and I’ll explain exactly what I’ve done soon, a few months after I met you and after you met Lilly. I remember very vividly you telling me about Lilly’s desire to feel free from her addictions and the hell of her life, and her telling you that to her, a second of freedom was worth more than a lifetime of bondage. I thought about that every day, every fucking day, and then I started watching you and watching how you took responsibility for the mess you had made of your life, and how you rejected everything you were told would save you in favor of what you believed, which was that you had the power to make the decisions that would decide the course of your existence. What I learned from the two of you was that freedom is worth sacrifice, and that I was in charge of my life and how I lived it and that I could decide to do anything I wanted to do. I wanted to escape, and be free, free of my job, of my position, of my role. I wanted out of the prison I built around myself. I wanted to get the fuck out.

  I started taking steps to do it when you were in Chicago. I knew the virus would get me sooner or later, so I was on a time schedule. My plan was to try to legitimize some of my businesses, so that I could make more money and hide it easier. I also read that if I started living better by exercising, eating properly and living as cleanly as possible, it might slow the virus down. That’s what all my diets were about, all my exercise plans, and I don’t know if they did anything or not. Once the virus started mutating, I was going to disappear, which is what I did, so that, before I died, I could live part of my life as a normal gay man, albeit a normal gay man who was dying of AIDS.

  That’s what I’ve been doing since I last saw you. First thing I did was get a fake passport and leave the country. I knew once I was gone that people would be looking for me, though not because I was gay, they probably still don’t know that, but because I disappeared with a big pile of money. I knew if they found me they would kill me. Being far away, where no one knew me or would recognize me, was important. I went to London, Paris, Rome, Athens, Madrid, Moscow and St. Petersburg. I looked at beautiful art and saw the sights and went to gay bars at night and looked at beautiful men. I went to India and saw the Taj Mahal, went to China and saw the Wall, went to Japan and saw all sorts of weirdness. After seven months I came back to the States and settled here. I’ve been very careful since I’ve been here. I don’t usually go out during the day. When I go out at night, I go to gay bars and restaurants with a predominantly gay clientele. I’ve been out on a few dates, I fell in love briefly, I’ve done some of the things I’ve always dreamed of being able to do.

  Over the course of time I’ve also gotten sicker and sicker. As you can see, I’m not in good shape. I hesitated to contact you until recently because I didn’t want you followed, and I’m sure at various points over the last year and a half you have been watched very carefully. Snapper, who is a wonderful man, but who is also a man with a nasty job that he does very well, would have known that you might be able to lead him to me, and that’s probably what he’s been doing since I left, trying to find me and kill me.

  I don’t have much time left. If you leave when I’m finished talking, I’ll understand, and I’ll be grateful to you for coming at all. What I did was fucked-up, but it’s what I did to complete my life, to be able to die happy. Now that I’ve seen you, I have only one thing left on my list of things to do before I die, which is play the golf course where my father worked and where I promised him I would play. To pull up, park my car in the lot, walk through the front door, and play that fucking course just like one of the members. I know that it isn’t going to happen, and if that’s all I haven’t done, I’m fine with it.

  Leonard stops speaking, slumps into his chair as if speaking
has taken all of his strength. I look at him broken and dying, wasting away, sores all over his body, wrapped in his blanket, he looks at me I speak.

  A lot of things make more sense now.

  Like what?

  No wife, no girlfriends. Your love of clothes and white cars. Why all of my girlfriends, romantic and platonic, wanted to be your best friend. The house in Laguna Beach, which is a gay town, that I thought you loved because of the view. Why you said Allison, who drops jaws everywhere she goes, wasn’t your type. The Speedo bikini you used to wear when you went swimming.

  He laughs.

  The signs were there. It’s fucking amazing nobody ever figured it out. And I still have that suit.

  I understand it now.

  He laughs again, it is a weak laugh.

  Straight or gay I stick to my guns on it, it’s for swimmers, Europeans, and motherfuckers with style.

  I laugh.

  I’m still not any of them.

  Your loss. Someday you’ll realize. Your loss.

  Is Freddie your boyfriend?

  No, though in a different situation I might want him to be. He’s my care-giver, a nurse of sorts. He helps me deal with what’s happening to me.

  I look at him.

  I’m sorry, Leonard.

  For what?

  I’m sorry you had to live like that for so long, sorry that you had to hide, and I’m sorry that you’re dying.

  I chose how to live as I’ve lived, and I’m choosing how to die as I’m going to die. You shouldn’t be sorry. If anything I should be sorry, for keeping the secret from you and for disappearing on you.

  No apology necessary.

  Thank you.

  Is there anything I can do?

  Hang out with me.

  That’s all I want. Some time with my son. That’s why I’m here.

  Thank you, James, thank you.

  Freddie orders lunch from an Italian restaurant. He sets up a table on the deck. We have mozzarella and tomato, pappardelle with boar ragu, veal chops, gelato. I eat like a pig, Leonard hardly eats at all. He feeds most of his lunch to Bella, pretends to eat the rest by pushing his food around the plate. I ask him about his travels, he smiles, calls for Freddie, asks him to get his books.