Man About Town: A Novel Read Online Free PDF Page B

to accelerate, as of course nothing was going to come of this.
    “I was in LA for a few years and then—last six months or so I was staying with my family. But I … I had to get out. So I thought I’d see what Washington’s like.”
    “What’s it like?”
    “Expensive.”
    “I guess,” Joel said. “So are you planning to live here, or just visiting, or …”
    “I’m not sure.” This was astonishing. At forty, or whatever age he was, not to be sure even of where you lived; there was something at once thrilling and scary about it. Scary, mostly; the guy was looking down at the bar, brow furrowed, as if he had to decide his future right then.
    Joel, for his part, was looking at the guy’s knee, which peeked out through the tear in his jeans. Joel had never thought of the knee as an especially rousing body part. Now, after a few seconds, he had to make himself look up. To find the guy smiling at him and holding out a hand.
    “My name’s Paul.”
    “Joel.” They shook.
    “Nice to meet you, Joel.” He chugged the rest of his beer; this was a goodbye, not a hello. Another rejection, and this time not a little bruise. Joel felt a sudden wave of disproportionate sadness and longing. As though, if Paul had been willing, something might actually have happened. Was this possible? It must have been: how else to account for Joel’s elation when, a second later, Paul said, “Can I get you a drink?”
    How many years since Joel had been granted the elemental pleasure of
scoring:
the affirmation of his value, the warmth in his groin.
    Now he really needed to say, “No, I just stopped in for onedrink. I’ve got to be getting home and starting dinner for my lover …” He had had his little rush of self-esteem, what he must have come to Zippers for; only a louse would play games with this nice guy. This lonesome, affable guy whose naked knee was making Joel a little dizzy.
    “Sure,” Joel said. “A scotch and water, please.”
    Sam hadn’t, now that Joel thought back, suggested monogamy. Sam had announced it; that was how he and Joel reached agreements. Sam would say, “I’m giving up smoking,” and Joel would say, “Me, too.” Sam would say, “I’m not going to see anybody else any more,” and Joel would say, “Me either.” Nobody made Joel say, “Me either.” Sam was only talking about what
he
was doing, not commanding. Though it sort of went without saying that he couldn’t stop smoking in a smoke-filled apartment, or be faithful to a slut.
    On those occasions when Joel treated one of Sam’s announcements as the unilateral resolution it was—as, for example, when Sam said he wasn’t going to the Hill Club any more and Joel kept going—the silent reproach that greeted Joel when he got home was two-pronged. Not just, you went and got plastered again, you boring cretin. But also, I am strong and you are weak. If Joel did something Sam didn’t approve of but for which Sam had no predilection, like buying too many books, Sam would shake his head but it wouldn’t be a big deal. A big deal was when Joel did something that Sam was nobly refraining from.
    It would be a very big deal indeed if Joel were to fall off the wagon they’d ridden for twelve years and pick somebody up at Zippers. Of course he would have to tell about it. One of their rules, in the three or so years they had been together before monogamy set in, was that they always told about it.
    This seemed, suddenly, an especially silly rule. Why should Joel have to tell about something that was none of Sam’s business? A little excursion that had nothing to do with Joel andSam, that wouldn’t constitute a betrayal any more than it was a betrayal if Joel thought about someone other than Sam when he jerked off. What possible good could come from telling about it? An hour or so with this nice guy, one explosion—Joel wasn’t nineteen any more—one explosion and it would be over. Sam would be mad, coming home and finding no dinner. One