Less(46)

Mohammed turns back and says, “Oh, but there is Wi-Fi in the desert.”

“There is?” Lewis asks.

“Oh, of course, everywhere,” Mohammed says, nodding.

“Oh good.”

Mohammed holds up one finger. “The problem is the password.”

Up and down the line the Bedouin chuckle.

“That’s the second time I’ve fallen for that one,” Lewis says, then looks back at Less and points.

There on the dune, beside the table, one of the camel boys has his arm around the other, and they sit there like that as they watch the sun. The dunes are turning the same shades of adobe and aqua as the buildings of Marrakech. Two boys, arms around each other. To Less, it seems so foreign. It makes him sad. In his world, he never sees straight men doing this. Just as a gay couple cannot walk hand in hand down the streets of Marrakech, he thinks, two men, best friends, cannot walk hand in hand down the streets of Chicago. They cannot sit on a dune like these teenagers and watch a sunset in each other’s embrace. This Tom Sawyer love for Huck Finn.



The encampment is a dream. Begin in the middle: a fire pit laden with gnarled acacia branches, surrounded by pillows, from which eight carpeted paths lead to eight plain canvas tents, each of which—outwardly no more than a smallish revival tent—opens onto a wonderland: a brass bed whose coverlet is sewn with tiny mirrors, nightstands and bedside lamps in beaten metal, a washbasin and coy little toilet behind a carved screen, and a vanity and full-length mirror. Less steps in and wonders: Who polished that mirror? Who filled the basin and cleaned the toilet? For that matter: who brought out these brass beds for spoiled creatures such as he, who brought the pillows and carpets, who said: “They will probably like the coverlet with the little mirrors”? On the nightstand: a dozen books in English, including a Peabody novel and books by three god-awful American writers who, as at an exclusive party at which one is destined to run into the most banal acquaintance, dispelling not only the notion of the party’s elegance but of one’s own, seem to turn to Less and say, “Oh, they let you in too?” And there among them: the latest from Finley Dwyer. Here in the Sahara, beside his big brass bed. Thanks, life!

From the north: a camel bellowing to spite the dusk.

From the south: Lewis screaming that there is a scorpion in his bed.

From the west: the tinkle of flatware as the Bedouin set their dinner table.

From the south again: Lewis shouting not to worry, it was just a paper clip.

From the east: the British technology-whiz-cum-nightclub-owner saying: “Guys? I don’t feel so great.”



Who remains? Just four of them at dinner: Less, Lewis, Zohra, and Mohammed. They finish the white wine by the fire and stare at one another across the flames; Mohammed quietly smokes a cigarette. Is it a cigarette? Zohra stands and says she’s going to bed so she can be beautiful for her birthday, good night, all, and look at all the stars! Mohammed vanishes into the darkness, and it is just Lewis and Less who remain.

“Arthur,” Lewis says in the crackling quiet, reclining on his pillows. “I’m glad you came.”

Less sighs and breathes in the night. Above them, the Milky Way rises in a plume of smoke. He turns to his friend in the firelight. “Happy anniversary, Lewis.”

“Thank you. Clark and I are divorcing.”

Less sits straight up on his cushion. “What?”

Lewis shrugs. “We decided a few months ago. I have been waiting to tell you.”

“Wait wait wait, what? What’s going on?”

“Shh, you’ll wake Zohra. And what’s-his-name.” He moves closer to Less, picking up his wineglass. “Well, you know when I met Clark. Back in New York, at the art gallery. And we did that cross-country dating for a while, and finally I asked him to move to San Francisco. We were in the back room of the Art Bar—you remember, where you used to be able to buy coke—on the couches, and Clark said, ‘All right, I’ll move to San Francisco. I’ll live with you. But only for ten years. After ten years, I’ll leave you.’”

Less looks around, but of course there is no one to share his disbelief. “You never told me that!”

“Yes, he said, ‘After ten years, I’ll leave you.’ And I said, ‘Oh, ten years, that seems like plenty!’ That was all we ever talked about it. He never worried about quitting his job or leaving his rent-controlled place, he never bugged me about whose pots we got to keep or whose we got to throw away. He just moved into my place and set up his life. Just like that.”

“I didn’t know any of this. I just thought you guys were together forever.”

“Of course you did. I mean, I did too, honestly.”

“Sorry, I’m just so surprised.”

“Well, after ten years he said, ‘Let’s take a trip to New York.’ So we went to New York. I’d forgotten all about the deal, really. Things were going so well, we were, you know, very very happy together. We had a hotel in SoHo above a Chinese lamp store. And he said, ‘Let’s go to the Art Bar.’ So we took a taxi, and we went to the back room, and we had a drink, and he said, ‘Well, the ten years are up, Lewis.’”

“This is Clark? Checking your expiration date?”

“I know, he’s hopeless. He’ll drink any old carton of milk. But it’s true. He said the ten years are up. And I said, ‘Are you fucking serious? Are you leaving me, Clark?’ And he said no. He wanted to stay.”