Five Tuesdays in Winter(39)

He stood up, signaled to the waiter to put it on his tab, and nearly pushed me to the elevator. When it came we got in alone, and as soon as the doors closed he was at me—mouth, stubble, osso buco breath. I am kissing Paul, I am kissing Paul. His name rang through me like a cathedral bell. He pressed me hard against the brass handrail, his hands reaching for my fly, and then the elevator dinged, and he was on the other side of the box and looking like he’d never seen me in his life. But no one was on the seventh floor when the doors opened. He put out his arm for me to step out first and then he shoved me against the elevator opening and when the doors tried to shut they bumped against my back over and over, pushing me into him. He was at me like an animal, biting my nipples through my shirt, shoving, thrusting, as if he’d gotten a hold of a piece of meat too enormous to know what to do with.

“Paul.” I took his face in my hands and held it in front of mine. “Slow down, baby. Let’s get to the room.”

He seemed unable to make eye contact but fished in his pocket for the key and led me down the hallway.

I stood in the center of the navy blue room as he locked and bolted and chained the door. I could hear him breathing. “You know, I think we need to take a few steps back here.”

He didn’t seem to register that I had spoken. He took off his shirt with one paw reaching behind his back and yanking up while the other fumbled with belt and zipper. His penis shot straight out at me and he was still breathing noisily but smiling now, proud of his erection, looking at me for the first time since we’d left the restaurant, as if he expected praise for what it could do.

“Lie down,” he growled.

I sat on the bed. “I’d really like—”

“On your stomach.”

“Paul, I’m not doing this.”

Again his face flinched. Then he walked over and leaned down and kissed me, long and slow and gorgeous, just the way I knew he could, just the way he’d kissed all those girls I was so jealous of. But even as he was doing it, even as my own erection returned and my insides spun around, I knew he was placating me, giving me what I wanted but what he really had no interest in giving or receiving. And when he had weakened me enough, he flipped me over and yanked down my pants (they were Steve’s jeans and slightly too big for me) without undoing them.

How many times that night did I try to make contact, beg him to slow down, to stop? He would not stop. When it was over, my body rang in pain. Paul passed out instantly, and I lay there waiting for the strength to get up, to return like this to Steve. It never came.

I woke up to the sound of the shower. I was sore everywhere. My legs and stomach had dark red bruises. I found it hard to roll over. “You sound just like Gail,” he’d grumbled at one point when I complained about the pain. Is this how Gail felt in the morning? Is this what he did to her, or was it what he thought men did to each other, or was it simply what he did to me, to punish me?

The shower stopped. The faucet ran. The tap of a razor against the sink.

When he opened the door, his face was drained of color.

“Morning,” I said sweetly, mockingly, the contented lover beneath the sheets.

He seemed not to be able to come into the room. “Do you have AIDS?”

“What?”

“I need you to tell me the truth. Are you HIV positive?”

“No.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve been tested plenty of times.”

“Like when? When was the last time?”

“I don’t know. Three years ago.” It’d been more like five.

“Three years ago. Jesus Christ. Three years ago. I have a wife and kids. Fuck! I cannot fucking believe this.” He went to the closet, unzipped a garment bag, and pulled a black suit and a striped tie off the hanger.

“Steve and I are monogamous.”

He snorted. “Oh yeah. I can see that. Is he as monogamous as you?”

“Paul— This was obviously. This was the first. I’ve never—”

“I heard Steve on the phone yesterday. He seemed up for a fuck. Face it, guys, straight, queer, they fuck when they get the chance. And gay guys get a disease for doing it. And you know who’s going to pay for it? My wife and my kids. You better fucking get out of that bed and go get yourself tested and send me the fucking results. Here, I’ll get you a card and you can send it to my office. You hear me?” He was rummaging around in his briefcase, which was on top of his suitcase. “What the fuck!” And he tipped the whole thing over, briefcase, suitcase, stand. They crashed against a little round table that held a small vase of tulips and when the table didn’t quite fall he pushed that over, too. Slowly I moved toward my clothes.

“I thought you guys were supposed to wear condoms.”

“I wouldn’t say I had a whole lot of choice about that last night.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means that your train was going into the station and there was nothing I could do to stop it.”

Then his pale-blue face knotted to one side. I’d never seen him cry. It never occurred to me Paul could cry. He stood there with a white towel wrapped around his thick waist, his hairless fat chest heaving, and his face all crumpled like a dirty napkin.

I continued to dress. Every movement hurt in some way. He wanted me to comfort him, to acknowledge his strange premature straight man’s middle-age crisis. Maybe he even wanted to have sex again.