Sunday, 28 June 1992I am sitting outside in my backyard today, on a lawn chair minus the cushion (still very comfortable) with this wobbly TV tray which makes me write slow. I’ve been anxious all day today to not let my writing time slip away, and now that I’m here I don’t know what to write. I feel no guilt about the days elapsed since last time—Wednesday—and in fact I feel rather in sync with a sense of flow. In a writing space. I am itching to start a short story or anything at all. Now is the time, but the longer I feel that way without acting on it, the more “now” becomes no time at all.
I guess what I feel most right now is in love with myself. I am connected to a deep trust in myself. Sound corny? Probably. These few days Nick’s been visiting have been incredible. We came through the crisis of me telling him about David with a deepened commitment to each other. I am so very much in love with Nick. In fact, since last night I’ve been feeling anxious about this intimacy and I need to share this too with him.
I wept on his shoulder late late Friday night (early Saturday morning). I have not cried in four years. The story behind all this is one so important to me—it was a crucial experience that will stand out as one of those momentous occasions etched in memory. I want to write it out, to attempt to render in words the connection that was made. Yet I shy away from the challenge tonight. I’m feeling tired and think I need both a clear mind and a bit of distance in order to “do the job” right. Yet this is all that’s on my mind, or almost all.
Basically, the upshot of what happened is Nick revealed his true feelings about our open relationship. He said he felt pressured into agreeing to my suggestion way back in April, just before he left town, and has grown less and less comfortable with my sleeping with other people. We were at the point, talking about this Friday night, where the impasse seemed only to be resolvable by breaking up. Nick’s pain took the form of sarcastic jibes at me, and I was very impressed, actually, that I did not let things degenerate into a dirty fight.
By 2 AM, after long periods of nerve-wracking silence, us each scrunched into opposite sides of the futon, occasionally venturing hesitant caresses and squeezes, he suggested we go to bed.
The solemn, doleful preparation for bed was in marked contrast to our caressing reunion the night before, when he’d arrived at 2 AM. Twenty-four hours later, we lay in bed rigidly, barely touching.
“I want to touch you,” he said, his voice quavering with emotion.
“I want to touch you too…”
“But I can’t because I think of you touching other people the same way, saying the same things you say to me. It really hurts me to think the things you say to me are as worthless as that.”
I was in no position to answer.
“Did he spend the night?” Nick asked. He meant David, of course.
“Yes, he spent the night.”
“What about the other two?”
Quietly, I said, “I told you, Nick, they were both in their cars, at the park.”
“Sounds really spiritual!” He spat the words. I took his point. There was no point in trying to explain anything. My mind was muddy and sad.
Moments passed, and suddenly Nick slid on top of me.
“I want to meet him,” he said. He thrust his tongue in my confused mouth like a knife. Madly he kissed me, sucked my neck, chest, and especially my nipples (as only he knows how). I don’t remember when his underwear came off, but at this point he stripped me of mine. My dick was next on his agenda, and the slobbery sucking sounds gave voice to his pain and mine.
He came back to my bewildered face and peered at me expectantly.
I whispered that I loved him, that I was sorry I’d hurt him.
“Are you?”
“Yes I am.”
We hugged, clinging to each other. I wanted all this pain to go away. I wanted a simple salve for this sore spot we’d made.
As my mind churned, something emerged from deep within, a recess I don’t visit often. Was I sure? I was scared to say it aloud. I rolled it around in my mind.
Softer now, he said, “I understand that you felt we had an arrangement. I wish I’d told you how I really felt earlier.”
“It’s alright,” I said. There was a change, a movement here that opened the way for me to share my new idea.
“Can we work on this?” I asked, clutching his smooth, tanned arms, feeling the barrier starting to melt.
“Yes.”
“Because if we can work on this, come to understand each other better on this, to the point where we can come to an agreement or to the point where we realize we can’t come to an agreement and that’s it; well if we both really want to work on this, then I will give the other up. I won’t sleep around or anything until we’ve worked this out.”
He pulled me close into his chest. I was overcome by what this was. I faltered. “I’ll do that for you,” I said, “and I’ll do it for me too.” I burrowed into his neck and wept. The tears purged me of all my sins, minute concentrations of love. I uncovered something in that moment. I knew how deeply I loved him. And it sounds corny to say, but it was palpably true: I loved myself.
